SCOTUS decision today re: Jeff Skilling, Enron CEO. Unanimous “partial victory” for Skilling. Deals with “honest services” statute, SCOTUS found it vague and put a narrow construction on it. Case sent back to Court of Appeals for consideration of conviction.
From limited report available, I think SCOTUS is correct about the statute. Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to read the opinion and if so, will supplement (or not, as things go on).
Have now skimmed the opinion in Skilling v. United States. The majority opinion (re: the ‘honest services’ provision of the mail and wire fraud statutes) sought to salvage the statute from Skilling’s claims that the same was unconstitutionally vague (a position that Justices Scalia and Thomas along with Justice Alito seemed to embrace in the concurring opinion written by Justice Scalia). Justice Ginsberg, writing for the Court, did IMHO a very good job in demonstrating why the statute could be construed to apply only to cases involving bribery and kickbacks, and thus be upheld when so construed. All 9 justices were in agreement as to the “fair trial” issue.
The result of the decision is that Skilling’s case was remanded to the 5th Circuit for further proceedings on the conspiracy issue. I do not know whether the 5th Circuit will be able to decide this, or whether the case would be remanded to the District Court for a new trial on the issue. Clearly, Mr. Skilling did not receive any bribes or kickbacks; none were so alleged by the Government. There were separate allegations made as to Mr. Skilling’s conduct under other sections of the mail and wire fraud statutes which may well support the convictions; the case, as before SCOTUS, did not address these thus the remand.
I have completed my morning psychoanalysis of the Pop Blog stats and am here to report that, moments ago, we have once again set a new record for views per month. We are at 20,754, breaking the 20K mark for the second consecutive month and for the third time this year.
John Isner or the US, defeated Nicholas Mahut of France in the first round at Wimbledon. The final score was:
6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (3), 70-68
You read that correctly, the set of the match went to a score of 70-68.
The match took eleven hours to play, over a three day period. Records were broken in many categories, including games (by far) time (again, by far.) Both players easily broken the record for aces, with Isner prevailing at 112 to Mahut’s 103.
PrairiePopulistsAndProgressives.net 
SCOTUS decision today re: Jeff Skilling, Enron CEO. Unanimous “partial victory” for Skilling. Deals with “honest services” statute, SCOTUS found it vague and put a narrow construction on it. Case sent back to Court of Appeals for consideration of conviction.
From limited report available, I think SCOTUS is correct about the statute. Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to read the opinion and if so, will supplement (or not, as things go on).
Have now skimmed the opinion in Skilling v. United States. The majority opinion (re: the ‘honest services’ provision of the mail and wire fraud statutes) sought to salvage the statute from Skilling’s claims that the same was unconstitutionally vague (a position that Justices Scalia and Thomas along with Justice Alito seemed to embrace in the concurring opinion written by Justice Scalia). Justice Ginsberg, writing for the Court, did IMHO a very good job in demonstrating why the statute could be construed to apply only to cases involving bribery and kickbacks, and thus be upheld when so construed. All 9 justices were in agreement as to the “fair trial” issue.
The result of the decision is that Skilling’s case was remanded to the 5th Circuit for further proceedings on the conspiracy issue. I do not know whether the 5th Circuit will be able to decide this, or whether the case would be remanded to the District Court for a new trial on the issue. Clearly, Mr. Skilling did not receive any bribes or kickbacks; none were so alleged by the Government. There were separate allegations made as to Mr. Skilling’s conduct under other sections of the mail and wire fraud statutes which may well support the convictions; the case, as before SCOTUS, did not address these thus the remand.
I have completed my morning psychoanalysis of the Pop Blog stats and am here to report that, moments ago, we have once again set a new record for views per month. We are at 20,754, breaking the 20K mark for the second consecutive month and for the third time this year.
Now back to your regularly scheduled programing.
Steven would be soooo proud of you! đŸ˜‰ Those stats have someone watching over them in his stead.
They don’t call them “stats to obsess over” fer nuthin’!
Having a long day at work? What about these guys?
John Isner or the US, defeated Nicholas Mahut of France in the first round at Wimbledon. The final score was:
6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (3), 70-68
You read that correctly, the set of the match went to a score of 70-68.
The match took eleven hours to play, over a three day period. Records were broken in many categories, including games (by far) time (again, by far.) Both players easily broken the record for aces, with Isner prevailing at 112 to Mahut’s 103.
It was awesome!
Ah, Wimbleton, where there is no “tie breaker” in the fifth set (gentlemens) or third set (ladies) matches.