Off topic but funny.
Continue reading Anthony Weiner Still Has A Problem With Photos.
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One well-known problem with eyewitnesses is that they are sometimes focused on one aspect and don't see or don't remember other aspects. The most common example is the armed robbery victim who is understandably focused on the gun and can't describe the robber.
Ellen Huet of the SF Chronicle has this twist on the witness focus phenomenon:
Ellen Huet of the SF Chronicle has this twist on the witness focus phenomenon:
Continue reading Eyewitness Focus.
I have been staying miles away from the Jodi Arias trial because there is only so much I can take. To sum it up very briefly, Ms. Arias does not deny stabbing her boyfriend (or ex-boyfriend, it's not clear which) 27 times, shooting him, and then slitting his throat. She is claiming "self-defense" and no, that is not a typo.
As is almost always the case, the defense has shifted away from what the killer did to what, supposedly, she was thinking. This has the advantage, from the defendant's point of view, that, while that a guy with his head nearly cut off can show up in a photograph to be shown to the jury, the defendant's mind can't, so you can always spin some yarn about it if you're creative enough.
It also has the advantage of allowing the defense to call psychiatric "experts," one of whom I have disrespectfully labelled a "shrink" in the title of this post. But I have my reasons: The shrink is now testifying about one area of her expertise, to wit, whether Snow White was an abused woman. And no, I am not making this up.
Continue reading A Defense Shrink Makes Parody Blush.
This post has nothing to do with crime, but it's too good to pass up, especially since one of today's posts was about diversity and the next was about dihydrogen monoxide. This post is about both, after a fashion.
The title, from "The Corner" at National Review Online, says all you need to know.
City of Phoenix Recruiting Minority LifeguardsEven If They Can't Swim
The story remarks, "The kids in the pool are all either Hispanic or black or whatever, and every lifeguard is white, and we don't like that," said [a city] official, who cited a language barrier as one of the city's concerns."
Some of us had been under the impression that, for the work of a lifeguard, drowning would be "one of the city's concerns," but, hey, that was then.
The dreaded substance dihydrogen monoxide is in the news yet again. (See this post.)
Two Florida DJ's reported, on April 1, that the substance has been detected in the Lee County water supply.
Two Florida DJ's reported, on April 1, that the substance has been detected in the Lee County water supply.
Continue reading Dihydrogen Monoxide.
For years, the defense has been complaining about improperly suggestive police lineups. Generally, these complaints have about the same gravity as other defense criticisms of the police -- that is, apart from their merit (usually none), they're designed to do something, anything, to change the subject away from the client's behavior when he knocked over the gas station, raped the 12 year-old, or what have you.
Still, there are instances when these criticisms are on the money, and I found one today. It was signaled by this entry from the Montgomery County, Maryland, Police Department:
The MCP Officer walked into the room to view the lineup volunteers. At that moment, the Officer realized that auto-correct had changed the word "PERP" to "PEEP" throughout his entire burglary report.
You can see following the break just how bad it was.
Continue reading Improper Police Identification Procedures.
The Founding Fathers considered the grand jury to be an important protection, writing it into the Fifth Amendment. Today, though, it is widely said that the prosecutor can get the grand jury to indict a ham sandwich, if he wants to.
This post by Jason Samenow at the WaPo comes close:
This post by Jason Samenow at the WaPo comes close:
As severe cold grips the eastern U.S. on March 21, Punxsutawney Phil's forecast for an early spring is best described as an epic failure. The prosecuting attorney of Butler County, Ohio, Michael Gmoser, wants the groundhog to pay for his flawed prediction, with his life.
Gmoser filed an indictment against Phil....* * *The indictment comes just three days after TheOnion.com satirically wrote the groundhog had been beheaded for his inaccurate prediction.
Post script
To close the interview, Gmoser confided he was just having "a little fun" with the indictment.
Bank robbery is a serious crime, especially when done at gunpoint. This is why governments in the Western world uniformly make it a felony.
Well, they used to make it a felony. Cyprus brings us the new normal (click on picture to enlarge):
OK, it's not really the new normal. Not yet. But the cartoon was irresistible.
Batman's usual venue is, of course, Gotham City. Gotham is a nickname for New York City. However, the Caped Crusader recently handed a wanted man over to the police in the West Yorkshire town of Bradford, Russell Jenkins reports for the Times of London.
We previously had these posts on the end of the world:
The first end of the world was May 21, 2011, based on a biblical calculation.
The second end of the world was October 21, 2011, based on a revised biblical calculation.
The third end of the world was December 22, 2012, based on the end of the Mayan calendar.
The fourth end of the world was yesterday. The WSJ has an editorial today titled World Doesn't End, Obama Hardest Hit. See the first post linked above for the allusion.
The first end of the world was May 21, 2011, based on a biblical calculation.
The second end of the world was October 21, 2011, based on a revised biblical calculation.
The third end of the world was December 22, 2012, based on the end of the Mayan calendar.
The fourth end of the world was yesterday. The WSJ has an editorial today titled World Doesn't End, Obama Hardest Hit. See the first post linked above for the allusion.
The dreaded substance dihydrogen monoxide is in the news again.
Continue reading Dihydrogen Monoxide.
Last year, Orin Kerr published a brief article in the tongue-in-cheek Green Bag. The article was titled A Theory of Law and provided a high-toned citation for anything a law review author had no other citation for. A micro-symposium of comments on Kerr's article is now available on SSRN, including a cyber perspective from a long-time computer programmer (moi), titled Cursing Recursion.
Opposing Views has this photo gallery of mug shots with T-shirts that, in retrospect, were poor choices.
Ellen Huet posts at SFGate:
A 33-year-old man had to be rescued by firefighters early Monday after he became stuck in the brick chimney of his home in San Francisco's Pacific Heights neighborhood, authorities said.
Continue reading Don't Try This If You Are Not Santa.
