They don’t call it Black Friday for nothing. A woman in a Los Angeles Walmart hit the store at 10:20 pm to grab the holiday deals only to find other customers rushing toward the items that she wanted. Police say that, as the coverings on the items were removed, she pepper sprayed the other customers. Twenty people were injured.
Continue reading “California Woman Pepper Sprays Other Customers To Get “Upper Hand” in Black Friday Deal”
Category: Criminal law
I previously wrote a column about the ongoing controversy over statutory rape prosecutions, the subject of prior blogs. Now, Grant County District Attorney Lisa Riniker appears intent on outdoing other prosecutors by charging a 6-year-old boy with first-degree sexual assault for what the family says was playing doctor with a 5-year-old girl.
As many of you know, I am lead counsel in the Sister Wives case challenging the constitutionality of Utah’s statute criminalizing plural or polygamous marriage. I also served as legal expert in the challenge to a similar law in Canada. The court has now ruled in that case and upheld the law in the decision below. While I strongly disagree with both the legal and factual conclusions of the Court, it is a decision that is worth reading. The decision can now be appealed to the higher courts in Canada.
Continue reading “Canadian Court Upholds Polygamy Law”
We previously followed the horrific story of an elderly man knocked unconscious by a teenager while his friends laughed and mocked the man at a CTA station. He is Scotty Strahan, 18, who does appear to be the man in the widely viewed videotape on YouTube.
Continue reading “Chicago Police Arrest Alleged Attacker in YouTube Video”
Everyone person who has illusions about the still awaited breakout of democracy and freedom in Afghanistan should read the article below. It details the life of a woman called Gulnaz who was raped by her cousin’s husband and became pregnant. Rather than prosecute the man, she was convicted of sex outside of marriage and given a choice: marry your rapist or spend twelve years in jail. She has been serving the sentence with her daughter in jail in this abomination produced by Sharia law. In the meantime, the EU has yielded to demand by the Afghan government that it bar the showing of a movie featuring her story, and other women like her.
Continue reading “Meet Gulnaz: The Face of The Plight of Women in “Free” Afghanistan”
In Chesapeake, Virginia, Ashley Fowler, 22, is our latest example of an a human who allegedly expresses her feelings by killing or torturing a pet. In this case, it was a pet piglet of her friend’s former boyfriend, Zach Sawyer, who raised piglets as therapy after an accident. Fowler is accused of decapitating the piglet.
Continue reading “Virginia Woman Accused of Stabbing and Decapitating Piglet”
The Justice Department is infamous for conducting long investigations of its own attorneys and finding no grounds for criminal charges as in the dubious investigation of attorneys involved in the torture program. Now, a special prosecutor has found that (surprise) there is no basis for criminal charges against Justice Department officials who concealed evidence in the prosecution of former U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens in open contempt of court. The reason is something only found plausible in the Justice Department’s review of its own conduct: U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan failed to order them not to conceal evidence and comply with ethical rules. I kid you not.
Continue reading “Special Prosecutor: DOJ Attorneys Cannot Be Charged With Criminal Contempt Because They Were Not Ordered To Comply With Legal and Ethical Rules”
Two teenagers share a passing kiss is viewed by most people as a sign of young love. The assistant principal at Orange River Elementary School, however, viewed it as a matter for immediate police intervention. The teacher called in the Lee County Sheriff to handle the teens. As Oliver Wendell Holmes said “[t]he sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a great deal longer.” That was not even counting the time for arraignment in Florida.
Continue reading “Forbidden Love: Florida School Officials Reportedly Call In Police After Seeing Two Teens Kiss”
We have previously seen fake doctors arrested after harmful or lethal operations, often low-cost cosmetic surgeries. Few compete with the alleged medical practice of Oneal Ron Morris, who is accused of injecting the buttocks of women with cement and flat-tire sealant in her “practice.” The use of flat-tire sealant appears to be a favorite off-the-counter item for such faux cosmetic doctors, given past cases. She was charged criminally for practicing without a license and obviously can be sued civilly.
Continue reading “Meet Oneal Ron Morris: Alleged Fake Doctor Who Injected Victims With Cement and Flat-Tire Sealant For “Curvier” Bodies”
Kevin Daly, 22, may need both a clothing and legal make-over. He was not only arrested for allegedly driving drunk and crashing into a police cruiser, but was wearing a tee-shirt reading “I’m not an alcoholic, I’m a drunk. Alcoholics go to meetings.”
Submitted by Mike Spindell, Guest Blogger
Last week during a long road trip, I was listening to a CD from the band The Eagles. A song came on written by Don Henley and Glenn Frey the group’s songwriters and leaders. The song is called “Get Over It”. As the autumn beautiful Shenandoah Valley landscape was passing by, a line from the song jarred me from my motoring reverie and made me think of this blog. The line was:
“The more I think about it, Old Billy was right
Let’s kill all the lawyers, kill ’em tonight.”
Continue reading “Let’s Kill All The Lawyers?”
Submitted by Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
It must have been that scene from Splendor in the Grass. You know the one where she is called to “stand and deliver” by the Nurse Ratchet-like school marm on William Wordsworth’s poem Ode: Intimations of Immortality. It’s an uncomfortable, vulnerable, and powerful bit of celluloid as the emotionally torn teenage beauty struggles with life and youth lost, and then distraught bursts into tears only to flee the classroom. It seemed a requiem for the 60s, and the reason for the activism of its time. It’s a fair estimate of Wood’s own life, as well.
Submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
UPDATED: Newton’s Third Law of Motion is commonly expressed by the phrase “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction”. The action in question is the Occupy Wall Street Movement. The reaction in question is fear.
Huffington Post obtained a copy of a memo being sent by high-powered Washington lobbying firm Clark, Lytle, Geduldig, Cranford to one of its major Wall Street clients over Thanksgiving. Previously unnamed, it has been revealed that the major Wall Street client in question is the American Bankers Association. The four page memo was first revealed by MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, host of the show “Up with Chris Hayes“. The first two paragraphs of the memo are indicative of the mood and probably sets the tone for what many in the lobbying industry are having to admit as an inconvenient truth. Namely the truth that the OWS Movement is gaining traction for their cause and doing so in such a way that politicians are eventually going to be forced to put on the appearance of action in bringing the criminals on Wall Street to justice if not actually bring them to justice. The fear on behalf of the lobbyists and their Wall Street clients is palpable.
The first two paragraphs of the Thanksgiving Memo read as follows:
Continue reading “The Smell of Corporatist Fear, Smells Just Like . . . a Lobbyist Memo”
A math teacher in Fort Myers, Florida is under fire for teaching his students about supply and demand within a market-based system. Jeff Spires’ problem appears to be his choice of pedagogical vehicle: purchasing their own grades. Spires was suspended from Charlotte County High School in Charlotte County, Fla., without pay on Oct. 14 and resigned two weeks later. This “new math” approach could have promise for wider applications as discussed below. Think of it as a variation of Adam Smith’s work, a type of “Wealth of Students” approach to the job market.
Continue reading “Teaching Supply and Demand: Florida Teacher Accused of Selling Math Grades”
An Illinois man, Gary Winner, pleaded guilty to criminal charges in Rhode Island after selling “penis enlargers” to diabetes patients to help with “bladder control, urinary flow and prostate comfort.” This could make for an a particularly novel product liability claim as well as a negligence case.