“You’re scaring them.”

One of the six Eleventh Circuit appeals the FPD’s JV squad is handling is a supervised-release violation that entails internet restrictions. Having not had home internet access for going on five days due to what we call technical difficulties, I can tell you this borders on cruel and unusual. We are quickly arriving at the point where denying sex offenders internet access is tantamount to denying an obscene caller use of the telephone system. One could still function, I suppose, but it would be so daunting that many would just be functionally banished from society, as we tend to do to sex offenders. As for me, I am making due whenever I am away from the office with my original 2G iPhone. While that device would have seemed nothing less than sorcery even six years ago, now it’s barely adequate for everything I need it to do.

Anyway, the JV squad is all up and running. All the briefs are due in early March, so hopefully we will be able to draft replies before the semester is out. The United States Attorney’s Office’s Chief of Appeals and School of Law alumna Anne Schultz (JD ’83) could not have been more accommodating, especially with scheduling. The judges of the Southern District of Florida, particularly the Chief (JD ’78), likewise facilitated the assignment of the cases.

Needless to say, things are a little more hectic than they usually are up here in my Ivory Tower, what with doing practical work for real people. So, when I gave my 235 1Ls the little talk about the Crim Pro exam yesterday, I may have been more emphatic than strictly necessary regarding what needs to be in those essays and, far more importantly, what had better not be in those essays. One of the few 2L-transfer students in Crim Pro who was in Evidence last semester, looked right at me during a pause in my tirade and said, “You’re scaring them.”