Law blog round-up
June 9, 2008
Good afternoon! I’m just back from a conference in Miami, and I’m absolutely thrilled to find that it’s way hotter and muggier here than it was there. Here are a few law links for your Monday — a nice excuse for staying cool at your computer instead of venturing out into the rainforest.
- The ABA Journal writes about the possibility that the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia and the Carolinas and has been reliably conservative for years, will soon shift to the left.
- The Sun has this profile of Judge Emory Plitt, the judge in the Kevin Johns prison-bus murder bench trial.
- Judges are busy people and don’t want to slog through bloated, muddled briefs, Paul Mark Sandler writes.
- This isn’t really new, but it falls into the “who knew,” um, cat-egory, at least for me. Some counties prohibit people from letting their animals, including cats, roam free. The felines need to be confined or leashed, just like dogs. Apparently, the cat fanciers don’t like this type of law much. By the way, anyone out there ever tried to leash a cat? I’ve done it and found that they will tolerate it, but they sure as anything won’t actually walk while attached to a leash. They will, however, sit on their tails and eat grass. (And then throw it up later. On the bed, if they can swing it.)
- What do you get the Supreme Court junkie who has everything? Via How Appealing, here’s one idea. Fabulous.
CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer
Sphere: Related ContentThis week in Maryland Lawyer
June 9, 2008
- Mandatory retirement ages for lawyers have lost favor with the ABA and many law firms, but as Danny Jacobs writes, performance-based retirement can bring its own set of problems. In a related story, the lawyer for a retired founder says his suit against his former partners is “just business,” but it feels personal to one of the men he mentored.
- Kathy Kelly Howard, lobbyist for property-owners’ rights, will be sworn in this week as president of the 23,000-member Maryland State Bar Association. Find out how she plans to use her year.
- The Court of Appeals heard argument Friday in two cases we’ve been following: A disciplinary matter against Lemon Law firm Kimmel & Silverman, and a zoning dispute between Loyola College in Maryland and North Baltimore County residents over the college’s plans for a retreat center in Parkton.
- A Frederick lawyer wins a round in his defamation suit over a blog post; and, in Verdicts & Settlements, a woman is ordered to repay $190,000 to her stepmother after her father dies.
- Leadership in Law honoree Mark Thomas, now a judge, talks about how being on the bench has literally given him a new perspective; Rommel Loria talks about the “low bono” green-card case he took for a Peruvian man after taking a class at Catholic Charities.
- The Editorial Advisory Board calls for more changes to Maryland’s foreclosure process; Wilhelm Joseph calls for more money for Legal Aid; and the woman at the center of a controversial child support ruling tells her side of the story in a letter to the editor.
Also, find legal briefs, “movers,” case digests, and summaries of the U.S. Supreme Court, the 4th Circuit and the Office of Administrative Hearings opinions here.
As always, you can comment on any of these stories by responding to this blog. Or, if you’re in Ocean City for the MSBA’s annual meeting, stop by our booth and leave me a message!
BARBARA GRZINCIC, Managing Editor, Law
Sphere: Related ContentChief judge ordered to act within 60 days
June 5, 2008
It’s not every day the 4th Circuit tells a district court judge to get cracking, but it happened here, after the appeals court learned that almost two years had passed since the last action on a motion for relief from final judgment.
Convicted drug conspirator Clarence Hicks complained of the delay by U.S. District Chief Judge Benson Everett Legg in a mandamus petition filed with the 4th Circuit on May 16.
“Finding substantial delay below, we grant the mandamus petition,” the per curiam panel wrote last week. (On the panel were Judges Paul V. Niemeyer and M. Blane Michael, as well as Senior Judge Clyde H. Hamilton.)
The appeals court gave Legg — or rather, his court — 60 days to act on the Rule 60(b) motion.
Have any of you federal practitioners out there seen similar delays?
BARBARA GRZINCIC, Managing Editor, Law
Sphere: Related ContentRed with envy
April 2, 2008
He may have a lifetime appointment and the cachet of a spot on the federal appellate bench, but Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III is jealous of Maryland’s top court.
“He acknowledged that being a judge is a ‘monastic’ life, exemplified by his uniform,” writes Lisa Provence from a paper called The Hook in Charlottesville, Va. “’Maryland has red robes,’” he said. ‘“They’re beautiful. Those of us with black robes envy them.’”
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge was speaking at the University of Virginia School of Law when he pined for the fashionable scarlet robes of the Maryland Court of Appeals.
If you’re curious about why our top judges wear red, check out this essay by a librarian at the Maryland State Law Library. (It contains this memorable sentence: “Between the post-Revolutionary period and the modern eras, there were times when judges sitting on the Court of Appeals wore either black robes or no robes at all.” Oh, dear.)
During his remarks at the law school, Wilkinson also said that he felt sorry for himself when President Bush didn’t nominate him to the Supreme Court, but that he’s gotten over it:
“Then one day, ‘I looked in the mirror and thought, ‘Jay, you make a hell of a poor victim,’’ said the federal judge on the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.”
CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer
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