Another parent’s pro se complaint: this time Luping Qu is suing the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in Durham, “asking a judge to overrule a teacher who gave his daughter a bad grade.” (Raleigh News & Observer, Feb. 1).
Posts Tagged ‘North Carolina’
New York Death Penalty Controversy
Ten years ago a mildly successful Republican state senator in New York won a huge upset — defeating the three-term incumbent governor of New York and Bill Clinton ally, Mario Cuomo. Part of the reason was probably Cuomo fatigue — he had been governor since succeeding Hugh Carey in 1983 and had been Carey’s lieutenant governor before that. But the biggest part of Gov. George Pataki’s victory was his promise to sign into law a statute reinstating the death penalty in New York.
Cuomo had vetoed numerous death penalty statutes. In 1994, New York had terrible crime, especially in New York City (which later dropped precipitously under Mayor Giuliani and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly) and New Yorkers wanted to send the message that the state needed to get tough on crime and, especially, ensure that cop-killers would not walk free after 20-25 years (this was a big issue for supporters of the bills).
True to his word, Pataki signed a death penalty bill. By most measures, it was about as progressive a bill as death penalty provisions could get: requiring instructing jurors of the consequences of their sentencing decisions, setting up an administrative group of lawyers that would set fee rates for defense attorneys in capital cases (to ensure better quality representation), and mandating direct appeals of capital convictions to the New York Court of Appeals (the state’s highest court). Ultimately, the statute seemed designed to insure the rights of the accused, be used only in extreme cases and be constitutional.
Self-Introduction
Please allow me to introduce myself, I’m a man of . . . pseudonyms and a small blog.
Greetings. I am The Monk, founder and primary author of The Key Monk a small politics-and-sports blog I started in April and which my old high school buddy and I now work on in our spare time.
I am a lawyer in Texas who has run the law firm private practice gamut: large general practice firm to medium-size insurance defense firm (where I was on the frontlines in the asbestos wars) to a small commercial litigation boutique. No, I haven’t seen it all, but I’ve seen a lot. I now practice primarily appellate litigation, which I prefer because it is analytical and there’s no discovery in appellate litigation. I have also worked as a prosecutor in North Carolina, a pro bono lawyer in Boston and was a journalist of sorts as the sports editor and advertising manager of my college newspaper.
The best work I’ve done as a lawyer is easy to select: my pro bono work for the Shelter Legal Services Foundation (formerly the Veterans Legal Services Project) — a foundation dedicated to providing legal help to homeless and indigent veterans, battered women and other people in the Boston area who cannot afford most legal services.
Hopefully I can bring some perspective as a practicing attorney who has worked in a variety of legal settings. I look forward to contributing to Overlawyered.com — long one of my bookmarks (sycophancy alert!) — for the next week.
Illinois alienation of affection
While just about everything else has become more actionable in today’s compensation culture, there has been a countertrend in family law. Most states have barred suits for the ancient tort of “alienation of affection” by jilted spouses. Utah (May 18, 2000) and North Carolina are exceptions, as is Illinois; there, Steven Cyl is suing a neighbor he says stole his wife. “Is this thing for real?” asks the defendant. Previous Illinois alienation-of-affection plaintiffs include the always-entertaining ex-Rep. Mel “Did I win the Lotto?” Reynolds, whose case was thrown out for unspecified reasons. (Steve Patterson, “‘This guy, he ruined my life’ — so man sues”, Chicago Sun-Times, Nov. 15 (via Bashman); “Former Congressman Mel Reynolds takes estranged wife’s lover to court”, Jet, Aug. 12, 2002; “Davidson Wrestling Coach Awarded $1.4 Million For ‘Theft of Wife?s Heart'”, North Carolina Lawyers Weekly, May 23, 2001). The ever-obnoxious Pat Buchanan approves. (“What is a Family Worth?”, Aug. 11, 1997; Hutelmyer v. Cox (N.C. App. 1999)).
Innocents behind bars
San Francisco magazine takes a long look at persons eventually exonerated and freed from prison after serving long stretches (“Innocence Lost”, Nov. (PDF)). Among them is the case of “John Stoll this past spring. After 20 years in jail for an infamous crime he did not commit, a judge said it had all been a mistake, and he was set free. ‘You win some, you lose some,’ the prosecutor shrugged, refusing to offer any admission of error or hint of an apology for all that her office had put Stoll through.” For the recent North Carolina case of Sylvester Smith, freed after 20 years in prison, see “Molestation charges dropped after victims recant allegations from ’84”, AP/Winston-Salem Journal, Nov. 6. (& letter to the editor, Dec. 20).
Ballot measure results
As I documented through the night at PointOfLaw.com, voters gave doctors and the business community some major victories in yesterday’s ballot measures. Limits on malpractice lawyers’ fees passed resoundingly in Florida, in a stinging rebuke to the trial bar. Among three other states considering med-mal ballot measures, doctors won decisively in Nevada and lost in Wyoming, while Oregon’s measure was slightly trailing but too close to call. (Update Nov. 9: late returns show one of the two Wyoming measures apparently passing after all.)
In California, in a convincing victory for the business community and good sense, voters approved Proposition 64 by a wide margin, requiring lawyers to demonstrate actual injury before invoking the state’s broad unfair-practices statute in private cases. (Thank you, Arnold.) Colorado voters lopsidedly defeated a trial-lawyer-sponsored measure to expand litigation over alleged construction defects. And in the two hot judicial contests, for seats on the Illinois and West Virginia Supreme Courts, trial-lawyer-backed candidates lost in both. Details on all these races can be found on PointOfLaw.com. Also, voters ignored this site’s advice and passed all eleven state marriage amendments on the ballot.
Finally, some politicians whose ambitions this website has followed were locked in too-close-to-call races: Washington state AG Christine Gregoire (see Oct. 28) was slightly trailing a GOP opponent in her bid for governor, while former trial lawyer lobbyist and Bush HUD secretary Mel Martinez (see Sept. 3) was leading by 80,000 votes in his Florida Senate race against Democrat Betty Castor. (Update: Martinez wins). John Edwards’s vice-presidential ambitions seem at the moment to depend on an unlikely reversal of Ohio results in late vote counting, while his home state of North Carolina went Republican both in the presidential race and in filling Edwards’s old seat. (Update: Kerry and Edwards concede).
Edwards’ lawyerly debating skills
The rhetorical techniques that John Edwards employed in his opening and closing arguments before juries were on display Tuesday night in the vice presidential debate, according to lawyers who crossed swords with him in his home state of North Carolina (Lisa Hoppenjans, “Lawyers: Edwards used trial technique”, Winston-Salem Journal, Oct. 6). Thoughts Online and Beldar discuss whether success as a trial advocate nowadays critically depends on the ability to “think on one’s feet”, as opposed to delivering a pre-scripted message, given the emphasis of modern procedure on avoiding surprise at trial. (My own impression is that Edwards was strongest when delivering material suitable to being prepared in advance, and less strong when obliged to depart from the script.) Several commentators note that Edwards saved many of his most slashing attacks for his final round of discussion on a given question, at which point Cheney would have no chance to reply. And George Will thinks Kerry’s selection of Edwards as running mate was a blunder, though for reasons unrelated to the debate (“GOP power plan”, syndicated/Washington Post, Oct. 7).
The debatable Edwards
Just in time for tonight’s debate, the Capital Research Center is out with an anything-but-flattering report on the North Carolina senator and his role on the Democratic ticket (Robert James Bidinotto, “Kerry, Edwards and ‘the Lawsuit Lobby'”, Organization Trends, Oct. (PDF))(quotes me). And reporter John Riley of Newsday takes a more than usually thorough look at Edwards’ record in medical malpractice work (“GOP may seek to exploit Edwards’ trial history”, Oct. 4)(also quotes me). For this site’s coverage of the Smiling One, see July 19, Aug. 2, Aug. 2, Aug. 17, Aug. 23, Aug. 25, and many other entries on our politics page.
Rapist can interfere with adoption
After being raped, an unmarried woman finds she is pregnant. She wishes to give the child up for adoption, but under current law she must first prevail on the birth father to give up his parental rights — and as a condition of doing so, he demands that she not testify against him. Does this sort of thing really happen? A lawmaker and a reporter in North Carolina investigate and find that, yes, it does seem to (Ruth Sheehan, “Rapists lose facet of power”, Raleigh News & Observer, Sept. 6). P.S.: I, Gadfly raises an important point, namely, how should the law deal with the fact that not all rape accusations are accurate and some are even made tactically? The Raleigh newspaper’s account indicates that the North Carolina legislation cuts off the parental rights of rapists only on conviction, which minimizes the damage done by false accusations, but also suggests that the law may be without effect in the type of case that caused outrage in the first place, in which avoiding conviction is the whole point of the abuse.
Medical education constricted
Symptoms of the medical liability crisis are less severe in North Carolina than in many other states; “Dr. Edward Halperin, vice dean of Duke’s medical school, said the issue is not cited as a major factor in Duke students’ decisions to pick a medical specialty,” which is not the case in some other parts of the country. “The malpractice issue has had a negative influence, however, in the kinds of learning opportunities medical schools offer. In years past, Halperin said, schools routinely let students do training stints at hospitals around the country. Now this practice is being curtailed, because medical schools are leery of carrying the liability for students working outside their hospitals.
“Such subtle problems seldom get mentioned in the debate, but Halperin said the effect is long term. ‘It’s inhibiting access to educational opportunities,’ he said.” (Sarah Avery, “Malpractice debate hides subtleties”, Raleigh News & Observer, Sept. 7) (via Common Good).