SBM Blog

In Memoriam: Thomas J. Trzcinski

Thomas J. Trzcinski, of Livonia, died Dec. 24, at the age of 58. Mr. Trzcinski was an assistant Wayne County prosecutor.  He is survived by his wife Barbara, and children Leah, Brett, Ryan, and grand-niece Riley. Visitation is at the Harry J. Will Funeral Home, 37000 Six Mile Rd. in Livonia, from 1-9 on Saturday, and from noon on Sunday until a service at the funeral home at 1 p.m. Memorial contributions may be made to the American Red Cross.

TRZCINSKI THOMAS JOSEPH age 58. Beloved husband of Barbara. Loving father to Leah, Brett, Ryan and grand-niece Riley. Dear brother of Suzanne White (Robert) and Kenneth Trzcinski. Son-in-law of Joan Murdock. Brother-in-law of Susan Murdock, Sue Anne Messineo, Anne Vrooman-Curry (Terry), Laurie Stigura, Beth Lambert and Robert Murdock (Brenda). Predeceased by parents William and Mary Trzcinski and sister Patricia. Survived by many appreciated cousins, nieces and nephews. Visitation Friday 5-9 p.m., Saturday 1-9 p.m. and Sunday 12 p.m. until the time of Service at 1 p.m. at Harry J. Will Funeral Home, 37000 Six Mile Rd. in Livonia. Memorial contributions may be made to the American Red Cross. - See more at: http://deathnotices.michigan.com/view-single.php?id=332844&token=f08f6308cdab756309425ddc8282f3eaee2a07717b9af6f555509de5c6e1dbe0#book

The Best Peter O'Toole Lawyer Story

The legendary actor Peter O'Toole wasn't a lawyer (but read on), much less a Michigan lawyer.  Nevertheless, the loss of his unique flamboyance seemed to beg for a post. So there's this, from the New York Daily News:

Brooklyn: In the 1980s, I drove a cab while I was in college and law school. One night I picked up Peter O’Toole from P.J. Clarke’s and took him to the Stanhope Hotel. While stopped at a light, he looked at the hack license bearing my name. “O’Hara, are you spying on me?” The silence was broken when O’Toole cracked up and said, “You’re joining me at the Stanhope for a drink.” When I said I had a few more hours on my shift, he peeled off $120 and said, “Can you take a break?” I parked in front. This son of an Irish bookmaker was just like he was on late-night TV shows — loaded to the gills, but a class act. I told him I wanted to go to law school, and he said that’s what he had always wanted to do. I asked what Johnny Carson was like, and he said, “A lot quieter than you think.” We drank for an hour (or two). With a handshake, he said he was going to look for me on the Supreme Court. More than 30 years later, it seems like it was last night. Rest in peace, Mr. O’Toole. John K. O’Hara

Another lawyer distinction -- O'Toole holds the Academy Award distinction of being nominated more times than anyone without having won an acting Oscar. His first loss, when he was nominated for Lawrence of Arabia, was to Gregory Peck for his portrayal of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird.

 

Incidentally, there IS a Michigan lawyer named Peter O'Toole.

Santa, Gifts, and Campaign Finance Disclosure

In Michigan this year, the holiday and campaign finance are connected only by the coincidence of a controversial campaign finance act bill sitting on the Governor's desk as Christmas approaches. But Roll Call's Money Line draws a more explicit connection between the Christmas and campaign finance. Writing about the Federal Election Commission's recent request to Congress for permission to receive gifts and use them to facilitate transparency in federal campaign finance data, Kent Cooper asks provocatively, "If Santa Asked For A Gift, How Could You Refuse to Give?"  Generally a fan of disclosure, Cooper the idea of asking for gifts to a federally funded regulatory agency  could do more harm than good:

If Congress permits these gifts, it may put those in the regulated community in an awkward position. It may be similar to Santa, or the Justice Department, or a judge asking for a gift. How can you say no? If you have been good, you may worry that if you don’t give, you might be moved to the ‘bad’ list. If you have been naughty, you might feel a gift would move you to the ‘good’ list. And like any good government agency, they’ll keep a list, and check it twice. Almost sounds like a member of Congress asking for a campaign contribution.

Canada Overturns Laws Against Prostitution

On Friday, a unanimous Supreme Court of Canada overturned the country's major prostitution laws, saying that their decision is not about whether prostitution should be legal but about whether the legislative means of controlling it infringe upon the constitutional rights of prostitutes. From the decision:

The prohibitions all heighten the risks the applicants face in prostitution — itself a legal activity.  They do not merely impose conditions on how prostitutes operate.  They go a critical step further, by imposing dangerous conditions on prostitution; they prevent people engaged in a risky — but legal — activity from taking steps to protect themselves from the risks.  That causal connection is not negated by the actions of third‑party johns and pimps, or prostitutes’ so‑called choice to engage in prostitution.  While some prostitutes may fit the description of persons who freely choose (or at one time chose) to engage in the risky economic activity of prostitution, many prostitutes have no meaningful choice but to do so.  Moreover, it makes no difference that the conduct of pimps and johns is the immediate source of the harms suffered by prostitutes.  The violence of a john does not diminish the role of the state in making a prostitute more vulnerable to that violence.

Gov. Snyder On Pensions, Bankruptcy, And Campaign Finance

The Governor's legal training shows in this end-of-the-year Detroit Free Press video interview about pensions, bankruptcy, and campaign finance.

Report: Gay Office of Special Counsel Staffers Punished With Exile to Detroit

CBS Detroit, MLive, Business Insider, and Legal Times all have stories on the just-released federal investigation report that contains allegations that Scott Bloch, special counsel in the Office of Special Counsel during the Bush administration (2003-2008), created a field office in Detroit specifically for the purpose of transferring seven employees found to be objectionable, including for their sexual orientation. According to the report, within three months of assuming his responsibilities as Special Counsel, Bloch initiated several policy, organizational, and programmatic changes, including reversing the policy of the previous Special Counsel by deciding that personnel actions taken against an employee because of his or her sexual orientation would not be deemed prohibited personnel practices under 5 U.S.C. 2302(b)(IO). From the report:

[T]he investigative team adduced facts which reflect that Mr. Bloch and Mr. Renne may have been motivated in their actions by a negative personal attitude toward homosexuality and individuals whose orientation is homosexuaL Foremost among these were the statements witnessed, and described to the investigative team by, retired Army Lieutenant General Richard Tretry, an MPRI vice-president who met frequently with Messrs. Bloch and Renne as part of MPRI's contract work, Mr. Bloch indicated to General Trefry that there was a sizeable group of homosexuals employed by OSC, which had developed during the years prior to his taking office, that he "had a license" to get rid o f homosexual employees, and that he intended to "ship them out." Further, in the portions of Mr. Bloch's official e-mail account that were available to the investigative team, there were crude and vulgar messages containing anti-homosexual themes that appeared to have been forwarded from his personal emaiL The investigative team noted that Mr. Bloch, who stated during his interview with them that as a matter of business practice, he routinely deleted all of his email traffic to avoid "cluttering" his computer, had in fact chosen to retain such items, which were insulting to gay persons. Similarly, Mr. Bloch's public media references to Ms. Kaplan contained repeated, negatively-phrased assertions regarding her sexual orientation. For example, in interviews he granted during 2007, Mr. Bloch described her as a
'lesbian activist,~~ a "public lesbian," a ''well~known gay activist," and similar depictions. While Mr. Bloch's statements did not overtly link her public policies to private personal factors, the investigative team observed that his repeated characterizations of Ms. Kaplan in terms of her sexual orientation (as opposed to her professional qualifications as an employment law attorney with the Federal Government, Federal employee unions, and private-sector law firms) suggests that her personal orientation was significant to him.

In the end, the report says, none of the transfers actually took place because all of the affected employees either obtained employment outside OSC or were separated from the Federal service for refusing to accept their directed reassignments.

Note: this post previously situated the Office of Special Counsel within the Department of Justice. In fact, the Office of Special Counsel is an independent federal investigative and prosecutorial agency.

Frances Fukuyama On The Michigan Court Of Claims

At the core of this new piece, "The Decay of American Political Institutions," is an argument that, applied to Michigan, suggests that our Court of Claims shouldn't have been shifted to the Court of Appeals. It should have been sent back to the executive branch (as in almost all other states). A sample:

The decay in the quality of American government has to do directly with the American penchant for a state of “courts and parties”, which has returned to center stage in the past fifty years. The courts and legislature have increasingly usurped many of the proper functions of the executive, making the operation of the government as a whole both incoherent and inefficient. The steadily increasing judicialization of functions that in other developed democracies are handled by administrative bureaucracies has led to an explosion of costly litigation, slow decision-making and highly inconsistent enforcement of laws. The courts, instead of being constraints on government, have become alternative instruments for the expansion of government. Ironically, out of a fear of empowering “big government”, the United States has ended up with a government that is very large, but that is actually less accountable because it is largely in the hands of unelected courts. 

Two Views of Michigan Campaign Finance Law

As of this moment, SB661, making substantial amendments to Michigan's Campaign Finance Act, is sitting on the governor's desk for signature. There appears to be no middle ground between these two views of the bill and what the Governor should do with it. In an MLive op-ed today, Michigan Freedom Fund's Greg McNeilly calls the bill "a terrific, common-sense bill the governor should sign":

Anonymous “issue ads” are an American tradition stretching all the way back to the anonymously written Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers. Without them, many of us would never feel comfortable exercising our right to free speech because of the fear of intimidation.

Critics say donors to causes should be placed on a government list, so we can judge the issue based on who supports it. But we would never demand a reporter disclose anonymous sources in order to judge their article. No one demands newspapers publish their financial records after they endorse particular candidates.

We judge issues and causes based on their substance and merit. The people who want donor lists only want to use them to intimidate people who step out of line, like union members who support education reform or big business employees who want greater workplace regulations.

Michigan Campaign Finance Network's Rich Robinson, in an Free Press op-ed, takes the opposite view, and calls for the governor to veto the bill:

Is disclosure of spending and donors a threat to free speech? Look what the Supreme Court said in the famous Citizens United decision:

“The First Amendment protects political speech; and disclosure permits citizens and shareholders to react to the speech of corporate entities in a proper way. This transparency enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages.”

Is disclosure a threat to freedom of association? Those who cite a 1958 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court stopped Alabama from obtaining the NAACP’s membership list are creating a false equivalence between the right to anonymity for civil rights advocates who risked being lynched and for political spenders, who risk only commercial backlash or public scorn.

The freedom at the heart of Senate Bill 661 is the freedom to launder money. The anonymous spenders in state campaigns are rational economic actors; they want a policy return for their political investment. They just don’t want you to know who they are, so you can’t connect the dots.

Decide for yourself.  Here's the bill.

 

Michigan Supreme Court Makes New Appointments To Model Civil Jury Instructions Committee

By order today the Michigan Supreme Court appointed Kent County circuit judge James R. Redford as chair of the Committee on Model Civil Jury Instructions, and appointed Kent County circuit judge Kathleen A. Feeney and Birmingham attorney William B. Forrest III to the committee. The Court also reappointed Court of Appeals judge Jane M. Beckering (Grand Rapids), Detroit attorney Mark R. Bendure, Detroit attorney W. Mack Faison, Lansing attorney Paul C. Smith, and Sanilac County circuit judge Donald A. Teeple. All terms expire Dec. 31, 2016.

 

Governor Names Michael Chupa To 37th District Court

Governor Snyder has named Michael C. Chupa to the 37th district court (Warren/Center Line), filling the position previously held by Judge Jennifer Faunce, who was appointed to the Macomb circuit court. He is a graduate of the Detroit College of Law and founded Chupa and Associates in 1995 in Warren.