United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes Legislative Library

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) is an agency of the United Nations established to assist Member States with issues concerning illicit drugs and international crime. UNODC’s online legislation legal library provides full text of drug control laws and regulations adopted by countries in support of international drug control treaties. It includes legislation adopted since 1948.

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YouTube - U.S. Government's channel

The U.S. government has aggregated channels and videos from across departments and agencies onto one site, YouTube - The U.S. Government Channel. Channels and playlists are organized by topics such as White House, NASA, etc. (channels) or "Defense and International" or "Money and Taxes" (playlists).



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Legal Ethics and Facebook

The Legal Ethics forum has an interesting post on lawyers, litigation and Facebook. The "friending" of adverse witnesses or lawyers in pending litigation have apparently become problematic issues. I'm guessing that we'll soon see much more discussion about professional misconduct and the use of Facebook (and other social networking sites) by lawyers.


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Supreme Court Confirmation Process

Now that we have a nominee to fill a Supreme Court vacancy, the process of evaluation and confirmation hearings begins. You can find background about the process, confirmation surveys, and hearings documents on the web sites of two key players: the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, which holds hearings, and the American Bar Association Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, which peer-evaluates the professional qualifications of Supreme Court and other nominees for the federal bench, issuing "ratings letters" for each nominee. As the process continues this summer, you'll want to have these sites bookmarked for quick access to the relevant documents as they are posted. You'll also be able to compare them with statements, surveys, and hearings for judges now serving on the Court.


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SCOTUS Nominee: Sonia Sotomayer

Today Pres. Obama announced Second Circuit judge Sonia Sotomayor as his nominee for the United States Supreme Court. She would replace Justice Souter who announced his decision to retire from the Court at the end of this term. The wikipedia entry on Judge Sotomayor may be found here, and a discussion of her opinions is available on SCOTUSblog here.



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Kangaroo Courts

The Yankees recently held their first kangaroo court in over a decade. Mariano Rivera presided as judge. The Mariners also recently held a kangaroo court, and it sounds as though Ken Griffey, Jr. had better robes than Rivera, but that neither was dressed quite as poorly as Wade Boggs when he presided over the previous Yankees kangaroo court, if you believe the rumors.

Black's says that the origin of the term "kangaroo court" is uncertain, but that it can be traced to the mid-nineteenth century American West.



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Write Your Name In Runes

For a light-hearted yet historically informative start to your Summer break, why not see how your name looks when written in the Futhark, the ancient runic alphabet of the Nordic peoples. PBS’s Nova Online Web page allows you to type your name into a little box, and then see how it would look in the runic script. The page also gives an interesting thumbnail introduction to the runes and their historical roots.

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Criminal Justice Reform Resources 2008-2009

Criminal justice reform is an issue that does not receive as much attention as it should, but there are people and organizations generating important work on the subject. Criminal Justice Reform Resources 2008-2009 compiles some of the most important resources and documents. From the site:

This article focuses on select current reports, surveys, legislative proposals and scholarship regarding criminal justice reform. It is only a small sampling of the increasing volume of publications on vital matters of interest to criminal practitioners and the public. Therefore, only a few themes are covered: criminal justice, discovery, forensics, juvenile justice, prosecutorial misconduct, public defense, sentencing and wrongful conviction.



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Human Rights Watch International Film Festival

The 20th annual Human Rights Watch International Film Festival is scheduled from June 11 through June 25. This year, over 20 films are featured, touching human rights issues across the globe. One particularly interesting film is The Reckoning -- a documentary about the International Criminal Court.




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Holmes Defeats Posner

Brian Leiter surveyed his readers with the question, 'Who were the most influential legal thinkers of the twentieth century?'  The results of the survey are here.  Oliver Wendell Holmes ranked first.  Richard Posner came in second.  Antonin Scalia was tenth.  No other current Supreme Court justices made it into the top 25.

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