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Recent Posts
- Oral argument to be replaced by Chat Bot
- 2023: Lunar New Year of the Rabbit
- The charade of appellate review
- Appellate Judges to be Replaced by ChatGPT
- ACT UP: HIV+ is not a sex offense.
- Getting AIDS from Typewriter Keys
- NY DA Supports Discrimination Against HIV+ Persons
- The Public Defender Card Game
- Maud Maron v. The Legal Aid Society
- I’m objective, thee is biased
- People’s briefs and other horror fiction
- “My pronouns are sheehurr… so yours would be?”
- May it really, really displease the court
- Defending the Second Amendment
- May It Displease the Court
- Covid in the Courtrooms: an Unnecessary Risk
- Judge Jack Weinstein 1921-2021
- In-Person Oral Argument Should Go the Way of the Dodo
- Convicting Bill Cosby: “An Unconstitutional Coercive Bait-and-Switch”
- Judge Conviser rips into SORA
- Adios, 2020!
- THE BEST OF APPELLATE SQUAWK 2010-2020
- Call a rose by any other name and it’ll see you in court
- Try the new high-tech system for alienating your clients
- Outdoor Public Defending
- Why do cops lie? Because judges believe them.
- Courts to replace juries with potted plants
- Do Statues Matter?
- Sexual thoughts and the First Amendment
- COVID-19 masks for judges
- Judges in trouble
- Hell hath no fury like a client scorned
- “Don’t you dare invite me to your stupid Zoom party!”
- Janitors, Catholic schoolteachers and the Hosanna exception
- Supreme Court hears robocall case, flushes toilet
- “Planet of the Humans”
- The virus, like the rain, falleth on the just and the unjust
- The NYC arraignment scandal: part 2
- NYC courtrooms: the arraignment scandal
- Squawk under house arrest
- Must be true, says so right here in the Probation Report
- Discovery reform in Brooklyn: fuggetabout WitCom
- Happy Lunar New Year 2020: Year of the Rat
- The Sex Offender Bus
- Head for the hills, discovery reform arrives with the New Year!
- Annals of Social Injustice: Affluent People Drinking Rosé in Central Park
- Is it silly to demand transparency from appellate courts?
- “Your question has nothing to do with this case, Judge.”
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- Let’s keep dogs off the witness stand.
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Category Archives: Law
The charade of appellate review
“He’s a good man,” argued the Guv, defending her pick for Chief Judge – a veiled reference to the last one, who suddenly resigned amidst ethical inquiries. Besides, he’s “of color,” so what’s the problem? A bevy of law profs … Continue reading
Appellate Judges to be Replaced by ChatGPT
Official Photograph of the Judges of the New Appellate Court Ushering in the most revolutionary innovation in legal drafting since dispensing with cuneiforms on clay tablets, the Administrator of Court Administration announced today that appellate judges will be replaced by … Continue reading
Convicting Bill Cosby: “An Unconstitutional Coercive Bait-and-Switch”
“They tell you to follow your dreams. Does anyone say you have to wake up first?” — Bill Cosby. The Constitution woke up. “While the prosecutor’s discretion in charging decisions is undoubtedly vast,” said the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, “it is … Continue reading
Posted in Law
Tagged Andrea Constand, Bill Cosby, Justice David Wecht, Phylicia Rashad
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The Court of Appeals believes the victim (even when the jury doesn’t)
Comes now New York’s highest court with the holding that an accuser’s trial testimony constitutes clear and convincing evidence of the truth of her accusations, even though the jury found her not credible and acquitted the defendant of those charges. In … Continue reading
Posted in Law, Law & Parody, Satirical cartoons, SORA
Tagged NY Court of Appeals, People v. Bretton
11 Comments
Relax, baby, I’m gay.
The Second Circuit has just held that it was wrong to fire a skydiving instructor for telling a customer he was gay. Under Title VII of the federal law, a person can’t be “discharged because of a homophobic customer.” Zarda v. … Continue reading
Appellate Squawk’s Institute of Continuing Legal Education
Addition and Subtraction for Attorneys Explore the mysteries of arithmetic in this empowering seminar guaranteed to improve your ability to calculate everything from billable hours to SORA points. Prerequisite: Introduction to Counting. How to Use Comas and Other Punctuation The nuts and … Continue reading
The Case of Masterpiece Cakeshop
What’s an evangelical Christian baker to do when asked to design and decorate a custom cake for a gay wedding? If he complies, he violates his religious objections to same-sex marriage. If he refuses, he’s prosecuted for violating the public … Continue reading
“The War on Sex”
As anyone knows who litigates SORA hearings, reason and a dime will get you a cup of coffee. The “research,” endorsed by the Supreme Court, showing that sex offenders have a “frighteningly high” rate of recidivism comes from a … Continue reading
Vwar deer or vor dire? A guest post from the Public Defender of Harris Co., Texas
Alex Bunin founded the first and only public defender’s office in Houston, Texas, replacing the traditional folk custom of appointment-by-donation-to-the-judge’s-campaign. Asked in an interview with Simple Justice how he was received by the Jumbo State’s legal establishment, Alex said, “The biggest obstacle … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal law, Humor, Law, Satirical cartoons
Tagged Alex Bunin, Harris County Public Defender
2 Comments
Do prosecutors know the truth from a lie?
Word is that California plans to make it a felony for prosecutors to hide exculpatory evidence from the defense. That’s harsh: to the prosecutor cerebellum, “exculpatory evidence” is a contradiction in terms. After all, the defendant is obviously guilty or they … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal Defense Appeals, Criminal law, Humor, Law, Law & Parody, Satirical cartoons
Tagged Brady, prosecutors
1 Comment
Homeland Security announces contest for best sex offender passport design
Last February Congress passed the “International Megan’s Law,” requiring registered sex offenders to have a conspicuous mark on their passports identifying them as such. A federal court summarily dismissed a lawsuit challenging the law, saying that, since the government has … Continue reading
Posted in Civil Liberties, Humor, Law, Law & Parody, Satirical cartoons, SORA
Tagged International Megan's Law
3 Comments
SORA: The human cost of junk science
Of the nearly 40,000 persons on New York’s sex offender registry, 9,679 are displayed on its public website as Level 3, a warning that he or she presents the maximum risk of committing a sex crime of maximum seriousness. … Continue reading
The NY Court of Appeals gets its comeuppance
When it comes to federal habeas petitions, never has so much been denied to so many by so few. To the prisoner, a habeas is the last bastion of hope. To the federal judish, it’s the occasion for assuring state … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal Defense Appeals, Criminal law, Judges, Law, Satirical cartoons
Tagged Brady material, federal habeas, People v. Fuentes, Second Circuit
7 Comments
Guest Post: Exoneration after 25 Years Is Great but Competent Appellate Review at the Time Would Have Been Better
When Andre Hatchett was exonerated after serving half his life in prison for a murder he didn’t commit, the deceptively mild-mannered Ursula Bentele, Professor Emerita of Brooklyn Law School, commented that the Appellate Division had every reason to know at … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal Defense Appeals, Criminal law, Law
Tagged Andre Hatchett, Brooklyn Law School, Innocence Project, Ursula Bentele
6 Comments
Punishing misconduct: Prosecutors can dish it out but can’t take it
Once again the NY State District Attorney lobby has strongarmed the Legislature into not even voting on a bill that would hold prosecutors accountable for misconduct (NY Law Journal 6/22/2016). The idea of “subjecting already busy prosecutors to investigations and hearings … Continue reading
Posted in Humor, Law, Law & Parody
Tagged NY State District Attorneys Association, Prosecutor misconduct
2 Comments
Court of Appeals to Squawk: Drop Dead
Sigh. Another drop-dead letter from the NY Court of Appeals, the second one this week. The first denied leave to appeal where our client got 107 years after a trial that he spent mostly down in the courthouse pens because … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal Defense Appeals, Criminal law, Judges, Law, SORA
Tagged NY Court of Appeals, SORA Risk Assessment Instrument
1 Comment
Time for courts to put their money where their mouth is about eyewitness misidentification
Courts make a lot of chin music about the perils of eyewitness misidentification. But when it comes to scrutinizing the suggestiveness of lineup procedures. . . . . . everyone is expected to take the cops’ word for it that … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal law, Humor, Judges, Law, Law & Parody, Satirical cartoons
Tagged eyewitness identification, suggestive lineups
1 Comment
Sheldon Silver’s Life Matters: Part 2
Prosecutor Preet Bharara, come to save the day from Injustice and Corruption, howled for a 14-year sentence, saying, “There is no excuse or mitigating factor tempering the seriousness of Silver’s crimes.” A hundred letters to Judge Caproni pleading for a … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal law, Law
3 Comments
Sheldon Silver’s Life Matters
It’s a bizarre society where a cop can choke a helpless man to death in front of a camera and not be indicted, while 72-year old former Speaker of the Assembly Sheldon Silver, who’s devoted his life to public service, … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal law, Judges, Law
Tagged FBI Exigent Letters, Sheldon Silver, Valerie Caproni
3 Comments
We find no error “under the circumstances”
Step right up folks, and guess which shell has the reversible error under it. Pick the right one and you get a reversal for your client’s case. How about you, sir? The one under my hand? Whupp! Nope, that’s harmless … Continue reading
Posted in Criminal Defense Appeals, Criminal law, Humor, Judges, Law, Law & Parody, Satirical cartoons
Tagged Appellate review, shell game
1 Comment
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