May

31

Seventh Circuit Criminal Case of the Week

Posted by: Michael M. O'Hear | May 31, 2009 | Leave a Comment

With only one new opinion in a criminal case, there’s not much to choose from.  Unfortunately, United States v. Sainz-Preciado (No. 07-3706) was a fairly routine case that broke no new legal ground.  In its opinion, the Seventh Circuit (per Judge Tinder) affirmed the defendant’s 262-month sentence for cocaine trafficking over various objections to the way the guidelines sentence [...]

May

29

Sotomayor, Obama, and Ideology

Posted by: David R. Papke | May 29, 2009 | Leave a Comment

I am among what must be a million or so people who receive e-mail messages from President Obama. They come addressed to “David” and are signed “President Barack Obama.” The most recent concerned the Sotomayor nomination and included an earnest four-minute video in which the President offered his reasons for the nomination.
I found the video [...]

May

27

Women at the Bargaining Table . . . and on the Way to the White House

Posted by: Michael M. O'Hear | May 27, 2009 | Leave a Comment

Andrea Schneider has two fascinating new papers on SSRN.  In different ways, both papers deal with what Andrea and her coauthers label the “double bind” facing women in leadership positions: “The incongruence of the core feminine stereotype with managerial effectiveness can result in women being perceived as competent but unlikable, or as likable but incompetent.”  [...]

May

27

Law School Announces Milwaukee Foreclosure Mediation Program

Posted by: Joseph D. Kearney | May 27, 2009 | Leave a Comment

At a press conference today in Eisenberg Hall, featuring Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, the Law School announced today the creation of a program that will provide mediation between lenders and residential borrowers facing foreclosure. This program responds to the final report and recommendations of the Milwaukee Foreclosure Partnership Initiative [...]

May

27

Doubling Down on Empathy

Posted by: Richard M. Esenberg | May 27, 2009 | 3 Comments

This strikes me as a good description of President Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court. Like all of us, I am still learning about Judge Sotomayor and have probably revised even those thoughts I expressed this morning on the Charlie Sykes show or those that you can see this [...]

May

27

You Heard It Here First

Posted by: Michael M. O'Hear | May 27, 2009 | Leave a Comment

Amidst all of the press coverage of the Sotomayor nomination yesterday, WISN (Channel 12) ran an interesting story focusing on the reactions of Ed Fallone and Rick Esenberg.  The story highlighted Ed’s correct prediction of the Sotomayor nomination in a comment on this Blog on the very day Justice Souter announced his retirement.  (Have any good [...]

May

26

It Takes Two to Tango

Posted by: Jon Deitrich | May 26, 2009 | Leave a Comment

Historically, courts have declined to impose aiding and abetting liability regarding crimes for which two parties are essential to commission.  As the Model Penal Code puts it, accomplice liability does not extend to conduct that is “inevitably incident” to the main offense; more colloquially, accomplice liability will not apply to crimes for which it “takes [...]

May

26

Professional Responsibility: One Marine’s Example

Posted by: Peter Heyne | May 26, 2009 | Leave a Comment

As I was driving home the evening of Memorial Day, I happened upon Terry Gross’ Fresh Air. She was interviewing former Marine Donovan Campbell. From the NPR site:

Campbell served three combat deployments, two in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. In Iraq, he commanded Joker One, a platoon of new Marines that he trained and transformed [...]

May

26

Environmental Sentencing: Its Bark Is Worse Than Its Bite — Should We Care?

Posted by: Michael M. O'Hear | May 26, 2009 | Leave a Comment

I have a new paper on SSRN about the sentencing of environmental offenders.  The title is “Bark and Bite: The Environmental Sentencing Guidelines after Booker.”  Using date collected by the United States Sentencing Commission, I show that judges sentence below the range recommended by the federal sentencing guidelines in an unusually high percentage of environmental [...]

May

25

Repairing the Harm From Clergy Sex Abuse

Posted by: Janine P. Geske | May 25, 2009 | 5 Comments

For the last ten years I have worked in the field of restorative justice. My students, community members, and I, along with the survivors of crimes of severe violence, regularly participate in intensive three-day healing circles we conduct in maximum-security prisons. Our MULS Restorative Justice Initiative (RJI) also facilitates victim/offender dialogues in very serious cases. [...]

May

25

Correlation Between Number of Questions the Justices Ask and Losing Your United States Supreme Court Case

Posted by: Jessica E. Slavin | May 25, 2009 | Leave a Comment

The New York Times has published a story about some studies showing a strong correlation between the number of questions the Supreme Court justices ask a particular litigant during oral argument and an increased likelihood that that side will lose.  In the words of the attorney who did some of the first work on this question [...]

May

25

O’Hear, Twerski, and the Work of the Professoriate

Posted by: Joseph D. Kearney | May 25, 2009 | Leave a Comment

Professor Jessica E. Slavin recently posted concerning Professor Michael M. O’Hear’s well-deserved receipt of the Eastern District of Wisconsin Bar Association’s Judge Robert W. Warren Public Service Award. Through the resources available to me as dean, I have been able to secure a copy of Michael’s brief and well-stated acceptance remarks. Professor O’Hear describes his [...]

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