BRIEF RELIEF

Research regarding New York Public Officers Law and its application.

Florida jurisdiction over custody of minor absent for 18 months and service under Hague Convention.

Stay of matter commenced prematurely where arbitration was proper remedy.

Research regarding UN Convention Against Torture and immigration matter.

Copies of New York Workers’ Compensation opinions.

Forms for Charitable Remainder Trust and information on preparation.

Issue off contractor’s report to collect from owner for improvements to real property when tenant who ordered them filed for bankruptcy.

Georgia ethics matter as to attorney’s use of "runners" and cases.

PUBLICATIONS OF INTEREST

Hsieh, Sylvia. "Criminal Defense Lawyers Get New Weapon Against Eyewitnesses’ Ids." Lawyers Weekly USA, November 15, 1999.

Bayles & Griggs. Buyer Beware: A Discussion of the Limitation of Liability for Year 2000 Failures. Loyola Consumer Law Review: November 1999, Vol. 12, No. 1, pg. 4.

Chin, Gabriel J. Segregation’s Last Stronghold: Race Discrimination and the Constitutional Law of Immigration. UCLA Law Review: October 1998, Vol. 46, Iss. 1.

Capurso, Timothy J. How Judges Judge: Theories on Judicial Decision Making. University of Baltimore Law Forum, 1988.

Scheck & Neufeld. Actual Innocence. Crystallizes the lawyers’ efforts to bring DNA technology to the forefront of criminal defense.

Herbert, Bob. "Breathing While Black," In America, New York Times, November 4, 1999. Injustices in an upstate manhunt.

MATTERS OF INTEREST

U.S. Supreme Court

A person to whom a statute may constitutionally be applied may not challenge that statute on the ground that it may conceivably be applied unconstitutionally to others in situations not before the court. LAPD v. United Reporting Publishing Corp., 12/7/99.

The Court has agreed review a Fourth Circuit decision that a defendant’s voluntary confession is admissible even if he was not given a Miranda warning. The Fourth Circuit held that a statute enacted two years after Miranda was decided, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3501, replaced that bright-line test with a rule that says "a confession...shall be admissible in evidence if it is voluntarily given." U.S. v. Dickerson, No. 99-5525.

Texas Supreme Court

A premises owner, merely by placing a safety employee on the work site, does not incur a duty to an independent contractor’s employees to intervene and ensure that they safely perform their work. Koch Refining Co. v. Chapa, 12/16/99.

Vermont Supreme Court

Gay couples are constitutionally entitled to the same benefits of marriage as opposite-sex couples. The unanimous ruling interpreted the state constitution’s "Common Benefits Clause," which is similar to the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause. Baker v. State, 98-032.

New York Court of Appeals

Plaintiff, a tenured professor, may not assert a breach of contract action against his employer, Cornell University, where the plaintiff claims that the University did not follow proper procedures in resolving students’ sexual harassment claims against him. Maas v. Cornell University, 1999 N.Y.Int. 0157.

California Supreme Court

Evid. Code sec. 1108, permitting the admission, in sexual offense case, of defendant’s other sex crimes for the purpose of showing a propensity to commit such crimes, is constitutionally valid. People v. Falsetta, No. S071521.

Third Circuit

Where a town would not allow a cellular phone tower in a residential area, this did not violate the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996. The plaintiff sued under the Telecommunications Act, 47 U.S.C. Sec. 332(c)(7), claiming that the denial of a variance "had the effect of prohibiting the provision of personal wireless service." APT Pittsburgh Limited Partnership v. Penn Township Butler County of Pennsylvania, No. 98-3519.

IRS Regulations

Final regulations that allow some of an estate’s administrative expenses to be paid out of assets passing to a spouse or charity without reducing the marital or charitable deduction have been released by the IRS. The deduction will not be reduced for "estate management" expenses for property passing to the surviving spouse, because these expenses would have been incurred even it the decedent had not died.

West Palm Beach, Fla., is the most pro-plaintiff major city in the country, according to a report released by the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics. Report shows that, nationally, plaintiffs win 62% of bench trials but only 49% of jury trials. However, in jury trials where the plaintiff prevails, the result is often a higher damage award. "Civil Trial Cases and Verdicts in Large Counties, 1996."