Law Humor

Has Justin Bieber Abandoned His Monkey?

Posted on May 17, 2013
According to Rolling Stone, Justin Bieber's management company has told the shelter currently housing Mally, his 20-week-old capuchin monkey, that Bieber doesn't want the animal and that it should be placed in a zoo. Mally was quarantined by German customs...

Assorted Stupidity #52

Posted on May 15, 2013
When attorneys get carried away at a press conference: "I have a client who is not only not guilty, he is truly 100% innocent," said the attorney for the man initially charged with sending ricin to federal officials. She was...

Does Eric Holder Know?

Posted on May 15, 2013
Nope. He does not: Of course, neither did Alberto Gonzales, or if he did, he didn't recall: Now, I don't know whether it's worse to not know anything or to not recall anything. I mean, if you don't know, you...

Mom, I Love You, But Please Don't Write Foreign Leaders Without Telling Me

Posted on May 13, 2013
Presidential historian Michael Beschloss sends out some great stuff on Twitter (@beschlossDC). On Mother's Day, he tweeted this image of a letter from JFK to his mom, dated November 3, 1962. In it, the President tells his mother he has...

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Creeps (Back) in the News

Posted on May 13, 2013
There's no shortage of creeps in the news, of course, but two of them have previously appeared here and are especially creeptastic. First, O.J. Simpson, whose most recent appearance here was in 2010, when the Nevada Supreme Court affirmed his...

Naked TSA Protester's Appeal to Be Heard Tuesday

Posted on May 13, 2013
As you may recall, John Brennan took off all his clothes last April at an airport checkpoint in Portland to protest being hassled by the TSA (they got a false positive on that swab test), and was then charged with...

No, You Can't Force Your Employees to Be Scientologists

Posted on May 09, 2013
So says the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in this press release, describing a lawsuit it filed today (May 9) against a Miami company. According to the EEOC, the company required employees to take Scientology courses and engage in a variety....

John McAfee: "I'm a Master at Sullying My Own Name"

Posted on May 08, 2013
Turns out that former software mogul and current oddball John McAfee successfully escaped the persecution (or prosecution, depending on who you believe) he was facing in Belize. See "If I Am Captured, This Blog Will Continue," Lowering the Bar (Dec.....

Former Judge Ordered to Send Out Pictures of Herself Wearing Handcuffs

Posted on May 08, 2013
Joan Orie Melvin, previously a justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, was convicted in February of six counts of corruption for using her judicial staff to help her run for office (twice). Three of the charges were felonies, but Melvin...

Judge Orders Prenda Law Group Beamed Out Into Space

Posted on May 07, 2013
For full coverage of the Prenda Law debacle, let me refer you to Popehat, where Ken has been following it closely for a while now and has written many excellent posts on the saga (with help from, among others, Cathy...

TIP: If You're Standing in Front of a Car, You Are In a Poor Negotiating Position

Posted on May 06, 2013
On the other hand, it could get significantly worse: Just to be clear, that car is not parked. It is traveling down a road in Roswell, Georgia, at what I would guess is around 45 mph. The hood ornament is...

Guess What the Air Force's Chief of Sexual Assault Prevention Was Just Arrested For

Posted on May 06, 2013
Shoplifting! No, I'm just kidding. It was sexual assault. Ironically, according to the website of the U.S. Air Force's Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Program?a program that was led until today by the alleged assailant, who now seems to have...

U.S. Pat. No. 6,368,227: Method of Swinging on a Swing

Posted on May 02, 2013
I know what you're thinking, but this inventor is not just talking about the usual method of swinging on a swing, which he himself notes has been "known for generations." It would be stupid to try to patent that. This...

Does Size Matter? (Or, In Memory of Miss Wiggles)

Posted on May 01, 2013
That's one way the court described the question before it in this case (click for the full opinion): More specifically, the plaintiffs sought an injunction against the enforcement of a San Antonio ordinance that required their dancers to wear more...

Hairy-Visor Infringement Update!

Posted on May 01, 2013
A reader intrigued by yesterday's intellectual-property tale did a little research and uncovered some potentially relevant evidence. First, as you may recall, the plaintiff is seeking a declaratory judgment that it did not infringe on a patent for the "ornamental...

Comes Now the Plaintiff, Seeking a Declaratory Judgment of Hairy-Visor Non-Infringement

Posted on April 30, 2013
1. A recently filed complaint contains the following statement: "U.S. Pat. D557,478 is a design patent for the ornamental design of a visor with simulated hair." 2. Said patent includes sketches of the proposed visor, to wit: 3. In the...

WARNING: Peanut Shells May Contain Peanuts

Posted on April 29, 2013
Here's how utterly ridiculous this story is. In the UK, unshelled peanuts are called "monkey nuts," as depicted here, but although this story therefore involves people being "warned not to eat roasted monkey nuts," THAT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH BY...

Assorted Stupidity #51

Posted on April 26, 2013
"Disciplinary records, ... special-needs records, testing records, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses and birth dates are among some of the data [about school children] that can be shared with the third-party vendors contracting with state and city districts" without parental...

Judge Holds Himself in Contempt for Cellphone Violation

Posted on April 23, 2013
"I thought it would never happen to me," said Judge Raymond Voet, who is the chief judge in Ionia County, Michigan. He was referring to the fact that his cellphone made noise in court on April 13 during a trial....

Classifying a Killer Whale for Tax Purposes

Posted on April 21, 2013
That's the title of this short video (1:13) in which Professor Jeff Karlin of Golden Gate University explains that the IRS distinguishes between killer whales and great white sharks, although both are big giant swimming things that could potentially eat...

Tax Day

Posted on April 18, 2013
On top of everything else, Monday was tax day, and while we were just reminded that tax gripes are relatively minor in the scheme of things, of course, that doesn't mean we should stop griping entirely. If you failed to...

Attorney: "The Training I Recieved at Hustler Was Extremely Helpful" in Law School

Posted on April 18, 2013
Susannah Breslin, who is a contributor at Forbes.com, has posted her interview with Dan Kapelovitz, who is currently a criminal-law attorney but previously worked at Hustler magazine. See "How A Porn Magazine Editor Became A Criminal Law Attorney," Forbes...

Plaintiff Who Keeps Suing Search Engines Still Not Clear on Streisand Effect

Posted on April 16, 2013
Me in 2010, on Stayart v. Yahoo: "Like many," this opinion begins, "Beverly Stayart was curious about what she would find when she put her name into a search engine." And like many, Beverly Stayart was not happy with what...

Sharp Conflict in Reports on Courthouse Duck Incident

Posted on April 15, 2013
The UPI reported it this way: HONOLULU, April 10 (UPI) -- Authorities in Honolulu said they confiscated two bottles of beer and a live duck from a man entering a courthouse to meet with his probation officer. A courthouse security...

Criminal-Defense Tip: Do Not Answer the Door Holding Contraband

Posted on April 12, 2013
You won't be able to read the full text of this article if (like me) you don't have premium access to the New Jersey Law Journal. On the other hand, you don't need to. If the first sentence is too...

White House Grants Senate a Glimpse of Legal Memo Re: Killing Americans

Posted on April 10, 2013
From yesterday's edition of The Hill: The Obama administration on Wednesday is expected to grant members of the Senate Judiciary Committee access to its legal justification for killing suspected terrorists who are U.S. citizens. Yep, after months of asking, the...

Well, at Least He Wasn't Texting

Posted on April 09, 2013
Here's your headline of the [insert appropriate time frame]: Witnesses: Man drove 90 mph with genitals hanging out the window It looks as though an alleged reign of terror may be coming to an end, after three of what police...

Oregon, Hawaii May Name Official State Microbes

Posted on April 09, 2013
If House Concurrent Resolution 12 passes, Oregon could become the first state in the Union to declare an official state microbe. Specifically, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, also known as "brewer's yeast" or "baker's yeast," for reasons you can probably guess...

The Day Justice Douglas Threw a Book Out the Window

Posted on April 08, 2013
From the book In Chambers: Stories of Supreme Court Law Clerks and Their Justices, noted by Andrew Cohen in The Atlantic : Law clerks in this era all learned that none of [Justice William O.] Douglas' rules were ever to...

Blade Walks in Daylight Again

Posted on April 07, 2013
Meaning, of course, Wesley Snipes, whose film career has been on hold lately due to being in federal prison. Snipes was convicted in 2008 of not filing federal tax returns, and received a three-year sentence. He is still under house...

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