Articles Posted in Laws

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected California company Grant Media’s recent trademark application for the phrase ‘Casey Anthony.’

Yes, that Casey Anthony: the Florida mother whom a jury acquitted of murdering her young daughter Caylee Anthony. The trial received an enormous amount of media attention on the Web, television, and in print media.

Exactly why did they USPTO reject Grant Media’s application?

Justia read the papers on file with the agency to find out, and we wanted you to see for yourself.

Last week, Netflix announced some big changes in their structure and offerings. First, they will split into two companies: one for streaming and one for physical DVD rental. Second, Netflix subscribers will be able to share and discuss their rentals through Facebook. The Netflix blog reports: “The Netflix/Facebook integration empowers you as a Netflix member to share what you watch from Netflix with your friends on Facebook and to discover what your friends are watching both on Facebook and within the Netflix user interface. This makes it easier and more fun to find new television series and movies to watch.” Michael Drobac, Director of Government Relations at Netflix, has a caveat, however. This access will be limited to users outside of the US due to a “1980s law that creates some confusion over our ability to allow U.S. members to share what they watch.” Since Netflix didn’t cite the code or link to which “1980’s law” they are referring to, I thought it might be useful to post about it. Mr. Drobac is talking about  18 USC § 2710, “Wrongful Disclosure of Video Tape Rental or Sale Records.” This law authorizes civil penalties for release of consumer rentals or sales without informed consent of the renter or a court order.

Step 1. California imposes a Use Tax collection duty on retailers with an affiliate or corporate nexus to California.

Step 2. Amazon immediately abandons its California-based affiliates.

Step 3. Amazon seeks a referendum on the New Sales and Use Tax law.

Step 4. Rinse and Repeat.

Earlier this week, a panel of Ninth Circuit judges held in Diaz v. Brewer that an Arizona bill withdrawing health benefits for domestic partners of state employees violated the federal Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause.

The state originally offered these benefits to spouses of state employees, but in April 2008 expanded coverage to include both same-sex and different-sex domestic partners. In September 2009, Arizona governor Jan Brewer signed into law a bill that restricted benefits once again only to (different-sex) spouses. Several state employees whose same-sex partners would lose their much-needed health benefits if the bill went into effect brought this suit to enjoin the governor and relevant state officials from implementing the new law. Represented by Lambda Legal—the largest legal organization working for the civil rights of LGBT people—the employees challenged the law as violating the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under the law.

Some government authorities in the United States and abroad want to criminalize the use of social media, concluding that by taking a blunderbuss approach to outlawing conduct, more crimes will be prevented. The problem with this strategy is that it appears to be largely based upon an unfounded fear of the unknown.

Recently, when a ‘flash mob’ allegedly robbed a 7-Eleven in Maryland, one report concluded, without any proof, that the crime was committed by “a large group of people coordinated by Twitter or other social media.” CNN quickly joined in and repeated a Maryland policeman’s unsubstantiated allegation that although investigators still “‘can’t confirm how this (robbery) was organized’, [they] believe the Internet was involved.”

In the next few weeks, children throughout the Golden State will bid farewell to the unstructured freedom that summer affords as they head back to rule the corridors and classrooms of their local schools. For public school teachers, the new school year offers a respite from this summer of discontent. The continuing recession has thinned their ranks a bit, leaving many feeling beleaguered by layoffs and budget cuts. Additionally, the effort to identify underperforming teachers by parsing standardized testing data seems to assign all of the blame for failing students on the teachers alone.

Of course, the teachers, who serve on the instructional front line, are the most visible faces in the educational system. But, we should not forget the men (and women) behind the curtain: the members of the state senate and assembly.

Considering the amount of attention that our dear Congress devotes to children, I am quite surprised by the average academic performance delivered by our sweet angels when compared to their peers in other countries. Lest you think Congress is too focused on earmarks for their donors constituents, I must point out that even the rancorous debt ceiling debate during the past few weeks was all about the children. In face of the spending cuts called for in the debt ceiling bill, Senator Durbin urged his colleagues to consider its impact on the children:

Durbin, speaking from the Senate floor, said fewer poor children will be enrolled in early childhood education programs, working families and children will face more college debt and medical research dollars stand to be cut.

So, how else does Congress look out for the future of America? Let’s take a look.

Here is a rundown of July’s highest scoring lawyers on Justia Legal Answers, along with a look at which Onward blog and Facebook posts readers viewed the most.

Justia Legal Answers’ Top 10 Legal Answerers for July 2011

1. Mark A. Siesel, 11,600 points, 232 answers
2. Burton A. Padove, 10,195 points, 215 answers
3. Terrence Rubino, 2,805 oints, 72 answers
4. Robert Neal Katz, 1,545 points, 33 answers
5. David Philip Shapiro, 1,020 points,22 answers
6. Cedulie Renee Laumann, 850 points, 17 answers
7. Andrew Bresalier, 650 points, 13 answers
8. Stephen J. Plog, 552 points, 11 answers
9. Gojko Kasich, 510 points, 13 answers
10. Christopher Gilreath, 500 points, 10 answers

Update: In a post  I wrote on collaborative democracy back in April, I mentioned that our friend Mary Minow had recently traveled to Sacramento to voice her support for California Senate Bill (“SB”) 445. The Bill, which increases privacy protections for library patrons by amending the California Public Records Act, was Mary’s idea and one which she submitted as a part of a “There Oughta be a Law” contest.  As a contest winner, Mary’s bill was introduced by California State Senator Joe Simitian in Feburary, 2011. I’m happy to report that SB 445 was signed into law by Governor Brown a few weeks ago.

Way to go Mary!

California State Senator Loni Hancock (D-Alameda) recently introduced Senate Bill 490, which seeks to abolish the death penalty in California. This is the first time that the California Legislature has considered the issue of capital punishment since the current statute was enacted in 1978.

After Gregg vs. Georgia reinstated capital punishment nationwide, California voters approved the current death penalty law in a referendum. To amend that law, SB 490 must be approved by the voters because state law mandates that referendums can only be repealed at the ballot box.

If California voters approve SB 490, first-degree murder with one or more special circumstances will be punished by life without the possibility of parole. The death penalty option would no longer be available. Additionally, the state would halt future executions and commute all existing death sentences to life without parole.

The impetus for this effort comes from a Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review article authored by U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Senior Judge Arthur L. Alarcon and Loyola Law School Los Angeles Adjunct Professor of Law Paula M. Mitchell. Their study contended that the abolition of capital punishment in California could save the state $1 billion dollars every five or six years. The study also found that “the state’s 714 death row prisoners cost $184 million more per year than those sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.”

Don Heller, the author of the original enacting initiative, supports Senator Hancock’s bill. Heller has since come to “fervently believe” that capital punishment should be abolished. He says that when the law was drafted in 1978, his office grossly underestimated the costs to the state. He argues that each execution since the death penalty was reinstated under that law has cost the state $330 million, and it’s simply not worth it. It should be noted that the American Law Institute, which promulgates the Model Penal Code (upon which many states base their own statutes), has also reversed its position, taking capital punishment out of the model code.