Lowering the Bar

O.J. Simpson Arrested; Blames Police, J. Edgar Hoover

Former Heisman Trophy winner and "World's Greatest Dad" O.J. Simpson was arrested on Sunday and held on multiple felony charges in connection with an alleged robbery.  Police say that Simpson and several other men were involved in -- can I call it a "caper"?  Don't see why not -- a caper at the Palace Station casino-hotel in Las Vegas last Thursday night in which they barged into a room and took some of Simpson's sports memorabilia.  Simpson had been questioned immediately after the incident, but no one was taken into custody until today.

Simpson admitted last week that he had been in the room, but said no guns were involved and that he went there only to recover mementos that had been stolen from him to begin with, including his Hall of Fame certificate and -- most importantly -- a picture of Simpson with former F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover.  Simpson said he had been called several weeks ago by an auction-house owner named Tom Riccio, who told him that some "collectors" had a lot of his "stuff" and were planning to quietly sell it.  Conveniently, Simpson happened to be in Las Vegas that week anyway, and he arranged to meet Riccio, who had set up a meeting with the "collectors" without telling them O.J. was involved.

What could go wrong?

According to those in the room, Simpson and six or seven other men came "busting through the door . . . with guns, hollering and screaming," took Simpson's stuff and left.  Riccio, who claimed that the intent had been to either peacefully reclaim the stuff or call police, admitted that things had gone "haywire."

According to the Associated Press, "Simpson said he was accompanied by several men he met at a wedding cocktail party, and they took the collectibles."  (Emphasis added.)  "We walked into the room," he told a reporter.  "I'm the last one to go in, and when they see me, it's all 'Oh God.'"  But he said there were no guns and "nobody was roughed up."  Simpson admitted that he had not called the police to help, but said this was because he seems to have found the police unresponsive to him in recent years.  Or, as he put it, "[t]he police, since my trouble, have not worked out for me."

It appears that by "my trouble," Simpson is referring to allegations that he was somehow involved in the murder of his ex-wife and another man in 1994, although he was acquitted of that crime and so it seems to have all been a big misunderstanding.  It must have been a very traumatic experience for him, because otherwise you really wouldn't expect to hear a man describe the savage murder of two other people as "my trouble."  Perhaps the men in the room had heard something about these ridiculous allegations, so that "Oh God" may have meant something like "Oh God, please don't nearly cut our heads off as we've heard a still-unidentified person or persons did to your ex-wife for reasons still unknown."  This is the kind of stigma that O.J. apparently has had to live with since his trouble.

Anyway, I'm sure the truth about that will come out as part of the investigation into the Palace Station caper.  Another man was arrested Saturday night in connection with the same incident, after police searched two or three other residences (they did not say whose) and said they had found evidence of the crime.

Whether or not they recovered the precious J. Edgar Hoover memento is currently unknown.

Link:  AP via ESPN.com (Sept. 16)
Link:  AP via ESPN.com (Sept. 15)

Opinion Corrected: Replaces "Iggidy" With "Wiggity"

While the facts of the underlying opinion in U.S. v. Freeman aren't especially comical -- it was an appeal from a conviction and sentence on drug-conspiracy charges -- it does have some educational value.  The question was whether the district court had properly allowed the government's expert witness to testify "regarding the meaning of encoded drug language."  In part, this involved the witness's translation of certain terms that are "part of the jargon commonly used by drug traffickers."

But, possibly since much of this jargon is not commonly used by Ninth Circuit judges and clerks (presumably), the opinion had to be amended in August to make the following change:

Please make a note of it to avoid confusing "iggidy" with "wiggity" in your future briefing.

Link: Legal Pad (Cal Law)

Plain English Campaign: "If Nothing Needs to Be Said, Say Nothing"

In its latest act in defense of the language, today the Plain English Campaign went on the offensive against government signs and other warnings that do no more than state the obvious.  Saying that the statements are unnecessary and "assume a lack of intelligence on the part of the reader," the PEC called on the police, government agencies, and private organizations to stop.

Their primary example: a sign posted by police in Hertfordshire telling citizens: "Don't Commit Crime."  Other unnecessary government signs included "Warning: Platform Ends Here" and "Caution: Water on Road During Rain."

Obvious and (hopefully) unnecessary product warnings are also featured:

• A packet of nuts labeled "Warning: contains nuts";
• A can of pepper spray labeled "May irritate eyes";
• An airplane's emergency-exit door labeled "Do not open door while airborne except in emergency"; and
• A bike manual with the important warning, "Removing the wheel can influence the performance of the bicycle."  Dramatically, in fact.

The PEC also called on politicians to eliminate statements like "We are committed to improving the health service" and "We are taking the terrorist threat very seriously," which do not communicate useful information.  "Our advice," said a spokesman, "would be say what you need to plainly and simply then stop.  If nothing needs to be said, say nothing."

The Plain English Campaign is a great organization that has been around since 1979 and is very active in defense of the language.  The PEC publicizes good writing as well as bad, awarding its "Crystal Mark" to documents it has certified for clarity.  Organizations as a whole can also qualify.  I scanned the list, and while the UK Law Society itself (similar to U.S. bar organizations) had received the Mark, I saw few if any law firms on the list.  Something to strive for.

Go forth, write plainly, and don't commit crime.

Link: Yahoo! News
Link: Plain English Campaign
Link: Adam Freedman's Party of the First Part: Adventures in Legalese (blog)

Tool Sued

The New Orleans bureau has alerted me to a new lawsuit against the rock band Tool, filed in federal court in Louisiana.  Tool, whose music is described as "heavy metal," "alternative metal," "art rock," "art metal," "progressive rock," "progressive metal," "post-metal," and "genre-transgressing" in their extremely detailed Wikipedia article, was founded in 1990 and remains active today.  The band is also known for its creativity and elaborate stage shows and even packaging (Tool's album 10,000 Days won the 2006 Grammy for "Best Recording Package").

Turns out, all this time Tool has been exploiting Jason Crowley from Shreveport.

Crowley sued the band (named in the suit only as "Tool") on September 5, alleging that Tool had used him "to base their music on."  Crowley alleges that Tool uses his name in their music and has used his "likeness in video on screens on stage in live performances."  (Maybe this is the guy in the video for "Sober.")

More troubling is the allegation that Tool "managed to get into my apartment and place a ring, that you would wear on your hand, inside."  Crowley claims to have recently found a picture of said ring in a CD booklet insert.  He does not explain what Tool's motive might have been for breaking into his apartment and planting a ring (the hand kind) inside.  According to the complaint, Crowley has been trying to get the Shreveport Police Department interested in Tool (or at least the ring story) since 2003, but they accepted his report only in May of this year.

Crowley demands ten million dollars for "invasion of privacy, the use of my name, the images, and the trespassing."

Link:  Crowley v. Tool, Case No. 5:07cv1475 (W.D. La. filed Sept. 5, 2007) (PDF).
Link:  Justia Docket Search

Lawyers Attack Riot Police "With Furled Umbrellas"

From a New Yorker article in July about protests in Islamabad after the Chief Justice of Pakistan was suspended:

The largest crowd by far was made up of lawyers in starched collars, white shirts, and black suits.  They marched in orderly ranks, three abreast, like emperor penguins in a nature film.  Some held up very British-looking umbrellas, on which markedly un-catchy slogans, such as "Long Live Lawyers Unity," had been carefully daubed in white paint.

In earlier demonstrations, the lawyers had clashed with riot police, and the country's most senior barristers, silk ties flying, had responded with surprising vigor, hurling back tear-gas cannisters at staff-wielding policemen and jabbing at them with furled umbrellas.

Link: William Dalrymple, "Days of Rage," The New Yorker, July 23, 2007 at p. 26.

Spanish Thief Partly Like Robin Hood, Partly Not

In August, Spanish police finally captured "The Loner," the country's most wanted criminal.  The Loner, whose secret identity was Jaime Jimenez Arbe, had robbed more than 30 banks and killed three policemen during his crime spree.  But his lawyer has sought to portray Jimenez as a fighter for justice who robbed banks only because they stole from the public.

Reports have said that Jimenez "saw himself as a Robin Hood-style figure," but that doesn't seem to be completely accurate.  More specifically, the lawyer said that Jimenez thinks of himself as "Curro Jimenez," described as "a Spanish 1970s television bandit in the style of Robin Hood."

El bandolero Curro Jimenez.
Robaba a los ricos para dárselo a los pobres.

And the Jaime Jimenez version of the Curro Jimenez version of the style of Robin Hood seems to have lost something in translation.  Specifically, while The Loner did robaba a los ricos he had not quite gotten around to darselo a los pobres.  Police said that so far as they could tell, The Loner had not given any of the money away, but had stashed it in several different bank accounts.

Maybe he just wanted to get the first part of the style perfected before moving on.  That does seem to be the hard part.

The murder of three policemen is also a little inconsistent with the Robin Hood characterization, but Jimenez said in a letter to newspapers that he regretted the deaths.  "I am not a killer," he said (apparently meaning "one who enjoys killing" as opposed to "one who has killed," which he has), "and if I was obliged to shoot at officers of the law, it was always against my will and in order to avoid being arrested."  Again, without the "only trying to help others" part, this falls a little flat.

Jimenez's attorney also said that, at the time his client was arrested, he had finished with banks anyway and was planning to move on to insurance companies.

Link: Reuters

"American National" Sues All Nine Supreme Court Justices

Brave American citizen Jerry Brumbaugh struck a blow for freedom or something on Friday when he sued the nine current members of the United States Supreme Court for making rulings that have violated his constitutional rights.  Specifically, all of them (all the rulings and all the rights).

In the lawsuit, filed in the Springfield division of the Western District of Missouri, Brumbaugh takes issue with the Court's rulings that have "violated my constitutional rights . . . in all manners, ways, and areas of law."  These include:

• "Violation of civil liberties by allowing a granted clause of the Constitution to violate my rights in many manners and ways,"
• "Failing to correct violations of the Constitution which it is the duty of the Court to do," and
• "Allowing unlawfully the loss of civil liberties by contractual means into the sphere of the 14th Amendment."

We would probably all agree that there are lots of "violations of the Constitution" that the Court has been failing to correct, although we would probably all disagree about exactly what those violations are.  Perhaps hoping to save space, Brumbaugh does not allege any facts supporting his own personal claim.  It is refreshing to see a complaint limited to three pages (especially after last week's titanic 239-page "brief" on behalf of Jeff Skilling), but this one probably needed a little more detail.  And a little more research -- I know the liberal wing of the Court is in the minority these days, but it would still be polite to spell Justice Breyer's name correctly.

On the other hand, Brumbaugh's complaint is consistent with his position that, since he is "an American national citizen," those pesky Federal Rules of Procedure do not apply to him.  The argument seems to be that the Bill of Rights amended "every preceeding [sic] clause" of the Constitution, so that the 14th Amendment's Due Process Clause applies directly to the action, authorizing Jerry D. Brumbaugh to do whatever he wants: "Plaintiff hereby asserts that the rules may not be used to interfere with this case . . . nor its continuance before the courts."

That argument didn't fly in a previous case, Brumbaugh v. Tandy, to which Brumbaugh refers in this complaint in support of his request that counsel be appointed for him.  (In both cases, he has specifically requested Gerry Spence.)  The complaint in that case elaborated a bit on Brumbaugh's arguments, and made some more creative ones, such as the argument that the Privileges & Immunities Clause grants a "right to protection by the government," and "to allow a pro se litigant to flounder is a horrid violation of the right to protection."  Maybe so, but it can also be very entertaining.  I hereby assert the right to deny Mr. Brumbaugh counsel, as to appoint one would infringe upon my pursuit of happiness.

In Brumbaugh v. Thomas, et al., of course, plaintiff has taken a more direct approach, as his certificate of service indicates: "YOU ARE HEREBY GIVEN NOTICE THAT YOU NINE JUSTICES ARE BEING SUED FOR VIOLATIONS OF THE U.S. CONSTITUTION."  Should he prevail, he requests "a ruling that the judges [sic] of the U.S. Supreme Court have violated the Constitution," and as damages "the net worth of each justice as payment for their deriliction [sic] of duty."  You nine justices should take note.

Link:  Brumbaugh v. Thomas, et al., Case No. 07-CV-3295 (W.D. Mo. filed Sept. 7, 2007) (PDF).
Link: The Supreme Court (for now) of the United States

McDonald's Employee Charged With Oversalting Officer's Burger

Kendra Bull, a 20-year-old employee of a McDonald's in Union City, Georgia, was arrested Friday and now faces criminal charges for allegedly putting too much salt on a police officer's hamburger.

After using the drive-through, Officer Wendell Adams returned to the restaurant and told the manager that the burger had made him sick.  Bull admitted that she had accidentally spilled salt on some hamburger meat earlier, and said she told a supervisor and a co-worker, who "tried to thump the salt off" so the meat wouldn't be wasted.  But Officer Adams had heard enough.  He arrested Bull, who was charged with premeditated overseasoning -- okay, misdemeanor reckless conduct -- and spent the night in jail.

Bull said that she did not intentionally serve the salty burger to a police officer (good thing, since that probably violates the PATRIOT Act), and can't even see the drive-through window from her work area.  But according to a city spokesman, Bull was charged with a crime because she served the hamburger "without regards to the well-being of anyone who might consume it."  Bull told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that she didn't think the meat could have been salty enough to make anyone sick, partly because on her break she had eaten a burger made with it herself before Officer Adams showed up.  She also wondered why he had eaten the burger if it was really that salty.

She makes a very good point here.  For this to be a criminal act, presumably there had to be some realistic chance of harm to someone's "well-being."  And unless Officer Adams is worried about developing hypertension later in life, the harm would have to be salt poisoning.  Though there are many cases of this involving young children or nursing-home patients (who can become dehydrated), it turns out to be extremely rare otherwise, precisely because it is so difficult to consume enough salt to seriously hurt you without your body rejecting it (a process that experts call "barfing").  That is true even though your sodium levels can go up dangerously from as little as a tablespoon or two of salt.

In fact, a 2004 study published in the Journal of Internal Medicine (my research staff thinks it's being paid overtime, apparently) found so few cases of hypernatremia (and also paid by word length) in normal, healthy adults, the study actually concluded that "mental or emotional disorders are crucial for voluntary ingestion of toxic amounts of salt."  The authors located 17 reported cases of "severe hypernatremia secondary to oral administration of sodium."  These included:

• A mentally-disabled woman who ate "four cups of jam supplemented with three to four heaping tablespoons of salt,"
• Three cases in which a woman was convinced or forced to drink extremely salty water as part of an exorcism,
• A fisherman who swallowed a "considerable amount" of seawater after his boat was sunk by a hurricane, and
• Four suicides, including one in which a Japanese woman drank an entire one-liter bottle of soy sauce.

None of the reported cases involved policemen.

Since almost all such poisonings resulted from unique circumstances generally involving a mental or emotional disorder (or an exorcism), the study concluded that "oral administration of sodium is an extremely uncommon cause of [salt poisoning], as healthy adults resist the taste of excess amounts of salt and do not ingest more than small quantities of salty substances."  So, had there been enough salt on this burger to suggest it was an intentional act or one reckless enough to put someone's well-being at risk, Officer Adams would likely not have eaten it.

Now that science has exonerated Kendra Bull, I hope the charges will be dropped.

Link: Yahoo! News
Link: Y. Ofran, et al.,  Fatal Voluntary Salt Intake Resulting in the Highest Ever Documented Sodium Plasma Level in Adults, 256 J. Int. Med. 525-28 (Dec. 2004).
Link: Yamazaki, et al., A Case of Salt Poisoning from Drinking a Large Quantity of Soy Sauce, 2 Legal Med. 84-87 (2000).

O'Melveny & Myers Shames Itself With 239-Page Brief

The Wall Street Journal's Law Blog reports this afternoon that lawyers at O'Melveny & Myers, the firm defending former Enron CEO Jeff Skilling on appeal from his criminal conviction, have filed an appellate brief with the Fifth Circuit that is 239 pages long.

To be fair, the Fifth Circuit does require a 14-point font.

Still, at 58,922 words, the brief is over four times the length allowed by the Federal Rules, which limit briefs to 14,000 words unless you get permission from the court.  The normal limit would permit a brief of about 50 pages (again, depending on the font), but I can't recall ever seeing a case where I thought the issues really justified anything close to that.  Let alone 239.

I admit that I once wrote a brief that ended up being more than 40 pages.  It wasn't really my fault, but I still hang my head in shame about it.  (Tip:  If you can't make your argument in 30 pages or less, you probably need a new argument.)  The last brief I saw that was long enough to mock was a 100+ page draft of a brief that featured a 17-page introduction (itself longer than most briefs), with eleven separate main arguments, the last of which was the Dormant Commerce Clause.  (Tip: If your argument even mentions the Dormant Commerce Clause, you probably need a new argument.)  O'Melveny's brief uses 239 pages to cover just five main points.  The brief includes:

• A 12-page introduction;
• Over 44 pages of facts;
• A two-page summary of argument;
• Beginning on page 61, a 175-page argument; and finally
• A two-sentence conclusion, for anyone who has not crumbled into dust, or evolved into some other type of lifeform that is above our petty human concepts of "justice," before actually reaching the end of the document.

Each and every page, of course, is deeply treasured by its author(s), who could no more delete one of these pages than you would push one of your own children in front of a bus to buy yourself a few extra seconds to dodge out of the way.

Of course, that's not the argument made in the accompanying Motion For Permission to File a Brief Exceeding the Word Limit Set Forth in Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32(a)(7)(B), which itself is eleven pages long.  In that motion, O'Melveny says that the case of their client (referred to as "appellant Jeffrey Skilling ('Skilling')" just in case you forget which "Skilling" they're talking about) are sufficiently "extraordinary and compelling" that the extra words are justified.  The brief will raise a "large number [five] of "serious legal issues" -- most briefs don't raise these, I guess -- each of which "could easily justify a full-length brief on [its] own."  And has gotten one.

Finally, the authors note that this is not the longest brief (yes, an oxymoron) ever written, pointing out that in U.S. v. Brown, the government used 69,370 words in its brief, and in U.S. v. Martha Stewart it used 56,078 words.  So you see, 58,922 words is really quite reasonable.  True, it is more than Hamlet (31,901) and Alice in Wonderland (26,698) put together, and over half of Huckleberry Finn (111,275).  But what's extraordinary about those?

In all fairness, I should say that the brief really is very well written.  Honestly, this is outstanding legal work.  It's just way too goddamn long.

And now, having written 595 words complaining that somebody's brief is too long, I'll stop.

Link: WSJ Law Blog
Link: Count words for yourself at Project Gutenberg

Steven Seagal Demands FBI Apology for Ruining Career

Steven Seagal, who you may remember from such action films as Under Siege, Under Siege 2: Dark Territory, and Under Siege 3: Straight to DVD, has demanded that the FBI apologize for ruining his career by making false allegations that linked him to the Anthony Pellicano scandal.

In August 2007, Seagal claimed that "[f]alse FBI accusations fueled thousands of articles saying that I terrorize journalists and associate with the Mafia . . . .These kinds of inflammatory allegations scare studio heads and independent producers -- and kill careers."

Apparently, FBI agents referred to Seagal in affidavits filed in the Pellicano case, saying that Seagal was one of the celebrities who had hired Pellicano for alleged dirty tricks such as intimidating reporters.  According to an article in the Los Angeles Times, "Seagal, sipping tea in his Mandeville Canyon home, in a dining room filled with Japanese art, said the premise of the allegations was preposterous" and "laughable."  (He has since taken and passed a polygraph test on at least some of the allegations.)  He also implied that the FBI was seeking to discredit him personally.  "Do you believe it was an accident that this secret document was placed in a public file?" he asked.  "I don't."

And if Steven Seagal doesn't believe something, my friend, you'd best consider not believing it too.  This is a man who believes that he is a tulku, or reincarnation, of the "treasure revealer Chungdrag Dorje."  To be fair, a Buddhist monk told him that, so he has some reason for believing it.  Less clear is the source for his belief in a special link between his own spirit and those of animals, something that contributed to what his Wikipedia entry describes as a "mystical dog incident" that seems to have changed his life:

Mystical dog incident

While being interviewed by PETA [see below], Seagal was asked to provide an example of a special interaction with an animal. To lend context and meaning to his animal rights work, Seagal offered the story about a dog which approached him during his early aikido years in Japan. Seagal described feeling as if he had known this white dog forever. After keeping the dog for a few days, the dog (by barking) warned Seagal that his dojo was on fire. Seagal quickly summoned help to put out the fire. He never saw the dog again.

I would like to think that if my dojo was on fire, I would know it without needing the help of a mystical spirit dog, but I guess you never really know how you will react until your dojo is actually burning.  To his credit, Seagal has continued to strongly support animal rights, a noble effort, and one that will give him something to do now that his career, formerly Hard to Kill, now appears to be Half Past Dead.  And as the following chart shows, this decline started well before the Pellicano scandal broke in 2002:

Gross Income of Steven Seagal Movies
(One Seagal = $30 Million)

Since 2001, Seagal has had no major hits, but instead has made a dozen or so straight-to-DVD films that in total have generated about $25 million.  At least one longtime Hollywood publicist, though, was quoted by the L.A. Times as saying that there may be something to what Seagal is saying.  "This controversy made the studios very nervous," said the publicist. "Let's be honest: Steven Seagal was no Harrison Ford when this happened. But these accusations certainly hastened his decline."

Seagal never saw the publicist again.

Link: LATimes.com
Link: "Getting Tough with Steven Seagal," 2001 Interview on PETA.org
Link: Anthony Bruno, "Steven Seagal and the Mob," CourtTV Crime Library