After being found mentally competent to stand trial, Rodney Oglesby pleaded guilty to committing domestic violence, aggravated assault and — worst of all, or at least co-equal with his other crimes, at least according to PETA — killing a kitten. The competency finding was based, per the stipulation of the parties, on just one of the psychiatric reports. The other psychiatrist opined he was incompetent. Oglesby fought his court-appointed attorney every step of the way. He asked for, and was denied, new counsel, then accepted a plea deal offered by the People, in which his lawyer refused to join. In fact, his lawyer insisted that Oglesby was not competent. He…
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More on California’s Private Attorney General Statute
This post at The UCL Practitioner notes an article about a case being argued today in the California Supreme Court (Olson v. Automobile Club of Southern California, no. S143999) addressing whether expert witness fees are recoverable under the state’s private attorney general statute, Code of Civil Procedure section 1021.5. If the private AG statute interests you generally, make sure you didn’t miss this post from yesterday, which appears immediately below this one on the home page.
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Recovery of Fees for Pre-Litigation Activities
In this post at The Opening Brief, Tom Caso discusses an attorney fee case that I missed last month (geez, it hurts to admit that). The case, Hogar v. Community Development Commission, case no. D049452 (4th Dist. Dec. 14, 2007), involves the issue of whether fees for pre-litigation activities may be recovered under California’s private attorney general fee provision, Code of Civil Procedure §1021.5. Tom’s post also discusses a key difference between attorney fee recovery under Section 1021.5 and recovery under its federal counterpart. Tom knows about attorney fees in public interest cases, having been chief counsel for Pacific Legal Foundation.
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A Philosophical Link between Golf and Sentencing Reform
Who’d have thought? But the Sentencing Law and Policy blog spots the link in the 2008 revisions to the Rules of Golf. Hint (especially for you non-golfers): the Rules of Golf can be hard to understand and are chock full of penalties for various infractions.
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Post-Arbitration Petition Attorney Fee Order is Appealable
In Otay River Constructors v. San Diego Expressway, case no. D049612 (4th Dist. Jan. 7, 2008), the Court of Appeal holds that an order denying an award of contractual attorney fees to a party who succeeded in defeating a petition for arbitration in an action brought solely for that purpose is appealable. The court reasoned that where an action is brought solely to enforce a contractual arbitration provision, then a defendant’s defeat of that petition is effectively a final judgment because it disposes of the only issue before the court, even if further litigation is contemplated. Thus, an order denying an award of attorney fees to the party who successfully…
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My Attorney Fee Article in CITATIONS
I have an article in this month’s issue of CITATIONS, the monthly magazine of the Ventura County Bar Association, and for which I serve on the editorial board. The article is an expanded version of this post on Cruz v. Ayromloo, 155 Cal.App.4th 1270 (2d Dist. Oct. 3, 2007). The article, titled“Pro Bono Attorney Fees” Is Not an Oxymoron, highlights the Cruz court’s dictum on the recovery of attorney fees in pro bono cases and examines the implications of that reasoning for future cases. You can download a PDF copy of the article here.
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Compare and Contrast: Virginia and California
Waaaaaayy outside our usual jurisdiction, but California appellate lawyers may be interested in reading this post by “S. COTUS” at Appellate Law & Practice, which in turn links to this post at the SW Virginia Law Blog about the en banc Virginia Court of Appeals opinion in Moore v. Commonwealth. If I read these posts correctly, and they accurately portray the case, the posts demonstrate a wildly different approach to appellate jurisdiction in Virginia than in California, for which we should probably all (well, at least those of us representing appellants, and all appellants in pro per) breathe a sigh of relief. The court dismisses the appeal because the “petition…
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Skilling’s Reply Brief
If you’re a fan of legal writing and/or legal blogs, you’ve probably read this elsewhere already. But I’m still playing catchup from the holidays and thought some of you might be, too, so here goes. Jeff Skilling filed his reply brief in his Fifth Circuit appeal of his convictions. You might remember earlier posts about the extraordinary length of his opening brief here and here, the former of which also has a round-up of commentary on its substance. According to White Collar Crime Prof Blog, the 161-page reply is the shortest brief filed in the case yet. The blog follows up with some commentary on the substance of the…
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Appellate-Related New Year’s Resolutions
I discovered a few on-line resolutions by some appellate bloggers: At The Opening Brief, taking his own advice that improvement of one’s writing is a career-long endeavor, Sacramento appellate attorney Tom Caso resolves to work actively on his writing during the year. At the (new) legal writer, New Orleans appellate attorney Raymond Ward resolves to keep in perspective such legal writing trivialities as whether to put one or two spaces after a period, where to place citations, and whether to fully justify text. Attention to detail is important, he says, but there’s room to disagree on things like this. I’d like to say that I didn’t come up with any…
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Apple v. Bloggers Settlement includes Shutdown of Apple Rumor Blog
This isn’t really appellate-related, but I figure that at least some of you must be, as I am, a Mac-using lawyer, and will find this of interest. In this post at The UCL Practitioner, Kimberly Kralowec updates some of her earlier reporting on the Apple lawsuit against some bloggers that had leaked internal Apple information. She provides links to a few articles about the settlement, reminds us that “in 2006, the Court of Appeal ruled that the bloggers were ‘journalists’ and that California’s shield law therefore protected their sources,” and links to some of her earlier coverage about the case.
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Easing Back into Things with Some Reminders from the Judicial Council
OK, I’m going to ease back into posting here with some easy ones. The California Courts website now has up-to-date versions (i.e., the versions effective as of January 1, 2008) of the following posted: Judicial Council Forms. This is a nice list, as it is only of the forms that have changes or been added, and the page includes a link to download all of the changed and new forms in a single zip file with one click. This list includes two forms for appeals, APP-003 — Appellant’s Notice Designating Record on Appeal (Unlimited Civil Case) and APP-008 — Certificate of Interested Entities or Persons. The latter is a brand…
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Happy New Year, Everyone!
I hope everyone is off to a good start. After 10 days or so off from blogging, I’m ready to get started again. Did I miss it? Surprisingly, no. I mean, I’m glad to get started again, but I was so busy while getting ready for “vacation” (that word is in quotes because I worked on two days), that I was just happy to rest. I just checked my stats, and traffic was predictably light from just before Christmas through today. At least nine people out there must not have had a very good Christmas, since they hit my blog that day. Watch for posting to resume soon.