Commentary: Gorsuch ruling will be tainted I The Philadelphia Inquirer
Scott Sundby: At his nomination hearing, Chief Justice John Roberts famously compared a judge's role to that of a baseball umpire whose job is to solely "call balls and strikes." And it is a baseball analogy that helps explain the shadow that will hang over current nominee Neil Gorsuch if he should ascend to the Supreme Court.
Trump’s Rhetoric Undercuts His Travel Order I Voice of America
“If I were legal counsel, any kind of counsel, to the president, I would tell him to stop with the inflammatory rhetoric because he is undermining his own goals,” said David Abraham, professor of immigration and citizenship law at the University of Miami (Florida) School of Law.
Abraham said as recently as Wednesday's rally in Nashville, Tennessee, the president was using rhetoric that could hurt him in court by indicating that the new travel order is not really different from the old one.
“As he did again last night in his address, the president said, ‘Well we cleaned it up. It's basically what I wanted before; it's the same thing. In fact, I like the other one even better.’ So in some ways so the president is creating his own bad static.”
It’s Time For Facebook To Deal With The Grimy History of Revenge Porn I Wired
Invasive as the leak was, it helped make 2014 a pivotal year for the awareness of, and fight against, revenge porn. Lawrence confronted it volubly, calling revenge porn a “sex crime” in Vanity Fair. Meanwhile, the FBI arrested Hunter Moore, who is also currently serving a prison sentence. Those two events “demonstrated both the turning tide against revenge porn and its continuing prevalence,” says Mary Anne Franks, who teaches law at the University of Miami and serves as vice president of the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative. While the problem hasn’t changed—female celebrities have had their nude photos hacked and shared online numerous times since Celebgate, including one scandal just this week involving Emma Watson and others—the voices of angry people calling for solutions have grown louder.
Until that point, prosecuting revenge porn had met significant structural obstacles. Not only did many women refuse to come forward to press charges, but when they did according to Citron, police officers dismissed complaints as overreacting to mere locker-room talk. “Law enforcement often told these women to ‘relax,’ and that ‘boys will be boys,'” she says. “That changed when folks like Holly Jacobs came forward.” In 2013, Jacobs (herself a victim of nonconsensual porn) and Franks teamed up to found the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, which does everything from advocacy to provide revenge porn removal how-tos for victims. Since that time, the number of states with laws against revenge porn has grown from three to 35, plus DC.
However, the fact that those laws exist—and revengeporn–related arrests have surged—doesn’t mean that enforcement is a given. “Many of these laws are poorly drafted,” Franks says. “Particularly those that only apply if the perpetrator intends to harm or harass the victim.” Other laws still have obvious gaps, like not accounting for exes who distribute the victim’s consensual selfies. Not even Hunter Moore was actually convicted of sharing revenge porn—the courts charged him with hacking and identity theft instead. The two men behind Celebgate? Same story.
Marines United members begin posting nude pictures of sisters-in-arms on porn sites I International Business Times
Organisations that fight against online sexual exploitation note that many states do not have any so-called "revenge porn" laws and when they do, they are not necessarily strong.
"We've been successful in encouraging legislators in these states to take up these laws, but that doesn't mean that these states have come up with good ones," Mary Anne Franks, a professor of law at the University of Miami and the legislative and tech policy director with the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, told NBC News.
Innovation: The Ultimate Game-Changer in the Legal Field I Money Inc.
LawWithoutWalls, founded by Michele DeStefano, professor of law, University of Miami School of Law, features collaboration among lawyers, entrepreneurs, law and business students to explore innovation in legal education and practice.
CONTACT: Catharine Skipp at 305-284-9810 or cskipp@law.miami.edu
