The BLT: The Blog of Legal Times

A Judge Named Alito

We're always on the lookout for a Supreme Court angle to any news event, but at first that seemed to be a tall order in connection with Idaho Sen. Larry Craig's recent headline-making difficulties. But The Hill newspaper came to the rescue, with a 2005 story that is making the rounds on the blogosphere.

Turns out that Craig, whose musical talents were mainly on display with the Singing Senators group, wrote a song about Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito Jr. just hours after meeting him in November 2005. Collaborating with CBS bandleader Paul Shaffer for a charitable event, he set the song to the music of "Maria," from "West Side Story." Here is how it goes, according to the story:

"The most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard Alito, Alito, Alito, I just met a judge named Alito And suddenly the name will never be the same Alito, Bush just picked a judge named Alito Alito, say it proud, that Republican saying Say it soft and there’s Democrats praying Alito, may the Senate confirm Alito.”

The words don't exactly track the original song, but it worked like a charm. The Senate confirmed Alito on Jan. 31, 2006, by a 58-42 vote.

Million-Dollar Dog

The dog of former real estate and hotel billionaire Leona Helmsley, who died earlier this month in Connecticut, no longer has to worry about retirement benefits or whether he'll have ample Social Security funds available after his modeling career is over. Helmsley, who was convicted of tax evasion in 1988, made it clear in her will that her dog, a white Maltese named Trouble, was to inherit $12 million, all to be put in a trust fund, according to a CNN report. Trouble reportedly once appeared in ads for the Helmsley Hotels. Two of Helmsley's four grandchildren, however, were left with zilch.

D.C. Firm Gets to Work on Duke Fallout

First came the dropping of charges, then a settlement with the administration of Duke University. Now, according to the Durham Herald-Sun [registration required], the three Duke lacrosse players falsely accused of raping a stripper have hired Brendan Sullivan Jr. of D.C.’s Williams & Connolly and Barry Scheck, co-director of the Innocence Project, for a possible civil rights suit against the city of Durham, N.C.

Any suit would likely hinge on whether the city’s law enforcement practices violated the players’ constitutional rights. Two possible targets would be police statements impugning the men and a faulty photo lineup that led to the initial identification of the three players.

Both Scheck and Sullivan bring hefty reputations to the case. According to the Herald-Sun, the city has already held closed-door meetings to consider its response and is planning on meeting with the lawyers to discuss the “basis for a lawsuit and perhaps terms for an out-of-court settlement.”

Lerach's Exit Strategy

William Lerach is leaving the building. With rumors swirling that the lead partner at Lerach, Coughlin, Stoia, Geller, Rudman & Robbins is about to reach a plea deal with prosecutors on allegations stemming from alleged kickbacks to plaintiffs by his former firm, the legendary class action attorney is leaving the firm.

The move will allow him to "travel, and do whatever I'm going to do," he told The Recorder, a sister publication to Legal Times. It will also permit him "to resolve the investigation about alleged events at my former firm more than a decade ago," he wrote in a memo to Lerach, Coughlin posted on The Wall Street Journal's Law Blog.

"[D]espite my mistakes, I am immensely proud that together we built a firm without peer and never shied away from taking on the world's most powerful and corrupt corporations," Lerach wrote. The firm declined to discuss any compensation he'd be getting on the way out the door, but The Recorder notes that his firm has already won more than $7 billion in judgments stemming from Enron's collapse.

Should it take place, Lerach's plea deal wouldn't be the first stemming from the payments to clients. Steven Bershad, a partner at Milberg Weiss, entered a guilty plea earlier this year.

Morning Wrap

Brokeback Senator: "He said/he said misunderstanding." If you’re a Republican senator from a conservative state (say, Idaho) those words might not be the first choice for a spokesman to use when describing your conduct in a men’s bathroom. Only 36 hours into Bathroom Gate, a poll shows that a majority of Idahoans think Senator Larry Craig should resign. Slate offers up a back and forth between its editors with different reactions to the arrest.

Fight for the Right: According to this morning’s Post, President Bush is willing to throw down for his attorney general of choice. For the right candidate, say Bush’s aides, he will not go quietly into that good night of an easy, nonpartisan confirmation hearing.

No Mo General: Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf might be giving up that general title soon. In the face of plummeting approval ratings and political battles on the horizon, Musharraf could give up the coveted uniform in an effort to hold on to the presidency.

Bye, Bye, Ataturk: Turkey’s new president, Abdullah Gul, was voted in yesterday. With an Islamic background, Gul’s presidency marks the first time in 84 years that the country’s secularists haven’t been in power. 

Abu Ghraib: The only officer charged with detainee abuse in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal was acquitted by a military jury on abuse charges. However, Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan did receive a conviction on one count of willfully disobeying an order.

Remember Katrina?

On the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's massive devastation, the National Low Income Housing Coalition is pushing the Senate to act quickly on the latest effort to help Gulf Coast hurricane victims. Federal recovery efforts have been roundly criticized for the sluggish pace in helping displaced residents rebuild their homes.

In a statement issued earlier today, NLIHC President Sheila Crowley called on the Senate to pass the Gulf Coast Housing Recovery Act of 2007. The House passed a similar bill in March by a 302-125 vote, but S.B. 1668 has been stalled since June. Both bills contain provisions that would speed up the repair and redevelopment of federally assisted housing on the Gulf Coast, simplify some federal rules that are slowing the recovery effort, and add new housing resources.

After two years of fumbled efforts by the federal government, the statistics on the recovery effort aren't promising. More than 106,000 mostly low-income families are still displaced, with 65,000 families still living in FEMA-issued trailers or manufactured homes located in trailer camps or next to the wreckage of their former homes. The NLIHC wants the Senate bill put on a fast track toward approval. Of course, the Senate hasn't been known for acting quickly on anything lately.

"There is no better way to observe the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina than to take action to make good on the promises that national leaders have made to the people of the Gulf Coast,” Crowley said.

Patient Who Gouged Out Eyes Gets $2.2 Million Bill

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty’s administration has hit Frank Harris Jr. with a $2.2 million bill for his care at St. Elizabeths Hospital, even though the 55-year-old schizophrenic man gouged out his eyes with his bare hands while he was supposed to be under constant supervision.

The D.C. Attorney General’s Office has included the bill in an ongoing lawsuit, which was filed in 2004 by Janice Motley, Harris’ legal guardian, over his treatment at the District's mental hospital. The D.C. government is now arguing that any award won in the suit, which seeks more than $10 million in damages, should be offset by the $2.2 million hospital bill, says Joseph Cammarata, Motley’s attorney.

“That’s the outrageousness. That’s the mean-spiritedness. That’s getting paid for your own wrongdoing,” Cammarata says. “What’s the accountability?”

D.C. Councilmember Phil Mendelson will hold a press conference with Motley and Cammarata at 10 a.m. on Wednesday at D.C. Superior Court to protest against the city's legal strategy. In an Aug. 13 letter to Fenty, Mendelson called the claim for the hospital bill "offensive" and said it is “intended to discourage litigation against the District." Mendelson noted that Fenty had protested against the same legal strategy in 2002 when Fenty was a councilmember. Fenty spokeswoman Carrie Brooks didn’t respond today to requests for comment.

In 2003, Harris was under a physician’s orders to be physically restrained and receive constant supervision. But Harris broke loose from an orderly who had freed him from his restraints, even though the orderly was required to request help and authorization from other staffers, Cammarata says. Harris, who suffered from delusions, then pulled his eyes one by one out of their sockets before he could be restrained again.

Harris, who is now blind, still lives at St. Elizabeths, where he has been a patient since the 1970s. Motley hopes to use damages awarded in the suit to move Harris to a private facility where he can receive better care, Cammarata says. But until then, Harris remains “a ward of the District of Columbia subject to their mercy, subject to whatever they want to do with him,” Cammarata says.

Legal Tender: Risky Bonds

Some hedge funds have experienced huge losses from bond investments, and individual investors ought to take notice, cautions financial adviser William Suplee IV. Suplee, writing in today's The Legal Intelligencer (a fellow ALM publication), sets forth a safe approach to bond investing that keeps maturities short, invests only in high-grade obligations, and diversifies broadly.

You can't go wrong in following this advice. I merely note that some investors more comfortable with risk might reasonably be willing to hold high-yield and emerging-market debt to obtain additional diversification benefits. At most, these investments should be a fairly small portion of your holdings. Leaving the risky bond strategies to the pros, as Suplee recommends, is a perfectly sensible choice.

Will Idaho Republican Run Again?

Could reports of his arrest and the rumors swirling around Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) endanger what has been viewed as a safe seat for Republicans?

Craig hasn't said whether he'll stand for a fourth term next year, but if the story of his guilty plea to disorderly conduct charges in an airport restroom -- broken by Roll Call yesterday -- grows more damaging, it could give Democrats an opportunity in a red state. The Washington Post says the scandal makes it more likely that Craig will retire, though Democrats say he's stubborn. And MSNBC reports that conservative blogs aren't defending him.

Craig's hometown paper, the The Idaho Statesman, published the results of a three-month investigation into the rumors surrounding Craig today. It says Craig denied ever engaging in homosexual acts.

Judge to D.C. Madam: Are You Sure About This Pro Se Thing?

Alleged D.C. madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey’s request to dump her second court-appointed defense lawyer struck Senior U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler as a dicey move.

“Ms. Palfrey, I want you to think long and hard about what you’re doing, about your future,” admonished Kessler, during a status conference today in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. “We’re talking about jail time, Ms. Palfrey.”

Last week, Palfrey asked the judge to cut defense lawyer Preston Burton from the case and allow her civil lawyer, the eccentric Montgomery Blair Sibley, to represent her. Failing that, Palfrey asked for a tin-cans-on-a-string setup, where, technically, she would represent herself, but Sibley would coach her from afar. (We’re not sure whether that would entail a lot of whispering over the railing or intensive pretrial drilling. Sibley has already demonstrated a propensity for both, much to the dismay of prosecutors, as well as Palfrey's defense lawyers.)

Predictably, the government is opposed to both designs. “[Palfrey] may have a right to represent herself, but she does not have the right to dictate to the Court the terms of that self-representation, nor does she have the right to choose her own court-appointed attorney,” scoffed assistant U.S. attorneys Daniel Butler and Catherine Connolly, in an opposition brief filed last night.

In May, Palfrey chucked her first court-appointed attorney, Federal Public Defender A.J. Kramer, arguing he was too busy to properly defend her. Neither Kramer nor Burton, a partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, seemed too broken up over the prospect of losing her as a client.

Today’s hearing was originally scheduled for arguments on whether the prosecution could use evidence seized from Palfrey’s California home in 2006. Kessler, lamenting the case’s “glacial speed,” reset the motions hearing for Sept. 7. The judge also said she planned to have a tête-à-tête with Palfrey -- to ensure the defendant understands “the dangers” of self-representation -- before ruling on the counsel matter.