The government has filed its opposition to Steven Donziger’s petition seeking Supreme Court review of his conviction of criminal contempt of court. Donziger’s social media posts suggests he thought there was some chance the government might take his side in the matter, but I cannot believe there was any real chance the government would not
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Hello to Rubin & Rudman!
If you have ever written a story, painted a painting, or started a business, you know how proud you are of a creation done well. That’s how I feel about Folkman LLC, the practice I started at the beginning of COVID in early 2020 and that has been my professional home for nearly three years.…
Case of the Day: Begisholli v. KBR
The case of the day is Begisholli v. KBR Government Operations. It comes out of a corner of the legal world that was utterly unknown to me a year ago. The Defense Base Act is a federal statute that gives a worker’s compensation-like benefit to employees of US government and military contractors injured at…
Elephant Habeas: California Judge Denies Petition
A judge in Fresno has denied the habeas corpus petition brought by the Nonhuman Rights Project on behalf of three elephants at the Fresno Zoo. The decision didn’t turn on the NhRP’s “elephants are people” argument. Instead, the judge decided that under California law, only persons in state custody can petition for habeas corpus. I…
Evidence Convention: Swiss Practice May Be Changing
The Swiss government has published a draft bill that, if enacted, would authorize Switzerland to modify its declarations under Article 15 to 17 of the Evidence Convention to give its permission generally for willing witnesses to be questioned in foreign proceedings by telephone or video conference. By way of background, Chapter 2 of the Convention…
Case of the Day: Fleites v. Mindgeek
The case of the day is Fleites v. Mindgeek SARL (C.D. Cal. 2022). The plaintiff, a victim of child sex abuse, accused the defendants of soliciting and monetizing her “child sexual abuse material.” The decision isn’t clear on this, but I assume this means that the defendants somehow sold images or videos of the…
Letters Blogatory: Still Against Abolishing The Leap Second
In her prologue to The Human Condition, written at the dawn of the space age, Hannah Arendt wrote:
The earth is the very quintessence of the human condition, and earthly nature, for all we know, may be unique in the universe in providing human beings with a habitant in which they can move and breathe…
Case of the Day: McCarthy v. Johnson
The case of the day is McCarthy v. Johnson (D.D.C. 2022). I wrote about the last round a few months ago. Decades ago, Helen McCarthy sued Michael Heath Johnson in the District of Utah, alleging that he had converted her property, including an ownership stake in the Salt Lake Tribune and real property in…
Case of the Day: In re Alpene
The case of the day is In re Alpene, Ltd. (E.D.N.Y. 2022). Alpene, a Hong Kong corporation, had a treaty arbitration claim against Malta, and it arbitration under ICSID arbitration. It sought discovery from Elizabeth McCaul, a New Yorker, under Section 1782. The case raises a question left open in the Supreme Court’s ZF…
Case of the Day: Palladian Partners v. Province of Buenos Aires
The case of the day is Palladian Partners, LP v. Province of Buenos Aires (S.D.N.Y. 2022). In 2018, Palladian obtained a German judgment against the Province of Buenos Aires, which had defaulted on euro-denominated bonds following the 2001 financial crisis. Now it seeks recognition and enforcement of the German judgment in the Southern District of…