- Kentucky: “The day before the deal was offered, prosecutors also indicted Card’s wife, mother and father. If Card gave up the cash, the written plea offer said, the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office would drop their charges, too.” [Jacob Ryan, WFPL] Same state, different case: “Conviction Or Not, Seized Cash Is ‘Cost of Doing Business’ In Louisville” [Jacob Ryan, Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting]
- Judge in New York: “Suffolk County may not charge $80 to resolve a $50 red light camera ticket.” [The Newspaper]
- “Civil Forfeiture Disenfranchises the Poor” [Cato Daily Podcast with South Carolina lawmaker Alan Clemmons and Caleb Brown] “Class-Action Lawsuit Challenges Detroit’s Asset Forfeiture Racket” [C.J. Ciaramella, Reason]
- “Father and adult daughter sue feds over confiscated life savings” [Theresa Braine, New York Daily News]
- “Free to Drive: States punish poverty by suspending millions of driver’s licenses for unpaid fines and fees” How about reserving license suspensions for instances of actual unsafety? [advocacy site with maps and more; related, Tachana Marc, Florida Policy Institute; New York state advocacy site]
- “Missouri Cops Used Federal Loophole To Seize $2.6 Million From Drivers Who They Never Charged With Crimes” [Zuri Davis]
Posts Tagged ‘Long Island’
For Long Island prosecutors, a merry forfeiture feast
“Prosecutors in Suffolk County, New York gave themselves $3.25 million in bonuses — from the asset forfeiture fund, of course.” [David Schwartz, Newsday]
P.S. Wyoming highway cops seized $91,800 from motorist Phil Parhamovich, claiming he gave it to them voluntarily; shortly after the Institute for Justice launched a national publicity campaign on the musician’s behalf, a judge reversed the seizure and ordered the money returned [Jacob Sullum/Reason, AP/Chicago Tribune] And a curious defense of the practice from a high Justice Department official [Tim Cushing, TechDirt (“DOJ: Civil Asset Forfeiture Is A Good Thing That Only Harms All Those Criminals We Never Arrest”)]
Labor and employment roundup
- Sending a letter to your employees informing them of a pending EEOC investigation might itself violate discrimination laws [Jon Hyman] More: Jerome Woehrle;
- As its fiscal year 2017 closes, a “return to frantic filing” at the EEOC [Matthew J. Gagnon, Christopher J. DeGroff, and Gerald L. Maatman, Jr., Seyfarth Shaw]
- Once occupational licensure is in place, it’s hard to pry off established interests that grow up around it [Steve Bates, Society for Human Resource Management, and thanks for quotes]
- Nassau’s labor unions say it’s “impossible” to summarize their contracts with county, as financial control board would like [Robert Brodsky, Newsday]
- “Michigan’s pension reforms are kind of a big deal” [Eric Boehm, Reason] “State Police Pay 43 Officers Over $300k Each To Not Retire” [Evan Carter, Michigan Capitol Confidential]
- “Organized Labor Wants to Push Out Local Restaurants and Raise Prices at Portland International Airport” [Nigel Jaquiss, Willamette Week]
Law enforcement for profit roundup
- Missouri law incentivizes local ticket-writing, Illinois not so much. Guess how municipalities respond? [Jesse Walker] “Ferguson’s Court Fine Scandal Arose Because Of Its Bloated Government” [Scott Beyer; earlier on fines and fees in Ferguson here, here, here, here, here, here, here, etc.] “Nassau’s top cop orders retraining of officers who write fewest tickets” [Newsday via @GoLongIsland]
- Maryland House passes forfeiture reform 81-54, with nearly all GOPers voting against the property rights side [my Free State Notes post, Maryland Reporter and more (Baltimore County Del. and former police officer John Cluster “said he hadn’t seen a single case of abuse in his time”), Jason Boisvert]
- “Quiet change expands ATF power to seize property” [Adam Bates, Cato]
- Meanwhile on the civil side, hedge funds place heavy bets on litigation finance [Paul Barrett, Business Week]
- In news that will surprise few libertarians, debt collection on behalf of government agencies is fraught with problems [CNN project overview links to individual stories]
- Among its numerous other problems, pending “human trafficking” bill would establish a fund to cycle fines back to law enforcement and victim advocates [Elizabeth Nolan Brown, Reason]
- Investigation into forfeiture in Indiana [Indianapolis Star]
January 12 roundup
- “Don’t the attorneys who bring these [sled injury municipal] lawsuits have kids and don’t any of them go sledding together?” [Abby Schachter, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, quoting my response to that question; Nicole Kaeding, Cato; earlier]
- Eighth Circuit sends back for reconsideration lower court’s $4.7 million fee award against EEOC to trucking company it sued [Transport Topics, opinion, earlier]
- Long Island: judges have awarded at least $638K in court appointments to influential Nassau Democrat [Newsday]
- Or just call them “competition”: “Uber Called ‘Criminal Enterprise’ by Philadelphia Cab Owners” [Bloomberg]
- Update: New Jersey attorney Paul Bergrin loses appeal in “No Kemo, no case” witness murder affair [opinion, 2012 round, earlier]
- More on flaws of suit seeking to blame gun business for Sandy Hook massacre [Nicholas Johnson, Liberty and Law, earlier]
- Local man tips Eugene Volokh, Ken White (Popehat), and Steve Hayward (Power Line Blog) to irresistible free-speech story, internet goes crazy [Pete McCarthy, Frederick News Post, on how Kirby Delauter story went viral; earlier]
“New York Woman Sues Police for Not Arresting Son”
“A Long Island woman says in a lawsuit that her 29-year-old son died in a drunken driving crash because police decided not to arrest him on DWI charges earlier that night…. Restaurant chain Ruby Tuesday’s is also named in the lawsuit, because [the late Peter] Fedden was drinking there before the two crashes, according to [Fedden family lawyer Harry] Thomasson.” [NBC New York, auto-plays]
Schools roundup
- UCLA admins grovel, humiliate veteran profs over charges of “microaggression” [Heather Mac Donald, City Journal] Meanwhile, this piece on overuse of disability card/trigger warnings in academic settings has already gotten labeled #AbleistAbuse so read at own risk [June Thunderstorm, The Baffler]
- Toughened D.C. truancy laws “flooding schools with paperwork and pushing tardy students into the criminal justice system” [WP]
- Polite opinion beginning to turn in favor of procedural protections for accused in campus sex cases? [Ruth Marcus, Washington Post] Richard Painter: accused minorities may be at disadvantage under new house rules [Legal Ethics Forum]
- Schoolboy hurts himself opening emergency exit at back of bus, lawsuit follows [NY Daily News]
- Union fines Nassau Community College adjuncts for not “supporting” strike, including one who was on leave at time [Newsday] P.S. Union situation over at Rockland Community College has its own problems;
- Before registering for classes, students at some universities must submit to Title IX training with wildly intrusive personal questions [Susan Fruth, FIRE]
- Summary of Eric Hanushek’s expert report in Texas school finance case [Texas Public Policy Foundation]
Politics roundup
- Weekly Standard runs my parody song about the local governor’s race, “Show Me the Way to Frederickstown, or, Lost in Maryland“; Update: Here’s Lauren Weiner’s rendition, to the tune of “Sweet Betsy from Pike.” Freelance writer Lauren Weiner has lived in Baltimore since 1992. [improved YouTube link with video]
- Also on Maryland governor’s race: it’s not every day a GOP challenger blames a Democratic incumbent for issuing too few pardons [Radley Balko; more on clemency]
- Harry Reid forces are latest to demagogue Stand Your Ground laws and role of American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), but Glenn Kessler calls them on it with Four Pinocchios [Washington Post “Fact Checker”]
- Enough non-citizens vote illegally “that their participation can change the outcome of close races.” [Jesse Richman and David Earnest, Washington Post Monkey Cage; a response]
- State attorney general offices are now politicized and targets of lobbying, and why should we be surprised at that given all the power they’ve grabbed for themselves as business regulators in recent years? [David Boaz, Cato] Hot state-AG races this year include Wisconsin, Nevada, New Mexico, Arkansas [John Fund]
- Two views on Alabama proposed Amendment One, curbing use of foreign law: Paul Horwitz (adds nothing to Alabama constitution not already there), Quin Hillyer (insurance against bad judicial decisionmaking);
- More about the Greg Abbott tree-fall settlement called into question by opponent Wendy Davis [Hugh Kelly, TLR, earlier]
- Long Island legislator withdraws from State Senate race after charges of high-dollar law-firm misconduct [Newsday]
- Defaulted mortgages: “Coakley lawsuit has ties to key backer’s interests” [Boston Globe via Funnell] Flashback: Radley Balko in 2010 on Martha Coakley’s awful prosecutorial record (up to that point) [Politico; related, Harvey Silverglate on prosecutors who run for higher office; earlier]
“Iowa Troopers Steal $100,000 in Poker Winnings From Two Players Driving Through”
Jacob Sullum traces how a gambling jackpot magically became a forfeiture jackpot (also from him, a history of how forfeiture law got so bad). The Washington Post followed up last month on its multi-part, front-page exposure of forfeiture law (Tim Lynch and Scott Shackford summarize some of its findings) with an op-ed from two former DoJ officials calling for abolition of the program they once helped run; Scott Greenfield has commentary on that as well as more generally on the costs of defense in forfeiture cases and on Nassau County, N.Y.’s resumption of the seizure of cars being driven by persons arrested for drunk driving, whether or not owned by those persons.
From today’s Washington Post: “Activists and Hill staffers meet to discuss curbs to asset-forfeiture laws”. And George Leef writes in Forbes: “Time For Civil Asset Forfeiture Laws To Meet The Same Fate As Jim Crow.”
Discrimination law roundup
- Mayor de Blasio settles firefighter bias suit on terms sympathetic to plaintiffs [City Journal: Dennis Saffran and Seth Barron]
- One way to dodge some Culture War fights: roll meaning of “public accommodation” back to travel, lodgings, places of public amusement, etc. [Andrew Kloster, Heritage] As original/creative expression goes, florists and cake-bakers sometimes outdo NYT’s Greenhouse [Ann Althouse] From Dixie Chicks to Hobby Lobby, few escape hypocrisy when commerce collides with convictions [Barton Hinkle]
- Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights investigating Florida’s popular Bright Futures college scholarship program [Orlando Sentinel]
- Do EEOC mediators overstate risk of legal action to extract big settlements from employers? [Bloomberg BNA, Merrily Archer on survey] New Colorado expansion of employment liability bad news for large and small employers alike [Archer]
- “Religious exemptions — a guide for the confused” [Eugene Volokh]
- Washington Post columnist repeats myth that Lilly Ledbetter “did not know she was being paid less than male counterparts” until after statute of limitations had run; Hans Bader corrects [letter to editor]
- If helping out local people was one reason your town decided to back public housing, you might have been played for suckers [AP on DoJ suit against Long Island town over local preference]