A Guilty Plea in the Sherrie Phillips Saga

From the Andalusia Star News and al.com, Evergreen attorney John Brock entered a plea of guilty to third degree perjury for his role.  Here (John Brock plea documents) is the plea paperwork.  Although I don’t agree with what he did, I don’t see how Attorney Brock can be guilty of perjury under Section 13A-10-103 because a requirement of perjury is that the person be under oath.  If all he did was file paperwork, he shouldn’t have had to file an affidavit or any other type of oath.  However, since this is a misdemeanor plea, his lawyer might just be taking the best deal available.  Also, a felony plea or conviction would likely be an automatic loss of law license so perhaps this is the smartest move for him under the circumstances.  Since stuff disappears from the al.com website pretty often, here is Connie Baggett’s story from al.com:

Evergreen judge pleads guilty to perjury; accused of mishandling $3.2 million estate

EVERGREEN — Municipal Judge John Brock could lose his law license after he pleaded guilty to perjury Thursday in connection with the mishandling of a $3.2 million estate case.

“A complaint will go before our disciplinary board,” said Tony McLain, general counsel for the Alabama State Bar Association. “If this is deemed a serious crime, the attorney (Brock) could face suspension or disbarment.”

McLain said the board typically finds any crime involving dishonesty or misrepresentation a “serious crime,” and the stiffest punishment would likely result.

Brock, 62, runs a private practice in Evergreen and also serves as the city’s municipal court judge. Brock pleaded guilty to third-degree perjury for knowingly filing misleading documents in the estate of a Conecuh County man.

The state attorney general’s office handled the prosecution, and retired Monroe County District Judge William Causey presided in the case. Causey was appointed when local judges stepped aside, including District Judge Jeff Brock, a nephew of the accused.

John Brock was ordered to pay a $3,000 fine, court costs and $500 to the Alabama Crime Victims Fund. He also received six months in jail, although that portion of the sentence was suspended.

The misdemeanor guilty plea stems from a tangled estate case that also led to the conviction of former Covington County Probate Judge Sherrie Phillips, 58, in November.

Evergreen Mayor Larry Fluker could not be reached for comment Friday, nor could John Brock or Phillips.

According to court records, Cary Douglas Piper, 52, of Castleberry died in January 2007, leaving an estate worth $3.2 million.

His friend, Mary Drew Sullivan, also of Castleberry, hired John Brock to act as her attorney in an effort to be named the administrator of Piper’s estate.

Sullivan said that Piper had no known relatives.

According to court records, Brock had Sullivan move accounts to Region’s Bank in Andalusia and then filed a petition to be named the estate’s administrator by Phillips, a longtime friend of Brock’s.

Agents from the attorney general’s office filed charges against Phillips in June 2008, charging the probate judge with taking $1.8 million from the estate and opening a bank account in her own name.

Agents said she spent more than a half million dollars of the money paying off personal debts, buying cars, remodeling her home and loaning money to relatives.

She also took a $405,000 fee for administrative costs that the courts ruled was “egregious and impermissible.”

Brock took a similar fee. Both have repaid the money as ordered by the courts.

The scheme unraveled months ago, when six first cousins of Piper’s came forward, inquiring about his estate.

Phillips was convicted of theft in November and sentenced to 10 years in prison. She remains free on bail during appeal, but the conviction was affirmed by the Alabama Supreme Court in July.

Sullivan filed a civil lawsuit against Brock and Phillips in June.

“How do you know the witness?” “He shot me.”

Ah, voir dire.  Nothing else like it.  From the Panama City News Herald (hat tip to JuryImpact):

Prosecutor Greg Wilson was asking if anyone on the panel knew Lionel Crawford when a woman raised her hand. He’d gone through a list of potential witnesses and wanted to know if familiarity with a witness would bias a juror for or against their testimony.

“How do you know Mr. Crawford?” Wilson asked.

“He shot me in 2004,” the woman replied.

“He shot you?” Wilson asked. After a long pause, he said, “Would it be safe to say you’d have a problem judging his credibility in this case?”

Sotomayor: favors insurance industry

My good friend John Jones (a great lawyer and all-around good fella) ruined my day with this article from the Insurance Journal.

Given her lengthy time on the bench, including on the District Court and Court of Appeals, Sotomayor has a long list of insurance coverage cases on her resume, Maniloff explained. “But what I discovered in the course of looking at Judge Sotomayor’s overall body of opinions on coverage issues was far more interesting than any one case. Judge Sotomayor has been very, very insurer-friendly during her time on the bench.”

Now this is just one guy saying Judge Sotomayor is “very insured-friendly” but then I recall Judge Sotomayor was first appointed to the Federal Bench by then President George W. Bush.  Following the advice of his lawsuit hating presidential brain Karl Rove, I doubt President Bush would have appointed a plaintiff friendly Federal Judge.

UPDATE:

Now I am concerned.  According to Politico.com, The United States Chamber of Commerce, that “consumer friendly” entity, has endorsed Judge Sotomayor.

U.S. Withheld Data on Risks of Distracted Driving

Now why the heck would they do that?  From the New York Times, this really chafes me raw:

the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, decided not to make public hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the use of phones by drivers — in part, officials say, because of concerns about angering Congress.

Other info:

Research shows that motorists talking on a phone are four times as likely to crash as other drivers, and are as likely to cause an accident as someone with a .08 blood alcohol content.

I have always said cellphone drivers were as dangerous as drunks.  Who knew I’d ever be right about anything?

Senate Confirmation Hearings on Judge Sotomayor: I Miss Howell Heflin!

On the eve of the Sotomayor hearings, here is a blast from the past: Howell Heflin’s statement to Antonin Scalia during his confirmation hearing in 1999:

STATEMENT OF SENATOR HOWELL T. HEFLIN

Senator HEFLIN. Judge Scalia, I believe that almost every Senator that has an Italian-American connection has come forward to welcome you to this or to participate in this hearing thus far.

I would be remiss if I did not mention the fact that my great
great grandfather [laughter] married a widow [laughter] who was
married first to an Italian American. [Laughter.]

The CHAIRMAN. Let us get quiet.

Judge SCALIA. Senator, I have been to Alabama several times too.
[Laughter.]

Senator HEFLIN. So, Judge Scalia, it is with pride that I welcome
you on behalf of the 4,022 Italian Americans in Alabama and the
other 4 million people to this hearing. I also am delighted to welcome your wife and your nine children.

Looking at the number of your children, it appears that you have
had much experience in working with groups of nine. However,
nine is enough, at least for the U.S. Supreme Court Justices.
If confirmed, I hope your experience, family and otherwise, will
help you to build a consensus when justice requires it, and to resolve the minor disputes which may arise on the Court.

Great stuff.   But here is the part applicable today.

In my examination of a nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, I
am in agreement with the opinion of the late Senator John McClellan of Arkansas. He stated that: “there is room on the U.S. Supreme Court for liberals and conservatives, for Democrats and Republicans, of Northerners and Southerners, of Westerners and Easterners, of blacks and whites, and men and women— these and other factors should neither qualify nor disqualify a nominee.”

To live under the American Constitution is the greatest personal privilege which was ever accorded any member of the human race.  Therefore, I believe that the men and women to whom we entrust the care of our Constitution should be chosen with great care. In my opinion, only a handful of men and women are both qualified and capable of wearing the weighty robe of a Supreme Court Justice.

Motion to Compel Defense Counsel to Wear Appropriate Shoes at Trial

Back in the day, Montgomery defense lawyer James Anderson (a great lawyer and a great guy) used to wear old button down collars to achieve that “simple poor lawyer” look.  While he beat your brains out.  Now I read (by way of Above the Law) about a Motion to Compel a defense lawyer from wearing shoes with holes in them to achieve a “frugal” or “simple lawyer” look.

Read the story here.

But shouldn’t the motion be a Motion in Limine?  (You know, “Sustaining objection to such XYZ would not cure the effect of such prejudice.  Instead it would reinforce the impact of such prejudicial matter to the jury.”)

Apparently the Judge rejected the Motion, allowing the guy to keep his old brogans.  So If James wants to get those old buttondowns out of the closet he probably can do so as well.  (But he should be Attorney General of Alabama, another story for another day.)

New Lawsuit in Sherrie Phillips Saga

From the Andalusia Star News, a story about former Covington County Probate Judge Sherrie Phillips being sued along with Evergreen lawyer John Brock and Birmingham accountant John Boohaker.

The fun part is to scroll down and read the comments section.

For the lawsuit itself, read it here:  Sullivan v. Brock, et al. (click on the “document 125″ icon for the lawsuit file to open)

Oldie but a Goodie

For those of you doing trucking accident cases in Alabama, from the New York Times in 2006:

The practice of falsifying driver hours is an open secret in the industry; truckers routinely refer to their logs as “comic books.” Fines are small. The federal motor carrier agency does not have the staff to monitor closely 700,000 businesses and almost eight million trucks.

Timothy L. Unrine, a 41-year-old driver from Virginia, said in a recent interview that he was taught to conceal excessive driving hours during training last January by his former employer, Boyd Brothers Transportation of Birmingham, Ala. Mr. Unrine said his orientation instructor told his class that government inspectors were allowed to examine a monthly logbook if it was bound. But if the staples were removed, the log was considered “loose leaf” and inspectors could require an examination of only those pages from the most recent seven days, Mr. Unrine said the drivers were told.

Company officials advised drivers to use fuel credit cards that recorded only the date, not the time, of the fuel stop, he said.

Mr. Unrine added that the company pushed him to work longer hours than permitted, and that his logbooks were “adjusted” many times to make it appear he was within the limits. Several times, when he told a dispatcher he was too tired to make another trip, he said, he was ordered to do so after just a few hours’ sleep.

“I never felt safe driving under these conditions,” said Mr. Unrine, who left Boyd last June because of a legal dispute over medical bills from a fall. “I talked to many drivers on the fuel islands, truck stops and rest areas. Logbooks are so fake; it scares me that there aren’t more accidents on the road.”

Richard Bailey, the chief operating officer at Boyd Brothers, and Wayne Fiquett, the company’s vice president for safety, disputed Mr. Unrine’s claims. They said that drivers might have been instructed to keep only seven days of log entries, but denied that they were encouraged to violate the rules.

“Nobody here will tell someone to do something unsafe,” Mr. Fiquett said. “If a driver is tired or over his hours, the system will not allow that driver to continue driving.”

We have run into a fair bit of this in our practice; I was amazed at the allegations about Boyd Brothers.  Here’s hoping they are not having these problems today.

Weird Funeral Home Story Three

From MSNBC:

Funeral home misplaces grandma

Wrong body in casket clothed with grandmother’s dress, family says
The Associated Press
updated 10:04 a.m. CT, Wed., July 16, 2008

STICKNEY, Ill. – A family from suburban Chicago said they arrived at a funeral home Monday to view their 91-year-old grandmother’s body, but instead found another woman in the casket.

Even worse, the family of Lillian Grogan said the stranger had on the grandmother’s dress and favorite bracelet. They claim the mix-up happened because the funeral home incorrectly tagged Grogan and another woman.

By the time it was noticed, Grogan had already been buried. Her family got a court order to have the body exhumed yesterday, and she’ll be reburied.

A spokeswoman for the company that owns the funeral home declined to discuss the incident.

“Improve your departments productivity and increase revenue”

Does this bother anyone else or is it just me?  From Officer.com, an “Online event,”  eCitations: Your Ticket to Increased Revenues and Productivity.

Your Ticket to Increased Revenues and Productivity
This presentation will be available to audience members until June 10, 2010 at 02:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time.
The high cost of manual citation procedures is well documented — every year, agencies lose millions of dollars to errors and lost productivity due to the time consuming and awkward manual process. Join Officer.com editor Frank Borelli as he examines the advantages of eCitations and learn how to improve your departments productivity and increase revenue through this mobile ticketing solution.

Obvious point, but I didn’t know it was the job of the police to increase revenue.