Crime scene investigation has gotten popular these days with TV networks discovering that the interest is high in the public in shows dealing with the often gory details of death investigation. Over the last several years, news reports have reflected the sometime less than spectacular performance of those “scientist” engaged in this art. Just keeping track of all the various scandals is a hard, but important task for those of use representing people charged with serious offenses based in part on their work.

Now there is a website (isn’t there always) devoted to keeping track of the perpetrators and scandals; Link

Via Ken Lammers at Crimlaw.

Along these lines, the Linkup is an organization that provides support to victims of sexual abuse at the hands of the clergy. They have a site up tracking ministers/clergy members who have been convicted of sexual offenses around the nation: Link.

When the feds pass out money to up the enforcement of drinking and driving laws, most people thinks this is a good thing. More OWI arrests = safer roads for everyone. What often is missed in this analysis is the consequences down the road.

Allen County is now looking for money to hire another prosecutor just to keep up with the additional OWI cases coming into the prosecutor’s office because of increased enforcement paid for with federal grants:

Money to pay for programs to curb drunken driving has traditionally gone to police departments to increase arrests. But other areas of the criminal justice system have been ignored, creating a backlog in the prosecutor’s office, which has to process the increased caseload.

Indeed, Allen County has become a victim of its own success; arrest rates for drunken driving have more than doubled in the last five years. In 1999 there were 1,399 arrests and in 2003 there were 2,836. Richards says that her office is working on 700 to 900 felony driving cases. This does not include the number of misdemeanor OWI cases, which is even higher.

Police Chief Rusty York agrees that typically his side of the criminal justice system gets grant money that does not necessarily trickle down. The more arrests police make, the more it affects the jail and judicial side of the criminal justice system. In the last four years Fort Wayne has received more than $542,000 for increased drunken driving enforcement. The money has enabled police to heighten enforcement almost every weekend night.

Link to the story, thanks to True Believer for finding this story.

Another consequence of these federal grants is to force police to make stops that they otherwise would not have. For the “innocent” this may mean a minor inconvenience as you are pulled over for a minimal traffic offense that would normally be overlooked by an officer working the beat. For the “guilty,” it definitely increases the chance that you will be caught (one of these days). For all of us, it means greater government scrutiny of our lives, something that we are becoming increasingly more accustomed to, but something that seems foreign to many people’s view of the Land of the Free.

And the pressure on officers is real. Here is a copy of a memo issued by our local police department to encourage officers to up their arrest numbers in order to keep the federal dollars rolling in.

Proving things is the main focus of an attorney’s work. Understanding the law, finding it and applying it is crucial, but most cases live and die by the facts. Frequently, issues of proof revolve around what someone said, or failed to say. The trouble with this issue is people often differ on what was said, and you often end up in a “he said, she said” standoff. Having the key conversation on tape, resolves the issue quite nicely.

Because of this, people who know they are headed to court frequently want to get their conversations on tape. So, clients often ask whether taping a conversation is legal. For the attorney, this question, and the tapes generated by the client pose real threats. The legality of taping a conversation, both on the phone and in person, is an issue of state law. In all jurisdictions, taping a phone call that you are not a party to is illegal, but in some states, only one party (like you) need to consent to the taping of the call (and know about it). But in many states, everyone on the call must be informed of and consent to the taping. For the attorney, just knowing the law of your state is not sufficient, as the client may end up on the phone with someone out of state.

When the client brings a tape in to the attorney, this presents a threat as possession of the illegally taped conversation is also illegal, so these tapes are toxic. The issue most frequently comes up in domestic litigation, frequently on issues involving children. In most litigation, by the time the parties are working with attorneys and headed to court, they no longer associate with the opposition. In domestic litigation, the parties often must continue to have contact with the opposition regarding the children, even while they are in the heat of litigation. So the question comes up, can I tape the call? Can I tape calls between my child on my phone and the other parent?

Answering these questions is made a little easier thanks to this site, put up by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

Hayes Arboretum is a privately run foundation in Richmond, Indiana, that for years has provided the community with access to hiking trails, bird watching, nature education, and much more. The foundation has struggled with money in recent years, and after scaling back its staff and programs, determined that it should sell off 33 acres of the property that borders Highway 40 for development. The foundation stood to clear several million dollars through the sale. In order to complete this plan, they sought to have the parcel rezoned for a planned unit development.

Many of the longtime users (they actually used to be called “members,” but it is not clear what they were members of) were outraged by the proposal, noting that the foundation had made little effort to raise the funds through other means before moving forward with the sale. A group of citizens banded together to block the rezoning, and the whole issue ended up at the steps of city hall. After several contentious meetings, the democratic mayor vetoed the rezoning, putting the sale on hold.

The foundation then turned and sued the city for over 8 million dollars. Today, it appears that the issue is coming to a compromise. The mayor states that formal mediation has resulted in an agreement to reverse the veto and permit the development of the 33 acre parcel. In exchange, the foundation will enter into a 40 year covenant not to develop any additional portion of the arboretum.

Read more here.

Congratulations go out to Citizens for School Choice, Inc., a local group that has worked diligently for several years to bring their vision for a new school to town. It has just been announced that they have been awarded a charter by Ball State University to open a public charter school in Richmond, Indiana. This has been a long hard effort in the face of strong opposition by the local school district.

Galileo Charter School, Richmond: Initially, Galileo Charter School in Richmond will serve grades K-3 and later add grades 4-6. The school will focus on literacy, character development and self-esteem. The public school will place emphasis on preventive rather than remedial curriculum with reading viewed as the foundation of academic success. Scientific, evidence-based programs and intervention techniques will be used to prevent illiteracy. The school will educate students in a community of mutual respect to inspire a lifelong love of learning.

Link.

I do a lot of domestic work. No one likes to have a bunch of attorneys digging around in their personal life, but divorce, child custody and visitation, and related issues will typically call for a fair amount of intrusion on your “personal sphere.” Most people understand this is a necessary evil, and are pretty tolerant. Most people see attorneys working the other side in their divorce as “just doing their jobs,” and do not form personal hatreds. But this is not always the case, and I have developed my share of lifelong enemies. It generally does not go this far:

A woman is accused of trying to run down her child’s father and his lawyer at the Campbell County Courthouse, WLWT News 5 reported.

According to the lawyer, Cathy Manning tried several times to run them over in the parking lot behind the courthouse.

He said every time he tried to step out from behind a parked car, she accelerated.

A bailiff ended the situation when he pulled Manning from her car and took the keys.

I have discussed Indiana’s implementation of its sexual offender’s list in the past. Putting convicted sex offenders and their addresses on lists permits citizens to protect themselves from potential predators, say proponents. The offenders and their families often complain that the lists provide a permanent, or at least long term burden, long after they have “paid their debt to society” by doing their time, and that being on the list keeps them from gaining regular employment and living normal lives after they have been “reformed” in prison. Further, being on the list opens them up to harassment and hostility from their fellow citizens.

My issue with the list is they work to paint folks with a pretty broad brush, making it hard to determine whether the people on the list pose a true threat to the public. Most of us would consider a 55 year old who molested a young child to be a much more serious threat than a 21 year old who had a physical relationship with his 15 year old girlfriend. However, both would end up on the sexual offender’s list under current law.

Well, those who desire the protection the list promises will soon have a good way to stay on top of local threats: Steve Carter, Indiana’s Attorney General (running for reelection in November) just announced that citizens will soon be able to receive email notifications when new offenders are added to the list based on their particular geographic specifications. Read more here.

For years there has been a growing backlash against the model states use to decide who gets to raise children and how much the other parent will pay in support when there is a divorce. Many fathers come away from the experience feeling like they were the presumed looser from the start, left seeing their kids on off weekends and paying support that leaves them financial disabled, unable to live a normal life. Sometimes these movements focus on the amount of money the support laws require for the support of their kids. More recently, there has been a movement of fathers that calls into question where the justice system views mothers and fathers in the same light when making custody determinations.

Now, the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution and similar provisions in most state constitutions prevents laws to explicitly favor mothers over fathers, a distinction based on the parent’s sex. So the laws are written in a gender neutral manner. Reading the statutes, you will not see any basis for the claimed unfairness. The results, though, show that mothers get full custody of their children far more often than fathers do.

From my experience, I cannot say that the system is truly blind to the sex of the parents. I have heard child development experts and even a few judges give the age old “little children should be with their mothers” opinion. But in defense of the system, the results generally are more a reflection of our society, where mothers continue to carry the bulk of the weight in caring for kids, while fathers generally are able to earn more in the workplace than their female colleagues, than a reflection of the unfairness of the justice system.

The standard used in most states is “the best interests of the child.” Meaning that the court evaluates the determination of custody from the perspective of what will benefit the children the most. Especially for younger children, this involves determining which parent has been the “primary care-giver” and awarding custody to this parent, to maintain the status quo and give the children stability. Most experts will state that shuttling children from home to home on a weekly, or monthly, or daily basis in a “split” custody arrangement presents too much disruption in the child’s life, particularly on school nights, when the child needs stability and routine to get the basics of nutrition, homework, and sleep done in a reliable fashion.

The fathers’ groups focus on the right to parent, and wonder why, if the rights of the parents are equal in the eyes of the law, how come the courts do not equally divide the parenting time?

In truth, states have responded to these complaints. Indiana’s parenting time guidelines now effect an equal split of the non-school time (half the weekends, half the summer, and half the holiday time) between the parents, but still show a preference for the kids being at one parent’s home on school nights (i.e., the bulk of the year).

Indiana also recently revised its support guidelines to provide additional reductions in support for non-custodial parents who have the kids at their homes more frequently (which has created a reluctance to permit additional parenting time for many custodial parents. A new problem for parents and practitioners). I have not seen any studies of the impact of this change, but in my experience, we are seeing a lowering of support obligations for parents who stay involved in their kids lives.

The next frontier for the father’s rights groups is litigation. A father in Pennsylvania has brought a federal suit against the state seeking class certification for a claim that the state system unfairly results in the impairment of parent’s right to parent their children. Legislation is being put forth as well to “fix” the system:

Stevenson’s bill would set a “presumptive standard” that physical custody should be split 50-50 unless one parent can prove that there’s a good reason for a different arrangement. Legal custody, which gives both parents a say in issues such as religion, health and education, can be shared equally even when physical custody is not.

But many of the experts say legislating a 50-50 standard is a bad idea.

“This is one more attempt to say that every case that goes into court should start with the assumption that it’s 50-50 time - even if they haven’t been putting in 50-50 time before that,” said Lynne Gold-Bikin, a family law attorney and past chair of the American Bar Association’s family law section. “And why do they want 50-50 (custody)? Some people want it because they know they can reduce the support they pay to their wives” as a result.

Read about it.

One of the main groups behind the movement is the Indiana Civil Rights Counsel, which estimates that over 40 such lawsuits are on file around the country.

Thanks the Sherry at Stay of Execution, I have been spending some time reading Al Nye over at his blog. Mr. Nye is an attorney working in Maine, but I did not have time to find out too much about him, I was too busy reading his insightful book reviews. Many of his reviews are off-topic, legal wise, but still informative. What I really enjoyed were his reviews of books intended for the practicing lawyer. There is not much in the way of reviews of this type of material, and unlike “standard” books, most legal treatise will set you back $100.00 or more. That is a big amount to pay, just to find out the author has collected a bunch of trite statements about the law, that offer nothing new. If you are in the practice, I recommend you take a look.

The Pal-Item continues to provide Earlham College with excellent PR over the college’s conflict with Attorney General Steve Carter over the management of Conner Prairie. Today, the paper has an editorial up in support of the college, and several pro-Earlham letters. A sample:

Earlham, as the steward of the aforementioned, has done an outstanding job in the past and is quite capable and has every right to do so in the future. Any suggestion to the contrary attacks Earlham’s moral character, allows government to arbitrarily interject itself, and is unacceptable.

Frank Mazzei is president and chief executive officer, Richmond-Wayne County Chamber of Commerce

Link.

Instead of recognizing and appreciating Earlham’s contributions to the museum, Attorney General Steve Carter is needlessly prolonging a dispute — thereby hampering the capacity of two excellent institutions to educate the public.

Alice Shrock and Randall Shrock, Richmond, Ind.

Alice Shrock and Randall Shrock are both professors of history at Earlham College.

Link.

Hopefully Earlham College can prevail on appeal or if there is a change in the office of attorney general, a fairer resolution will be reached for all involved. If not, why would anyone choose to give a charitable contribution to any non-profit organization in the state of Indiana that could be questioned long after the benefactor is able to defend his generosity.

Lisa Jackson.

Link.

Due to the one-sided presentation of news and opinion, anyone would be hard-pressed to find anyone in central Indiana who has a good word to say about Earlham, which is being stigmatized as either stubborn or greedy, or both. Many of us may occasionally have differences with what Earlham does but these untrue accusations go beyond legitimate differences and strike at the good name of an institution.

Victor Jose is a Richmond resident.

Link.

The only impediment seems to be Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter. He was called into the fray by ex-board members of the museum. He entered on the grounds that Earlham is administering a public trust and he seems determined to have Earlham do something that nearly any institution would find nearly impossible: provide 40 years worth of detailed financial information.

Link.