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As a new assistant district attorney in 1979, I started my prosecution career in Savannah, Chatham County. In that office at that time, there was established one of the first victim/witness advocacy programs in the state of Georgia.

Jack Guerin Special to the USA TODAY Network Through our recent national traumas, we’ve learned the importance of the rule of law.  No one in our society should be above the law including the Delaware General Assembly. As Thomas Jefferson warned, “Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves therefore are its only safe depositories.” Our lawmakers have used their lawmaking power to exempt themselves from the section of the Delaware Co...

AllOnGeorgia March 9, 2021 Georgia Senators had a vote of 33-20 that rejected a bill that would raise their own pay. A similar bill was withdrawn from the General Calendar and recommitted to the Rules Committee on March 3, 2021 in the House of Representatives. On the same day, the house bill was then favorably reported by the Committee Substitute. According to the State Compensation Commission(read below), lawmaker pay has been the same since 1999. The First Reader Summary for Senate Bill 252:...

25 Feb 2021 The Georgia House is weighing legislation to end the state’s requirement that law-abiding citizens acquire a permit from the state in order to carry a handgun for self-defense. The legislation, House Bill 110, is sponsored by five Republican State Reps and one Democrat. Those Reps. are Clark Heath (R), Steve Tarvin (R), Emory Donahoo (R), Joseph Gullet (R) , Danny Mathis (R), and Mike Glanton (D). The text of HB110 says: To amend Part 1 of Article 1 of Chapter 3 of Title 12, Title...

On Feb. 5, the University of Georgia’s First Amendment clinic sent its second letter to the Oconee County School Board asking for the board to increase transparency with the community, promote more virtual accessibility to board meetings and unblock members of the community on its Twitter account. The First Amendment clinic is a semester-long course offered at UGA’s law school to law students after the completion of their first year. The clinic, which first launched in August 2020, is...

Tuesday, February 2, 2021 Copyright jurisprudence in 2020 was, in many ways, a study in the scope of copyright protection. While certain courts brought century-year-old precedent to the forefront to interpret the scope of copyrights, other courts ruled overruled 40 years of precedent to even the playing field between popular works and works that are less known. In the wake of the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit’s pivotal copyright decision in the Led Zeppelin “Stairway t...

They dont get credit, but a California nonprofits threat forced Wisconsin jury instructions to become public Bruce Vielmetti, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel © The Palm Beach Post . At court trials, judges and lawyers depend on Wisconsins standard jury instructions to help frame issues, define offenses and guide jurors understanding of the law, so they might reach just verdicts. But as crucial as the instructions are, they were — until recently — hard to obtain, almost like a...

On that date the United States Supreme Court (SCOTUS) refused to hear:  The case challenged the 2020 Presidential election results—an election whose legitimacy was being questioned by President Trump and the 74 million people who voted for him but was also being affirmed by President-elect Joe Biden and the 85 million people who voted for him. The Supreme Court’s running sheet for the case (see image below) belies what was happening. 23 Motions—supporting either the Plaintiff or Defend...

(AP Photo/John Bazemore) On December 4, 2020, the Trump Campaign filed a lawsuit challenging the outcome of the Presidential election contest in Georgia.  The action was filed in Fulton County Superior Court.  I wrote an article on the suit the day it was filed. This was a contest I had been anticipating because it was specifically provided for in the Georgia election statutes, and it is not one where the Court would need to wrestle with jurisdictional issues such as “standing” by the par...

The end of 2020 brought a moment of celebration for a long-time Polk County public servant. A small gathering of the Polk County Board of Assessors and tax assessor’s office employees last week helped recognize chief appraiser Janell Cook, who will mark 40 years working for the county tax assessor’s office in January. Cook joined the office in 1981 as a clerk and worked her way up to chief appraiser in 1997. Board of Assessors Chairperson Charles Wright, along with members Derinda Ste...