QUESTION:
On behalf of the California Administrative Office of the Courts, we would like to know if there are any courts in the United States that “sell” delinquent court-ordered fines, fees, penalties, and assessments. In specific, we are looking for criteria, and private vendors used, including pricing structure.
RESPONSES:
CRS Report No. R41222; 4/30/2010; Posted 5/7/2010 Author(s): Charles Doyle, Senior Specialist in American Public Law Subject(s): Criminal Justice; Law
No. of Pages: 9
Summary Zacarias Moussaoui, members of the Colombian drug cartels, members of organized crime, and some of the former Enron executives have at least one thing in common: they all have federal conspiracy convictions. The essence of conspiracy is an agreement of two or more persons to engage in some form of prohibited misconduct. The crime is complete upon agreement, although some statutes require prosecutors to show that at least one of the conspirators has taken some concrete step or committed some overt act in furtherance of the scheme. There are dozens of federal conspiracy statutes. One, 18 U.S.C. 371, outlaws conspiracy to commit some other federal crime. The others outlaw conspiracy to engage in various specific forms of proscribed conduct.General Section 371 conspiracies are punishable by imprisonment for not more than 5 years; drug trafficking, terrorist, and racketeering conspiracies all carry the same penalties as their underlying substantive offenses, and thus are punished more severely than are Section 371 conspiracies. All are subject to fines of not more than $250,000 (not more than $500,000 for organizations), most may serve as the basis for a restitution order, and some for a forfeiture order.
From: Fair Courts E-lert, May 7, 2010 Published by the Brennan Center for Justice, New York University School of Law.
1. Show Me Better Courts, a Missouri organization seeking to replace the state’s merit selection of judges with contested judicial elections, claims to have raised $1.5 million “to gather petition signatures” to put the organization’s proposal for a constitutional amendment on the November ballot. In a conference call with reporters, director of the organization James Harris said he expected “another $2 million to $4 million will be spent on the fall campaign if enough signatures are valid.” Missourians for Fair and Impartial Courts, “the group leading opposition to the measure,” and defending the so-called “Missouri Plan” has thus far raised approximately $268,000.
Dave Helling, The Battle Over Missouri’s Courts: A Million Dollar Bash, Kansas City Star, May 3, 2010.
Top Ten Stories of the week ending May 7, 2010:
Judiciary Stevens Explains Death Penalty Stance, Bow Ties
May 6, 2010 7:05 am CDT
Jonathan Stock who along with others has been working tirelessly to save six threatened law libraries in Connecticut from closure due to financial constraints. Here is Jonathan’s latest report, received as an e-mail on May 6, 2010.:
The Connecticut General Assembly closed down last night. We now know that the bill, its substance merged with the 2011 Budget, passed. You will find herein as an attachment [ see download link below] the latest bulletin from the Judicial Office of External Affairs. We have saved at least three of the six threatened law libraries: Bridgeport, Litchfield, and Hartford. Depending on the Branch’s negotiations with the Department of Public Works, we may also get back the Willimantic Law Library as well as the Willimantic Courthouse.
The good news Jonathan writes about would not have occurred without his continuing, tireless efforts along with those of many other people and organizations such as the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL), Southern New England Law libraries Association (SNELLA).
Much is being written about the application development and information security aspects of cloud computing but there has been comparatively little discussion about how cloud computing relates to ethical issues that may arise from a lawyer’s use of this technology. In their two part article I n t r o to Cloud Computing and Its Ethical Implications – Is There a Silver Lining? (Part I of II) Jeremy Feinberg and Maura Grossman have contibuted significantly toward filling that gap in the literature. Part I has already been published in the May 2010 issue of the New York Professional Responsibility Report (NYPRR) and is being reprinted below with permission of the publisher in response to those of you who through your comments have expressed an interest in these issues. We also plan to post Part II here after it first appears in NYPRR.
David Badertscher
Intro to Cloud Computing and Its Ethical Implications — Is There a Silver Lining? (Part I of II)
By Jeremy R. Feinberg and Maura R. Grossman ______________________________________________________________________
Understanding the legal and ethical implications of rapidly emerging technologies can be a bit like shooting at a moving target. It was barely 18 or 24 months ago that you could ask a lawyer whether he or she had a Facebook account, or “tweeted,” and you were likely to be met with a blank stare. In this short span of time, social networking sites have gone from fringe activities to mainstream tools in many lawyers’ marketing and communications arsenals Now that Web 2.0 has become fairly common, the latest trend that some lawyers and law firms – and many of their clients – have begun to embrace, is cloud computing. In the first of this two-part series, we will provide a brief, non-technical introduction to what “cloud computing” is, explain why it is catching on, and at least identify some of the ethical issues that may arise from a lawyer’s use of this technology In the second part of this series, we will consider a set of legal and ethical issues implicated by cloud computing, primarily when it is the lawyer’s client that makes use of this technology.
What Is Cloud Computing? Why Is It Becoming So Popular?
Setting aside associate and support staff compensation for the moment, real estate and information technology (“IT”) costs are probably two of the most significant overhead expenditures for many law firms. Imagine, however, a law practice that did not house its own computer servers and other hardware, indeed, did not even have its own IT Department. Could such a law firm function in this day and age of ubiquitous electronic records? Sure, if it has embarked on cloud computing, a trend which essentially entails “outsourcing” some or all of the firm’s technology infrastructure, software applications, and storage needs to a third-party provider from whom the firm “leases” them, over the Internet, for a monthly fee. Cloud computing takes advantage of the convenience, scalability, and cost savings that can be achieved by sharing hardware, software, and data storage. It allows users at multiple, disparate locations to make use of a joint pool of technology resources that each alone might not be able to afford, without having to physically house or personally manage them
Cloud computing first became possible because certain companies worldwide – among them Google and Amazon – amassed vast amounts of computer hardware and software so that they could handle the staggering consumer demands during the peak ordering season (i.e., the holidays). In seeking uses for this IT infrastructure during the remainder of the year, when there was less call for the applications and servers, it occurred to these companies (and others) that they could make the excess resources available for “rent” to the public, through the Internet. (The “cloud” is the symbol used to depict the Internet in technical drawings). Law offices seeking to take advantage of the cloud could thereby secure remote access to virtually unlimited computing resources, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, on an as-needed basis, through a contract with a third-party service provider that linked them with the type(s) and amount(s) of IT resources they needed, ranging from proprietary software applications to document management systems and back-up storage.
The potential benefits for cloud users are obvious. Because of the savings in real estate costs and computer equipment, as well as on the personnel needed to manage on-site IT systems, cloud users can access the particular computing resources they need, at a particular point in time, for a fraction of the cost of owning and maintaining them. As their needs expand and contract, they can simply scale up or scale back without having to worry about details like electricity costs for operating and cooling equipment, or licensing fees and upgrades for software applications. The computing resources are conveniently available at any time, and from any place, as long as there is a working Internet connection. As a practical matter, however, use of the cloud means that a lawyer’s (or law firm’s) email, word processing, and document management systems – and all of the confidential client information contained on them – are no longer housed within the four walls of the lawyer’s office, but rather, somewhere in cyberspace that the lawyer may not be able to readily identify at any given point in time. It is in these details that the devil may reside.
In an economy where the bottom line and around-the-clock accessibility have become increasingly important, to many organizations, cloud computing may seem like a no brainer. But before making the leap to the cloud, there are certain ethical issues that should be considered. Although a comprehensive discussion of the myriad legal issues implicated by cloud computing are beyond the scope of this article, the interested reader may wish to refer to the following series of blog entries, which provide an excellent overview of some of these issues:
http://www.infolawgroup.com/2009/08/articles/cloud-computing-1/legal-implications-of-cloud-computing-part-one-the-basics-and-framing-the-issues/ (discussing the basics of cloud computing);
http://www.infolawgroup.com/2009/09/articles/breach-notice/legal-implications-of-cloud-computing-part-two-privacy-and-the-cloud/ (discussing privacy considerations in cloud computing); and
http://www.infolawgroup.com/2009/10/articles/cloud-computing-1/legal-implications-of-cloud-computing-part-three-relationships-in-the-cloud/ (discussing relationships in the cloud).
As for the pertinent ethical issues, we address below some of those that uniquely apply when it is the law firm that moves to the cloud. There are other issues that are implicated primarily when it is the client that chooses to do so. Those we will address in the second article in this series.
Continue reading
The following is presented as a service of the ABA Criminal Justice Section http://www.abanet.org/crimjust
The ABA Section of Criminal Justice is pleased to provide Professor Rory Little’s Perspective, a Case Brief in U.S. v. Stevens which includes the Holding, Facts, and Analysis in the case.
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In his provocative Opinion piece Our Fill-in-the-Blank Constitution in the April 13 New York Times, Geoffrey Stone examines this question and more. He emphasizes that contitutional law is not a mechanical exercise in just applying the law, a fact that needs always to be considered in the selection and evaluation of judges and justices.. Here are two excerpts from the article:
“AS the Senate awaits the nomination of a new Supreme Court justice, a frank discussion is needed on the proper role of judges in our constitutional system. For 30 years, conservative commentators have persuaded the public that conservative judges apply the law, whereas liberal judges make up the law….”
“So, how should judges interpret the Constitution? To answer that question, we need to consider why we give courts the power of judicial review – the power to hold laws unconstitutional – in the first place. Although the framers thought democracy to be the best system of government, they recognized that it was imperfect. One flaw that troubled them was the risk that prejudice or intolerance on the part of the majority might threaten the liberties of a minority. As James Madison observed, ( http://www.constitution.org/jm/17881017_bor.htm ) in a democratic society “the real power lies in the majority of the community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended … from acts in which the government is the mere instrument of the major number of the constituents.” It was therefore essential, Madison concluded, for judges, whose life tenure insulates them from the demands of the majority, to serve as the guardians of our liberties and as “an impenetrable bulwark” ( http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch14s50.html ) against every encroachment upon our most cherished freedoms.”
“On January 21st, 2009, President Obama issued a Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government in which he described how: ‘public engagement enhances the Government’s effectiveness and improves the quality of its decisions. Knowledge is widely dispersed in society, and public officials benefit from having access to that dispersed knowledge.’
To support the President’s open government initiative, DOT has partnered with the Cornell eRulemaking Initiative (CeRI) in a pilot project, Regulation Room, to discover the best ways of using Web 2.0 and social networking technologies to: (1) alert the public, including those who sometimes may not be aware of rulemaking proposals, such as individuals, public interest groups, small businesses, and local government entities that rulemaking is occurring in areas of interest to them; (2) increase public understanding of each proposed rule and the rulemaking process; and (3) help the public formulate more effective individual and collaborative input to DOT. Over the course of several rulemaking initiatives, CeRI will use different Web technologies and approaches to enhance public understanding and participation, work with DOT to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of these techniques, and report their findings and conclusions on the most effective use of social networking technologies in this area….”
Quote from U.S. Department of Transportation Website.
Criminal Law Library Blog