Much has been made, and will continue to be made, of the past week’s events at the University of Missouri and, closer to home, at Yale. These flashes in the pan do signal something important, but not what most folks think. What is at stake is the death of pluralism.
In Missouri, a college president and a senior administrator stepped down after members of the football team announced they weren’t going to play anymore unless the president resigned. The president, they reasoned, didn’t do enough about campus racism. At Yale, students erupted after a silly debate about...
November 11, 2015
If the recently argued case of Foster v. Chatman teaches anything, it is that there probably is no fail-safe way to police the conduct of lawyers during jury selection. In the end, the criminal justice system, and the civil justice system, will rise or fall based on the integrity of those who participate in it.
Timothy Foster was convicted and sentenced to death in Georgia in 1987 for the murder of Queen Madge White. Foster is African American; White was caucasian. The jury the convicted Foster and sent him to die was all white.
That was apparently by design....
November 5, 2015
At the end of a long day, the last face I expect to see, tucking me in and whispering endearments, is that of New Haven Police Chief Dean Esserman. But perhaps that will change some day. Dean cares about me, you see. He cares about all of us. He cares so much about us he wanted to permit officers to steal from us in the name of community safety.
NYou read that right.
New Haven municipal spokesman Laurence Grotheer was all smiles earlier this week. He announced that police officers spotting an unlocked car on city streets just might open the car to check for valuables. If they...
November 5, 2015
Causation, as trial lawyers know, is a notoriously difficult subject. We're taught, for example, what scientists know: two events apparently related in time may not be related as a matter of fact. Thus the old maxim: post hoc ergo propter hoc, loosely translated as "after this, therefore because of that." It is a logical fallacy.
Correlation is not causation.
Politicians aren't bound by the canons of science or the rigors of legal doctrine; the political class are tethered to the interests they serve. Beware the assertions politicians make about causation. Often, their claims are...
October 28, 2015
October 22, 2015
I can never really tell when a client is serious about suicide. My hunch is that those who talk about it won’t do it. It’s the silent...
October 22, 2015
Some time in or about 2040, Caucasians will become a minority in North America, according to projections from the U.S. Census Bureau. This change in...
October 14, 2015
In the end, when our civilization and way of life collapses, it will not be because some foreign enemy laid us low. The rot that will destroy us will...
October 7, 2015
“How did you feel when you got your summons in the mail asking you to come to court?”
More often than not, it is the first question...
October 7, 2015
As of Oct. 5, 754 people, or almost three people per day, were shot to death by police officers in the United States in 2015. This information was...
October 5, 2015
Dr. Lishan Wang doesn’t want to be forced to take medication. His mind is clear. He is prepared to represent himself at trial against the...