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Baltimoronic Investigation
FEATURED
July 8, 2025
Baltimoronic Investigation
By: James Trusty
June 24, 2025, may mark the day that the criminal justice system for Baltimore, Maryland finally established its lunacy. If the allegations are correct, an employee of Pretrial Services committed what Maryland officials view as a cardinal sin—he or she let ICE know that there was an illegal alien coming to the office. Armed with that information, ICE showed up at the courthouse, was allowed up to the 4th floor, and arrested an illegal alien. There are no allegations of disruption to the Pretrial Services office, no suggestion that the arrest caused a courthouse-wide panic, and no lawyers rushed to microphones to announce the alien had been tortured, beaten, and shipped off to a Salvadoran prison. But the Baltimore City…
Biden and DOJ’s Spiteful Ploy Boomerangs: How Politics Destroys Privilege
June 30, 2025
Biden and DOJ’s Spiteful Ploy Boomerangs: How Politics Destroys Privilege
By: James Trusty
During the pre-indictment period in which I was one of President Trump’s lawyers, there was a considerable amount of then-sealed litigation over the Special Counsel Office’s (“SCO”) insatiable search for incriminating evidence. We regularly found ourselves fighting against prosecutors providing ex parte information to the Court in support of their singular claims that Donald J. Trump did not have the same legal privileges as almost…
AI Conversations Feel Private. Could They Be Privileged?
June 11, 2025
AI Conversations Feel Private. Could They Be Privileged?
By: Robert Ward
The New York Times’ lawsuit against OpenAI continues to spark debate, and not just about copyright. Most recently, a federal magistrate judge ordered OpenAI to preserve chats that the company might otherwise have deleted at a user’s request. In response, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman suggested that it may be time for a version of the attorney-client or physician-patient privilege, but for AI. While any attempt…
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…
Is Virginia Real?
May 26, 2010
Is Virginia Real?
By: Ifrah Law
U.S. Attorney Neil MacBride of the Eastern District of Virginia has been in the news of late. Last week, he announced plans to pursue prosecutions of high-profile securities-fraud cases in his district. For years, securities-fraud cases have been, with rare exception, primarily handled by the Southern District of New York. MacBride takes comfort in a December 2007 Fourth Circuit case that held that the Eastern…
Is Craigslist Eligible for Immunity?
May 22, 2010
Is Craigslist Eligible for Immunity?
By: Ifrah Law
Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and a coalition of 39 attorneys general have long accused Craigslist of furthering prostitution and human trafficking. Blumenthal’s May 3, 2010, subpoena to Craigslist has reignited the debate over the online bulletin board’s responsibility for prostitution ads posted on its site. Craigslist is clearly fighting back. Its CEO, James Buckmaster, recently wrote on the official Craigslist blog, “As AG Blumenthal…
The Fate of an Iowa Butcher — Scapegoat or Cautionary Tale?
May 14, 2010
The Fate of an Iowa Butcher — Scapegoat or Cautionary Tale?
By: Ifrah Law
On June 22, 2010, Chief U.S. District Judge Linda Reade of the Northern District of Iowa will impose a sentence on Sholom Rubashkin, formerly the plant manager at Agriprocessors, Inc., the now-defunct Postville, Iowa, kosher slaughterhouse. The sentencing comes more than two years after a massive immigration raid that netted a total of 289 undocumented workers and led to Rubashkin’s arrest and conviction. Rubashkin originally…
Not so Fast Kentucky
November 2, 2009
Not so Fast Kentucky
By: Ifrah Law
When the Commonwealth of Kentucky petitioned the Franklin Circuit County Court to seize www.fulltiltpoker.com, Pocket Kings Limited, asked a U.K Chancery Court to injoin FTP’s registrar, Safenames Limited, from complying with the Kentucky trial court order. In an order dated October 22, 2009, the Chancery Court granted Pocket King’s request and declared that Safenames shall not comply with any present or future seizure order from the Commonwealth…
