Miller-Jenkins case – Overlawyered

Higher education roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 21 Jul 2015 11:05:44 +0000

“Virtually a model of how to regulate badly”: law professor Carl Schneider discusses his new book on institutional review boards, The Censor’s Hand: The Misregulation of Human-Subject Research [Inside Higher Ed via Zachary Schrag]
Does Title IX require colleges to police off-campus behavior? [University of Kansas; Greg Piper, The College Fix] “No Due Process, Please; This is a Campus” [KC Johnson, Minding the Campus]
Fourth Circuit: no insurer duty to defend Liberty U. in Miller-Jenkins kidnapping suit [WSET, Virginia Lawyers Weekly, earlier here and many other posts]
Ex-Arkansas college student wants $75,000 after claiming she broke fingers in musical-chairs game [AP/Daily Journal]
“Portland State University Will Shut Down Political Activity If It’s ‘Triggering'” [Robby Soave, Reason]
The Scarlet Transcript: D.C. bill would would flag students who quit college with sex charges pending [Washington Post, more/update (“unconscionable“)]
Virginia Tech now requires professors to demonstrate work towards diversity/inclusion to receive tenure [Ashley Thorne, National Association of Scholars]

Tags: colleges and universities, Miller-Jenkins case, science and scientists, Title IX, Virginia Tech, Washington D.C.

Higher education roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Law schools roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 04:06:41 +0000

“Law school plotted to sabotage its own students?” [Steele, Cassandra Burke Robertson, Caron on Phoenix allegations]
Bryan Garner’s take on law reviews [Green Bag]
Washington & Lee’s innovative practice-oriented third year has drawn much attention, but job placement results lag [Deborah Merritt via Alice Woolley]
“Law school sues for liability insurance coverage” [VLW on Liberty U., Miller-Jenkins kidnapping case]
The business of one high-flying law school: documents shed light on NYU [Joe Patrice, Above the Law]
Concussions: NFL players’ union to fund $100 million Harvard project, including HLS, on football and health [Cohen, Prawfs, with further thoughts from a notorious gadfly on lobbying by lawprofs]
John O. McGinnis and Russell Mangas, “An Undergraduate Option for Legal Education” [IRLE/SSRN]
Toward more sensible law school rankings? ABA makes it harder to count higher expenditures themselves as a plus [Above the Law]

Tags: football, law schools, Miller-Jenkins case

Law schools roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

March 18 roundup

Walter Olson — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 04:06:54 +0000

Justice done in Tewksbury, Mass. as feds won’t appeal loss in Motel Caswell forfeiture case [Institute for Justice]
Oh, FTC: “Government Now Says Tweets Have To Include ‘The Fine Print'” [Business Insider]
Judge lifts “no Facebook posts” order against class action objector [Paul Alan Levy, ABA Journal, earlier]
House Judiciary Committee hearing on litigation abuse feature Ted Frank, John Beisner [link to video, Chamber-backed LNL]
Update: minister who aided Miller-Jenkins custody-napping gets 27 month sentence [AP,earlier]
Pennsylvania high court judge convicted on charges of using state staff for campaign [AP] Also in Pa., wife/chief aide of high court justice “has received 18 payments as referral fees for connecting law firms with clients” [Philadelphia Inquirer] “Arkansas Supreme Court Justice reports $50k gift from plaintiff lawyer” [LNL]
Widow sues church for refusal to accept NASCAR-themed cemetery headstone [IndyStar]

Tags: Arkansas, forfeiture, FTC endorsement rules, Miller-Jenkins case, Pennsylvania, Ted Frank, Twitter

March 18 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Law schools roundup

Walter Olson — Wed, 28 Nov 2012 04:06:08 +0000

Conservative-turned-away case: “Jurors say they saw hiring bias at U. of Iowa” [Des Moines Register, Caron, Adler/Volokh] Wagner will seek retrial [Daily Iowan]
David Lat on the GMU Law conference on law school and lawyer markets [Above the Law, earlier]
ABA accreditors defend, but tinker with, standards for minimum law school libraries [Caron]
“Comparative notes on German legal education” [Darryl Brown, Prawfs]
Spinoff of Miller-Jenkins case: Janet Jenkins sues Liberty U. School of Law charging assistance to custody-nappers, dean calls suit frivolous [ABA Journal]
“Law Schools Now 5-0 in Placement Data Fraud Lawsuits by Alums” [Caron] Charles E. Rounds, Jr. reviews Brian Tamanaha book [Pope Center]
Does Peoria, Ill. need a new law school? Surely you jest [Campos]

Tags: Illinois, Iowa, law schools, Miller-Jenkins case

Law schools roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Law schools roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 04:08:18 +0000

U. Miami: “Law School Email Draws Fire Amid Hotly Contested Retention Election for 3 Top Florida Judges” [ABA Journal, earlier on election]
Janet Jenkins sues Liberty U. School of Law, charging assistance to custody-nappers; school describes suit as baseless [ABA Journal, earlier on Miller-Jenkins custody case]
“Maybe a lawprof is not what you want in a politician. And yet, Bill Clinton was a lawprof. So was Hillary Clinton. And there are different types of lawprofs. They don’t all listen, give ground, and offer complex caveats!” [Ann Althouse]
“Former law student became a chronic litigant” [Boston Globe]
Andrew Morriss on Tamanaha’s Failing Law Schools [Liberty Law]
“Institute for Humane Studies Webcast on the Pros and Cons of Law School” [Ilya Somin]
Fred Rodell knew: reasons not to write law review articles [Matthew Salzwedel, Lawyerist] What a rising law professor should put in a book review [Pierre Schlag via Prof. Bainbridge]
Bradley C.S. Watson on law school progressivism [National Review, pay site, mentions Schools for Misrule]

Tags: Florida, humor, law schools, Miller-Jenkins case, Schools for Misrule

Law schools roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

August 17 roundup

Walter Olson — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 04:06:15 +0000

Judge OKs settlement in Skechers shoe promotion suits, valued at $40 million [WaPo, earlier]
“Philadelphia woman faces $600-a-day fine for feeding needy neighborhood kids” [Fox]
“Minister Found Guilty of Aiding Miller-Jenkins Kidnapping” [BTB, my latest, earlier]
Yes, the HHS waiver eviscerates welfare reform [Andrew Grossman, Kaus, more, yet more; Bader, more; Kay Hymowitz, City Journal (quoting Doug Besharov on the reversal: “The domestic policy staff doesn’t believe in ‘work first'”); contra, Josh Barro, Dave Weigel] USDA: Por favor, acepte food handout [Barton Hinkle, Bader, NR (backs off)]
Reason “nanny of month” is New Jersey dog seat belt law [Ted Balaker, Hit and Run; our earlier coverage]
“Malicious prosecution, unfair trials and the U.S. Constitution” [Alison Frankel, Reuters]
Manchester, Conn.: “Mom Arrested for Letting Her Kids, 11 & 7, Walk to Pizza Shop” [Lenore Skenazy, Free-Range Kids] “Desperate Dad: ‘I Let My 12 y.o. Play Outside. Is that Criminal?'” [Skenazy, The Agitator; update on another case]

Tags: animals, Miller-Jenkins case, New Jersey, Philadelphia

August 17 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

New at HuffPo: Bryan Fischer, the Miller-Jenkins case, and kidnap apologetics

Walter Olson — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 18:05:21 +0000

The American Family Association’s zany yet high-profile Bryan Fischer is in the news for calling for an “Underground Railroad” by which his fellow believers would “rescue” kids from gay parents. In my new Huffington Post piece, just up, I trace two main threads in his argument — that gay parents are a menace to their kids, and that extralegal steps are called for to put “God’s law over man’s” – and show how the same messages have been emanating lately from some rather more respectable social-conservative quarters, in Princeton, N.J. and elsewhere. The controversy develops in part from the Miller-Jenkins custody and kidnapping case, long a topic of coverage in this space; in the latest development, Mennonite clergyman Kenneth Miller (applauded by Fischer) has just gone on trial for allegedly abetting the spiriting of Isabella Miller-Jenkins (no relation), now 10, out of the country in defiance of court orders.

Fischer now says he wasn’t suggesting that kids of same-sex couples be abducted from their beds by Christians unrelated to those children, but he definitely is encouraging believers to use extralegal force in cases that pit one of theirs against a gay parent in a custody dispute. He hints broadly that the next test case after Miller-Jenkins will be that of a divorced woman he describes who is losing custody to her gay ex-husband, and who just might disappear with the child into the “Underground Railroad” he promotes. Meanwhile, the Liberty University School of Law in Lynchburg, Va., whose faculty has multiple connections with Lisa Miller’s side of the Miller-Jenkins litigation, stirred criticism when related civil-disobedience precepts reportedly emerged as part of the curriculum in a class.

It might be added that this, like so many unsettling developments on the Right, is not without its parallels on the Left. Since the 1980s and the famous Elizabeth Morgan case, some feminists have operated a so-called Underground Railroad to enable mothers to defy court orders and abduct their kids away from fathers with shared custody or visitation orders. Usually some allegation is made of abuse, but the tactic has been used and applauded even where a judge has considered the abuse allegations and declined to accept them. (Law prof Nancy Polikoff discusses her mixed feelings about the Miller-Jenkins case here).

Reacting to the potential for lawlessness in this realm, Congress has passed at least two statutes of relevance: the International Child Abduction Remedies Act, signed by President Ronald Reagan in 1988, and the International Parental Kidnapping Crime Act, signed by President Bill Clinton in 1993.

Update Aug. 15: Jury convicts Kenneth Miller.

Tags: Miller-Jenkins case, same-sex marriage, WO writings, wrong right

New at HuffPo: Bryan Fischer, the Miller-Jenkins case, and kidnap apologetics is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Law schools roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 12:10:10 +0000

“A Dean’s Lament: I Wish I Had Never Gone to Law School” [Chen via Caron] Critiques of law schools go way (way, way) back [Dave Hoffman, ConcurOp]
“ProfScam” blogger with provocative critique of legal academia reveals self as Paul Campos of Colorado [Kerr, Horwitz, Conglomerate, Ribstein, Lat] Lawprof cage match, Campos vs. Leiter — go Campos! [Caron, Campos, Greenfield]
To deregulate legal services, start with law school accreditation [Winston/Crandall, WSJ] More views [Tim Lynch, Greenfield, Bader]
Law school placement data scandal: here come the class action lawyers [TaxProf] ABA’s Villanova censure a venture in “atmospherics of disclosure” [Dave Hoffman, ConcurOp]
“The no-frills law school” [Roger Dennis, Faculty Lounge] What drives law school tuition? [Orin Kerr]
Per one critic, Liberty lawprof’s book on Miller-Jenkins case “justifies parental kidnapping and flouting the American judicial system” [BTB]
NYSBA president on law schools: “Our research and our own experience show that graduates are less prepared to practice law” [WSJ] Evidence as a mere elective? What are law schools thinking? [Greenfield]
Take a stroll with the law dean on his walk to work — but sign a release form first [ABA Journal]
“Blame the lawyers and law schools” [Bob Ingle, Asbury Park (N.J.) Press, thanks for mention of Schools for Misrule]

Tags: bar associations, law schools, Miller-Jenkins case

Law schools roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Law schools roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 26 May 2011 12:56:31 +0000

Refuting a law review’s vaccine-autism claims [Orac, Respectful Insolence, more, Fair Warning]
Should sue-the-cops fliers have used Suffolk U. law school logo? [Boston Herald via Wood, Chronicle]
“There’s a saying that ‘the law you learned in law school is the law'” [Bill Araiza, Prawfs]
Annals of legal scholarship: law review article on “planetarian identity formation” [SSRN] Larry Ribstein on the trouble with law reviews [TotM, earlier]
Enough with the “balance” talk, says organizer of Hastings Law conference on Palestine rights [SFGate]
“The entire law school industry … a significant profit center for universities — is a giant bubble” [The New Republic] “Mind-boggling” tuition increases hard to explain other than as product of market distortions [Hans Bader]
Liberty Law exam question on notorious kidnapping case raises eyebrows [Sarah Posner, Religion Dispatches; background]
“It’s Deja Vu for Louisiana Economy as Law School Clinic, Activists Challenge Air Permit” [WLF]

Tags: law schools, Miller-Jenkins case, vaccines

Law schools roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

November 21 roundup

Walter Olson — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 12:08:24 +0000

Federalist Society annual convention (which I attended) included panels on anonymity and the First Amendment, judicial recusals, many other topics;
Nomination of R.I.’s McConnell to federal bench could soon reach Senate floor [ProJo]
“Why U.S. Taxpayers Are Paying Brazilian Cotton Growers $147 Million” [NPR via Popehat]
“Litigation Governance: Taking Adequacy Seriously” [Trask, Class Action Countermeasures]
“Family” groups vs. a family, cont’d: Vermont Supreme Court upholds Miller-Jenkins custody ruling [Volokh, BTB]
OSHA allows more comment on what could be an extremely expensive mandate against noise in the workplace [ShopFloor]
Cops who inform on cops are often left to twist in wind [Balko]
Interview with Mark Zaid, collector of comic book art with law/legal themes [Abnormal Use]

Tags: class actions, Federalist Society, Miller-Jenkins case, OSHA, police, recusals, Rhode Island

November 21 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system