Busy work day ahead. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome, except Zimmerman, who has his own threads. Far as i can tell the B-29 thread is still open.

On a lighter note, via How Appealing: Senior U.S District Court Judge Richard Kopf (Nebraska)has a blog about the role of a federal judge called Hercules and the Umpire. A few days ago he wrote a post opining that no misdemeanor and 7 day jail sentence for abuse of a toilet and bathroom warrants 57 pages in an appellate decision. The opinion at issue: U.S. v. Strong, decided last week by the First Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge Kopf describes the case:

In Strong, the defendant was convicted of three misdemeanors, and received a sentence of seven days in jail, for literally messing up a bathroom in a federal court-house. He claimed to have a problem with his bowels, but the government saw his conduct in a more malicious light.

Judge Kopf also includes some personal details in his post, including that he's a "toilet freak" and the worst part of moving from being regular District Court Judge to senior status was losing his private bathroom.

I decided to read some more of Judge Kopf's blog. Parts of it are really funny.

Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn takes on the claims that Chicago's murder rate is the highest in the country and that it's murder rate has reached a crisis point in his new column, Wrongly Accused.

"Since Trayvon Martin was killed, 500 people have been killed in Chicago alone," said talk-show host Larry Elder during a guest appearance on CNN on Tuesday evening. The previous night on the same network, in a video montage related to the umpty-whillionth panel discussion prompted by Zimmerman's acquittal, an unidentified woman said, "Nobody's talking about what happened in Chicago last week; 62 people were killed."

Nobody was talking about it because it didn't happen. No one on the show bothered to correct the assertion — the actual number of murders in Chicago in that week was 10, police said...

Juror B-29, the sole minority juror in the George Zimmerman trial, and her attorney flew to New York to be interviewed by Robin Roberts of ABC News.

ABC identified B-29 as Maddy and said she is Puerto Rican.... Maddy tells ABC that the case was never about race for her.

In fact, Maddy says she doesn't believe the case should have gone to trial. "I felt like this was a publicity stunt," she tells Roberts. "This whole court service thing to me was publicity."

In other reports of the interview, "Maddy" says she wanted to convict Zimmerman but the jury instructions didn't allow it, and she thinks he "got away with murder." [More....]

(Note: Links added and blockquoting fixed.)

A federal jury in Brooklyn has sentenced Ronell Wilson to death for killing two undercover cops a decade ago. Wilson was previously convicted and sentenced to death, but the Second Circuit reversed the death sentence due to prosecutorial misconduct during closing arguments.

That sentence was overturned in 2010, when an appeals court ruled that prosecutors had unfairly tried to influence the jury in the case.

The court specifically faulted prosecutors for arguing that Wilson's claims of remorse should be discredited because he declined to plead guilty and refused to testify in his trial.

More...]

The DEA raided several medical marijuana dispensaries in Washington State yesterday. One had only been open a month.

Casey Lee, an employee at the Bayside Collective, said DEA agents served him with a search warrant and seized about "11 or 12 plants Wednesday morning. They also took marijuana in jars that is set aside for patients. He said the seized marijuana totaled about a quarter pound. The DEA agents seized his and another employee's cell phone, Lee added.

Fellow Bayside Collective employee Addy Norton said she was "terrified" during the raid, and DEA agents pointed guns in her face as they entered the building.

An appeals court in Peru has upheld the 28 year sentence of Joran Van der Sloot for homicide and simple theft pertaining to the murder of Stephany Flores. Van der Sloot's attorney, Maximo Altez, had sought a lower sentence.

According to the chief Judge, Javier Villa Stein, the decision means Van der Sloot will have to serve his entire sentence in Peru before being extradited to the U.S. to face his extortion charge pertaining to Natalee Holloway's mother.

Javier Villa Stein, president of the high court, who noted that this decision was made unanimously after evaluating the sentence issued in January 2012 on charges of homicide and simple theft. Furthermore, [Judge Stein] noted that Van der Sloot must meet his sentence in Peru before being extradited to the United States....

Busy work day for me, open thread for you.

All topics welcome except Zimmerman and TM Martin.

The House rejected the Amash Amendment to block funding for NSA's mass warrantless surveillance program.

The measure was narrowly defeated, 205-217, after last-minute lobbying by the Obama administration and House members on the intelligence panel, who said the program was crucial to national security.

The measure, from Rep. Justin Amash (R., Mich.), would have blocked funding for the National Security Agency to collect phone records unless they pertained to a particular person under investigation. The program came to public attention due to disclosures by Edward Snowden, the former NSA employee who recently released details of two classified programs.

Republicans with libertarian leanings joined with liberal Democrats in voting for the Amendment, but it wasn't enough. I, for one, sincerely appreciate their efforts.

The Amash Amendment to end NSA's bulk electronic surveillance program will be voted on this week.

"The amendment would prevent the NSA, the FBI and other agencies from relying on Section 215 of the Patriot Act "to collect records, including telephone call records, that pertain to persons who are not subject to an investigation under Section 215."">will get a vote, probably Thursday. Debate is expected late today.

The vote by itself will not restrict the surveillance, it would simply include Amash's amendment in the annual Defense appropriations bill, which the House is considering this week; the Senate must also approve the bill before it goes to President Obama's desk.

The House Intelligence Committee supports it, the House Judiciary Committee opposes it.

Go here and see how your rep is voting. Send them a tweet urging them to pass the Amendment

A hearing was held yesterday on sequester cuts to defender services. Funding for federal defender services is quickly becoming a constitutional crisis. Federal defender offices are facing closure, federal courts are considering doing away with juries in civil cases, fees for appointed counsel are being delayed, and funding is being slashed for probation and pre-trial services. The Judiciary has requested emergency funding, and Congress has not acted on it. Here is the statement of Hon. Julia S. Gibbons, Chair of the Committee on the Budget of the Judicial Conference of the United States.

But the U.S. has money to buy Costa Rica $30,000 of new computers as a "display of friendship" to be used in developing crime-fighting strategies, as part of the CARSI initiative.[More...]

Time for an open thread. All topics welcome except the Zimmerman case (and related and unrelated race issues) which have their own threads.

The House may vote later this week on repealing authority for the NSA Surveillance Program. The ACLU says call your representatives and tell them to vote Yes on the Amash Amendment.

The Amash Amendment would prevent the NSA from indiscriminately collecting the phone records of most Americans, including who we talk to, for how long, and how often.

Instead, it will limit the NSA's ability to collect these records to people who are actually under investigation under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act

Anthony Weiner is apologizing again and about to hold a press conference. [Added: He's staying in the race for Mayor.][More..]