“Obama ‘HOPE’ poster artist pleads guilty to contempt”

Locked in litigation with the Associated Press over whether his famous poster improperly infringed on the copyright of the news photograph on which it was based, Shepard Fairey did not conduct himself well. According to U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, Fairey “went to extreme lengths to obtain an unfair and illegal advantage in his civil litigation, creating fake documents and destroying others in an effort to subvert the civil discovery process.” [AP]

Disabled-hiring “goals” for federal contractors

I’ve got a new op-ed at the Daily Caller on one of Washington’s more ambitious schemes of arm-twisting private businesses for the presumed good of society, and a post at Cato at Liberty tying it in with the curious legal situation in which — even before quotas! — some employers feel obliged not to discriminate against school-bus-driver applicants who’ve recently been in rehab. The WSJ covers the story today too. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking is here (& Disability Law, more, Bader).

Dharun Ravi on trial for “bias intimidation”

Assuming the Rutgers roommate/consummate jerk should be facing criminal charges in the aftermath of Tyler Clementi’s suicide — a big if — it shouldn’t be over purported “bias intimidation,” argues Jacob Sullum [Reason, more; Jersey Conservative] Earlier on the Clementi case here, here, and here. And a Boston case has prompted questions about the reach of hate-crime law: “Are Lesbian Gay-Bashers Guilty of a Hate Crime?” [Atlantic Wire]

Related: At Psychology Today, Israel (Izzy) Kalman writes a blog critical of the rise of the “anti-bullying industry” and attendant efforts to criminalize for the first time many personal interactions both verbal and behavioral.

February 29 roundup

  • Jackpot justice and New Jersey pharmacies (with both a Whitney Houston and a Ted Frank angle) [Fox, PoL, our Jan. 3 post]
  • New Mexico: “Trial lawyers object to spaceport limits” [Las Cruces Bulletin]
  • Dodd-Frank: too big not to fail [The Economist] Robert Teitelman (The Deal) on new Stephen Bainbridge book Corporate Governance After the Financial Crisis [HuffPo] Securities suits: “trial lawyers probably won’t be able to defend a defective system forever” [WSJ Dealpolitik]
  • Uh-oh: U.K. Labour opposition looks at unleashing U.S.-style class actions [Guardian] “U.K. Moves ‘No Win, No Fee’ Litigation Reforms to 2013” [Suzi Ring, Legal Week]
  • More on controls on cold medicines as anti-meth measure [Radley Balko, Megan McArdle, Xeni Jardin, earlier here, here, here]
  • Recognizable at a distance: “In Germany, a Limp Domestic Economy Stifled by Regulation” [NY Times]
  • Fewer lawyers in Congress these days [WSJ Law Blog]

How to handle serial litigants?

In southern California’s sprawling Orange County (population 3 million), 77 people have been placed on the courts’ vexatious litigant list, but it’s not an easy matter to get someone on. “A Huntington Beach woman recently filed 47 lawsuits in a matter of months against various agencies including the city, the District Attorney’s Office and the Orange County Sheriff’s Department…. She sued Huntington Beach saying she wants more plants near parking lots.” [Orange County Register]

Labor and employment roundup

Supreme Court to review Alien Tort Statute

In the case of Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum, scheduled for argument Tuesday, the Supreme Court will consider curbing the modern scope of the Alien Tort Statute, which asserts U.S. jurisdiction over various human rights controversies arising within the bounds of other countries. [Reuters, earlier] Considering that it amounts to the Law of the Hegemon, the Statute is oddly popular in some Left circles [Kenneth Anderson/Volokh] European governments (Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands) have filed amicus briefs on the defense side [John Bellinger, Lawfare; more, WaPo]

More: The New York Times’s Room for Debate discussion includes a contribution by my Cato colleague Ilya Shapiro. And Point of Law is having a featured discussion on the case with David Weissbrodt of the University of Minnesota and Julian Ku of Hofstra.