"2 Hialeah businessmen busted for bilking Medicare for penis pumps"

That headline, from Jay Weaver's article, really says it all, doesn't it? More:

It's one thing that a pair of Hialeah companies were fraudulently billing Medicare for penis pumps at $395 a pop to supposedly help male patients combat impotence.
It's quite another that Charlie RX and Happy Trips also billed the federal healthcare program for vacuum erection systems to aid female patients battle erectile dysfunction, authorities say.
And what's even more remarkable: Medicare paid the two medical equipment providers $28,600 after they submitted a total of $63,000 in false claims for the erection pumps, according to charges unsealed Monday in federal court in Miami.

Happy Trips indeed.

I'm back

Thanks to my guest bloggers -- SFL, Rumpole, and Rick B.

Now back to work.... I hope everyone enjoys the last good week of traffic because school starts in one week and then US1 and I-95 turn back into parking lots.

A couple of quick hits to start your week:

1. Blago jury still out.

2. Justice Sotomayor jokingly compares herself to J.Lo.

3. Blogger convicted after three tries for threatening comments about federal judges.

4. Justice Ginsburg wants the good ol' days back in the Senate.

5. Justice Scalia OK after tripping.

6. Neal Katyal likely to become 10th Justice.

7. A must read dissent by Judge Kozinski on GPS tracking and the 4th Amendment. The intro:

Having previously decimated the protections the Fourth
Amendment accords to the home itself, United States v.
Lemus, 596 F.3d 512 (9th Cir. 2010) (Kozinski, C.J., dissenting
from the denial of rehearing en banc); United States v.
Black, 482 F.3d 1044 (9th Cir. 2007) (Kozinski, J., dissenting
from the denial of rehearing en banc), our court now proceeds
to dismantle the zone of privacy we enjoy in the home’s curtilage
and in public. The needs of law enforcement, to which
my colleagues seem inclined to refuse nothing, are quickly
making personal privacy a distant memory. 1984 may have
come a bit later than predicted, but it’s here at last.

And the conclusion:

I don’t think that most people in the United States would
agree with the panel that someone who leaves his car parked
in his driveway outside the door of his home invites people
to crawl under it and attach a device that will track the vehicle’s
every movement and transmit that information to total
strangers. There is something creepy and un-American about
such clandestine and underhanded behavior. To those of us
who have lived under a totalitarian regime, there is an eerie
feeling of déjà vu. This case, if any, deserves the comprehensive,
mature and diverse consideration that an en banc panel
can provide. We are taking a giant leap into the unknown, and
the consequences for ourselves and our children may be dire
and irreversible. Some day, soon, we may wake up and find
we’re living in Oceania.

Let's Talk Judicial Appointments!

We might as well, since President Obama and Senator McConnell did the same the other day:

President Obama and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell had their first one-on-one meeting today, and it dealt primarily with one topic: Confirming judges.
Or, more precisely, Republican holds on Obama judicial nominees.

"Right now there are 12 federal judicial nominees that have passed the Judiciary Committee with a unanimous vote," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said before the meeting. "There are other judges that have been through the process and approved by the Judiciary Committee."

The meeting concerned "a direct discussion about moving those judges," Gibbs said.

The president is "rightly frustrated" at a pace that is "unrivaled and unmatched in its slowness," Gibbs said, and he added that some recess appointments may be in the offing.

Hmm, that's not good.

According to ACS' nifty website judicialnominations.org, there are now 100 vacancies out of 867 seats on the federal bench.

So that's roughly 10 percent of the judicial branch, with nominees cooling their heels for indefinite periods while they await an uncertain fate in the Senate.

My guess is this will have some deleterious institutional effects on the federal justice system, but what do I know?

This is SFL, hoping I'm wrong (again).

Magistrate Judge Brown Addresses Futility of "Notices of Unavailability"

Judge Brown Notice of Unavailability

Hi kids, SFL here.

Regular readers of my blog know I have a special fondness for this case.

In an order entered yesterday, Magistrate Judge Brown addresses the rather pointless of practice of filing "notices of unavailability," a personal pet peeve of mine:

The parties should note that there is no local rule in our Court providing for the filing of same, and no federal rule supporting same.  While the Court is not precluding anyone from filing same, and as a matter of professionalism and courtesy they should be considered, the parties should understand that these filings have no legal significance.

He's right.

This is a dated practice of dubious utility.  If you have a conflict with an actual (as opposed to a possible or  hypothetical future) Court deadline, ask the Court to move it.  If you don't want the opposing party to schedule something while you're on vacation, pick up the phone and ask them about it.

D.O.M. called

“You haven’t posted anything.”
That was D.O.M. again, calling from wherever.
“Yup.”
“What about that case where Judge Altonaga got affirmed for asserting jurisdiction over the pre-WWII Germans?”
“Yeah, I saw that.”
“So, why not write something up, Professor?”
D.O.M. only busts out my title when things are dark, so I said,
“Well, you gave the blog over to the people who write comments.”
“I thought you didn’t read the comments.”
“I don’t.”
Beat.
“You’re being too uptight about this.”
That was D.O.M. breaking the silence.
“Maybe.”
Beat.