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As a fan of Citizen's United, I can confidently say that McCutchen was bullshit.
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# ? Apr 27, 2014 16:27 |
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# ? May 9, 2024 11:39 |
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Green Crayons posted:As a fan of Citizen's United, I can confidently say that McCutchen was bullshit. Can you elaborate? Do you mean the holding was bullshit, the dicta was bullshit, or both?
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# ? Apr 28, 2014 03:51 |
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I know this is for current events on the court, but I saw this on reddit and felt the bile gurgle up:U.S. Supreme Court posted:Here, there is no doubt that the Black Hills were “taken” from the Sioux in a way that wholly deprived them of their property rights to that land. The question presented is whether Congress was acting under circumstances in which that “taking” implied an obligation to pay just compensation, or whether it was acting pursuant to its unique powers to manage and control tribal property as the guardian of Indian welfare, in which event the Just Compensation Clause would not apply.” U.S. Supreme Court, I was wondering if those of you who follow the court more closely have a lowlight list of opinions, or snippets from opinions, that similarly enrage you.
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 18:17 |
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Ron Jeremy posted:I know this is for current events on the court, but I saw this on reddit and felt the bile gurgle up: Is that intended to read 'Yeah, we took it. We haven't decided if we took it in a way that means we need to pay you for it or if we just control everything you own, but it's gone now and you can't have it back.'? Because that's pretty much how it reads to me.
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 18:19 |
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Prism posted:Is that intended to read 'Yeah, we took it. We haven't decided if we took it in a way that means we need to pay you for it or if we just control everything you own, but it's gone now and you can't have it back.'? Because that's pretty much how it reads to me. That's how it read to me too. The court decided in a way I agree with, but the Sioux have refused the settlement money as just compensation because they want the land back instead. According to wikipedia, the money is still in the BIA hands, accruing with interest, currently over $1B.
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 18:24 |
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Prism posted:Is that intended to read 'Yeah, we took it. We haven't decided if we took it in a way that means we need to pay you for it or if we just control everything you own, but it's gone now and you can't have it back.'? Because that's pretty much how it reads to me. It's basically: "We took it under all conceivable definitions of taking. If we took it under Power A, we owe you money for it because constitutionally Power A requires compensation. If we took it under Power B, we don't because it doesn't." The opinion then goes on to decide which way they did it. The snippet is just setting up what they're deciding. They don't get it back either way, the only question was whether it counts as a 5th amendment takings or whether it was under the tribal land management power.
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 18:25 |
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Looks like the administration is getting a win at the court today over its clean air rules in regards to upwind pollution traveling across states, overturning the DC circuit in a 6-2 decision(Alito recused) http://thehill.com/regulation/energy-environment/204658-supreme-court-upholds-epa-cross-state-air-pollution-rule quote:The Supreme Court on Tuesday in a 6-2 decision upheld a rule that allows the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate power plant air pollution that crosses state borders, handing President Obama an important regulatory victory.
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 18:42 |
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Scalia's dissent is pretty amazing because you can see him try to twist his logic to suit his agenda. Hell, he even cites his own decision in a prior case incorrectly to support his dissent. Washington Post posted:Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, dissented. The dissenters may have the better of the textual argument (more about that later, time permitting), but Scalia’s opinion also contained a noticeable error. On page 12 of the dissent Scalia writes:
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 20:16 |
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Party Plane Jones posted:Scalia's dissent is pretty amazing because you can see him try to twist his logic to suit his agenda. Hell, he even cites his own decision in a prior case incorrectly to support his dissent. “Too many important decisions of the Federal Government are made nowadays by unelected agency officials exercising broad lawmaking authority, rather than by the people’s representatives in Congress.” Unelected officials? Like say, supreme court justices?
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 20:21 |
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Omerta posted:Can you elaborate? Do you mean the holding was bullshit, the dicta was bullshit, or both? McCutcheon v. FEC, 134 S. Ct. 1434, 1450-51 (2014) posted:Moreover, while preventing corruption or its appearance is a legitimate objective, Congress may target only a specific type of corruption—“quid pro quo” corruption. As Buckley explained, Congress may permissibly seek to rein in “large contributions [that] are given to secure a political quid pro quo from current and potential office holders.” 424 U.S., at 26, 96 S. Ct. 612, 46 L. Ed. 2d 659. In addition to “actual quid pro quo arrangements,” Congress may permissibly limit “the appearance of corruption stemming from public awareness of the opportunities for abuse inherent in a regime of large individual financial contributions” to particular candidates. Id., at 27, 96 S. Ct. 612, 46 L. Ed. 2d 659; see also Citizens United, 558 U.S., at 359, 130 S. Ct. 876, 175 L. Ed. 2d 753 (“When Buckley identified a sufficiently important governmental interest in preventing corruption or the appearance of corruption, that interest was limited to quid pro quo corruption”).
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 21:54 |
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The Supreme Court slapped the Fed. Cir in the face again and returned more power to district courts with regard to attorney fees in patent litigation suits. See Octane Fitness v. Icon Health & Fitness and Highmark v. Allcare Health Management Systems. How fast will Fed. Cir ignore it or try to route around it?
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# ? Apr 29, 2014 22:48 |
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Allaniis posted:The Supreme Court slapped the Fed. Cir in the face again and returned more power to district courts with regard to attorney fees in patent litigation suits. See Octane Fitness v. Icon Health & Fitness and Highmark v. Allcare Health Management Systems. Can someone put together an effortpost explaining how these sorts of cases make it to the Supreme Court? I'm assuming that there's a legal organization somewhere that wanted more power for the District Courts, and it's one that has no opinion on and no interest in the merits of various health food companies. I would also be surprised if Octane Fitness were looking to spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to go all the way to the Supreme Court with whatever dispute it was. So my question is, how did these groups get married up? Whose job is it to find these nobody companies in esoteric disputes and shepherd them to the highest court in the land, and why do they agree to it?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 04:51 |
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StarMagician posted:Can someone put together an effortpost explaining how these sorts of cases make it to the Supreme Court? I'm assuming that there's a legal organization somewhere that wanted more power for the District Courts, and it's one that has no opinion on and no interest in the merits of various health food companies. I would also be surprised if Octane Fitness were looking to spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to go all the way to the Supreme Court with whatever dispute it was. One of the decisions was that attorney fee awards are reviewed for abuse of discretion, but the more important one was that the Federal Circuit's interpretation of the attorney fee award part of the Patent Act was almost impossible to meet and was not the correct interpretation of the law. So you had IP groups supporting the FC decisions because the FC loves IP trolls and lets them get off without a fee award constantly, while tech companies that are constantly being sued over software patents and the like opposed them.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 05:09 |
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StarMagician posted:Can someone put together an effortpost explaining how these sorts of cases make it to the Supreme Court? I'm assuming that there's a legal organization somewhere that wanted more power for the District Courts, and it's one that has no opinion on and no interest in the merits of various health food companies. I would also be surprised if Octane Fitness were looking to spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to go all the way to the Supreme Court with whatever dispute it was. There are a number and it depends by field, but in food and drug law my bet is that the most infamous is the Washington Legal Foundation. I don't know who funds them, but they bring test cases from a number of conservative, free market directions that are especially well-designed in terms of attacking the purview of the government. As a food and drug- focused guy, I'd say their biggest success was Washington Legal Foundation v. Henney, which basically prevented the FDA from regulating or limiting off-label prescription. Speaking from an FDA- reg perspective, the WLF are unusually sophisticated legal actors, even by the standards of such groups. The frequency and ordering of cases and arguments made on their behalf attacking regulation of commercial practices make it look an awful lot like they have planned test cases targeting ambiguities in regulatory law on deck for every outcome they can anticipate for a given one of their suits- the sort of thing that takes a metric ton of research and planning, and long-term dependable funding, to arrange.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 05:13 |
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Allaniis posted:The Supreme Court slapped the Fed. Cir in the face again and returned more power to district courts with regard to attorney fees in patent litigation suits. See Octane Fitness v. Icon Health & Fitness and Highmark v. Allcare Health Management Systems. The next time a district court awards shifted fees would be my bet. StarMagician posted:Can someone put together an effortpost explaining how these sorts of cases make it to the Supreme Court? I'm assuming that there's a legal organization somewhere that wanted more power for the District Courts, and it's one that has no opinion on and no interest in the merits of various health food companies. I would also be surprised if Octane Fitness were looking to spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to go all the way to the Supreme Court with whatever dispute it was. Actually, it was definitely Octane - they were hoping to force ICON to pay their legal fees for the dispute. Not backed by anyone else, just their own interests. (having billed something like 120k in work to clients in March all by myself, I can understand the desire to recover attorneys fees.)
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 05:58 |
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Kiwi Ghost Chips posted:So you had IP groups supporting the FC decisions because the FC loves IP trolls and lets them get off without a fee award constantly, while tech companies that are constantly being sued over software patents and the like opposed them. Speaking of patents, the last case this term will be another patent case in Limelight v Akami.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 06:15 |
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Allaniis posted:It also helps larger companies by fending off legitimate claims from smaller competitors, due to the increased risk. These are basically nonexistent in practice though. Akamai is being argued today. It's interesting, but Nautilus will likely have a larger impact on the patent world than either of it's bigger name brethren (Akamai and CLS bank, unless the Court does something more extreme than expected in CLS.)
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 06:46 |
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If they pull another Bilski, no wonder the Federal Circuit does is own thing
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 12:54 |
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StarMagician posted:Can someone put together an effortpost explaining how these sorts of cases make it to the Supreme Court? I'm assuming that there's a legal organization somewhere that wanted more power for the District Courts, and it's one that has no opinion on and no interest in the merits of various health food companies. I would also be surprised if Octane Fitness were looking to spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to go all the way to the Supreme Court with whatever dispute it was. The correct standard of review upon appeal (Highmark) comes up in every single appellate case. It was only a matter of time for the Federal Circuit to get it wrong, and for SCOTUS to take the appeal as an easy case for error correction. Indeed, the petitioner/appellant had won in the District Court, and the Federal Circuit's de novo review reversed (in part) that win -- so there was a strong impetus to spend the money on appeal and get the Federal Circuit's own opinion reversed, because there would be a net financial gain if they won. And this is the typical calculus most clients have on appeal, I might add. Similarly, attorneys frequently ask for attorney's fees (Octane Fitness). It was only a matter of time for that minor, but important, issue to work its way up the system. It probably helped that the Court decided to also grant Highmark, as the two cases go hand in hand.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 13:31 |
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Also the Federal Circuit has a reputation for basically doing whatever the hell it wants and ignoring the Supreme Court.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 13:42 |
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So the Supreme Court just put out an amended Scalia dissent in Homer City, removing the erroneous citation. Some clerk is having a bad day
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 14:47 |
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Emanuel Collective posted:So the Supreme Court just put out an amended Scalia dissent in Homer City, removing the erroneous citation. Some clerk is having a bad day I thought Scalia mostly wrote his own opinions?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 15:05 |
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Rygar201 posted:I thought Scalia mostly wrote his own opinions? Wouldn't stop the clerk from being the one with a bad day, though.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 15:11 |
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When do we get the hear the fish destruction of evidence case? Next term? That one sounds just so delightful to me.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 15:47 |
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All I'm hoping for is cert grant in Ryan v. Hurles
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 15:51 |
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Rygar201 posted:I thought Scalia mostly wrote his own opinions? Even if he does, a clerk would be responsible for cite-checking (reviewing all the cites to make sure they're properly formatted and the underlying case/law says what the opinion says it does).
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 18:55 |
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Even so, the image of Scalia squinting at a draft in the middle of the night trying to figure out whether a period is italicized is deeply satisfying.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 19:08 |
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FCKGW posted:When do we get the hear the fish destruction of evidence case? Next term? Why did they charge him under SOX? Aren't there a lot of more logical obstruction charges?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 19:10 |
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hobbesmaster posted:Why did they charge him under SOX? Aren't there a lot of more logical obstruction charges? He destroyed tangible property. Otherwise known as fish.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 20:19 |
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ayn rand hand job posted:He destroyed tangible property. Which was evidence in a crime therefore surely theres other statutes that would work?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 20:26 |
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hobbesmaster posted:Which was evidence in a crime therefore surely theres other statutes that would work? I think it's because the fish thing was merely a civil infraction, and briefly looking at the part of the U.S.C. on obstruction of justice (18 U.S.C. §§ 1501 - 1521) I think that may be the only provision criminalizing this specific heinous fish-crime, as it just says obstructing "the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States." Edit: Yeah it looks like this provision of SOX has been used as a broad weapon since the beginning of Holder's term at the DOJ. I think the Supreme Court wanted to grant cert on the most ridiculous fact pattern. Homura and Sickle fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Apr 30, 2014 |
# ? Apr 30, 2014 20:57 |
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Jagchosis posted:I think it's because the fish thing was merely a civil infraction, and briefly looking at the part of the U.S.C. on obstruction of justice (18 U.S.C. §§ 1501 - 1521) I think that may be the only provision criminalizing this specific heinous fish-crime, as it just says obstructing "the investigation or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States." Sounds like more picking defendants and finding crimes rather than the other way around. That trend started long before Holder though.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 21:06 |
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FCKGW posted:When do we get the hear the fish destruction of evidence case? Next term? Could I get a little background on this one?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:11 |
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StandardVC10 posted:Could I get a little background on this one? There are apparently regulations requiring that fish of a certain species caught be over 20 inches long, and government officials found some fisher with some undersized fish and cited him. In doing so they requested that he keep the fish for an investigation, and he threw some of the fish out and replaced other ones with appropriately sized fish. He was charged with obstructing a federal investigation under 18 U.S.C. § 1519, which comes from Sarbanes-Oxley § 808. The whole thing is pretty dumb. http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/28/us-usa-court-crime-idUSBREA3R0VL20140428 edit: Here's the Circuit Court opinion if you're curious: http://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/ops/201116093.pdf Homura and Sickle fucked around with this message at 22:34 on Apr 30, 2014 |
# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:18 |
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Jagchosis posted:There are apparently regulations requiring that fish of a certain species caught be over 20 inches long, and government officials found some fisher with some undersized fish and cited him. In doing so they requested that he keep the fish for an investigation, and he threw some of the fish out and replaced other ones with appropriately sized fish. He was charged with obstructing a federal investigation under 18 U.S.C. § 1519, which comes from Sarbanes-Oxley § 808. The whole thing is pretty dumb. Why is it pretty dumb? It's worded broadly enough that it may apply to fishery law, and the officers instructed Yates to keep the fish as a tangible record that the fish were undersized, and he clearly did so with the intent to obstruct justice. What's the major legal difference between destroying the fish and destroying, say, photographs of the fish next to a ruler or destroying a document listing the lengths of all the fish caught? edit: I mean it's not exactly "three felonies a day" stuff here - he purposefully destroyed the fish in order to escape punishment for something that he knew or (as a fisherman) should have known was illegal esquilax fucked around with this message at 22:48 on Apr 30, 2014 |
# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:37 |
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Jagchosis posted:There are apparently regulations requiring that fish of a certain species caught be over 20 inches long, and government officials found some fisher with some undersized fish and cited him. In doing so they requested that he keep the fish for an investigation, and he threw some of the fish out and replaced other ones with appropriately sized fish. He was charged with obstructing a federal investigation under 18 U.S.C. § 1519, which comes from Sarbanes-Oxley § 808. The whole thing is pretty dumb. Why should the defendant have the burden of maintaining the states evidence against him?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:42 |
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Ron Jeremy posted:Why should the defendant have the burden of maintaining the states evidence against him? Because they generally have the burden of not destroying evidence in their possession.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:45 |
The part where they tell him to keep them rather than taking them as evidence? It's like they wanted him to destroy them so they could nail him for that instead.Kalman posted:Because they generally have the burden of not destroying evidence in their possession. Isn't that traditionally used as "you are under investigation, don't destroy anything" and then they actually take the stuff they need when they find it?
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:48 |
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Kalman posted:Because they generally have the burden of not destroying evidence in their possession. But why was it in his possesion? If the state depends on the actual artifact to prove its case, the state should seize it and maintain it. If it were some other form of contraband you can be sure they would have. Hell look at asset forfeiture. They seize the poo poo out of that. But here, they cite him and expect him to maintain the evidence? That's some bullshit right there.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 22:53 |
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# ? May 9, 2024 11:39 |
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Ron Jeremy posted:Why should the defendant have the burden of maintaining the states evidence against him? The defendant has always had the burden of not destroying evidence. He is not being accused of "failing to maintain" the evidence, he is being accused of deliberately destroying it. It's bullshit to suggest the problem is he wasn't taking the evidence to a mechanic or something.
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# ? Apr 30, 2014 23:02 |