Mary Beth Williams of Wampum Blog is running for a seat in the Maine House of Representatatives. She will be blogging about the process as she goes along.

Walter in Denver hosts the new edition of the Rocky Mountain Blog Roundup.

The Dreyfuss Report says Richard Perle didn't quit, he was pushed, from his position on the Defense Policy Board--by Rumsfeld.

Skippy is all things awol, all the time. He kept track of who made political comments at the Oscars last night--and says he's not tired of Lord of the Rings. He also writes about the many official government websites that are still "proffering the untrue version of what awol did in the 70's, ie, they say he served with distinction."

Randy of Beautiful Horizens takes on the issue of whether Aristede was pushed.

Daily Kos reports and comments on the Sierra Club's request that Justice Scalia recuse himself from the Cheney Energy case pending in the Supreme Court.

Dave Cullen of Conclusive Evidence has been in Seattle judging the Dart Awards which will be handed out in New York in April. The Dart Center is "a global resource for journalists who cover violence."

Digby is covering Haiti.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld announced plans today for 18,000 more National Guard troops to head to Iraq:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld ordered on Monday that 18,000 National Guard soldiers be alerted for possible duty in Iraq, beginning this fall or early in 2005.

....The units affected by Monday's order including the headquarters of the 42nd Infantry Division of the New York National Guard in Troy; the 256th Infantry Brigade of the Louisiana National Guard; the 116th Armored Brigade of the Idaho National Guard; and the 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment from the Tennessee National Guard.

The Washington Post says it's the biggest deployment of the Guard since WWII.

The Government gave its initial closing argument in the Martha Stewart trial today. They painted her as a liar. The defense lawyers for her co-defendant, stockbroker Peter Bacnovic, began their closing today, calling the Government's case one without foundation, built on a house of cards.

We think the strongest charge against Martha is the one that she made false statements to investigators when she said she didn't recall being told that Waksal was dumping his stock shares. We don't think the defense was successful in destroying Douglas Fanueil's credibility. But, in the end, we don't think the Government's case against Martha is strong enough--we think at least one juror will refuse to convict her.

The prosecution isn't done though. They get the last word--a second closing argument, after the defense lawyers have finished. The trial will end with their last words, and then jury instructions. Hopefully, Robert Morvillo will anticipate what the Government intends to say in its rebuttal closing and debunk it in his closing. If we had to guess what the prosecution will save for its rebuttal, we'd say it will stress to the jury that the case against Martha isn't small potatoes, it's an important one--and then do a little flag waving.

Bump and Update: Kobe's lawyers say his accuser may have had sex within 15 hours after having sex with Kobe:

Kobe Bryant's lawyers said today that the woman accusing him of rape had sex with someone else less than 15 hours after her alleged assault by the NBA star. The accusation was made in a court filing in which the defense argued that the woman's sex life should be admissible at Bryant's trial, despite Colorado's rape-shield law.

The defense said the woman had "multiple acts of sex" in the three days before her June 30 encounter with Bryant. Bryant's lawyers also said she had sex with two prosecution witnesses, which could affect their credibility.

If one of those sex partners is the bellman, so much for his value as a "prompt outcry" witness. He'd hardly be an impartial witness. It also strikes us as rather non-credible that a rape victim would have consensual sex within 15 hours of being raped.

The defense won a key ruling today. The Judge ordered the prosecutors to turn over to the defense two pairs of underwear --one the accuser wore the night of the encounter with Kobe and one she wore the next day to her rape exam. The Judge was angry the DA's hadn't done it before and gave them 24 hours to do so.

Update: The Judge has delayed the testimony of Kobe's accuser until March 23-24. He is reconsidering a request to limit the questions she may be asked.

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Original Post:

One Denver news station reported tonight that the defense in the Kobe Bryant will not be moving for a change of venue and the trial will be held in Eagle, probably in August or September.

Hearings resume Monday morning, and the accuser is scheduled to testify on Tuesday.

[comments closed. Comments are for commenting, not reprinting news articles. We can't afford the bandwidth. Also, this thread is about the Kobe Bryant case not Mike Tyson.]

We've got a busy morning surrendering an out of state client to the federal court. Meetings with pre-trial services who then recommends a bond amount; then meeting the FBI agent who will walk our client across the street to the U.S Marshals' office where he will be fingerprinted and mugshots taken, and then he stays in the nice, warm lockup until 2 or 3 when the duty judge can hear his case and set bail. We won't have much time to blog, so here's an open thread for you to talk about the news of the day that you find interesnting.

Terry Nichols, Scott Peterson and Kobe Bryant are all in court. The Tuesday primaries are a day away. Haiti is on the brink of disaster with U.S. Marines flying in to restore order. A lot to talk about. Have fun.

We thought there was more to the story of Bush's pardon of his dying, convicted pal a few weeks ago, and now there is new information . This week there is even more information at LA Weekly .

George Bush does almost no pardons. They’re labor-intensive, entail considerable political risk and provide little political or pecuniary gain. At 12, he’s about to set a record for the modern presidency. That’s only nine more than the number of turkeys he’s pardoned in the annual pre-Thanksgiving ritual.

Remember the S&L collapse. You’re still paying for it. No one knows the final tab, $300 billion to $500 billion in taxpayer-funded bonds to be retired in the future. More than half that was a transfer payment out of the pockets of taxpayers in the other 49 states and into insolvent S&Ls and bloated real estate deals in the Great State. Texas led the nation in failed S&Ls with 237,

We are so tired of Lord of the Rings. It tied with Titanic and Ben Hur for winnng the most awards in one year.

The best moment to us was when Sean Penn won for best actor for Mystic River. The rest was a yawn.

Drug courts have been around state courts for years, but now, federal judges in North Dakota are thinking of bringing them to federal court:

The saddest day in the world is when we lock people up for the rest of their lives because they have drug problems," said U.S. District Judge Ralph Erickson, of Fargo. Erickson and other federal judges are working on a drug court plan under which minor federal drug offenders could face strict supervision and treatment rather than long jail sentences.

The proposal also could include people on their way out of the prison system, said Rich Crawford, North Dakota's chief federal probation officer.....Crawford said bringing such a program to the federal court system in North Dakota would be a welcome change. "I really wish Congress would see the benefit of this type of program as opposed to just harsh sentencing guidelines," he said.

Even the U.S. Attorney in Fargo is open to the plan:

While federal prosecutors typically focus on large trafficking operations, the system could be used for people who plead guilty to lesser charges and testify in drug investigations, U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley said. "I'm intrigued by it and open to it," he said.

Our view: From their mouths, to Ashcroft's ears. More information on drug courts is available here.

More from Dave Neiwart of Orcinus, this time on the recent revelations in the Oklahoma City bombing case. Neiwert outlines the conspiracists' theory that white supremacist bank robbers and others were involved in the OKC bombing.

Most notably, it was the entire subject of Mark S. Hamm's book In Bad Company: America's Terrorist Underground, published in 2002. According to Hamm, four cells of the ARA were involved. In Hamm's report, the first cell comprised "the bomb builders" -- Steven Colbern, Dennis Malzac, and a third "phantom bomb builder" -- while McVeigh, Nichols, and Michael Fortier constituted the second cell, whose role was "to plan and develop a strategy for the bombing." A third cell for "information, training, weapons, and logistical support" was led by Andreas Strassmier. It also included Denis Mahon and a Elohim City resident, Michael Brescia, whom some have fingered as John Doe No. 2. The fourth and final cell was in charge of financing, which, like The Order in 1984, was largely the product of bank robberies. This was the public ARA, led by Peter Langan, and included Brescia, as well as four others: Richard Guthrie, Kevin McCarthy, Scott Stedeford, and a Posse Comitatus leader, Mark Thomas. All of these ARA participants are either dead (Guthrie committed suicide) or behind bars, except Brescia and Thomas, who both served time and are free now.

Like David, we find the theory wanting in several respects. Nonetheless, it's good that the investigation is being re-opened--provided it's a real one and not just a "going through the motions" type one.

Journalist, author and blogger David Neiwert of Orcinus says Ralph Nader is an extremist:

Anyone who votes for Nader isn't just voting for Bush. They're voting for a right-wing tool and a wacko in his own right.

Jury selection is set to begin in two state trials this week--Scott Peterson, accused of killing his pregnant wife Laci and their unborn son, and Terry Nichols, accused of conspiring to kill approximately 160 people in the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing. Nichols was previously convicted in federal court of conspiring to kill federal officers. The state trial is focusing on the other victims.

Jurors in death cases must be death-qualified. How does that work? Here's an inside look.

We think jurors should be life-qualified, rather than death-qualified. The test should be whether they could impose a life sentence even if they find the defendant guilty. But, that's not the law. Nonetheless, skilled capital defense lawyers push the envelope during jury selection to try to do just that -- find the jurors who could give life, no matter how heinous the crime. They want jurors who will listen to their mitigation evidence and reach within themselves to a find a reason to save their client's life.

Death penalty training for defense lawyers is intense. They call it "death camp" -- for good reason. We non-capital defense lawyers call it "G-d's work." We will focus more on this as these and other death life trials progress.

In the meantime, a cool and insightful blog to read to get into the mindset of the defense lawyer is Public Defender Dude.

Peter Goldberger, the appellate lawyer guru from Ardmore, PA, points out that the news is mischaracterizing the Judge's dismissal of the securities fraud count against Martha Stewart. He writes,

Judge Cedarbaum did not "toss" or "dismiss" or "throw out" the securities fraud charge against Martha Stewart, as all the news stories have been saying. She found Stewart Not Guilty on that charge, that is, she acquitted her.

Peter is correct. Martha was acquitted on that count. You can read the opinion here(pdf).

Update: Here is some of the relevant language from the Judge's opinion: