Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Archive for July, 2012

Police drones in the sky, cont’d


Caleb Brown interviews me for Cato’s Daily Podcast on the subject of law enforcement drones, which I wrote about yesterday. You can watch here.

Also, check out recent columns on the subject by my Cato colleagues Gene Healy and Nat Hentoff. As Healy points out, elected officials such as Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-Va.) and Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) have made remarkably blithe statements in favor of drone use, even as a defense contractor is perfecting tiny mechanized spies-in-the-sky that weigh no more than a battery and can perch on window ledges taking pictures of what is inside. (Another drone capability: intercepting nearby wireless communications.) Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has emerged as a leading critic (“when I’m separating out my recyclables, I don’t want them having a drone to make sure I’m putting my newspaper in the proper bin.”) The AP’s Joan Lowy covered the controversy last month.

Meanwhile, the chief practical obstacle to widespread drone deployment over U.S. skies — Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approval — was quietly gotten around this spring when Congress passed legislation directing the FAA to carve out an approved space for drones, a move that followed a strong lobbying push on the “pro” side and almost no organized opposition from privacy advocates, Fourth Amendment fans or anyone else (see T.W. Farnam’s excellent Washington Post account.) More on domestic drone lobbying from Andrea Stone at HuffPo and First Street Research.

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On the Gibson Guitar raid

Gibson CEO Henry Juszkiewicz, WSJ, excerpted at PoliceMisconduct.net:

In America alone, there are over 4,000 federal criminal offenses. Under the Lacey Act, for instance, citizens and business owners also need to know – and predict how the U.S. federal government will interpret – the laws of nearly 200 other countries on the globe as well. Many business owners have inadvertently broken obscure and highly technical foreign laws, landing them in prison for things like importing lobster tails in plastic rather than cardboard packaging (the violation of that Honduran law earned one man an eight-year prison sentence). Cases like this make it clear that the justice system has strayed from its constitutional purpose like stopping the real bad guys from bringing harm.

Harvey Silverglate says that while Juszkiewicz is right as far as he goes, he’s seeing only part of the picture. Earlier on the Gibson raid and Lacey Act here, here, etc.

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Labor and employment roundup

  • Why is the U.S. Department of Labor funding Restaurant Opportunities Center United (ROC), a group that stages protests in front of restaurants and has “harassed” patrons? Rep. Darrell Issa wants to know [Chamber-backed Legal NewsLine, Daily Caller]
  • Connecticut public workers who wrongly took food stamps get their jobs back, and no, you can’t read the arbitration decisions [Raising Hale]
  • Michael Fox’s pioneering employment law blog turns 10;
  • “Why Defending Employment Lawsuits Can Be So Expensive” [Daniel Schwartz]
  • What lawprofs are up to: proposal to gut the employee-misconduct defense [Pandya, Workplace Prof]
  • Hans Bader of the Competitive Enterprise Institute explains why he sees no contradiction in opposing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act [ENDA] while supporting gay marriage. Related: Jacob Sullum;
  • Hyper-regulation of employment in Italy cries out for reform [John Cochrane, Tom Smith, one deterrent]

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Drones overhead, snapping law-enforcement pics

We’re getting closer to that world very fast — and if you have Fourth Amendment qualms, maybe you’re the sort a drone-company exec responds to as follows:

“If you’re concerned about it, maybe there’s a reason we should be flying over you, right?” said Douglas McDonald, the company’s director of special operations and president of a local chapter of the unmanned vehicle trade group.

My new post at Cato at Liberty has much more (& Above the Law).

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Promoted from comments: the money from Prop 63

From this morning’s roundup:

Proceeds of California’s Prop 63 “millionaire’s tax” were supposedly earmarked for mental health. Here’s where the dollars have actually been spent [AP]

To which wfjag comments:

Where has the Prop 63 money to help people with mental illnesses gone?

The state has approved spending on acupuncture, art and drama classes, sweat lodges for American Indians, parenting courses for Spanish-speakers and massage chairs for students in Southern California. More than two dozen counties have spent money on anti-bullying programs and several have used it to fund horseback riding therapy, including a $944,843 program in Kings County.

Fresno County spent $315,000 on gardens for Hmong refugees. In San Francisco, Proposition 63 money pays for city workers with mental illness in their families to attend lunchtime yoga classes.

As a group, people with mental and emotional disabilities don’t tend to vote in large numbers. However, city workers, teachers and staff, and folks receiving money for ego-stroking programs do tend to turn out and vote for those who give them such money. So this shouldn’t come as a surprise.

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July 30 roundup

  • Backing down, sort of: “Menino says he can’t actively block Chick-Fil-A” [Boston Herald; Michael Graham on the Boston mayor’s curious standards] Glad for small favors: Maryland public officials have wisely stayed out of the fracas [my post at Maryland for All Families got an Instalanche, thanks Glenn Reynolds] Earlier here, here, here;
  • Trying to start a business in Greece? What to expect [Reuters on shrimp farm]
  • Proceeds of California’s Prop 63 “millionaire’s tax” were supposedly earmarked for mental health. Here’s where the dollars have actually been spent [AP]
  • George Will on prosecution of whale-watcher for “harassing” humpback [WaPo, our January coverage]
  • Tries to slide down banister four stories up, survivors now suing Chicago’s Palmer House hotel [Chicago Sun-Times]
  • Link bait: the ABA Journal picks the 12 greatest courtroom plays;
  • Prop 65 and carryout bags: “California, Land of the Free” [David Henderson]

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