Thursday, January 16, 2014

Brrrrrrrrrrr

Here's what's going on:

1.  Justice Scalia doesn't like advocated who read from their notes:
What an awkward exchange in the opening of Marvin M. Brandt Revocable Trust v. United States, between Justice Scalia and Steven Lechner, who was making his first appearance before the Nine.
Lechner began with the customary, “Mr. Chief Justice and may it please the Court,” and continued on for about a page in the transcript, when he was interrupted by Justice Scalia.
MR. LECHNER: It is axiomatic that the highest evidence of title in this country is a patent from the government. When the government issues a patent, it divests itself of title except for those interests expressly reserved. Here, the patent did not reserve any interest in the 1875 Act -­
JUSTICE SCALIA: Counsel, you are not reading this, are you?
Oh isn’t that uncomfortable.
A moment later, Justice Breyer kindly intervened:
JUSTICE BREYER: It’s all right.
What do you all think -- jerk move by Scalia or not?

2.  We're #1 in ID Theft cases.  From Curt Anderson:

Florida has the nation’s highest rate of identity theft, led by the fraud-wracked Miami area, and thieves are increasingly using the ill-gotten personal information to rip off the government through fraudulent tax refunds, a top federal prosecutor said Wednesday.
The identity theft rate in Florida in 2012 was more than 361 complaints for every 100,000 residents, according to the most recent Federal Trade Commission data. Georgia was next at 194 complaints per 100,000 residents, followed by California and Michigan at about 122 complaints each and New York at 110. The 2012 figures are the most recent.
Among metropolitan areas, the Miami region topped the identity theft charts — just as it has previously for Medicare fraud and mortgage fraud — at more than 645 complaints for every 100,000 residents, according to the FTC. Florida has all five top identity theft regions: Naples, Tampa-St. Petersburg, Fort Myers-Cape Coral and Tallahassee round out the national top five.

3.  We aren't #1 in Health Care Fraud though.  That goes to the Southern District of Illinois.  From TRAC:



The Southern District of Illinois (East St. Louis) led the nation with 10.1
prosecutions of this statute per one million people, over eight times the
national average of 1.2 prosecutions per million. In second place was the
Southern District of Florida (Miami) with 8.8 prosecutions per million,
followed by South Carolina with 7.2 prosecutions per million.


8 comments:

Anonymous said...

No question a jerk move. Just ask the guy a substantive question.

Anonymous said...

What?! Justice Antonin Scalia acted like a jerk? I'm shocked! Shocked!

Anonymous said...

While I'd probably be reading from it too, you can't step up to bat in the World Series and use a tee.

Anonymous said...

if it walks like a jerk, and sounds like a jerk.....

Anonymous said...

Do you ever read the transcripts of these arguments? Thomas is right.

MC Waste Services, Inc said...

Silent Thomas is a token for all silent people of the world

Anonymous said...

MC Waste: you may want to rethink your word choice


BTW: East St. Louis? Really? Come on Miami, step your game up!!

Rumpole said...

I'm sure Nino would have been nicer if it was a criminal case, right?