APPELLATE LEGAL NEWS

Appellate Law & Practice Updated : Giving it up. I am going to be discontinuing my participation in this blog in the next week or so. If you want someone to blame, blame 1) non-lawyers; 2) furries; and 3) the victims rights/tort reform industry. CA1: It’s official. Everything is mail fraud. US v. Hebshie, 07-2339 (12/4/08). This is a federal arson case. As you know, the framers of the constitution really envisioned the federal government prosecuting insurance fraud (or, as they say, “mail fraud”). The first says that pretty much any... CA1: Drinking and driving isn’t accepting responsibility U.S. v. Jordan, No. 08-1432 (12/5/08). The defendant committed some criminal acts while out on bail – namely drinking and driving. At sentencing, the District Court denied an offense level reduction under § 3E1.1 based on his putative acceptance of... CA1: proper punishment for a stalker that refused to retain a lawyer before not paying taxes USA v. Steirhoff, 08-1183. Selya tries to be dramatic. He says “The tale of how the stalker became the stalked follows.” Anyway, the defendant seems like a bad guy because he talked to the police without a lawyer. And he... CA1: surprise! creating false invoices to defraud Uncle Sam is corrupt U.S. v. Marek, No. 07-2437 (11/26/08). This is sort of interesting. There was an audit by the IRS. The defendants appeared to participate in the audit in good faith. Problem was that they went so far as to procure back-dated...