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Acting US attorney once orchestrated Facebook posts criticizing judge presiding in his case, report says

homesafetytechpros — Sun, 04 May 2025 01:23:36 +0000

Prosecutors

Acting US attorney once orchestrated Facebook posts criticizing judge presiding in his case, report says

April 28, 2025, 11:12 am CDT

Edward R. Martin Jr., now the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, speaks at an event at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., in June 2023. (Photo by Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/The Associated Press)

The acting U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., formerly helped ghostwrite posts criticizing a judge presiding in a civil case in which he was the defendant, according to lawsuit documents cited by ProPublica.

U.S. attorney nominee Edward R. Martin Jr. helped his associate, Priscilla Gray, write the posts that began in 2016 after the Illinois judge “dealt Martin a major setback in the case,” according to the report by ProPublica, noted by Bloomberg Law’s Wake Up Call. Martin is filling the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia position on an acting basis.

Gray’s posts on the judge’s Facebook page called the judge a “politician” with the “lowest rating for a judge in Illinois.”

Martin had urged Gray to call the judge’s actions “unfair and rigged over and over,” according to ProPublica. He also urged Gray to privately message the judge, the article reports.

The judge was presiding in a case seeking to oust Martin from association with a grassroots group that he once headed, the Eagle Forum. The plaintiff was Anne Schlafly Cori, an Eagle Forum board member who was the daughter of the group’s founder, Phyllis Schlafly.

The truth about Martin’s involvement in the criticism “emerged as Cori’s lawyers gathered evidence for her lawsuit,” according to ProPublica.

President Donald Trump has nominated Martin, who has no prosecution experience, to remain in the U.S. attorney position. Martin did not respond to ProPublica’s requests for comment. Gray also declined to comment to the publication.

Andy Schlafly, a former Eagle Forum board member who supported Martin, told ProPublica that Gray “speaks for herself” and had every right to express her outrage. He also said no court has ever sanctioned Martin for his “First Amendment advocacy.”

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Our favorite Instagram posts from 2024

homesafetytechpros — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 12:17:50 +0000

Year in Review

Our favorite Instagram posts from 2024

By Jackson A. Thomas

December 23, 2024, 10:34 am CST

Image from Shutterstock.

It’s been another riveting year in the legal industry and for our coverage at the ABA Journal. And like clockwork, 2025 will be here before we know it.

Over the last year, we’ve featured on our Instagram page myriad photos and videos.

Check out some of our favorite Instagram posts from 2024 below, and we hope you enjoy them as much as we did!

1. Swift justice

2. Checkmate for BigLaw associate

3. Lawyer writes children’s book

4. California teen passes bar exam

5. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on Broadway

6. Smiles all around

7. Spotlight on ABA’s president-elect

8. 2024 end-of-year office holiday party

9. Horse-loving lawyer runs Colorado ranch

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Our top LinkedIn posts of 2024

homesafetytechpros — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 04:06:29 +0000

Year in Review

Our top LinkedIn posts of 2024

By Jackson A. Thomas

December 23, 2024, 10:54 am CST

As we close the door on 2024 and step into 2025, we’re giving readers a behind-the-scenes look at the ABA Journal’s LinkedIn page and social media analytics. (Image from Shutterstock)

As we close the door on 2024 and step into 2025, we’re giving readers a behind-the-scenes look at the ABA Journal’s LinkedIn page and social media analytics.

There are many ways to gauge engagement on LinkedIn. But this year, we’ve chosen to show you the Journal’s LinkedIn social media posts that received the most clicks, the most comments and the most reactions.

Contribute to the discussion by following the Journal’s LinkedIn page here.

Most clicks

1. May 14 – An associate clinical professor at the Mississippi College School of Law died over the weekend in a fatal shooting that also claimed the lives of her mother and sister.

2. April 10 – Alex Spiro, a partner with Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, wrongly appeared at a Texas deposition without pro hac vice permission and then proceeded to act in a “ridiculously unprofessional” manner, according to a sanctions motion.

3. May 9 – A woman who served six months in prison at Rikers Island in New York as a teenager passed the bar exam on the first try, a moment captured in a viral video posted to TikTok.

4. Aug. 24 – Vice President Kamala Harris would be the second president with a law degree from a school outside the top 14 if she is elected president.

5. May 20 – BigLaw firm will pay up to $20M to top partners, an amount needed “to be at the big table.”

Most comments

1. May 7 – Thirteen federal judges, all of them appointees of former President Donald Trump, have announced that they won’t hire clerks who graduate from Columbia University or Columbia Law School.

2. Aug. 24 – Vice President Kamala Harris would be the second president with a law degree from a school outside the top 14 if she is elected president.

3. May 14 – An associate clinical professor at the Mississippi College School of Law died over the weekend in a fatal shooting that also claimed the lives of her mother and sister.

4. Feb. 27 – Is SCOTUS making it harder to teach constitutional law? Profs “depleted” and taken aback by “velocity” of change.

5. Jan. 16 – A murder defendant whose lawyer slept during parts of the trial was denied his right to counsel under the state constitution, entitling him to a new trial, the top court in Massachusetts has ruled.

Most reactions

1. May 9 – A woman who served six months in prison at Rikers Island in New York as a teenager passed the bar exam on the first try, a moment captured in a viral video posted to TikTok.

2. Jan. 10 – Women have a slight majority in the ranks of associates at U.S. law firms, the National Association for Law Placement says in its latest diversity report.

3. May 14 – An associate clinical professor at the Mississippi College School of Law died over the weekend in a fatal shooting that also claimed the lives of her mother and sister.

4. Jan. 14 – Women have a slight majority in the ranks of associates at U.S. law firms, the National Association for Law Placement says in its latest diversity report.

5. Jan. 17 – Opposing counsel may want to watch out for Rochelle Ballantyne, a first-year litigation associate at Sidley Austin and a longtime chess champ with a fierce competitive spirit.

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Manhattan DA wants Trump gagged even more in light of posts

homesafetytechpros — Mon, 01 Apr 2024 21:46:00 +0000

Alvin Bragg (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II), Donald Trump (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg on Monday asked a New York City judge to expand and enforce a previously issued gag order in former President Donald Trump’s upcoming hush money trial.

In an 8-page motion, the district attorney’s office once again implored New York Supreme Court Justice Juan M. Merchan to issue guidance on who, exactly, is covered by the order and to warn the defendant over a series of recent online social media posts.

“Defendant’s dangerous, violent, and reprehensible rhetoric fundamentally threatens the integrity of these proceedings and is intended to intimidate witnesses and trial participants alike — including this Court,” Bragg and his office wrote in the Monday court filing.

On March 26, Merchan issued the order. On March 27, Trump used a Truth Social media post to criticize the judge, his daughter, and Bragg. On March 28, the 45th president made similar rhetorical jabs.

On March 29, Bragg’s office filed a letter categorizing the defendant’s posts targeting the judge’s daughter as “contumacious” and asking Merchan to “clarify or confirm that the Order protects family members of the Court.” Trump defense attorney Todd Blanche quickly fired back, arguing the state was trying to “expand” the order and that “there was nothing ‘contumacious’ about the social media posts.

By late Monday, the back-and-forth dueling continued, with Bragg’s office enlarging their argument and citing additional Truth Social media posts to show the defendant’s history with such language — and to argue that he is also targeting potential witnesses.

“After a series of statements from defendant that included threatening ‘death and destruction’ if he was indicted and posting a photo of himself wielding a baseball bat at the back of the District Attorney’s head — statements which required an extensive public safety response by multiple law enforcement agencies — this Court admonished defendant to refrain from statements likely to incite violence or civil unrest or which jeopardized the rule of law,” the district attorney’s motion reads.

More Law&Crime coverage: The Trump Docket: A forgotten legal battle is about to rear its ugly head

The state originally took note of those initial posts during Trump’s April 2023 arraignment and moved for a gag order then. The issue was dispensed with, however, with a promise from the defense that their client “could and would self-regulate,” according to Bragg.

“Defendant proved himself totally incapable of self-regulating, going so far as to refer to one potential trial witness last week as ‘death,”” the district attorney’s motion goes on — with a link to yet another Truth Social media post referring to his former fixer and attorney Michael Cohen and former Manhattan prosecutor Mark Pomerantz.

The state’s effort to expand the gag order also cites no fewer than eight Truth Social media posts and argues that Trump is focusing his ire on Merchan’s daughter due, in part, to her support for the Democratic Party. While the district attorney’s office calls this a “false claim,” Merchan’s daughter is, in fact, a Democratic Party-aligned consultant.

Bragg’s filing also references the confusion over an X (formerly Twitter) account that recently used an image of Trump behind bars as its profile picture — but which changed its profile picture after being identified and attacked by Trump. The defendant alleges that account belongs to Merchan’s daughter; the New York court system claims that account no longer belongs to her; the district attorney’s office claims the entire episode was “a fraudulent impersonation.”

“Defendant’s conduct since this Court issued the March 26 Order is all the record that is necessary to justify a further order making clear that the Court’s family is off-limits,” the state’s motion goes on.

In response to a defense request for a “full adversarial briefing” on the gag order expansion and sanctions request, the district attorney’s office says no such efforts are necessary because it’s not a close call.

“This issue is not complicated,” the district attorney’s motion argues. “Family members of trial participants must be strictly off-limits. Defendant’s insistence to the contrary bespeaks a dangerous sense of entitlement to instigate fear and even physical harm to the loved ones of those he sees in the courtroom. This Court should immediately make clear that defendant is prohibited from making or directing others to make public statements about family members of the Court, the District Attorney, and all other individuals mentioned in the Order.”

While the district attorney’s office repeatedly uses language to suggest the court can simply “clarify” the order already issued, the terms of the order do not purport to limit speech about the judge himself, his family, or Bragg. Conversely, the order explicitly does limit speech toward “members of the court’s staff” and Bragg’s staff as well as the “family members of any counsel or staff member.”

Likely anticipating objections to the language employed in the order, the district attorney’s motion also calls for an outright expansion.

“Defendant’s continued harassing and disruptive conduct thus demands clarification or expansion of this Court’s March 26 Order Restricting Extrajudicial Speech to protect the Court’s ability to administer this case; to protect this Court and the Court’s family from harm; and to show all witnesses, prospective jurors, and other trial participants that the judicial system stands ready to protect them too and to preserve the rule of law in the face of defendant’s extreme and deliberate provocations,” the state’s filing reads.

Trump’s defense attorneys, once again, quickly fired back their response to the state’s arguments for increased limits on their client’s speech.

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Las Vegas judge formally charged over social media posts

homesafetytechpros — Tue, 30 Jan 2024 06:03:01 +0000

Left: Clark County District Court Judge Erika Ballou appears in an image with two public defenders; Right: Ballou appears in a selfie (Nevada Commission on Judicial Discipline)

A judge in Las Vegas, Nevada, is facing disciplinary charges over a series of social media posts. After the charges were filed, the judge posted again: a selfie captioned with defiant Cardi B lyrics.

Clark County District Court Judge Erika Ballou was hit with two charges by the Nevada Commission on Judicial Discipline on Jan. 24.

For each charge, the judge stands accused of violating four specific ethical rules and is accused of violating five separate rules in total.

The 10-page charging document obtained by Law&Crime identifies the first disciplinary offense as an Instagram post that refers to the judge’s attendance at a music festival on Sept. 19, 2021.

During her attendance at iHeartRadio’s Life is Beautiful, at 10:46 p.m., Ballou allegedly posted that Billie Eilish was scheduled to start in 30 minutes — a seemingly late-in-the-evening start time for a judge with “an 8:30 calendar tomorrow.” The post also contained the hashtag: “VacateTheShitOuttaOutOfCustodyCases”

Special counsel Francis Flaherty alleges the Instagram post violated a rule requiring judges “to comply with the law.” The charging document also alleges Ballou violated two rules about refraining from actions that might cause someone to question “the independence, integrity, and impartiality of the judiciary.” The Instagram post also allegedly violated a rule requiring that the “duties of judicial office” take “precedence over all of a judge’s personal and extrajudicial activities.”

The second count against Ballou is over a Facebook post featuring a picture of herself in a hot tub with two other attorneys — one man; and one woman. Both women wear bikini tops. The man is shirtless.

The two other attorneys in that photo happen to be public defenders. The post is captioned: “Robson is surrounded by great t–––.”

The Facebook post allegedly violated the same rules about complying with the law and maintaining “the independence, integrity, and impartiality of the judiciary.” Additionally, the charging document alleges Ballou violated a rule requiring judges not to “convey or permit others to convey the impression that any person or organization is in a position to influence the judge.”

Law&Crime reached out to the judge’s chambers for comments on this story but Ballou’s clerk of court declined to comment.

According to Las Vegas-based CBS affiliate KLAS, the judge has, at least in some sense, responded to the allegations against her.

This past weekend, in a Facebook post, Ballou reportedly quoted the Cardi B song “Get Up 10.”

“Went from makin’ tuna sandwiches to makin’ the news,” the post reads. “I started speakin’ my mind and tripled my views.”

The post continues:

Get money, go hard, you’re m––––f––––– right
Never been a fraud in my m––––f––––– life
Get money, go hard, damn f––––– right
Stunting on these bitches out of m––––f––––– spite . . .

Knock me down nine times but I get up 10

Ballous has been a lightning rod for controversy since being first elected in 2020. The judge previously earned the ire of Sin City police for comments she made skeptical of police officers’ ability to interact with Black people without resorting to fatal violence, KLAS reports.

“You’re the one making the decisions not to walk away from cops,” the judge reportedly once told a defendant in her courtroom. “You’re a Black man in America. You know you don’t want to be nowhere where cops are. You know you don’t want to be nowhere where cops are ’cause I know I don’t, and I’m a middle-aged, middle-class Black woman. I don’t want to be around where the cops are because I don’t know if I’m going to walk away alive or not.”

Judges in the United States often praise law enforcement. Ballou’s against-the-grain commentary prompted the Las Vegas Police Protective Association to call for her resignation and an ethics investigation. The charges, however, do not reference those police-related comments.

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Our top LinkedIn posts of 2023

homesafetytechpros — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 01:54:46 +0000

Year in Review

Our top LinkedIn posts of 2023

By Lee Rawles

December 21, 2023, 9:47 am CST

Illustration by Lee Rawles and Diego Thomazini/Shutterstock.

Social media is an ever-shifting landscape, but one trend that we’ve seen at the ABA Journal over the past few years is the uptick in the use of LinkedIn among lawyers. It may have once been a static place to dump resumé details or humblebrag, but LinkedIn is now hosting in-depth discussions and thriving communities of legal professionals.

In 2021, we hosted Marc W. Halpert on an episode of The Modern Law Library podcast to discuss how LinkedIn could be useful to lawyers. Our follower count has only grown since then and is currently nearing half a million. So as we close out 2023, we thought we’d give readers a look behind the analytics curtain.

There are many ways to gauge engagement on LinkedIn, but we’ve decided to show you the posts this year that received the most clicks, the most comments and the most reactions. Perhaps the most interesting element is how little overlap there is between the three categories.