Category Archives: legal news

legal news, local news, national news, political news, Uncategorized

Seeing some symmetry between SCOTUS and APD chief picks

14910136_0

Am I hallucinating, or do I see a certain symmetry between two appointments: one at the highest level of government, the other right here at home on the High Plains of Texas?

One of them deserves the opportunity to do his duties as an elected public official. The other one also has earned the right to perform his duty as an appointed one.

Amarillo interim City Manager Terry Childers has selected Ed Drain to be the city’s interim chief of police; Drain is set to succeed retiring Police Chief Robert Taylor on July 1.

There might be a point of contention, though. You see, Childers won’t be city manager for very long. The City Council already has begun looking for a permanent city manager and Childers has declared his intention to retire completely from public life.

The council, though, has given Childers all the authority that the city manager’s position holds. Childers can hire — and fire — senior city administrators. He also is able to enact municipal policy changes when and where he sees fit. What the heck? He was able to bring changes to the city’s emergency communications center because he misplaced his briefcase at an Amarillo hotel, right?

Now, for the other example.

Caplan-Merrick-Garland2-1200

President Barack Obama has named Merrick Garland to a spot on the U.S. Supreme Court to succeed the late Justice Antonin Scalia. The voters delivered the president all the power he needs to do his duty when they re-elected him to his second and final term in 2012.

Republicans in the U.S. Senate, though, have said: Hold on a minute! The president’s a lame duck. We don’t want him appointing the next justice. We want the next president to do it. They, of course, are hoping that Donald J. Trump takes the oath next January. Good luck with that.

Here’s the question: Should the city manager be allowed to appoint the permanent chief of police, or should the council demand that the decision be left to the permanent city manager?

My own take is this: I’ve railed heavily against the GOP’s obstructing Obama’s ability to do his job. Republicans are wrong to play politics with this process and they are exhibiting a shameless disregard for the authority the president is able to exercise. The president is in the office until next Jan. 20 and he deserves the opportunity to fulfill all of his presidential responsibilities.

Accordingly, the Amarillo city manager will be on the job until the City Council hires someone else and that permanent manager takes over.

Thus, Terry Childers ought to be able to make the call — if the right person emerges quickly — on who should lead the police department … even if he won’t be around to supervise the new chief.

International news, legal news

Ex-SS guard gets five years for atrocities … enough?

hanning

This one is giving me fits and I’m likely to ask for some guidance on what to think about it.

A court in Germany has just sentenced a 94-year-old former SS guard to five years in prison for complicity in the atrocities that occurred at Auschwitz, the infamous Nazi death camp where many thousands of people were sent to their death.

Reinhold Hanning accepted the sentence apparently without emotion.

My questions are many:

Is the sentence long enough for a man nearing 100 years of age? Is it tantamount to life in prison? What has this man done with his life since the end of World War II? Would any contribution to society be enough to erase what he was accused of doing? Has he sought spiritual salvation for what he did?

“This trial is the very least that society can do to give… at least a semblance of justice, even 70 years after and even with a 94-year-old defendant,” chief judge Anke Grudda said.

“The entire complex Auschwitz was like a factory designed to kill people at an industrial level… You were one of those cogs” in the Nazi killing machine, she told the accused on convicting him as an accessory to murder in 170,000 cases.”

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ex-ss-guard-94-convicted-for-complicity-in-auschwitz-murders/ar-AAhc6I3

auschwitz

As the son of a World War II veteran who saw intense combat against Hitler’s war machine, I grew up believing that the men who carried out the madman’s orders bore a large measure of responsibility in the crimes against humanity they committed in Fuehrer’s name.

My hatred for Hitler over what he did in committing the atrocities hasn’t wavered.

I’m struggling, though, with the punishment being handed out so many decades later to those who were following orders. Did they understand fully — in the moment — that they were committing unspeakable atrocities?

Just seven years ago I had the honor of touring the Yad Vashem memorial and museum near Jerusalem, which chronicles the story of the Holocaust from its victims’ point of view. One cannot come away from seeing that exhibit without feeling the combined sense of horror and shame over what human beings are capable of doing to other human beings.

Therein lies the crux of my conflict.

I am inclined to believe the sentence was as just as one can expect, given the defendant’s age. I also am inclined to hope that his time in prison is made as miserable as is humanly possible. I know, of course, that the German prison system must not inflict on Hanning the same horrors he’s been convicted of inflicting on his victims at Auschwitz.

Your thoughts on this?

legal news, State news

Texas finds way to target parental scofflaws

child support

This is a capital idea.

The Texas Attorney General’s Office has found an interesting — and hopefully fruitful — way to pressure non-custodial parents to remain current on their child-support payments.

The idea? Withhold automobile registration from those who are delinquent in those payments.

Excellent!

I’ve watched state attorneys general from both parties say essentially the same thing: I’m going to get tough on those parents who don’t make their child support payments in a timely fashion.

Dating back to the days of Democrats Jim Mattox and Dan Morales, then moving into the Republican era of attorneys general John Cornyn, Greg Abbott and now Ken Paxton, they’ve all said the same thing.

https://www.texastribune.org/2016/06/14/child-support-evaders-vehicle-registration-renewal/

According to the Texas Tribune, the Texas AG’s Office has led the nation in child support payment collection. Paxton’s office said it has collected nearly $3.9 billion in the past fiscal year.

I can hear the complaints now. If the state disallows people from registering their vehicles because they are late in their child support payments, how are those delinquent parents going to get to work to make the money they then can send to help support their children?

“We’re going to use every tool that we can to collect support that is due to children and families, and that’s why this initiative is being pursued,” said Janece Rolfe, a spokeswoman for the Child Support Division, in an interview with the Texas Tribune.

She added: “The goal, obviously, is not to keep people from working or getting to work, but it is to gain compliance with court orders and to get support and money to children.”

This is an outstanding initiative. It puts immense pressure on parents to account for one consequence of bringing children into this world.

If they cannot remain married to the person with whom they produce a child, then they should be obligated to pay whatever the court decrees is necessary to assist the custodial parent in caring for that child.

 

legal news, political news

Stand tall, Rep. Ted Poe!

2 Comments

Poe_jpg_800x1000_q100

I’ve been critical of some members of the Texas congressional delegation of late.

They haven’t distinguished themselves at times while standing under the national spotlight.

U.S. Rep. Ted Poe, a Republican from Humble — near Houston — however, has made me proud.

Poe took to the floor of the House of Representatives to demand that the judge in a notorious rape case at Stanford University recuse himself.

You no doubt have heard of this case. Judge Aaron Persky sentenced a young Stanford athlete, swimmer Brock Turner, to six months in prison and three years probation for raping a young woman.

The light sentence outraged Poe –who was a former prosecutor and trial judge before being elected to Congress. He said: “The judge should be removed and the rapist should do more time for the dastardly deed. I hope the appeals court … overturns the pathetic sentence and gives him the punishment he deserves.”

Here’s the story as it was reported by the Texas Tribune:

https://www.texastribune.org/2016/06/09/texas-congressman-demands-removal-judge-stanford-s/

You might ask: What business is it of a Texas congressman to order a California judge to remove himself from a case being adjudicated under another state’s laws?

I don’t care if he has no business.

Rep. Poe has spoken for a lot of Americans who are outraged over the shamefully light sentence given to a young man who sexually assaulted another human being. He committed an act of extreme violence.

The Tribune reported:

“Persky said he chose not to impose a harsher punishment because ‘a prison sentence would have a severe impact on [Turner].’

“’Well isn’t that the point?’ Poe said in his speech to the House. ‘The punishment for rape should be longer than a semester in college.’”

Severe impact? On a criminal? What about the impact that the crime Turner committed had on his victim?

Ted Poe had a reputation in the Houston area of being a no-nonsense judge, perhaps owing to his prior work as a prosecutor.

I’m glad to know he has used his federal office as a bully pulpit to take up for the victim of a violent crime.

legal news, national news, political news

Trump winnows the judicial field

checks balance

This business of Donald J. Trump’s comments on a judge’s racial heritage is getting a little out of hand.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee remains in some seriously hot water over comments he made about a judge who’s presiding over litigation involving the defunct Trump University. U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel is an American-born jurist whose parents are Mexican immigrants.

Trump railed against the judge, saying he’s “a Mexican” who has been “very unfair to me” because of Trump’s proposal to “build a wall” across the southern border with Mexico.

Thus, Judge Curiel is disqualified, according to Trump.

Then he told CBS News’s John Dickerson that he might want Muslims disqualified from hearing any cases involving Trump because of his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the United States.

Now, get a load of this one.

A Trump spokeswoman said female judges might have to be disqualified because of Trump’s statements denigrating women.

Hmmm. Let’s play this out.

Who else might be unable to serve on the bench to litigate a case involving Trump?

A judge with a physical disability is one. Trump once mocked a disabled New York Times reporter.

A former prisoner of war. Trump once said that U.S. Sen. John McCain is a “war hero” only because he was shot down, captured and held captive for five-plus years. “I like people who weren’t captured, OK?” Trump said.

A judge who’s been married only one time. Trump is on his third marriage and has boasted openly about the affairs he’s had with women other than those to whom he was married.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-judge-attacks_us_57560111e4b0b60682deb6e3

Is it reasonable to assume that in Trump’s mind the only people who could judge a case involving him fairly and without bias are people who are just like him?

If so, then the pool of potential judges appears to have been narrowed considerably.

 

legal news, national news, political news

Former AG says Trump should challenge judge’s ‘fairness’

gon0-004

Donald J. Trump has gained an interesting ally in his dispute with a federal judge hearing a case involving a “university” that Trump founded some years ago.

The ally is former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who says the presumptive Republican presidential nominee is right to question whether U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel can judge his case fairly and impartially.

I’ll give Gonzales his due in one regard: the Texan argues his point with clarity and nuance, which is something that Trump is incapable of doing.

At issue, according to Gonzales, is Curiel’s association with a group called La Raza of San Diego, which Trump says is affiliated with the National Council of La Raza, a group formed to advocate for Latino issues. The Washington Post, though, has reported that NCLR and the San Diego outfit are unaffiliated.

That hasn’t stopped Trump, who has said that Curiel is “a Mexican,” which makes him unfit to hear the case. Curiel, of course, is an Indiana-born American citizen born to immigrants from Mexico. Trump’s alleged “reasoning” is that Curiel “hates” him because Trump wants to “build a wall, OK?” along our nation’s border with Mexico.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/282222-former-bush-ag-trump-right-to-challenge-judges-fairness

Gonzales, who served as AG during the George W. Bush administration, has said that Curiel’s association even with the San Diego La Raza group should cause questions about his fairness in hearing the Trump University case. Curiel is presiding over three lawsuits brought by former students of the for-profit educational program who contend they were bilked out of money they spent to take courses.

It’s important to note what Gonzales wrote in an op-ed in the Washington Post: “As someone whose own ancestors came to the United States from Mexico, I know ethnicity alone cannot pose a conflict of interests. But there may be other factors to consider in determining whether Trump’s concerns about getting an impartial trial are reasonable.”

Here’s Gonzales’ essay:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/06/04/alberto-r-gonzales-trump-has-a-right-to-question-whether-hes-getting-a-fair-trial/

You see, that is what Trump did when he challenged Judge Curiel’s ability to adjudicate this matter. He laid it solely on the man’s ethnicity. What’s more, he did so with utter disregard for the fact that the judge is no more “a Mexican” than Trump himself is “a Scotsman,” given that Trump’s mother emigrated to the United States from Scotland.

So, let’s have this discussion about whether a judge can preside with impartiality and fairness over a controversial case … but let’s leave the judge’s ethnicity out of it.

 

legal news, national news, political news

Has the GOP nominee-to-be finally gone too far?

trump

This might be considered something of a rhetorical question with no answer at least readily available, but I’ll pose it anyway.

Has Donald J. Trump finally issued the nonsensical statement that delivers the message many of us have known all along — that he is temperamentally unfit for the office of president of the United States?

The presumptive Republican nominee is getting shelled not just by Democrats, but by his new “best friend,” House Republican Speaker Paul Ryan, over comments he made about a federal judge.

Trump referred to U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel as “a Mexican” while declaring that the judge is guilty of a conflict of interest in the case he is hearing regarding the defunct Trump University.

Some former students have filed suit against Trump and the “university” he founded, claiming they were bilked out of money they shelled out to attend this online educational program.

Curiel isn’t Mexican. He’s an American. He was born in Indiana. His parents are immigrants from Mexico. He went to California after completing law school and became a hard-charging prosecutor who put many drug lords behind bars.

Now he’s hearing this Trump U case, but Trump says he’s got a conflict because the presidential candidate wants to “build a wall” along our border with Mexico to keep illegal immigrants out. Therefore, according to Trump, Curiel cannot judge this case fairly because of his heritage.

The blowback on this comment has been intense and sustained.

Ryan, who just 24 hours before Trump made the “Mexican” comment had endorsed Trump’s candidacy, criticized the candidate’s “left-field” assertion.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-attacks-223898

And, of course, the comment has drawn relentless fire from Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, who said: “If our president doesn’t believe in the rule of law, doesn’t believe in our constitution with a separation of power with an independent judiciary, that is one of the most dangerous signals that we are dealing with somebody who is a demagogue.”

She added, “If we start disqualifying people because of who their parents and grandparents might be and where they came from,” Clinton continued. “That would be running counter to everything we believe in.”

I am leery of predicting that Trump has finally uttered the politically fatal campaign gaffe. He’s had so many such moments along the way that — in a normal election season –Trump’s candidacy would have been tossed aside long ago.

I am an optimist by nature. My optimism has been dealt a boost once again by the Republican candidate’s loud and uncontrollable mouth.

 

legal news, national news, political news

Judge Curiel: hard-charging American lawyer

trump

Gonzalo Curiel was born in Indiana to parents who came to this country from Mexico.

He graduated from high school, went off to college, got his law degree and became an aggressive prosecutor.

He’s now a federal district judge. He’s an all-American guy, from what I know of him.

That, however, hasn’t stopped the Republicans’ presumptive presidential nominee, one Donald J. Trump, from launching a scurrilous attack on Judge Curiel. The reason for his attack? Trump called Curiel “a Mexican.” He called him a “disgrace,” and said other judges need to examine Judge Curiel.

Curiel, of course, is not “a Mexican.” He’s as American as Trump, whose own mother also was an immigrant.

That didn’t stop Trump from shouting from a campaign podium that Curiel needs to recuse himself from a case he is hearing involving the now-defunct Trump University. It seems that Curiel’s ethnicity disqualifies him from hearing the case because, according to Trump, he “hates” the nominee-to-be because of Trump’s inflammatory statements about Mexican immigrants.

Y’all, this is the latest in an interminable line of insults and provocation that have poured out of Trump’s pie hole ever since he announced his intention to seek the GOP presidential nomination.

Judge Curiel’s standing as a federal judge hearing this case is as solid as it gets. Trump’s suggestion that he cannot judge this case fairly is yet another attempt to denigrate someone solely on the basis of his ethnicity.

Trump’s accusations against Curiel are going to remain unchallenged by the target, the judge himself. As the Atlantic magazine noted: “Corrosive personal attacks aren’t new behavior for the presumptive Republican nominee. But unlike other targets of Trump’s ire, Curiel cannot defend himself in any forum. He acknowledged in an order last Friday that Trump had ‘placed the integrity of these court proceedings at issue,’ but will almost certainly go no further than that observation. Curiel is bound by the judicial code of ethics, which says that federal judges ‘should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court,’ including their own. The code also says judges ‘should not be swayed by partisan interests, public clamor, or fear of criticism.’”

Here’s the rest of the article:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/donald-trump-gonzalo-curiel/485636/

If only another disgraceful exhibition of intemperance would gain traction among those who keep standing behind this guy. Who’s to say what effect, if any, these latest remarks are going to have?

From my perch in the middle of what’s going to be called Trump Country, it’s just one more example of a presumptive presidential nominee’s unfitness for the job he is seeking.

 

legal news, national news, political news

‘Sic federal regulators on his critics’

2 Comments

trust-1

A single line jumped out at me as I looked at the New York Times article on Donald J. Trump’s view of the U.S. Constitution.

Adam Liptak’s story goes through a litany of concerns that constitutional scholars — across the political spectrum — have expressed about the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s views.

Then he writes of Trump: “He has threatened to sic federal regulators on his critics.”

That sentence stopped me cold. I froze.

Do you remember what happened to the last president who decided to “sic federal regulators on his critics”?

If you don’t, I’ll remind you.

President Richard Nixon did that very thing, we learned during the congressional investigation of the Watergate constitutional crisis.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/04/us/politics/donald-trump-constitution-power.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

That revelation — along with many others — led the House Judiciary Committee to approve articles of impeachment against the president, who then resigned his office on Aug. 9, 1974, thus ending, in the words of his successor, President Gerald Ford, “our long national nightmare.”

Trump wants to make it easier to sue the media for libel; he wants to ban Muslims from entering the United States; he attacked a federal judge solely on the basis of his ethnicity, calling the American-born jurist “a Mexican” who, according to Trump, “hates me.”

Any one of those occurrences would be a recipe for a top-of-the-line constitutional crisis. I’m trying to imagine what could happen if more than one of those things ever were to occur if a President Trump were to settle in behind that big desk in the Oval Office.

Here’s a comment from a conservative thinker, taken from Liptak’s article: “David Post, a retired law professor who now writes for the Volokh Conspiracy, a conservative-leaning law blog, said those comments had crossed a line.

“’This is how authoritarianism starts, with a president who does not respect the judiciary,’ Mr. Post said. ‘You can criticize the judicial system, you can criticize individual cases, you can criticize individual judges. But the president has to be clear that the law is the law and that he enforces the law. That is his constitutional obligation.’”

I believe this is a major part of what Hillary Rodham Clinton said Thursday when she described Trump as being “temperamentally unfit” to become president of the United States.

legal news, political news, State news

AG’s case takes interesting turn

051216KenPaxtonInCourt2_jpg_800x1000_q100

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s journey through the state’s judicial system has taken another interesting turn.

The 5th Court of Appeals, based in Dallas, has rejected Paxton’s request that the securities fraud case against him be tossed out. According to the appellate court, the case should go to trial and Paxton should have to make the state prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he broke securities law by failing to properly report income he received while providing financial advice to clients.

Paxton has pleaded not guilty to the charges brought by — get this — a Collin County grand jury, which happens to be in Paxton’s home county.

This case ought to be settled by a trial court.

https://www.texastribune.org/2016/06/01/appeals-court-upholds-fraud-charges-against-paxton/

What’s next? Paxton’s legal team is considering whether to take it to the state’s highest criminal appellate court, the Court of Criminal Appeals. The special prosecutor’s office assigned to this case said it is confident the CCA will uphold the lower court ruling against the AG.

I understand fully that Paxton is “innocent until proven guilty.” He has tried all along the way to get the case thrown out. The courts have ruled repeatedly against him, saying the charges against him have merit.

Will the Republican AG prevail if he takes it to the all-GOP Court of Criminal Appeals? That might be his best shot at getting it thrown out.

The Texas Tribune reported: “During a hearing before the court last month, Paxton’s lawyers most prominently argued that the grand jury that indicted him was improperly selected. The court rejected that argument in its ruling Wednesday.

“‘After reviewing the record and, in particular, the process used by the district judge, we conclude the complained-of method of selecting the grand jury is not a complaint that would render the grand jury illegally formed,’ Chief Justice Carolyn Wright wrote.”

The way I look at it, if he’s innocent of the charges brought against him by the grand jury — and by the complaint filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission — then he ought to make the case in court.

Make the state prove its case and let a jury of his peers decide.