“There are many things that go into a retirement decision."

 That was Justice Breyer in the N.Y. Times.  The whole article is worth a read... but here are some snippets:

He recalled approvingly something Justice Antonin Scalia had told him.

“He said, ‘I don’t want somebody appointed who will just reverse everything I’ve done for the last 25 years,’” Justice Breyer said during a wide-ranging interview on Thursday. “That will inevitably be in the psychology” of his decision, he said.

“I don’t think I’m going to stay there till I die — hope not,” he said.

Justice Breyer, 83, is the oldest member of the court, the senior member of its three-member liberal wing and the subject of an energetic campaign by liberals who want him to step down to ensure that President Biden can name his successor.

The justice tried to sum up the factors that would go into his decision. “There are a lot of blurred things there, and there are many considerations,” he said. “They form a whole. I’ll make a decision.”

***

He was in a characteristically expansive mood, but he was not eager to discuss retirement. Indeed, his publisher had circulated ground rules for the interview, saying he would not respond to questions about his plans. But he seemed at pains to make one thing clear: He is a realist.

“I’ve said that there are a lot of considerations,” Justice Breyer said. “I don’t think any member of the court is living in Pluto or something.”

Latest COVID order from SDFLA.... (UPDATED)

 ...is here.  It allows for the use of Zoom-hearings under the CARES Act.  There was some rumbling about whether jury trials (or grand juries) would be suspended again, but that didn't happen.  It's all systems go despite the all-time high COVID numbers.  There's also an order requiring all court employees to be vaccinated or tested twice weekly. I like it.  Unfortunately, though, this does not apply to the CSOs or Marshals.  

Even if there is no general order continuing trials, some judges are doing it on their own.  See this order from Judge Cooke:

Mistrial in the Michael Avenatti trial due to Brady violation

 Wow, this is a big one.

Another "taint team" and Brady problem in federal court. 

Reporter Meghann Cuniff is doing a really nice job covering what's going on in court:

Selna: "Shortcomings there may have been, but I find no misconduct, intentional or otherwise, on the part of the taint team."
Selna: "For all those reasons, I grant a new trial." It's official: Mistrial in Avenatti's wire fraud trial.

— Meghann Cuniff (@meghanncuniff) August 24, 2021

Here is the defense motion,

Govt response,

and the recent filing by the defense outlining the issues. 

COVID issues plaguing trial in Ft. Pierce

 This is a civil trial in which counsel has tested positive for COVID.  Developing.

Swintelski v. American Medical Systems de 168 by David Oscar Markus on Scribd

RIP Maria Shohat

 A really great person and lawyer, this is a sad one.  Maria and Ed Shohat made such a wonderful team.  And she was always the life of a party or a bar function.  But she has been battling Alzheimer's for a while now (here is the link to the fundraising page detailing the walk for Maria that is scheduled for November).  I will post the funeral arrangements on this page when I hear of them. 

Does this cross the line?

 I'm a big fan of sharp writing, but does it cross the line to compare your colleagues to a career offender because they've been reversed so many times it looks like a rap sheep?  Here's the 9th Circuit case in which Judge VanDyke does just that.

Apparently, AboveTheLaw didn’t like it: https://abovethelaw.com/2021/08/newsflash-unqualified-federal-judges-are-unqualified/

Bonus Podcast Episode with Billy Corben and Alfred Spellman

We've had defense lawyers.  We've had judges.  And today, I'm excited to let you know that we have a bonus episode of For the Defense with filmmakers (and my good friends and producers of this podcast!) Billy Corben and Alfred Spellman about their latest rakontur production -- Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami.  

If you haven't seen the docuseries on Netflix yet, you really should check it out. It's about the rise and fall of Willy Falcon and Salvador Magluta, also known as Los Muchachos or the Boys.  It's an only-in-Miami story -- Billy and Alfred's specialty.  

Lawyers will love it because it details the numerous trials in the case and there are lots of great interviews with federal prosecutors and defense lawyers (including Albert Krieger, Rod Vereen, Pat Sullivan, Chris Clark, Richard Klugh, and others).  Non-lawyers will love it for all of the craziness involved in the cases, detailed by none other than Jim Defede, who covered the cases in his New Times articles:  

And the latest version:



You can check out the bonus episode on Apple, Spotify, and Google,  All other platforms, including a regular desktop player, can be accessed on our website. 

Speaking of which, it's not too late to catch up on Seasons 1-3 of For The Defense.  While you are doing so, please subscribe, like, and comments.  We need you! (If you have a friend that would like to receive these updates, please have them sign up here.)

 

Hosted by David Oscar Markus and produced by rakontur

How are drugs these days getting into the U.S.?

 If you watched the most recent Cocaine Cowboys about Willy & Sal, you saw cocaine coming over in go-fast boats and planes.  But that's the old way of doing things.  According to Bloomberg, the drug trade has dramatically changed:

At a Florida port, the U.S. Coast Guard drops off $1.4 billion worth of cocaine and marijuana seized in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific. The haul, the fruit of nearly 30 incidents and boarding operations by the U.S., Canada and the Netherlands, contains nearly 60,000 pounds of cocaine alone.

No, it’s not a reboot of “Miami Vice” — it happened last week.

Huge shipments of drugs are being captured at sea on their way to the U.S. and Europe. In 2019, U.S. authorities boarded the Gayane, a 1,000-foot container ship registered in Liberia, as it was entering a Philadelphia marine terminal at the end of a 9,300-mile voyage from Chile. The raid netted 40,000 pounds of cocaine worth $1.3 billion.

These are eye-popping numbers, even to those who have been involved in interdiction operations for decades. What is driving the trend toward huge shipments of narcotics, and how will U.S. authorities cope with it?

In the 2000s, when I headed the U.S. Southern Command (which has military responsibility for the Western Hemisphere south of the U.S.), one of our crown jewels was the Joint Interagency Task Force South. Headquartered in Key West, Florida, it is built around participation from the entire U.S. government — led by the Coast Guard but with significant support from the Department of Defense, Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration, Customs and Border Patrol, FBI and CIA. Flags of 20 other nations fly in front of the Key West facility, representing liaisons from countries across Latin America, the Caribbean and Europe.

Over the years, traffickers moving cocaine up from the production zone — principally Colombia, Ecuador and northern Peru — have refined their efforts and, like any thriving business, scaled them significantly. In previous decades, they typically used many small runs on light aircraft, ultra-high-speed boats and even semi-submersibles. We captured one of the latter (often referred to in press accounts, incorrectly, as submarines), carrying 10 tons of cocaine, and put it on the lawn in front of Southern Command’s Miami headquarters as a trophy.

While those kinds of operations continue, the movement is toward more industrial notions of transport, with much larger shipments stored in huge container ships headed to the U.S. and Europe. With more than 5,000 major cargo ships globally moving 25 million containers (technically known as “20-foot equivalent units,” or TEUs) — and 11 million containers arriving annually to the U.S. alone — locating the ones carrying drugs is a needle in a haystack problem.

To deal with the traffickers’ new approach of going big, the U.S. and its allies need to update their own strategy and tactics.