reform Archives - Home Safety Tech Pros

Justice Thomas’ wife reportedly thanked group for fighting Supreme Court reform

homesafetytechpros — Fri, 13 Sep 2024 20:29:10 +0000

U.S. Supreme Court

Justice Thomas’ wife reportedly thanked group for fighting Supreme Court reform

September 5, 2024, 10:10 am CDT

Conservative activist Virginia “Ginni” Thomas walks during a break in a voluntary interview Sept. 29, 2022, in Washington, D.C., with the House panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. (Photo by Manuel Balce Ceneta/The Associated Press)

Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, the wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, thanked a religious liberty group in an email for fighting Supreme Court reform, according to a recording of a call led by the group’s president and CEO.

Kelly Shackelford, leader of the First Liberty Institute, a group that litigates religious liberty cases, said he was reading from parts of Ginni Thomas’ email in his July 31 donor call, according to a story by ProPublica and Documented, which obtained the recording.

Thomas reportedly sent the email soon after President Joe Biden proposed three reforms: term limits for Supreme Court justices, a binding ethics code for the justices, and a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s recent decision on presidential immunity.

Thomas reportedly wrote to a staff member of the First Liberty Institute after a meeting.

“I cannot adequately express enough appreciation for you guys pulling into reacting to the Biden effort on the Supreme Court,” she wrote in the email, according to Shackelford. “Many were so depressed at the lack of response by R’s and conservatives” to reform proposals.

“You guys have filled the sails of many judges. Can I just tell you, thank you so, so, so much,” Thomas reportedly wrote in all capital letters.

Shackelford also criticized Justice Elena Kagan during the call for endorsing an enforcement mechanism for the Supreme Court’s new ethics code.

“That is incredible, somewhat treasonous, what Kagan did,” he said. “The chief justice rules the court. They’re trying to keep the other branches’ hands off of them. And then you’ve got Kagan from the inside really being somewhat disloyal and somewhat treasonous in what she’s doing.”

Hiram Sasser, executive general counsel at the First Liberty Institute, issued a statement in response to a request for comment by ProPublica and Documented.

“First Liberty is extremely alarmed at the leftist attacks on our democracy and judicial independence and is fighting to bring attention to this dangerous threat. It’s shameful that the political left seems perfectly fine destroying democracy to achieve the court decisions they favor instead of working through democratic and constitutional means,” Sasser wrote. “It is dangerous to the liberty of all Americans, regardless of political leanings, for any of the co-equal branches of government to seek to rule over another. Eighty-seven percent of Americans believe judicial independence is essential to protecting our civil rights. We will continue this fight for the future of our nation.”

Hat tip to How Appealing and Above the Law, which noted the story.

Source link

The post Justice Thomas’ wife reportedly thanked group for fighting Supreme Court reform appeared first on Home Safety Tech Pros.

NY law prof is calling on ‘Lawyer Nation’ to reform

homesafetytechpros — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 05:41:01 +0000

The Modern Law Library

NY law prof is calling on ‘Lawyer Nation’ to reform

By Lee Rawles

February 28, 2024, 8:44 am CST

Ray Brescia, a law professor at Albany Law School in New York, has taken a hard look at the country’s legal system in his new book, Lawyer Nation: The Past, Present, and Future of the American Legal Profession.

In this episode of The Modern Law Library podcast, Brescia tells the ABA Journal’s Lee Rawles about the efforts in the late 19th and early 20th century to exclude people from the legal profession who were not part of the dominant social class and how access-to-justice issues persist today as a result of some of those measures.

The early American Bar Association is one of the organizations that he names as a participant in the exclusionary efforts through its law school accreditation program, and he and Rawles discuss the ABA’s current efforts to increase diversity, equity and inclusion.

As someone who has worked in academia, the nonprofit world, legal aid organizations and as a clerk at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, he says he’s come across many people who care deeply and want the justice system to function better. But without fundamental changes to the ways that legal services are delivered, he does not think that the access-to-justice issues can be solved.

A large part of Brescia’s concern that he expresses in Lawyer Nation is for legal professionals themselves. Brescia says the mental illness and substance-use levels within the profession demonstrate that greater care has to be shown for lawyers’ well-being and work-life balance. He shares his advice for making the profession more sustainable for the incoming generation. He also discusses how law schools and legal education can change.

Want to listen on the go? The Modern Law Library is available on several podcast listening services. Subscribe and never miss an episode.
Apple | Spotify | Google Play

In This Podcast:

Ray Brescia

" style="vertical-align:text-top;"/>

Ray Brescia

Ray Brescia is the Hon. Harold R. Tyler professor in law and technology at Albany Law School in New York. Before coming to Albany Law School, he was the associate director of the Urban Justice Center in New York. He also was an adjunct professor at New York Law School from 1997 to 2006. Before his work at the Urban Justice Center, he was a staff attorney at New Haven Legal Assistance and the Legal Aid Society of New York. Brescia also was law clerk to Senior U.S. District Judge Constance Baker Motley of the Southern District of New York. He is the author or editor of The Future of Change: How Technology Shapes Social Revolutions, Crisis Lawyering: Effective Legal Advocacy in Emergency Situations, How Cities Will Save the World: Urban Innovation in the Face of Population Flows, Climate Change and Economic Inequality and Lawyer Nation: The Past, Present, and Future of the American Legal Profession.

Source link

The post NY law prof is calling on ‘Lawyer Nation’ to reform appeared first on Home Safety Tech Pros.

Criminal justice reform advocate accused of murder

homesafetytechpros — Sat, 09 Mar 2024 00:17:47 +0000

Ex-con and criminal justice reform advocate Sheldon Johnson Jr., inset and background photo, who recently appeared on the “Joe Rogan Experience,” is accused of killing Colin Small. (Screenshots from WNYC/YouTube; inset screenshot from Joe Rogan Experience)

A criminal justice reform advocate and ex-con recently on Joe Rogan’s podcast was arrested after cops found the dismembered body of a 44-year-old man — with the bullet-wounded head and limbs in the freezer of the victim’s New York apartment.

Sheldon Johnson Jr., 48, was arrested on Thursday, shouting out to assembled reporters, “I’m innocent! I’m innocent!” after New York police made the grim discovery of the remains of Colin Small. The murder was uncovered when police responded to Small’s apartment on Summit Avenue in Highbridge on Tuesday at 8:25 p.m. on a wellness check when police said they found a torso in the apartment.

Citing police sources, The New York Post reported a foot was found in a blue bin and a head, arms, legs, and a second foot were discovered in the freezer. Police also encountered Johnson there, the paper reported.

Building superintendent Orlando Medina told New York ABC affiliate WABC that a tenant called him about the violence in apartment 6G.

“She said she heard two gunshots,” Medina said, the station reported. “Someone said, ‘Please don’t kill me. I got family,’ something like that and two more gunshots pretty quickly.”

He said surveillance video showed the suspect entering and leaving Small’s apartment in various disguises, including one in which he’s wearing a blond wig and carrying bags.

His father, Sheldon Johnson Sr., 73, thought his son, who had served 25 years in the Sing Sing Correctional Facility for a robbery conviction in 1997 and worked as a client advocate for Queens Defenders after his release, had turned his life around.

“I’m surprised and shocked,” said his father, who is deaf, through an interpreter, the New York Daily News reported. “I thought he did well in prison. He studied. I was happy he got out of jail. I thought he was reformed.”

“I can’t see my son giving up this good job and doing something like this.”

The Daily News reported a possible drug motive, but details were not disclosed on Friday.

Johnson Jr. spoke about his life on “The Joe Rogan Experience” last month. He spoke about being in a gang dealing drugs and doing time in prison and about his father and grandfather, who were incarcerated.

He told Rogan that he had an epiphany at one point in prison.

“I have to change my life,” he said. “I just can’t do this. I had a wife, I had family still. My son was growing up. He was hearing stories about my so-called notoriety. I just didn’t want to be that dad.”

He faces charges of murder, manslaughter, and criminal possession of a weapon.

Have a tip we should know? [email protected]

Source link

The post Criminal justice reform advocate accused of murder appeared first on Home Safety Tech Pros.

Natalie Anne Knowlton’s research has provided an important foundation for regulatory reform efforts

homesafetytechpros — Thu, 28 Dec 2023 01:28:45 +0000

(Photo of Natalie Anne Knowlton by Elevate Photography/ABA Journal)

When states consider law firm ownership and limited law practice by nonlawyers, a common attorney criticism is that such regulation changes will create a tiered legal system that would give an advantage to people represented by lawyers.

The discussions mostly involve state supreme courts and bar associations and their members, while consumers are rarely invited, says Natalie Anne Knowlton, a Colorado lawyer who spent 14 years with the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System, the last six years as director of special projects.

“Maybe you’d rather have a Toyota than a Mercedes-Benz,” Knowlton says of consumers and legal representation choices.

Her work for the IAALS, an independent research center housed at the University of Denver, has provided data and reference for states that have overhauled or are considering modifying their unauthorized practice of law regulations to allow for alternative business structures, limited nonlawyer practice or some combination thereof.

For instance, she helped spearhead Cases Without Counsel, an empirical research study that led to two IAALS publications focused on unrepresented parties in family court.

Pro se litigants interviewed often thought court staff was reluctant to provide information, while court staff who participated in the study spoke of the difficulties of helping these litigants without giving legal advice, Knowlton says.

“People don’t understand the line between giving legal advice and information,” she says, adding that consumers often felt everyone working in the court system was saying no to them, which creates tension. “And judges are concerned about how to balance their duty to remain neutral with their duty to dispense justice.”

The pro se litigants also were asked why they did not obtain counsel. Cost was a significant factor, as were experiences with lawyers and a sense they could self-represent, the survey found.

“We heard from some that getting an attorney in a family law case automatically made them feel that the matter was going to be a lot more formal than it needed to be,” Knowlton says. “We also heard, ‘I don’t want to drag our kids through this big legal mess, so we’re going to try to do it ourselves.’”

In August, she left the IAALS to co-found Access to Justice Ventures with fellow 2023 Legal Rebel Zachariah DeMeola. Knowlton describes the offering as a “justice ecosystem that prioritizes the public interest above all else, and we want to provide support in both creating that ecosystem and support to those operating in that ecosystem.”

“We intend to make what we know freely accessible through our website, and we are available for more bespoke consulting as well,” she explains.

According to her, Access to Justice Ventures’ audience will be legislatures, legal professionals, “law adjacent professionals” and the public. “We can never really speak on behalf of someone else. It is critical that legal consumers have a voice,” she says.

Technology will figure in too. “I want to support tech startups that in some way reach and directly benefit legal consumers,” says Knowlton, 42.

The 2008 graduate of the University of Denver Sturm College of Law initially thought she wanted to do international human rights law. She also has a graduate degree in international studies from the university, and during law school, Knowlton externed with the United Nations’ International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.

“When I went to law school, I knew right away I didn’t want to practice law in the traditional sense,” she says. “I was interested in systems and systemic change.”

Legal Rebels Class of 2023

Stacy Butler

Josh Blandi

Zachariah DeMeola

Sonja Ebron and Debra Slone of Courtroom5

Natalie Anne Knowlton

Uzoma Orchingwa and Gabriel Saruhashi of Ameelio

Patrick Palace

Janis C. Puracal

In This Podcast:

Source link

The post Natalie Anne Knowlton’s research has provided an important foundation for regulatory reform efforts appeared first on Home Safety Tech Pros.