You could say that the Senate is a bit of a graveyard. After all, there are over 300 bills waiting there for action, but only 33% will be enacted by Congress for December in the first year of a session. There's also checks and balances to consider, too. After a proposed amendment makes it all the way through Congress, it must then be ratified by three-fourths of the states. That's a lot of federal statutes falling into their graves. Even scarier are some of those laws that actually do make it out alive. Here are just a few spooky legal statutes recent law research found! No Priest Costumes in Alabama. It's not just certain towns and ... Read More >

1968 Federal Law basis for Pocket-Dial Decision:  In July, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment in part in Huff v. Spaw, a matter in which the listening and recording of a 91 minute pocket-dial was determined to not be eavesdropping.  James Huff, chairman of the Kenton County, Kentucky, Airport Board, had the unfortunate luck of discussing firing the airport’s CEO at length, all while the recipient of his pocket-dial, the CEO’s executive assistant, listened and recorded. Huff alleged, among other things, that the executive assistant violated Title 18, section 2511(1)(a) of the United States Code, which relates to ... Read More >

Update: Governor Brown has signed the bill. One of the most controversial pieces of legislation currently on Governor Jerry Brown’s desk is the “End of Life Option Act,” which would allow physicians to prescribe lethal medication to patients who meet residency, life expectancy and other requirements. Wait, didn’t that measure stall earlier this summer? It did. In January, similar provisions were introduced in Senate Bill 128 of 2015. While that bill passed three Senate policy committees, it ended up stalling in the Assembly Committee on Health. (It was set for hearings twice this summer, but both hearings were canceled at the ... Read More >

Criminal Mayhem: No Laughing Matter: Our latest blog post addresses the history of the crime of mayhem and aggravated mayhem. While the Allstate Commercials might make you think of tailgating gone wrong, dropped cell phones and teenaged drivers, the actual crime of mayhem is much gristlier. From the Mouths of Governors --- When researching California bills more than 50 years old, we frequently look to the Governor’s inaugural and biennial addresses for guidance on legislative priorities and historical context. These speeches also serve as reminders that there are few “new” problems in government. Recently, a project led me to Governor H. ... Read More >

When there’s Smoke … There’s Fire (Followed by Legislation) The dramatic footage from last weekend’s fire at the 14th floor pool of the Cosmopolitan Hotel in Law Vegas got us at Legislative Intent Service wondering whether it will spark any legislation.  The fire quickly burned the decorative palm trees, that were made of highly-flammable, high-density foam and plastic.  Thankfully, the black plumes looked more ominous than they really were and firefighters extinguished the fire in about 30 minutes.  However, we wonder if there will be some sort of legislative or regulatory action taken regarding outdoor flammable decorations ... Read More >

In the some 200 years since the Constitution was first created, there have been a total of 27 amendments. Originally, there were only 10, and the men who signed them were more bizarre than you might think. Here are just a few of the odd facts about the signers of the Constitution. A Real Ladies' Man Wrote the Preamble. Odds are you had to memorize the preamble -- you know, the bit that goes "We the people of the United States in Order to form a more perfect Union..." -- in school, but did you know that the guy who wrote it was a real ladies' man? Gouverneur Morris lost a leg in a carriage accident, so he had to wear a wooden one for ... Read More >

To the average person, being convicted of “mayhem” may sound like being caught doing something a little destructive, and maybe a little silly. After all, thesaurus.com lists serious terms such as “violence” and “anarchy” along with less weighty nouns such as “havoc,” “fracas” and “trouble” as synonymous with “mayhem.” However, as California criminal attorneys know, a charge of mayhem is no laughing matter – and a charge of aggravated mayhem, even less so. California Penal Code section 203 states: ... Every person who unlawfully and maliciously deprives a human being of a member of his body, or disables, disfigures, or renders it ... Read More >