Category Archives: Legal matters

Another appallingly stupid op-ed piece in today’s Chron. The author, a professor of history at Tomball College named Tom Lovell, really needs to get out more. SOME years back, a Rice grad invited me to an Owls home football game. … Continue reading → Continue reading →

The former mayor of Sugar Land is suing a talk show host for some columns he wrote in which he called the mayor “Osama”: A lawsuit has been filed by former Sugar Land Mayor Dean Hrbacek against radio talk show … Continue reading → Continue reading →

I knew if I brought up tort reform as I did in the previous post that someone would mention Liebeck v. McDonald’s, the infamous case in which a woman was awarded a multimillion dollar amount for spilling coffee on herself. … Continue reading → Continue reading →

A federal judge will rule whether or not Calvin Burdine, the Texas death row inmate who was granted a new trial on appeal because his original lawyer slept through much of the case, gets to retain the attorney who won … Continue reading → Continue reading →

The cover story in this week’s Houston Press is on the schism in the victims’ rights movement. One of the main players is Houston-based Justice for All, led by Dianne Clements. JFA is as tuff-on-crime as they come, and they … Continue reading → Continue reading →

There are two items of interest regarding the Madelyne Gorman Toogood, the woman who was videotaped beating her young daughter, in today’s Chron. First, columnist Ken Hoffman interviews Toogood and her attorney, Steve “Rocket” Rosen. Whatever good they may have … Continue reading → Continue reading →

In another 5-4 Supreme Court ruling the SCOTUS has struck down a law that prevents judges from saying in campaign ads how they’d rule on a particular issue. A local former judge disagrees with this ruling: Most people who can … Continue reading → Continue reading →

HMO successfully sued A jury has awarded $13 million to the widow and daughter of a man who died days after an HMO forced him out of a skilled nursing facility. The 83-year-old man was back in the hospital the … Continue reading → Continue reading →

So says the 9th Circuit US Court of Appeals, in ruling that the phrase “under God” violates the Establishment Clause. “A profession that we are a nation ‘under God’ is identical, for Establishment Clause purposes, to a profession that we … Continue reading → Continue reading →

The case of a 14-year-old girl and her multiple sex partners in Michigan is calling into question some of the assumptions about age of consent laws. Has Reynolds written about this one yet? Continue reading →

Calling Greg Hlatky – there’s a lawsuit between rival Jack Terrier organizations over who’s the better custodian of the breed. As the owner of a purebred mutt, I have to say I don’t get it. Anyone got some words of … Continue reading → Continue reading →

A Beaumont man has been freed from jail after spending over four years in the clink on a contempt charge. State District Judge Zeke Zbranek had refused to release [Odis] Briggs to visit his ailing wife or attend her funeral … Continue reading → Continue reading →

From today’s Chron: Harris County Civil Court at Law Judge Gary Michael Block ordered the owner of a telemarketing company to leave his name and home telephone number on his company’s recorded messages so that frustrated recipients can return the … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Mac Thomason pointed to this article in which a GOP candidate for Congress proposed taxing science fiction books as a means of funding NASA. Not only is it a stupid idea, it’s very likely an unconstitutional one. In the case … Continue reading → Continue reading →

The ongoing saga of who really won the Texas Academic Decathlon ended yesterday when the state Supreme Court told the lower courts to butt out, thus denying Pasadena Dobie a chance to challenge victorious Lubbock. Apparently, at the state match … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Girls in Texas who want an abortion but are required to get parental consent have been looking to courts in Austin and San Antonio for judicial bypass. Houston and Dallas have had almost no such reviews filed since the law … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Virginia Postrel, who seriously needs to start using permalinks (it’s The Future, dammit!), makes a good point about what is and isn’t censorship: NOT CENSORSHIP: Andrew Sullivan and others are making much of this Telegraph report that left-wing British publications … Continue reading → Continue reading →

I got a nice note from Fritz Schranck today with some comments about my recent post about Amber Kulhanek’s default judgment against Arco Media. Kulhanek claims she was coerced into entering a wet T-shirt contest where she was filmed flashing … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Ever see those ads on TV for the Girls Gone Wild videotapes? You know, the ones of coeds on Spring Break and at Mardi Gras flashing their boobs? Well, a girl who was seen in an ad for a similar … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Dahlia Lithwick discusses Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s reasoning behind his recent claims that Catholic judges who believe the Church’s teaching that capital punishment is wrong should not be on the bench. Scalia, who is a devout Catholic, is not … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Also taking the Fifth this week was Craig Rosebrough, an alleged leader of the radical Earth Liberation Front. I say “alleged” here because he’s never been directly linked to any of their activities, he’s only ever claimed to be a … Continue reading → Continue reading →

A dozen Hare Krisha congregations are filing for bankruptcy. I was going to make a cheap Arthur Anderson joke about this, but the Chapter 11 filing is in response to a lawsuit that alleges sexual and emotional abuse of children, … Continue reading → Continue reading →

I really don’t want to get into the whole gun debate here. It’s been done to death in blogdom, and frankly I find the whole thing boring. If there’s one issue on which a lot of bloggers (including myself) who … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Glenn Reynolds says: 15 KIDS AND ADULTS WERE INJURED, SOME CRITICALLY, AT A SCHOOL in Los Angeles, as a car veered into a crowd. It was a Mercedes. Will we hear calls for “car control,” and explanations that “no one … Continue reading → Continue reading →

A New Jersey man is charged as an accomplice in a DUI fatality even though he wasn’t in the car. Kenneth Powell was called to pick up his friend Michael Prangle, who’d been busted after blowing a 0.21 on the … Continue reading → Continue reading →