Cultivated Compendium

TV broadcasters have gained an ally in the federal government in a U.S. Supreme Court case that could reshape the contours of copyright law and broadcast TV. Re/code reports that the Justice Department filed an amicus brief in which they argued that Aereo's transmission of free broadcast TV programming over the Internet violates copyright law. But the governmental lawyers said a ruling against Aereo wouldn't threaten technologies like cloud computing when involving the remote storage and streaming of legally acquired copies of copyrighted works, Re/code further reports.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan has ruled that Steven Donziger and his co-counsel obtaind a $9.5 billion environmental judgment in Ecuador against Chevron by "corrupt means," The Wall Street Journal reports. The judge ruled that, while Donziger started legal work in the case to improve conditions where his clients lived, his co-counsel and he "engaged in coercion, bribery, money laundering and other criminal conduct," including ghostwriting an expert report for a court-appointed expert, WSJ also reports.

The National Law Journal's Mike Scarcella reports that the First Circuit, "while noting its concern about prolonged electronic surveillance, dismissed a Fourth Amendment challenge over law enforcement's secret monitoring of a suspect's vehicle." The appellate court concluded that federal law enforcement acted in good faith to use warrantless GPS tracking on a arson suspect's vehicle because they had good reason to suspect him of being a serial arsonist, NLJ reports..
 

The Associated Press reports on U.S. Supreme Court arguments held yesterday on how states evaluate mental disability in order to decide whether murder defendants can be executed. Execution of the mentally disabled is unconstitutional.

"Five justices, enough to form a majority, pointed repeatedly to the margin of error inherent in IQ and other standardized tests. They voiced skepticism about the practice in Florida and certain other states of barring an inmate from claiming mental disability when his IQ score is just above 70," AP also reports. The advocate for  not allowing inmates to be executed when their IQ scores are just above 70 conceded that a score of 76 would preclude an inmate from arguing mental disability.

The National Law Journal's Tony Mauro reports that the U.S. Supreme Court appears to be "mostly sympathetic" to the Environmental Protection Agency's climate-change regulation: "Any hope among industry advocates that the U.S. Supreme Court might ban Environmental Protection Agency regulation of greenhouse gases altogether went up in smoke, so to speak, during more than 90 minutes of spirited argument last week. For one thing, Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justice Anthony Kennedy both suggested the court has some obligation not to ignore the court's 2007 precedent Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency. That decision said the EPA did have authority to regulate greenhouse gases emitted by motor vehicles. For another, even Peter Keisler, the lawyer for five sets of private challengers to EPA regulation, acknowledged during the argument Feb. 24 that the EPA's mandate extended to stationary sources under other parts of the Clean Air Act — just not the part at issue in the case being argued."

Yale Law Professor Judith Resnik opined in the New York Times against Delaware's effort to fight against the growing market in private dispute resolution by allowing litigants to use Delaware's chancery judges for secret arbitrations if the businesses had at least $1 million at stake, paid $12,000 in filing fees and paid $6,000 per day: "The Delaware legislation is a dramatic example of rich litigants using their resources to close court systems that taxpayers support and constitutions require. But the problem goes beyond Delaware. To honor constitutional commitments that 'all courts shall be open,' the court should refuse the Delaware judges’ request, and Congress should restore rights to public courts for consumer and employment disputes." A split Third Circuit ruled against the constitutionality of the program, and the Delaware Court of Chancery is seeking certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Washington Post reports on "the legal gusher" facing BP in the federal courts in New Orleans.

One issue involves the April 2012 settlement over economic harm to people and businesses, and how much causation plaintiffs have to show to be entitled to be paid by the special master administering payouts from the BP fund, The Post reports. "BP alleges that many of the 256,478 claims filed--by a parade of fishermen, hotels, surf shops, law firms, nursing homes, strip clubs and others — are unjustified or even fraudulent," The Post further reports.

Another issue The Post highlights are possible conflicts of interest in which a lawyer, appointed as the appeals coordinator for disputed claims in the settlement fund, got the job because his father, a federal judge, helped arrange it with the special master overseeing the fund. The judge's sister-in-law got hired at an accounting firm advising restaurant owners and suppliers seeking money from the BP settlement. The judge's brother and nephew work at a law firm representing clients seeking money from the fund. The judge and his wife have filed a claim for payment by BP, even though the judge oversaw the trial of a BP engineer convicted of obstruction of justice.

For two months, the Philadelphia Police Department has had a new policy to stop false confessions, including putting strict limits on how long suspects can be held for questioning and preventing witnesses from being taken from a crime scene to a detective division for questioning, the Philadelphia Daily News reports. There have been a couple hiccups. The PPD issued a three-page clarification about the new interview and interrogation policy, including that it is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment to temporarily detain people found at a crime scene even though they can refuse to be taken to a detective division, the Daily News further reports.

It's been reported before how Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr. told the Supreme Court no one had standing to challenge warrantless electronic surveillance because no criminal defendants had yet been caught by the program. Despite Verrilli's assurances to the court that defendants would receive notice if the evidence against them derived from warrantless surveillance, the Department of Justice was not giving any such notices. The Intercept notes that Verrilli himself might not have known at the time that the DOJ wasn't providing notice, and he successfully argued for a change in policy. But Dan Novack, writing in The Intercept, asks why the solicitor general has not yet corrected the record in the U.S. Supreme Court: " Lawyers have an ethical obligation to speak with candor to tribunals, especially when representing the government. Amazingly, Verrilli has managed to remain silent throughout this controversy. It’s past time we heard from him directly."