Yesterday, after Chief Justice Roberts announced from the bench the Court’s opinion in Baze v. Rees, affirming the constitutionality of Kentucky’s lethal injection cocktail, Stanford’s Jeff Fisher argued a different death penalty case. Patrick Kennedy was convicted for the rape of his 8-year-old stepdaughter. Louisiana’s lawmakers, hoping to broaden capital punishment to include non-homicide rapists, [...]

Newly-returned from three days at the Harry Potter fair use trial, a veritable crash course in fair use, the Law Blog was interested this morning to read that the producers of an upcoming movie — starring a lawyer, no less — had invoked fair use in a statement they put out. Online at WSJ [...]

With Eliot Spitzer cast out of politics, do his prosecutorial tactics live on in U.S. Attorneys’ offices around the country? According to the WSJ editorial board, the ousting of Gen Re CEO Joseph Brandon, whom prosecutors named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the fraudulent reinsurance transaction between Gen Re and AIG, is proof that they [...]

After the second mistrial was declared yesterday in the case of the six Miami men charged with plotting to bomb the Sears Tower, the NYT is asking whether, under the Bush administration, terrorism arrests are being over-politicized and under-prosecuted. (Click here for an AP report on the mistrial.)
“In a lot of these cases, the government [...]

You’ve read the books. You’ve seen the movies. You’ve lined up at midnight outside a bookstore with your 8-year old dressed up as Dumbledore. Now, you’ve heard the arguments on both sides as to whether Steven Vander Ark’s proposed Harry Potter Lexicon infringes upon copyrights held by J.K. Rowling. And it’s time to cast your [...]

Let’s turn our attention away from all-things Potter for a moment and consider this fact: Just eight percent of law firm leaders are women, according to a report released in November by the National Association of Women Lawyers (NAWL). Why? It’s an issue addressed this week by Leigh Jones of the National Law Journal. [...]

There’s Laird, Law Blog readers, “the guiding genius of crossover board sports,” doing his thing with that funny-looking paddle. And you know what that means: time for our weekly (or so) spin over to the wacky world of bankruptcy — and what a wacky world it is, with its DIP loans, second liens, exclusivity periods [...]

[Gregory Gordon is Professor of Law, University of North Dakota School of Law.]...

Oh, ye of little faith. Like your dead beat cousin who manages to bum some money at every family event, like the possum that keep rooting through your garbage, like that Wiggles song you heard on the way to taking your kid to school and now can’t get out of your head. Asbestos Never Dies! And a sigh of relief by plaintiff and defense ...

The Idaho Democratic presidential primary, set for May 27, only has three names on the ballot: Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Keith Russell Judd. The April 9 issue of Boise Weekly has this story about Judd. Since then, other Idaho newspapers have picked up the story. Judd has been an inmate [...]