The BLT: The Blog of Legal Times

Congress Weighs in on DOJ's Handling of Swartz Prosecution

Updated 12:49 p.m.

Congress is wading into the controversy surrounding the death of political activist Aaron Swartz, with top House oversight legislators asking the Department of Justice for a briefing in the federal case brought against the 26-year-old Internet entrepreneur.

The top Republican and Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee sent a joint letter to Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. late Monday afternoon that raises questions about whether the level of punishment that prosecutors sought for Swartz’s alleged offenses was appropriate.

The same questions have bounced around the Internet and media reports since the January 11 death Swartz, known in part for opposing two Internet-related censorship bills, including the Stop Online Piracy Act. It even prompted a hacking attack of the U.S. Sentencing Commission's website by the group Anonymous.

The letter signed by Representatives Darrel Issa (R-Calif.) and Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) gives more heft to the lingering questions about the role of the DOJ in the events leading up to Swartz’s apparent suicide while facing time in prison for a cyber crime.

Man Convicted of Deceiving Judge Given Five-Year Sentence

A Washington federal judge sentenced a man yesterday to serve five years in prison for deceiving one of the judge's colleagues on the bench.

David Copeland-Jackson, 40, pleaded guilty to a conspiracy to commit obstruction of justice and perjury in February 2011. After filing a defamation lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in 2007, he admitted to filing a false affidavit that he had served the defendant and then filing court documents in the defendant's name. He won a $3 million default judgment from U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle, which was vacated after she learned of the fraud.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon sentenced Copeland-Jackson yesterday. The sentence also covered Copeland-Jackson's guilty plea in a separate case for mail fraud.

The Morning Wrap

Chasing Dodgers: The taxmen at the Internal Revenue Service can get some records on Swiss bank accounts under a ruling Monday by U.S. District Judge William Pauley in Manhattan, and prosecutors say it is one more step toward identifying and prosecuting tax dodgers who use anonymous offshore accounts, The Associated Press reports.

Plea for Spill: The Department of Justice and BP will try today to convince U.S. District Judge Sarah Vance to accept a guilty plea agreement by BP that includes $4 billion in fines related to the 2010 Gulf oil spill, The Times-Picayune reports.

SEC Shielded: The he U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled Monday that the Securities and Exchange Commission cannot be sued under the Federal Tort Claims Act for investments lost in the massive Bernie Madoff ponzi scheme, Reuters reports.

Deadline Approaching for Washington Legal Departments Contest

The National Law Journal is seeking nominations for our Washington Legal Departments of the Year Contest for 2013. We will recognize the Washington region's top in-house departments in six categories. To qualify, the departments must be led by lawyers from the D.C. metro area. Law firms may nominate their clients' legal departments for the contest.

Please send completed submissions to nljsurvey@alm.com, and include "Washington" and the company's name in the subject line. The deadline for submissions is January 31.

More information on the contest is available here.

Senators Agree on Immigration Reform Framework

A bipartisan group of eight Senators has agreed on the framework for a national immigration system overhaul for this year, and it includes key provisions sought by America's technology and farm industries to attract workers.

In addition, the parameters of future legislation described in a document released Monday would allow a "tough but fair" path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants, increased border security and an improved employer verification system.

The agreement comes from a group of key legislative players: Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Senator Charles Schumer, along with senators John McCain (R-Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), one of his party's leaders on immigration.

Amazon Hires Patton Boggs to Advocate for Sales Tax Legislation

Amazon.com Inc. has enlisted the help of Patton Boggs in Washington to fight for legislation that would allow states to collect sales taxes from online and catalog retailers located anywhere in the United States.

Patton senior policy adviser Michael Drobac, partner Jennifer Richter and public policy adviser Sarah Vilms, as well as associates Jennifer Cetta and Gregory Louer, are advocating for the Seattle-based online retail giant on the Marketplace Fairness Act, according to lobbying registration paperwork filed with Congress last week. The bill, which died in committee during the last Congress, hasn't been reintroduced in this Congress.

Patton spokesman Elliott Frieder declined to comment. An Amazon representative wasn't immediately available to comment.

After Landmark Supreme Court Win, Drug Defendant Represents Himself at Retrial

Antoine Jones has been in federal custody since late 2005, when the authorities picked him up on charges that he participated in a large-scale cocaine distribution ring in the Washington metropolitan area.

In the seven-plus years since his arrest, Jones has dealt with his share of lawyers—from his first two trials to the appellate level to the U.S. Supreme Court. Last January, the high court, in a landmark decision, concluded that his conviction and life sentence couldn't stand based on police violations of his Fourth Amendment rights.

Today, dressed in a dark suit—and flashing a grin that never really disappeared—Jones set out on his own to convince a jury in Washington's federal trial court that the charges against him are bogus. Jones, who faces life in prison, is representing himself at this, his third trial.

Delivering his opening statement this morning, Jones, in front of the jurors, ripped up a copy of the charging documents. "This is what we're going to do with the indictment," he said, tearing the paper into sections and setting the pieces on a table in the courtroom of U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle.

In Q&A, D.C. Forensic Sciences Chief Says Lab Moving Toward Accreditation

It's been four months since the grand opening of Washington's new forensic sciences laboratory. The $220 million facility is fully operational and District of Columbia Department of Forensic Sciences director Max Houck said they have a plan in place for moving towards accreditation and are making progress in filling vacant positions.

The 287,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art building isn't just home to new lab space, though. It is itself an experiment: Houck is guiding the city's transition to independent forensic testing, in which evidence testing and storage are no longer handled by law enforcement.

Houck sat down with Legal Times on January 25 to talk about the lab's first few months. Besides forensic sciences, the new building houses the city's public health lab, which is also under Houck's department, and the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, which continues to manage the city's morgue. His comments have been edited for space.

This Week in The National Law Journal

Rocks and a hard place: This month, new SEC rules went into effect that will require about 6,000 publicly traded companies to report whether their products contain four conflict minerals from the Demo­cratic Republic of the Congo. Jenna Greene reports on a lawsuit challenging the new disclosure rules.

Avoiding law school in droves: The number of applicants for seats in American Bar Association-accredited law schools are down by 20 percent from this time last year. Karen Sloan reports that if the trend holds through the rest of the admission cycle, law schools would see a 38 percent crash since their peak in 2010.

Obama's enforcer: The nomination of Debevoise & Plimpton partner Mary Jo White as the next chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission means that the agency will continue with an aggressive approach to Wall Street enforcement, financial regulation attorneys say. Todd Ruger and Jenna Greene have the story.

Forty years after 'Roe': Marcia Coyle sat down with Roger Evans, senior director of public policy litigation and law at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, to discuss his thoughts on abortion litigation 40 years after the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision.

The Morning Wrap

Layoffs: With layoffs running rampant at Allen & Overy, DLA Piper, and Eversheds, The American Lawyer asks whether U.S. law firms will be next. "These are not outliers. They're not anomalies," Zeughauser Group consultant Kent Zimmermann said of the recent layoffs. "It is something that's happening quietly in many, many firms in the industry."

Contraception Battles: Roman Catholics, evangelicals and Mennonites are flooding courts with challenges to a provision in the new health care law that requires employers to cover birth control in worker health plans, The New York Times reports. "This is highly likely to end up at the Supreme Court," said Douglas Laycock, a law professor at the University of Virginia and one of the country’s top scholars on church-state conflicts. "There are so many cases, and we are already getting strong disagreements among the circuit courts."

Stepping Down: Lisa Gomer, the general counsel of the U.S. Agency for International Development, is leaving the agency on February 9 amid an ongoing probe into alleged contract rigging, Corporate Counsel reports. Gomer’s attorney, David Schertler of Schertler & Onorato, said his client "did not violate any law." He added that she "cooperated completely" with the Office of Inspector General investigation, according to an emailed statement.