Remind me next time I get a little ticked off about something a judge has done not to send an email to would-be supporters describing how one might sit outside the jurist's home, concealed, and fire a shot into a bedroom.
It just might get me arrested for breach of the peace; it ought not get me arrested for threatening.
Edward "Ted" Taupier is facing threatening charges in Middletown. He sent an email to a group of six folks about Judge Elizabeth Bozzuto's home, and a cemetery behind it, and a bullet. He never sent the email to the judge; he sent it to fellow travelers among...
June 11, 2015
We have now entered the silly season of the emerging national debate about the use of force by police officers. We have Eric Casebolt to thank for that. He’s the officer who just resigned from the McKinney, Texas, police department after a video of him confronting some teenagers at a Texas pool party went viral.
I think I know why Mr. Casebolt resigned, and it had little to do with his conduct at poolside.
Police officers are under a microscope as never before. Whether in Cleveland, Baltimore, Ferguson, Charleston or Staten Island, police decisions to use force, often deadly...
June 11, 2015
Hard cases, the maxim goes, make bad law. So it is hardly surprising that the Connecticut General Assembly is poised to weigh in on the use of deadly force by police officers with a sloppy piece of legislation. I wonder, really, whether new laws are necessary. And if they are, I harbor doubts about the bill unanimously passed by the Senate.
This year's domestic news has been dominated by films of protest and reaction in Ferguson, Missouri, endless videos of a fatal police takedown on Staten Island, and, let's not forget, the killing of Freddy Gray in Baltimore. Did I neglect to mention...
June 4, 2015
Those of you who spend time on Facebook and other social media sites know that the boundaries of free speech can be stretched to cover all sorts of uncivilly spoken smack. There is a limit on what can be said, however. One such limit is what the law calls “true threats.”
The First Amendment is simplicity itself: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of...
June 4, 2015
May 27, 2015
I cannot help but wonder whether the public trial rights of criminal defendants are routinely violated in Connecticut when judges conduct sensitive...
May 20, 2015
I was at the Mohegan Sun casino the other day, during normal business hours. But I was not there for the purpose of gambling. I swear. I have a room...
May 17, 2015
I’m always amazed when I read press accounts of cases I have either tried, or am in the midst of trying: the reporter’s gloss rarely...
May 17, 2015
Much has been made about Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s demeanor during his recent trial. For 10 weeks he sat in a Boston courtroom. Observers report that...
May 8, 2015
Among the enchantments of criminal law is its specialized vocabulary.
For example, a new potential client often feels the need to approach...
May 7, 2015
Reliable information is hard to come by in the death of Baltimore’s Freddie Gray, but, from a distance, he looks to be a victim of a police...