It's Monday
Aug 3, 2020But the post office in Adliya was closed. Strange.
MarsEdit 3
Aug 2, 2020
Chicken bacon corned beef beef ribs venison. Pig chislic pork belly corned beef pastrami, shankle buffalo hamburger shank drumstick brisket pork chop. Chuck pork belly swine, porchetta leberkas beef ground round. Cupim pancetta beef capicola biltong rump pork loin short loin jowl frankfurter flank.
Boudin beef ribs chicken hamburger t-bone. Tongue jowl pastrami, shankle spare ribs strip steak andouille corned beef swine landjaeger tail kielbasa shank. Bresaola jowl pig, salami short loin meatball cow sirloin frankfurter pork loin. Ribeye leberkas meatloaf, jerky ham hock hamburger picanha frankfurter bresaola chuck chislic flank meatball pig venison.
Marsedit Image Test
Aug 2, 2020
Chicken bacon corned beef beef ribs venison. Pig chislic pork belly corned beef pastrami, shankle buffalo hamburger shank drumstick brisket pork chop. Chuck pork belly swine, porchetta leberkas beef ground round. Cupim pancetta beef capicola biltong rump pork loin short loin jowl frankfurter flank.
Boudin beef ribs chicken hamburger t-bone. Tongue jowl pastrami, shankle spare ribs strip steak andouille corned beef swine landjaeger tail kielbasa shank. Bresaola jowl pig, salami short loin meatball cow sirloin frankfurter pork loin. Ribeye leberkas meatloaf, jerky ham hock hamburger picanha frankfurter bresaola chuck chislic flank meatball pig venison.
Test of Marsedit
Aug 2, 2020This is a test of Marsedit.
Bacon ipsum dolor amet chislic short ribs tongue, pork bresaola pork chop short loin pastrami strip steak turkey shankle pig. Jowl cupim ham turkey. Cow spare ribs tri-tip shank. Ham cupim rump salami.
Shankle pork loin frankfurter turducken. Pork pork belly ribeye short ribs tail hamburger tenderloin. Beef porchetta turducken, spare ribs burgdoggen pastrami frankfurter strip steak hamburger leberkas alcatra. Pancetta sirloin pork meatball andouille prosciutto shoulder pastrami. Drumstick pork belly pancetta meatloaf, rump tenderloin boudin sirloin chuck.
Chicken bacon corned beef beef ribs venison. Pig chislic pork belly corned beef pastrami, shankle buffalo hamburger shank drumstick brisket pork chop. Chuck pork belly swine, porchetta leberkas beef ground round. Cupim pancetta beef capicola biltong rump pork loin short loin jowl frankfurter flank.
Boudin beef ribs chicken hamburger t-bone. Tongue jowl pastrami, shankle spare ribs strip steak andouille corned beef swine landjaeger tail kielbasa shank. Bresaola jowl pig, salami short loin meatball cow sirloin frankfurter pork loin. Ribeye leberkas meatloaf, jerky ham hock hamburger picanha frankfurter bresaola chuck chislic flank meatball pig venison.
Ham hock tenderloin sirloin kevin fatback. Chicken cow beef ribs, hamburger kielbasa pastrami tongue ground round capicola bacon meatloaf flank strip steak chuck. Leberkas burgdoggen venison, tail spare ribs flank pancetta. Beef ribs pig t-bone, sausage doner strip steak hamburger prosciutto bacon picanha biltong ham hock buffalo jerky. Fatback ground round meatball pancetta prosciutto. Beef ribs filet mignon corned beef turkey landjaeger boudin chuck biltong ribeye cow andouille prosciutto frankfurter rump.
Does your lorem ipsum text long for something a little meatier? Give our generator a try… it’s tasty!
Was It A Training Exercise?
Aug 2, 2020The killing of Floyd George has drawn an avalanche of commentary due to the subsequent and continuing protests throughout not only the country but the world. Few of these analysts have tried to analyze the arrest itself or draw legal conclusions from the known facts about that arrest.
Let’s take a deep dive into the circumstances surrounding the arrest and the legal conclusions which follow. \
Facts
Cup Foods is a convenience store in Minneapolis owned by Mahmoud Abumayyaleh. His teenage relatives worked in the store. On Monday, May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a regular customer at Cup Foods, entered the store.
At the time Floyd entered the store, Abumayyaleh’s nephew was working the cash register. Floyd purchased cigarets and paid with a $20 bill. Floyd then exited the store, walked across the street and sat in his vehicle. There is no allegation that Floyd ran out of the store or otherwise caused a problem in the store. The teenagers did not ask Floyd to remain in the store.
By the time Floyd was already in his automobile, the teenagers became concerned that the $20 bill Floyd used to pay for the cigarets was counterfeit. They exited the store and walked to Floyd’s automobile. When they reached Floyd’s car, the right-hand side passenger door was open. One of the teenagers approached this open door “in an effort to retrieve the cigarets.” Floyd, having already paid, declined.
The teenagers then returned to the store and called 911.
The teenagers did not call the US Secret Service, the agency tasked with investigating cases of counterfeit currency. There is a US Secret Service field office in Minneapolis.
The 911 call was improper. There was no “emergency” of any kind. Abumayyaleh, the store owner, claims that it was store policy to call 911 in counterfeit currency cases.
Floyd remained in his automobile and until the police arrive, had no contact with any other person. A prudent counterfeiter would not remain on the scene after passing a fake bill. Floyd’s presence on the scene is indicative of innocence and suggests that he did not know that the bill was fake, if indeed it was. To this day, no one knows if the bill was fake. The Minneapolis Police Department refuses to give out any information on this key issue. Perhaps they do not know either and are waiting for the Secret Service to determine the bill’s authenticity. If the police to this day do not know, how can one expect Floyd to know?
Two police officers responded to the scene. They walked past the store and then across the street where they found Floyd peacefully sitting in his automobile. This was not a vehicle stop. They tried to get Floyd to exit the vehicle. Floyd declined and one of the officers pulled his own firearm. Floyd then exited the vehicle and the firearm was re-holstered. Handcuffs were put on Floyd, who then peacefully walked to a wall and sat down at the officers’ direction.
At this point, another police car arrived, carrying Officer Derek Chauvin, a training officer for one of the other responding officers. Floyd and Chauvin knew each other; they were co-workers at the El Nuevo Rodeo nightclub in Minneapolis.
Chauvin placed Floyd under arrest. At this point, and throughout the encounter, there is no evidence that any police officer conducted an investigation to see if a crime had been committed. Chauvin and the others walked Floyd to one of the two police cars on the scene and ordered him to get into the vehicle. Floyd claimed that he was “claustrophobic” and refused.
The officers then tried to push Floyd into the car. Chauvin pulled Floyd out of the car. Chauvin and two other officers pinned Floyd to the ground. A fourth officer stood watch between the three officers, the pinned Floyd on the ground, and a small crowd that had formed and began filming. What follows is well-known: Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck. Floyd complained that he could not breathe. Chauvin ignored Floyd’s complaints and kept his weight on Floyd’s neck. Paramedics were called, but by the time they arrived, Floyd was lifeless.
\
Analysis
In Minnesota, knowingly passing false currency in small amounts, as here, is a misdemeanor. At the time of the arrest and thereafter, there was no investigation into whether the bill was counterfeit. Had Floyd simply stolen merchandise, my analysis would be different, because then there would be probable cause for the arrest. But in this case, there was no probable cause. Maybe the teenagers were correct and the bill was counterfeit: who knows? People make mistakes concerning counterfeit currency all the time. Before making the arrest, the police did not even examine the bill.
The officers were investigating a misdemeanor. Deadly force may not be used to halt a fleeing misdemeanant. But they treated Floyd as if they were trying to arrest not an alleged misdemeanant, but someone who had just committed a dangerous felony.
As a practical matter, Floyd should not have refused the officers’ command; as a legal matter, were the officers justified in making the arrest? If an arrest is unlawful, does a citizen have the right to resist?
At the time the officers approached Floyd’s vehicle, was there probable cause for his arrest? Certainly not. The officers had not even taken the time to examine the $20 bill. At best, they were permitted to keep Floyd in the area while they identified him and investigated whether there were grounds to arrest him for misdemeanor theft.
There was no felony to justify the use of deadly force—unholstering a gun was thus improper. What about handcuffs? I think the answer to this question could go either way. Handcuffs certainly escalate the situation, but the officers may feel they are necessary for their own protection and to insure that the suspect remains during an initial investigation. Floyd was a big, strong man. I do not believe that a court will substitute its after-the fact analysis and prohibit the use of handcuffs.
As of today, there is no proof that Floyd committed any crime. We do not even know if the teenagers were correct in their guess that the $20 bill was counterfeit; the officers certainly did not know. At best, the crime here is misdemeanor retail theft. A summons, that is a ticket should have been issued to Floyd and the matter left at that. Instead, full post-felony police deadly force rained down on Floyd as if he had committed a violent act.
The officers were only entitled to keep Floyd at the scene while they investigated the alleged misdemeanor. They did not have to let Floyd walk away—a crime may have been committed. To establish probable cause, at a minimum the officers should have examined the currency. They did not.
What is clear is that the officers had no probable cause to arrest Floyd. Without probable cause, was Floyd privileged, from a legal and not practical point of view, to refuse what were illegal police orders? Such illegal police orders are best sorted out, not on the street, but in a courtroom. Unfortunately, economically disadvantaged defendants rarely have the opportunity to engage judges in theoretical legal analysis. They are treated differently.
And did the officers lose qualified immunity because they were making an illegal arrest?
This analysis demonstrates, in part, the reasons for the frustration felt by the black community and explains in large part the nationwide reaction. Here a non-violent, unarmed man was killed where there may well have been no crime. Even when black people are only suspected of committing crimes, they are treated as a population under occupation, with violence the order of the day.
When police commands are not obeyed immediately, the police are trained to use force. This is in itself a problem, because the force used is all too often disproportional to the original reason for the police intervention.
Police commands are not laws. But to let a policeman’s command become equivalent to a criminal statute “comes dangerously near making our government one of men rather than of laws.” Gregory v. Chicago, 394 US 111 (1969)
A possible reason for the escalation in this case is because Chauvin took the opportunity to turn the situation into a training exercise for the new officer, demonstrating ways to subdue an arrestee. The problem with Chauvin’s decision is that, as the senior officer on the scene, he failed to conduct any investigation at all.
The only question for purposes of examining the constitutionality of the arrest is: Did Chauvin have probable cause to believe that a violation had occurred? See, *Draper v. Reynolds,*369 F.3d 1270 (11th Cir. 2004) . In the absence of any investigation, there was no probable cause and hence no immunity. No crime, no probable cause to arrest—no immunity.
Any lawyer knows how a misdemeanor retail theft case like this plays out: time served if the individual could not make bail and either probation or watch the movie and an order not to return to the store.
A misdemeanor case should not end with a body in the street.
\
Note: For many years I practiced federal criminal defense law. I am not an expert in Minnesota state law.
JT Leroy, Ted Berrigan, Alice Notley, Eileen Myles, T Kira Madden
Aug 1, 2020Maybe it was because it was a different time
I am trying to understand the outrage behind the JT Leroy saga. Laura Albert is a writer and actress. She created what she called an ‘avatar,’ JT Leroy. She wrote a novel which became a best-seller. She followed up with another work of fiction, a collection of stories. This book was picked up by Hollywood and a film was made. So let me ask, what’s wrong with that?
The outrage comes because Albert hired an actress to portray Leroy. The subterfuge worked for a while, but eventually an investigative reporter found out that Leroy was Albert’s pen name. The problem is that Albert had told people that Leroy was not a pen name but a real person.
All of a sudden, the books and film became worthless, part of what has been called a literary “hoax.” Even though JT Leroy was not real, the books certainly were. And at no time did Albert, or the actress she hired, claim that the books were anything other than what they were, i.e., works of fiction. So why the outrage?
Steven King used the name “Richard Bachman” to write a series of novels. When the world found out that Bachman was King, Bachman’s books were merely added to King’s ouevre. Yet Albert was unfairly ostracized, even though one could argue that the whole JT Leroy portrayal was astonishing performance art.
What is a novel, anyway? And should the author’s true identity always be a consideration? Do we damn J.R.R. Tolkien because he never visited Middle Earth? Eileen Myles’ Inferno: A Poet’s Novel is really a memoir, isn’t it? When she writes about afternoons spent at the home of Ted Berrigan and Alice Notley, she is referring to the author of Tambourine Life and his wife, the author of The Descent of Alette. By saying, “this is a novel” is Myles warning, “I have modified the facts?”
T K. Madden’s recent Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls approaches the question from the opposite direction, billing her work as a memoir but warning that her subjective memories of facts are her own. The level of detail in Madden’s work is similarly the opposite of the Latin legal rule, falsus in unus, falsus in omnibus: the truth of the details she recounts is strong evidence of the truth of the whole. Madden brings South Florida to life, she brings the 90’s to life: mentioning the padded strap of a Sony videocamera is but one accurate detail in a book full of trenchant observations.
Yet Myles’ book is full of observations as well. Annie Ernaux’s works fit well within what the French call autofiction , the Japanese the I-novel and sometimes read like a letter to a friend.
Those who claim “memoir” but actually write fiction are treated harshly–Little Pieces comes to mind. Laura Albert was treated just as harshly, but made no claim of truth.
Noam Chomsky once asked, “do the facts matter?” Perhaps the facts only matter when presented as facts. A journalist who lies is outside the pale. A novelist writing narrative fiction should be able to tell a story, whether that story is based on historical facts or invented, as they say, out of whole cloth.
Were JT Leroy’s “Sarah” to become popular today, would anyone care that Laura Albert had used a pen name?
## Death of a Lawyer: Perry Mason 2020, S01 Ep 4
Aug 1, 2020Death of a Lawyer: Perry Mason 2020, S01 Ep 4
Earle Stanley Gardner was an American lawyer, novelist and creator of Perry Mason, a crime-fighting lawyer who jumped from the novels to radio, film and finally a hit television series in 1957 starring Raymond Burr. Mason’s adventures were informed by Gardner’s work as a practicing attorney. The character was re-introduced in a new HBO television series that premiered during the pandemic.
Gardner never gave his readers Mason’s origin story; that story is the basis for the new series. Gardner went to law school in Indiana but never finished; he read for the law and took the bar exam in California, a state which then as now allows postulants to qualify without a law degree.
The new series is set in 1932. Mason is a private detective working for a newly invented character, a 74 year-old lawyer named “E.B. Jonathan” who is played by John Lithgow.
Jonathan and Mason are working on the defense of a sensational case, the kidnapping-murder of a young boy. Newspaper reporters constantly interrupt their work, but savvy Jonathan knows that playing the press is part of the defense. The district attorney grandstanded the arrest of their client while she was attending her own son’s funeral amidst a press riot. Jonathan must, as best as he can, present his client as an innocent victim as well.
At first, talking about the great California jurist and Supreme Court justice, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jonathan flaunts his own youth in comparison. Jonathan is 16 years younger than the 90 year old Holmes. In his own mind, Jonathan is younger still. He still very much has his wits about him.
But no matter. Old age stalks him. He has health problems, foreshadowed in previous episodes; feet that swell at night. Mason teases him by pointing out that he doesn’t suffer from the same ailments, to which Jonathan replies, “but you will.” Jonathan has fallen asleep in his clothes in his office; he asks Mason to help him with his shoes. The two men reminisce over their first meeting; Mason’s father had a property dispute; Jonathan’s office was between a blacksmith’s and a saddle maker’s. Those trades are gone, but Jonathan remembers the past fondly. He complains to Mason, just wait till “half your friends are in the cemetery and a million strangers on the street.”
Unfortunately, the wealthy grandfather of the victim who hired them has cut them off, now that he believes the child’s mother was involved in the crime. Jonathan moans that they have gone from being well-funded to defending the case pro bono. The Latin term, short for pro bono publico means, “for the public good.” What people do not understand is that the phrase also means, “the lawyer pays.”
Jonathan’s practice is not what it was. Time has taken away not only friends, but clients. The strangers in the street do not find their way to his office to seek a solution to their legal problems. While Jonathan still insists that his secretary answer the phone with both his name and the phrase, “and associates,” Jonathan knows that there are no more associates. He is the only lawyer in the office. But Jonathan knows how a case must be defended and how to defend a notorious case.
In a previous episode, Jonathan visited a colleague to ask for a loan. That colleague turned him away. When you need money, no one has it. Worse, the colleague reminds him of decades-old questionable financial maneuvering at the time of the First World War.
Jonathan has raided his savings to keep his office afloat. Unlike others, he was not destroyed by the 1929 Depression, but those events are still taking their toll. He has a payroll to meet, and Mason is not the only investigator he has working the case. With the loss of his client’s funding, he goes to his bank to seek a “measly” four month loan so that he can finance the case, his office, his secretary and the two investigators. But his bank officer, his friend Howard, is no longer with the bank and has retired. The new bank officer assigned to his file is unfamiliar with his business and sees only that Jonathan’s assets that survived the Crash are already mortgaged. There will be no bank loan.
Meanwhile, the district attorney has learned of the financial irregularities—to keep the lights on during the war, Jonathan “borrowed” from his trust account, though he replaced the funds and no client was harmed. For many years lawyers have been taught to view such conduct with horror, but a century ago the relationship between lawyers and banks was symbiotic in a way unimaginable today. Lawyers kept interest-free trust accounts at banks, which provided free banking services to the lawyer, such as covering checks that might otherwise bounce and providing automatic lines of credit. The district attorney threatens Jonathan with disbarment if he does not try the case or take a plea. The DA doesn’t want his investigator, Perry Mason to keep nosing around, either.
With no money to finance the case, Jonathan visits his client in jail to suggest a plea, which would at least give them both a way out. She would avoid the electric chair and he would be free of the case. In explaining the plea to her, he explains that sometimes when the power of the government is aligned against you, there is little you can do. Believing herself innocent, the mother refuses the plea. Jonathan gives a short inspirational speech, “we’ll fight then.”
But he doesn’t have the money to fight the case and now he cannot withdraw discreetly and honorably. If he withdraws, the newspapers will be merciless. The DA is threatening him with a very public disbarment. His life as a lawyer will be over.
Jonathan goes home to sleep and to think about the best course of action. The next morning he dresses as if to go to court. An old newspaper protects his kitchen table, displaying a story featuring a case he was once involved with, a reminder of ephimeral past glory. He arranges a chair, puts a towel under the kitchen door, turns the gas on and sits down.
This episode is not about Jonathan, not about the difficulties of practicing as a solo, not about the personal threats suffered by those who practice criminal law, not about the danger of getting involved in notorious cases or the thanklessness of pro bono work and certainly is not about the danger posed by trust accounts.
Or is it?
Back to mu7ami.com