Former SDFLA clerk goes to Supreme Court

Congrats to 30-year old Lindsay Harrison, a fifth year associate at Jenner & Block, for arguing before the Supreme Court last week -- her first appellate argument. A bunch of blogs have been covering the argument and Ms. Harrison, who clerked for Judge Gold and Judge Barkett. Here's a bit of an interview from AboveTheLaw:

ATL: First things first. What did you wear? There has been some controversy over how women oral advocates should dress when appearing before the Court.
LCH: I wore a black pantsuit. I was not about to wear a skirt, since they dispensed with that requirement and permitted women to wear pants a few years ago. If women don't take advantage of that opportunity, it sets a bad precedent. And I wore pearls -- my concession to formality.
ATL: You must be one of the youngest people ever to argue before the Court. Have you done any research to figure out where you fall?
LCH: I'm definitely not the youngest. The woman who argued Roe v. Wade, Sarah Weddington, was 26 at the time. Tom Goldstein was 29 when he argued his first case. I turned 30 on January 5.

The whole interview is a fun read.

UPDATE -- Ms. Harrison writes in:

There are actually a bunch of SDFL connections to the argument. An amicus brief was written by Adam Raviv (Marcus clerk) on behalf of FIAC, where my Barkett co-clerk Tania Galloni works. Cecily Baskir, another Barkett clerk, participated in one of my moots. And the argument was attended by both Adam Raviv and Deb Raviv, a King clerk from 03-04. All in all, a great showing for the SDFL.
I've also received a lot of really nice emails from folks in Miami, and it's been great to hear from the community, which I still feel very strongly a part of.

News and Notes

1. Liberty City 6, part 3, starts today. (via Herald)

2. The Cuban Spies are petitioning for cert and have brought in super Supreme Court lawyer, Tom Goldstein (of ScotusBlog fame). They are also trying to work out a political resolution to the case. (via Herald)

3. John Pacenti at the DBR covers the Mutual Benefits lawyers who were indicted.

4. The Congressional delegation from South Florida is being sworn in at the new courthouse this morning. Here's a picture of Ileana Ros-Lehtinen from the proceedings.

Prison riot at Coleman High

Here's the article from CNN. Apparently, 8 inmates were injured, one by gunfire. More info as soon as it's available.

In other news, Vanessa Blum explains that the new U.S. Attorney will likely have different law enforcement priorities:

In the coming months, President Barack Obama will put his own stamp on crime-fighting efforts in South Florida by naming a new U.S. attorney to direct federal investigations and prosecutions.The new president's pick will head an elite office of lawyers and be responsible for translating the priorities of the Obama White House and the Department of Justice into local cases and convictions.The office, now supervised by Republican attorney Alex Acosta, operates largely out of public view, but wields great influence over law enforcement priorities and leads federal, state and local agencies in joint crime-fighting initiatives."A new U.S. attorney could set a different prosecutorial agenda," said attorney Justin Sayfie, who took part in recommending Acosta for the job. "It's an enormous, enormous power."

What do you think the feds should prioritize?

Plea agreements to be available again

We have discussed before (and criticized) the local rule taking plea agreements off-line and hiding them from the public. Here's what we said back then:

This is a silly policy, which is only in place in this District (as far as I know). Hopefully it will be changed soon (the local rules committee is studying it). If there are safety concerns for cooperating witnesses, then those concerns should be addressed in that particular case, but to have a blanket policy making it more difficult to get these documents.... Haven't we learned from the State scandal involving secret docs?

We also noted that Chief Judge Moreno was a judge who believed in courtrooms being open to the public and was generally against things being secret. He said back then in an interview with Julie Kay:

“I’m a very open person,” Moreno said. “My personal feeling is that if something is said in open court, it should be an open record.”

As for plea deals: "Moreno said the court will continue to study another issue that recently has generated controversy — whether plea agreements should be posted online."

Now that they have studied it, the en banc district court has issued administrative order 2009-2, rescinding the old rule making plea agreements secret and ordering:

that as of February 20, 2009, the Southern District of Florida's current policy of providing limited electronic access to plea agreements is rescinded. All plea agreements filed on or after February 20, 2009 will be public documents, with full remote access available to all members of the public and the bar, unless the Court has entered an Order in advance directing the sealing or otherwise restricting a plea agreement.

Well done Chief Judge Moreno and the rest of the court!

UPDATE -- Kathy Williams and AFPD Beatriz Bronis represented the defense on this issue. Congrats to them as well.

Obama stuff

Who was right on the oath flub? Most have sided with Obama, but here's Roberts' side of the story (via Althouse).

Is Obama keeping his Blackberry or some other device? (Hat tip: JK)

More of the same from Obama? Here's a funny Jon Stewart clip:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Changefest '09 - Obama's Inaugural Speech

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video