Author Archives: Michael Froomkin

A Win for the Constitution

Posted on February 26, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Overruled, Rule of Law Returns

The ACLU just announced that Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, the only Bush-era “enemy combatant” being held in military detention on U.S. soil, will be charged as a criminal terrorist and tried for his alleged crimes by the Obama Administration. This is a really big deal, both because it marks a major step by the new Administration to demonstrate that national security does not require us to abandon the Constitution, and also because it gives meaning to President Obama's previous decision to close Gitmo. If the Gitmo detainees were merely transferred from Cuba to U.S. soil, but were then detained here without trail, the President's promise to close Gitmo would have been meaningless.

One more Bush-era cesspool being drained. Plenty left.

Posted in Law: Constitutional Law | Comments Off on A Win for the Constitution

Minimal Human Decency Abridged

Posted on February 26, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Fred Grim in the Miami Herald, Florida sex offender policy puts inhumane nightmare under bridge:

No, you think. That can't be. Not after two years. Makes no sense.

But they're still there, a bedraggled colony of outcasts, consigned to the bowels of the Julia Tuttle Causeway — as a matter of public policy.

No, you think. That's impossible. Last winter, state officials promised they'd solve the legal conundrum and international embarrassment that forced 19 sex offenders to live like rats under the concrete support beams of a causeway bridge. The camp's still there. Only the Tuttle bridge population has since grown to 48 men, crammed together in a nether existence of the Kafka kind.

Officially, of course, the state of Florida would never compel ex-offenders to live in unsanitary conditions in the dank underbelly of a freeway bridge, in tents, shacks, cars and two rusting campers. Yet parole officers have made it clear to ex-sex offenders who've served their prison sentences that they have no other options.

City and county laws have created so many overlapping forbidden zones — 2,000 or 2,500 feet from schools, day cares, parks, playgrounds, school bus stops — that the middle of Biscayne Bay has become an ex-offender's only allowable address.

“They check us here every evening. We've got to be here or we go back to prison,” said M.C., 48, who was banished to the bridge after his release from prison two years ago.

How can this be allowed to continue?

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Posted in Miami | 25 Comments

Supplemental Briefs in NSA Domestic Spying Case

Posted on February 26, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

For those following along at home, briefs were due today in the rearguard actions relating to allegations of domestic spying by the NSA. After the case was filed, Congress passed a peculiar statute that may have immunized the carriers for illegal wiretapping carried out at government order. The validity of that amendment is currently being litigated, and the supplemental briefs requested by Judge Walker in “In re National Security Agency Telecommunications Records Litigation, Mdl No. 1791” are now available online thanks to James S. Tyre:

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Posted in Civil Liberties | Comments Off on Supplemental Briefs in NSA Domestic Spying Case

Carl Malamud for Public Printer

Posted on February 26, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Carl Malamud is an early hero of the battle for access to knowledge. He was on the ground floor of the standards wars. He's responsible for EDGAR. He's put more information on line than universities.

And he'd like to be the Public Printer. We should be so lucky.

Support Carl Malamud for Public Printer. Visit Yes We Scan! for more information. Or place your signed endorsement in the comments to this blog posting.

Posted in Politics: US | Comments Off on Carl Malamud for Public Printer

IRL is on Twitter

Posted on February 25, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen has a Twitter account.

I still think that I have enough distractions in my life.

Posted in Politics: FL-18 | Comments Off on IRL is on Twitter

UM Student Running Florida Bar’s LSD

Posted on February 25, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

No, not what you're thinking. Actually 2L Madeleine Mannello just got elected as the first President of the Florida Bar's new Law Student Division. Here's the official announcement:

Last week, second-year UM Law student Madeleine “Mady” Mannello was elected president of the Florida Bar's newly-established Law Student Division (LSD). Mannello was elected by representatives from 10 Florida law schools.

…

A South Florida native of Ft. Lauderdale, Mannello came to the Law School after earning her Bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Florida. She is fluent in Italian, and volunteers with several student organizations at UM Law including the Environmental Law Society, where she is vice-president of events and programming; and the HOPE Public Interest Resource Center, where she co-founded a domestic violence initiative and works with Books & Buddies. Mannello is also a notary public and a soon-to-be-certified fitness instructor. With interests in political activism and human rights issues, Mannello plans to go into human and civil rights work.

We have great students!

Posted in Law School | Comments Off on UM Student Running Florida Bar’s LSD