Legal Commentary

Some Interesting Tidbits from The Legal Intelligencer:

By David Post

Alert readers (of whom we have so many) may recall that several weeks ago I was involved in a minor flap with the Philadelphia Legal Intelligencer, the local trade publication for attorneys in the Philly area. I had posted a rather scathing critique of an article in the Intelligencer (and I reproduced the article, in full, in my blog posting because the Intelligencer text was behind a paywall, and I therefore couldn?t make the critical points I was trying to make without showing exactly what the article said); the Intelligencer responded with a ?takedown notice? asserting infringement of their copyright in the article (with which we complied ? notwithstanding my position that I had a clear ?fair use? defense to the infringement claim).

So just to show how fair-minded I am, I thought I should note that yesterdays Intelligencer has not one, not two, but three really interesting articles about curious legal developments ? AND that it appears that they?ve altered their web access policy to allow visitors to access the text of the day?s paper without payment, a small victory for open access, perhaps.

1. The ongoing saga for the incredibly ugly Luzerne County, PA ?Cash for Kids? scandal. I blogged about this alot when it first hit ? see here and here ? a couple of state court judges in and around Wilkes-Barre who engaged in a revolting kickback scheme whereby kids were sent to a new, privately-run detention center in exchange for cash payments to the sentencing judges. The judges were held to be immune to civil suits for damages (under the doctrine of judicial immunity for official acts), but the trial of one of them on federal racketeering, extortion, and related charges has now just gone to the jury. As I?ve indicated before, for these guys, burning eternally in hellfire wouldn?t be too cruel (or unusual?) a punishment ? ruining the lives of a few hundred kids because you?ve maxed out on your credit card is just about as loathsome a thing as one can imagine.

2. Eastern PA?s trusty public system, SEPTA, recently won a negligence suit against it by introducing into evidence nothing other than the security video from the bus on which plaintiff?s injury allegedly occurred ? to show that while the bus was indeed involved in a fender bender, the event was so insignificant that it couldn?t possibly have caused plaintiff?s injuries (for which she sought recovery of $130,000). Nice! I?m sure there are some nasty privacy implications, but it looks like a pretty decent use of the technology to me.

3. Finally, the strangest one of all: an associate professor at the Widener Law School has been put on administrative leave, and is being investigated, for ?allegedly using ?violent scenarios? in his criminal law course that involved him murdering the Dean? of the school. Well. Impossible to tell whether this is a case of outrageous classroom behavior, or, as the professor claims, ?baseless claims from disgruntled students that I?m a bigoted racist? ? the Dean in question is a black woman ? ?with violent propensities.?

In any event ? good stuff! Well done, Intelligencer!

Full post as published by The Volokh Conspiracy on February 17, 2011 (boomark / email).