Cultivated Compendium is my personal website with the occasional link to my reporting and to important, cutting-edge or interesting legal news.
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October 28th, 2013
The Washington Post reports on a study done by liberal group Center for American Progress of "seven state supreme court elections in which spending exceeded $3 million for the first time between 2000 and 2007. CAP then compared rulings in the five years before and after those elections." The group found a correlation between that increased campaign spending, including by outside groups, with an increase by pro-prosecution, anti-... Continue Reading
October 28th, 2013
There is a current debate in Connecticut on where to draw the line on access t0 law enforcement records like 911 tapes and crime-scene photos and the public's right to know in the wake of the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School. An attorney for most of the families of the Sandy Hook victims testified at a legislative task force that they do not want public disclosure of the 911 calls made because of the shooting, The Norwich Bulletin... Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
California has enacted a law to make it easier for the wrongfully convicted to get compensation for the time they spent imprisoned, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported. Under a prior statute, defendants who were let go had to prove their innocence before they could get compensated for their wrongful imprisonment. Only 11 of 132 people released from California prisons since 2000 because they were wrongfully convicted were able to get... Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
A year after Superstorm Sandy hit the East Coast, "thousands of people still trying to fix their soaked and surf-battered homes are being stymied by bureaucracy, insurance disputes and uncertainty over whether they can afford to rebuild," the Associated Press reported. Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
The Republican majority leader of the Pennsylvania Senate is weighing several changes to the state's five-year-old right-to-know law, according to a report from The Harrisburg Patriot-News.
The proposed changes include:
- making state-affiliated universities like Penn State subject to the law in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky sex-abuse scandal;
- controlling the number of right-to-know requests from prisoners (although carving out... Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
At least three cable companies are considering circumventing the billions of dollars of retransmission fees they have to pay to broadcast TV companies by capturing free broadcast-TV signals themselves, Bloomberg reports. The cable companies would be mimicking the business model of Aereo and FilmOn X, which have developed Internet streaming services in which they retransmit free broadcast programming to subscribers through individualized... Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
The Wisconsin Supreme Court heard oral argments last week in a case in which conservative plaintiffs argue the state's domestic partner registry violates the state constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has a conservative-leaning majority, The Associated Press reported. The registry gives legal rights to same-sex couples like "the right to visit each other in hospitals and make end-of-life decisions for... Continue Reading
October 27th, 2013
The Washington Post reports that a defendant in a terrorism case has been informed by the U.S. Department of Justice that federal prosecutors want to use evidence generated from warrantless surveillance against him. The case is expect to generate a constitutional challenge. The case also could generated a U.S. Supreme Court test case. The Supreme Court rejected prior challenges to warrantless surveillance because the "lawyers, journalists... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
AP Editor William J. Kole writes that reason that his news organization requested the tapes of 911 calls made about the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., is because it would be in the public interest to examine "the law enforcement response to one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history." But, while Kole said a prosecutor's refusal to release the records breaks the law, he also points out... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
The New York Times' Jim Dwyer makes the point that confessions, but not entire interrogiations, are recorded in New York. But it's documenting entire interrogations that could stop people being wrongfully convicted after they give false confessions. Dwyer writes: "They’ve been recording confessions for years — true confessions, false confessions, they pretty much all look the same. But after so many people who... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
The Federal Trade Commission is set to regulate connected devices that share consumer data. Or as GigaOm more pithily says it: the Internet of Things. Why does this matter? GigaOm reports: "There are two issues at play here, one being the privacy of consumer data and the other being the security of the networks delivering that data. The privacy issue, however, also contains a security dimension since the devices can share things that... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
Even as China's economy continues to thrive, issues with consumer safety have arisen not only with products sold abroad in the United States but domestically. In a promising sign that the rule of law is catching up to China's economic growth, Chinese consumer safety rules have been tightened. The changes, Reuters reported, "increase consumer powers, add rules for the booming Internet shopping sector and stiffen punishments for businesses that... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
The Second Circuit has rejected a $150,000 cap on individual donations to political action committees and independent-expenditure groups, Newsday reports. The ruling rises out of legsl action by supporters for NYC Republican Mayoral Candidate Joe Lhota.
The court granted injunctive relief on the grounds of the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United holding "that the government has no anti-corruption interest in limited independent... Continue Reading
October 25th, 2013
The Guardian has another scoop based on documents leaked by Edward Snowden: during the second term of the Bush presidential administration the National Security Agency memorialized that it tapped the phone calls of 35 world leaders after getting their numbers from a U.S. official in another department. The secret document stated no actionable intelligence arose from all that surveillance, The Guardian also reported. Continue Reading
October 24th, 2013
The New York Times reported that the U.S. Department of Justice is contemplating entering a deferred-prosecution agreement with JPMorgan for the Wall Street bank allegedly turning a blind eye to Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme. There is no record of any other investment bank entering such an agreement to resolve criminal charges, The Times also reported.
The consequences of bringing criminal charges against JPMorgan is potential harm... Continue Reading
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