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How Thick is the Blanket? – Preemptive Pardons as a Presidential Power
FEATURED
December 6, 2024
How Thick is the Blanket? – Preemptive Pardons as a Presidential Power
By: James Trusty
As the presiding judge scolded Hunter Biden’s attorneys this week, “The Constitution provides the President with broad authority to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, U.S. Const. art. II, § 2, cl. 1, but nowhere does the Constitution give the President the authority to rewrite history.”[1] But what exactly is that history he claims is being re-written? Judge Scarsi was challenging the largely academic issue of whether a pardon signed at noon, for instance, protects against crimes committed on the same day at dinnertime. That is a very limited run at the notion of “preemptive” pardons, and it seems to be strictly a question of chronology. The judge did not seem to question the idea of…
Supremely Improbable
July 30, 2024
Supremely Improbable
By: James Trusty
President Biden’s pronounced objectives for Supreme Court “reform” are improbable, politically lifeless under a particularly lame duck presidency, and motivated by transparently November-driven calculations. But even if the proposed changes are doomed from the start, they push public discourse on a couple of issues that are red meat for the democrats. The stated reforms are superficially simple ones: 1) to “clarify” that “there is no…
Presidential Immunity Ruling Stirs Sound and Fury
July 5, 2024
Presidential Immunity Ruling Stirs Sound and Fury
By: James Trusty
The immediate and eventual impact of the Supreme Court’s immunity decision in Trump v. United States is both considerable and dramatically misrepresented. The initial consequences include likely delay to the January 6 prosecution out of D.C. and the setting of hearings—in D.C., Georgia and south Florida—where the judges will be required to make factual findings as to whether the evidence supporting the indictments reflect “official…
Rubashkin Gets 27-Year Federal Sentence for Fraud
June 21, 2010
Rubashkin Gets 27-Year Federal Sentence for Fraud
By: Ifrah Law
Today, U.S. District Judge Linda Reade in Iowa sentenced former kosher meatpacking executive Sholom Rubashkin to 27 years in a federal prison for his conviction on 86 counts of federal financial fraud charges. The prison term will be followed by five years of parole. Mr. Rubashkin will also be required to make restitution of nearly $27 million to several financial institutions. The sentence comes down almost…
A Rubashkin Acquittal: Did the Prosecutor Go Too Far?
June 11, 2010
A Rubashkin Acquittal: Did the Prosecutor Go Too Far?
By: Ifrah Law
Former Agriprocessors, Inc. executive Sholom Rubashkin was acquitted in Iowa state court on Monday, June 7, 2010, on all 67 counts of child labor violations relating to 26 teenagers from Latin America who worked at Rubashkin’s kosher meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa. The jury reached its verdict during the second day of deliberations. During the month-long trial, the jury had heard testimony from several Guatemalan…
Judge Weighs In on DOJ ‘Side Agreement’ With Bank
June 8, 2010
Judge Weighs In on DOJ ‘Side Agreement’ With Bank
By: Ifrah Law
In a rare occurrence, a so-called deferred prosecution agreement entered into by the U.S. Department of Justice with a target of a criminal investigation has been subject to scrutiny by a federal judge, and the result wasn’t favorable to the government. In fact, a judicial ruling in the case of a fired Miami bank executive appears to be a signal from the bench to the…
Is Google Ready to Protect Our Legal Rights?
June 7, 2010
Is Google Ready to Protect Our Legal Rights?
By: Ifrah Law
Is the government reading your e-mail messages? A routine law enforcement technique of using subpoenas instead of search warrants to obtain e-mail from internet service providers (ISPs) means that literally anyone who uses the Internet risks intrusion from unlawful government surveillance practices. Subpoenas can be issued under a much lower standard than the probable cause standard used for search warrants. They require only a reasonable…
Heritage, NACDL Session Weighs In on Criminal Intent
June 3, 2010
Heritage, NACDL Session Weighs In on Criminal Intent
By: Ifrah Law
An unusual coalition of the conservative Heritage Foundation and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) recently issued a study entitled “Without Intent: How Congress Is Eroding the Criminal Intent Requirement in Federal Law.” See this blog’s discussion at Crime in the Suites: Has Congress Eroded the Intent Requirement in Criminal Law? and the discussions on the Letter of Apology and the Sentencing Law and…
