ElectricLawyer

The strange case of the deactivated GMail account

Sometime in the middle of August, Rocky Mountain Bank set names, addresses, Social Security numbers and loan information of over 1,300 of its customers to a Gmail address, obviously by mistake. When the bank realized what it had done, it sent another email to the same address asking the recipient to contact the bank and delete the file without reading it. The recipient did not answer, and the bank asked Google for contact information on the recipient.

Following its privacy procedures, Google told Rocky Mountain that it needed a court order. The bank went to Northern District (San Jose) Judge James Ware, who not only ordered disclosure, but also -- this is where it gets strange -- deactivated the recipient's account. Yes, you read correctly: shut down this poor person's email account. This happened on Wednesday, September 23.

Mind you, the recipient had done nothing wrong. He or she had no duty to contact the bank, and nobody even knows if the information was ever received, as it is highly likely the unsolicited emails went straight into the junk folder.

The weirdness doesn't stop there. This week Google and the bank went back into court saying that the original request was now "moot," and asking that Google be allowed to reinstate the poor user's account. Instead, Judge Ware continued the case until October 5, leaving the user without email for another week.

What is going on here? First, who is protecting the user's rights? Second, what made the bank think that everything would be okay if the user had replied, saying the file was deleted? Third, why didn't Judge Ware order the account re-activated? Fourth, why did he de-activate it in the first place? Something is really wrong here, and unfortunately the person getting hurt is a totally innocent Gmail user.

Read more at http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=114347.

Judge Sharon Keller: an update

I wrote a couple of days ago about the hearing involving Texas appellate court Judge Sharon Keller, who is charged with denying a condemned inmate access to the courts by refusing to keep open the clerk's office so that his lawyers could file a request for a stay. In a New York Times editorial today, the editors opined that she should be removed: "Judge Keller's callous indifference in a case where the stakes could not have been higher makes her unfit for office."

On Wednesday, Judge Keller denied the inmate's lawyer a grace period: “That is not true. I declined to keep the clerk’s office open past closing time.” She apparently did not tell the lawyers that another judge was on duty at the courthouse ready to accept late filings.

Of course, a closed clerk's office meant there was nowhere to file the brief.

The Trial of Judge Sharon Keller: Way Stranger than Fiction

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Sharon Keller is on trial herself, charged in a civil factfinding hearing with intentionally denying a condemned prisoner access to the courts by refusing to keep the clerk's office open after 5 pm to permit his attorney to file paperwork. The inmate was executed a few hours later. I'll keep an eye on this very strange proceeding.

Going after bad prosecutors -- a career-ending move?

Cal State Bar Chief Trial Counsel Scott Drexel testified before a commission led by former Attorney General Van de Kamp (as reported by the California Lawyer) that after examining half of the 53 prosecutorial misconduct cases that led to reversals of convictions, he had found not a single instance where a judge reported the misconduct to the State Bar -- even though judges are required to do so by law (Bus. & Prof. Code sec. 6086.7(a)(2)).

After reviewing 1,464 State Bar cases 2001-2005, the San Jose Mercury News discovered exactly one action against a prosecutor. Judges don't report offending prosecutors, the News concluded.

Some people claim the judges are confused by the rules: who should be doing the reporting? The trial judge, the justices who overturned the opinion? I say all of them. Since when has ignorance of the law been an excuse?

Oh, by the way, the Chief Trial Counsel, who had brought a successful action against a deputy district attorney, was not appointed to a new four-year term by the State Bar Board of Governors. California Lawyer reports that one source present at the meeting said the opposition to his appointment came from the two prosecutors on the board, who convinced the other members.

Really gives one faith in the system, doesn't it?

When "public" is not really public - U.S. Senators' campaign contributions

The U.S. Senate refuse to put campaign contribution material on the Web. Senators are required to make the information public by the Federal Election Commission, so they will give it to us -- on dead trees. Even though it is gathered and compiled electronically.

We have to keep repeating to ourselves that we live in the 21st Century, even though it sure doesn't feel like it.

Does that make you just a little crazy? If so, you may want to support Representative Steve Israel's (D-NY) bill to define "public" to mean searchable and readable online, at the suggestion of Andrew Rasiej, a tech entrepreneur.

Read the whole story in The New York Times.

This site says Senator Roberts stood in the way of the passage of SB 482, which would have made the material available online. I have not been able to find a reference to the legislation other than that.

Military fraud gets help from VA

Today's New York Times (delivered to my digital doorstep via Kindle) reports that people are committing more and more military fraud, that is, pretending to be decorated veterans. Sometimes it is to get special license plates, like in Texas, or obtain other recognition or special treatment. The fraud is made easier by the fact that no computerized database of DD-214 forms, the one-page document that discharged service members get, exists.

Yes, dear readers, this is 2009, and yet the VA has no computerized database of discharge records. In 2004 the National Archives, which stores the paper (yes, paper) records, said it could digitize the forms for $12 million, which would save $4 million a year in retrieval costs. But the Defense Department nixed the idea, saying the database would be expensive and incomplete, because 18 million documents were destroyed in a warehouse fire in St. Louis. Critics said the missing records could be reconstructed or substituted.

Now that is one of the dumbest "your tax dollars at work" story I've read all day. The database would be expensive? It would save $4 million a year. And it would keep even more records from going up in smoke.

So who is policing military fraud? Volunteers. Volunteers and doing the work the Veterans Administration should be doing. One former Army sergeant, Doug Sterner, has personally built a 120,000 record database of Medal of Valor recipients. One little guy can build a database with over one hundred thousand records, but the VA can't digitize DD-214's? Spare me.

President Obama, I just found you $4 million for our healthcare reform. Tell the VA to get its act together.

NRA wastes political bullets on Sotomayor

Today's San Francisco Chronicle (received via Kindle) reports that the NRA has weighed in on the Sotomayor nomination -- first time it's had the temerity to try to influence the President's selection of a Supreme Court justice. It has threatened to punish senators who vote for her, and for once, it's losing.

Max Baucus, Jon Tester, and Lamar Alexander have already announced they will defy the organization. The cowardly Kay Bailey Hutchinson, as well as Orrin Hatch Saxby Chambliss and Johny Isakson, are submitting to the NRA's command.

Mind you, Sotomayor has never said she was against gun rights. All her rulings involving guns simply followed binding precedent. During the confirmation "hearings" (if that's the right word for the circus show) Sotomayor did not call the rights "fundamental," that is, applicable to the states, but that is for the obvious reason that the question will surely come before the high court. Keep in mind that the Heller decision involved the District of Columbia, which is a federal enclave.

The bottom line is that Sotomayor will be easily confirmed, and the NRA, which is considered the 900-pound gorilla in Washington, will suffer its first defeat. I doubt it will be the last.

What was he thinking? Sacramento County Superior Court Judge David de Alba

The name of the judge who approved the Ford coupon settlement I just wrote about is named David de Alba, according to ConsumerAffairs.com.

Can anyone shed light on this gentleman?

Ford owners get coupons, lawyers make millions

Elizabeth Cabraser of San Francisco's Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein and Kevin Roddy of Woodbridge, N.J. settled a case involving Ford rollovers where the lawyers got $15.9 million, and the class members got coupons worth between $300 and $500 towards a new, you guessed it, Ford.

Not surprisingly, only 75 of the Ford owners cashed in their coupons. Law.com reports that "Tracey Buck-Walsh, the Sacramento, Calif.-based plaintiffs' liaison counsel in the case, said she and other attorneys are disappointed that so few claims have been submitted. But, she said, the settlement was the best deal that could be crafted considering the American automaker's shaky financial footing."

Really. Disappointed? What did they expect? They shouldn't be disappointed. They made millions. What's the problem?

Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, said the low participation numbers are proof that so-called coupon settlements rarely benefit consumers, said the Law.com article.

But who cares about the consumers? Obviously the Sacramento County Superior Court judge (unnamed in the story; let me know who it is, dear readers) who approved the deal doesn't.

Read the whole story here.

Godzilla steps into the Apple Google Voice Fiasco

Wall Street Journal (online) reports that the FCC is investigating Apple's removal/rejection of the Google Voice apps. Yes!!! All that shouting and screaming among the Apple fankids has finally awakened the sleeping giant: the United States government.

BoyGenius re-posted a copy of a letter, supposedly from the FCC. The agency wants an answer to these questions: "What are the standards for considering and approving iPhone applications? What is the approval process for such applications (timing, reasons for rejection, appeal process, etc.)? What is the percentage of applications that are rejected? What are the major reasons for rejecting an application?"

Just the questions the befuddled and frustrated iPhone developers have been asking. Or to put it differently, why no Google Voice but a dozen apps for farts and semi-nude women?