By John R. Byrne
For starters, I’d like to thank David for giving me the opportunity to post on his blog. He’s created something special, and I’ll do my best to meet the high standards he has set.
Given that we already have a great group of (mostly) criminal law-focused bloggers, I plan to focus my posts on the civil side of the federal fence. Still, today, in keeping with the theme of this post, I’m covering a few criminal cases.
1. Clinton Portis—the former University of Miami and NFL running back—pled guilty this week to participating in a health care fraud scheme. The scheme involved submitting false claims to the NFL Player Health Reimbursement Account Plan. Although the case was prosecuted in the Eastern District of Kentucky, there is a Miami nexus (the Miami FBI Field Office helped with the investigation). Miami sports fans may recognize another defendant, Tamarick Vanover, who played at FSU and later the NFL (in one Miami-FSU classic at the Orange Bowl, he took the opening kickoff to the house).
2. The Dolphins open the season against the New England Patriots. Back in February of 2019, Florida state prosecutors charged the owner of the Pats, Robert Kraft, with misdemeanor solicitation (a charge that was dropped). In late July, Palm Beach County Judge Leonard Hanser ordered the state to destroy the previously suppressed video evidence (this followed a S.D. Fla. federal court order this past January ordering the video’s destruction). The case had many a twist and turn and Vanity Fair published a long article about it, if you’re interested in reading more.
3. In golf news, a week or so back, Judge Ruiz issued an order granting summary judgment to the PGA Tour in a lawsuit filed by Hank Haney. In short, Haney had blamed the PGA Tour for costing him his radio show at Sirius XM Radio (Sirius had cancelled Haney’s show after he made comments predicting a “Korean” to win the U.S. Women’s Open and going with the last name “Lee” because, if he “didn’t have to name a first name, I’d get a bunch of them right.”). Order was picked up by ESPN and other news outlets.
4. Finally, and on a non-sports note, the high-profile federal criminal trial of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes began this past week. You can read about the opening statements here. Both sides seem to have the right strategy, with the defense looking to humanize Holmes and calling her "innocent" and the government portraying her as a greed-driven executive.
3 comments:
So we have to endure an entire week of posts by new bloggers thanking David for the opportunity? It's like what we teach the young lawyers- when you stand up in opening and closing, DO NOT THANK THE JURORS as the first thing you say. You're losing your audience right off the bat. Other than that, very nice posts so far.
Maybe I should do the same? Nah- no one wants to be associated with a pariah. Well, maybe I can get Roger Stone.
Thanks Phil.
I love it when a judge overrule or grants an objection, lawyers who "thank" the judge after every ruling...... The best judges tell counsel not to "thank" the court after every ruling.
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