Sinclair Broadcasting, currently under fire for having local news talent read a canned script, is itself the product of earlier rounds of anti-media-consolidation rules, and tales of “70 percent market share” tales are sheerest bunk, reports Matt Welch [Reason] On local use of canned scripts, see also the regular Conan feature “Newscasters Agree.”
“How Overdue Parking Tickets Took Over an Innocent Person’s Life”
Tickets — with penalties, reaching an absurd $105,761.80 — all part of a man’s apparent ploy “to get revenge on his ex-girlfriend via the Chicago government.” And it didn’t exactly fail at that aim, either; she wound up paying quite a bit to put the matter behind her. [Dan Lewis, Now I Know]
Caution: do not swallow!
From @thrillscience on Twitter:
You can’t be too careful! @overlawyered pic.twitter.com/5jufzFlasr
— (((Thrill Science))) (@ThrillScience) March 27, 2018
“Man sues 10-year-old girl after jogging into her bike”
British Columbia, Canada: “A man who sued a young girl and her grandparents after he was injured when he jogged into the back wheel of her bike has lost his case in B.C. Supreme Court.” The jogger “also included the girl’s grandparents, Wendy and Patrick Marlow, in the lawsuit on the basis that they didn’t properly teach her to ride a bike safely. The judgment also clears them of liability.” [Maryse Zeidler, CBC]
Crime and punishment roundup
- Prosecutors too often dodge mens rea (knowing wrongfulness) as precondition for crime. SCOTUS can help by better defining “willfully” [Ilya Shapiro and Reilly Stephens on Cato certiorari brief in Ellison v. U.S.]
- False abuse accusations, a dozen years later: “The Girl Who Told The Truth” [Michael Hall, Texas Monthly]
- Retired federal judge Kevin Sharp: mandatory minimum sentences forced me to do injustice [Cato Policy Report]
- Kansas is unique in extent to which it adds large classes of drug offenders to sex offender list, new bill would change course [Maurice Chammah, Marshall Project]
- Like a contingency fee: “Tennessee state forensic scientists have a financial incentive to secure DUI convictions, says a Tennessee appeals court, as the $250 fee imposed on guilty motorists pays their salaries (and some of their positions were nearly cut in a recent budget crunch). Which violates due process.” [John K. Ross, “Short Circuit”, on Tennessee v. Decosimo]
- Amicus brief from Cato Institute and other groups in Ross Ulbricht/Silk Road case argues that Internet deserves robust Fourth Amendment protection [Ilya Shapiro and Aaron Barnes]
Finally, rules to rein in agency guidance documents
Agencies use informal guidance documents in lieu of formal regulation to clarify and interpret uncertainties in existing law and enforcement. Unfortunately, this and other forms of “subregulatory guidance” can also offer a tempting way to extend an agency’s power and authority into new areas, or ban private actions that hadn’t been banned before, all without going through the notice and comment process required by regulation, with its protections for regulated parties. Fair? Lawful? The Department of Justice under Jeff Sessions has lately sought to bring agency use of guidance documents under better control, and in particular end the use of documents that 1) are obsolete, 2) improperly use the process to circumvent the need for formal regulation, or 3) improperly go beyond what is provided for in existing legal authority. I’m interviewed about all this by Caleb Brown for the Cato Daily Podcast.
More: Charlie Savage, New York Times (DoJ revokes batch of guidance documents), Matt Zapotosky/Washington Post; Scott Shackford, Reason (rescission of guidance letter on local fines and fees should be read not as blessing those practices as okay, but as reflecting fact that federal government lacks clear statutory or constitutional mandate to intervene against them); Stephen McConnell, Drug and Device Law (“DOJ Says its Litigators May Not Use Noncompliance with FDA Guidances as Basis for Civil Enforcement Actions”).
“This is by no means the first time a city council has sued itself, or tried to”
Instances of local governments litigating against themselves include Auckland, New Zealand’s appeal of its own land use decision, and a London council’s appeal of a parking ticket it had issued to one of its own vehicles [Lowering the Bar]
The wages of public sector unionism
From a new paper by Michael Lovenheim and Alexander Willen, via Tyler Cowen:
Our estimates suggest that teacher collective bargaining worsens the future labor market outcomes of students: living in a state that has a duty-to-bargain law for all 12 grade-school years reduces earnings by $800 (or 2%) per year and decreases hours worked by 0.50 hours per week. The earnings estimate indicates that teacher collective bargaining reduces earnings by $199.6 billion in the US annually. We also find evidence of lower employment rates, which is driven by lower labor force participation, as well as reductions in the skill levels of the occupations into which workers sort. The effects are driven by men and nonwhites, who experience larger relative declines in long-run outcomes.
Jon Gabriel discusses the current wave of teacher strikes, Caleb Brown notes that “Kentucky Teachers Have Had Enough” — but of what? — while this Twitter thread discusses the Oklahoma walkout. More: Eric Boehm on Kentucky’s efforts to shore up underfunded teacher pensions.
UK judge: violist can pursue hearing-loss claim over loud Wagner rendition
Noting that Britain’s 2006 Noise at Work Regulations “recognize no distinction as between a factory and an opera house,” a British judge has approved the claim of a violist for the Royal Opera House Covent Garden who says he suffered hearing loss from the loudness of the close-by brass section during a rehearsal of Die Walküre, part of Wagner’s Ring Cycle. Damages are yet to be determined; he is seeking £750,000. [Mark Savage, BBC] The opera house argued that it had gone as far as a reasonable employer to reduce the risks of loudness, including issuing ear protection which he was using, and that his condition “had in fact been the result of his coincidentally developing Meniere’s disease at around the same time.” [Damien Gayle, Guardian] Earlier on the United Kingdom regulations on sound in the workplace here (police dogs’ barking, with links to many other posts), etc., and related here and here on European orchestra noise regs.
April 4 roundup
- “Former employee of red light camera company that bribed Chicago official (who is now serving 10 years) turns informant, seeks sizable cut of the $20 mil the company paid to settle the city’s suit. Seventh Circuit: The chutzpah!” [John K. Ross, Short Circuit, on City of Chicago ex rel. Rosenberg v. Redflex Traffic Systems Inc.]
- “Why Religious Organizations Shouldn’t Lose Tax-Exempt Status Based on Public Policy, Post-Obergefell” [Sally Wagenmaker via Caron/TaxProf]
- The regulated American truck operator: “For the liberty minded professional driver, the situation looks bleak.” [“Gordilocks,” Glibertarians]
- Practice pointer: don’t make closing argument in a condition that could score .337 on a Breathalyzer afterward [Mike Frisch, Legal Profession Prof; Jefferson County, Ky.]
- Not a total shocker: study finds student editors at law reviews tend to accept articles matching their own ideologies [Prof. Bainbridge]
- Per a United Nations expert, 1) adopting fiscal austerity programs may put countries out of compliance with international human rights; 2) to remain in compliance, countries may be obliged to undertake crackdowns on financial privacy meant to extract more taxes. Oh, international human rights, how elastic thou art [Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights, U.N.]