I Fought the LOL and the LOL Won

[Stephen Maturin]

Election-denying GOP troglodytes and their lolyers are ushering in a Golden Age for the litigation disaster tourism industry.

Take AZ gubernatorial election loser Kari Lake (please!), for instance. She filed a lolsuit challenging her loss. The trial judge shitcanned the entire case, and the intermediate appellate court affirmed. The state supreme court send one claim back to the trial court for further proceedings, a claim involving allegations that Maricopa County failed to follow established signature verification requirements as to ballots received during early voting.

Trial of that claim is under way. Lake has an expert witness who testified today.

As to expert testimony, Step One is establishing that your witness actually qualifies as an expert in the subject matter at issue. A lolyer does that by asking questions about the witness's education, training, experience and knowledge in the subject matter. After that, the lolyer turns to the judge and offers the witness as an expert in that particular subject. The other parties can object and question the witness on his qualifications, and eventually the judge will make a ruling. Assuming the judge rules the witness qualifies as an expert, the witness can give opinion testimony on the subject at issue. The first lolyer then conducts direct examination to elicit the expert's opinions and the factual and scientific bases for those opinions.

At least that's the way it's supposed to work. Lake's lolyer examined the witness on his qualifications and followed up with "No further questions":

On Thursday, Lake’s lawyers called their expert signature verification witness, Erich Specki. But shortly after Lake attorney Kurt Olsen had established Speckin’s background, Olsen said he had no further questions for the witness. He quickly tried to take that back, saying he didn’t have more questions for Speckin at that particular moment, but wanted to ask more questions later.

“You said ‘no further questions,’” [Judge Peter] Thompson told him, explaining to Olsen that, when an attorney utters that phrase, that means they are done questioning the witness.

And lawyers for defendants Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Maricopa County were not having it.

“It’s not my fault they don’t understand basic procedure,” Craig Morgan, the attorney for the Secretary of State’s Office, said. “He ceded the witness to me, and now it’s my turn to cross-examine or not. That’s how we do this, your honor.”

Lake's lolyer proffered an argument that amounted to, "Please forgive me for being a dipshit." The judge gave the lolyer a break, which appeared to be based mostly on concern that the case might come back yet again if the judge made the lolyer bear the full consequences of his dumbassery:

Olsen asked for Thompson’s indulgence in allowing him to continue and the judge gave it, after admonishing Olsen.

“I feel like I’m teaching a seminar up here,” Thompson said.

The judge added that he was giving Lake’s lawyers some wide latitude because he did not want to risk the appeals or Supreme Court remanding the case back to him a third time.

One cannot be blamed for thinking back to Orly Taitz examining her expert, ITT Tech grad Chito Papa, during birfer litigation all those years ago.

[specious_reasons]

Originally Posted by Stephen Maturin

Lake's lolyer proffered an argument that amounted to, "Please forgive me for being a dipshit." The judge gave the lolyer a break, which appeared to be based mostly on concern that the case might come back yet again if the judge made the lolyer bear the full consequences of his dumbassery:

I remember listening through parts of the Alex Jones trial (via the Knowledge Fight podcast), and as much as Jones was raging against the judge in public, the judge was extremely lenient on Jones and his team. I had gathered it's the same thing - give as much leniency as tolerable to avoid issues coming up on appeal.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Guy sues for defamation only to have the Supreme Court of Canada go 'Yeah, nah, you really are a bigot.'

And since he just lost that one he's almost sure to lose this one too.

[mickthinks]

IANAL so can someone with more insight than me explain how one might get from "Hansman's speech should be protected in the public interest", which is what the court said was its ruling, to "Barry Neufeld deserves to be called a bigot because he is one", which is what Kam's link suggests the ruling amounts to? I'm not seeing it and I'm thinking it might not be there.

[Ari]

Here ya go!
This Man is Probably The Worst School Trustee in British*Columbia

Neufeld appears to be an anti-lgbtq antisemite conspiracy theorists who sued because he was called a bigot. The courts upheld the right for others to call him a bigot.

[Stephen Maturin]

Originally Posted by mickthinks

IANAL so can someone with more insight than me explain how one might get from "Hansman's speech should be protected in the public interest", which is what the court said was its ruling, to "Barry Neufeld deserves to be called a bigot because he is one", which is what Kam's link suggests the ruling amounts to?

The dismissal was based on a British Columbia statute called the Protection of Public Participation Act. It's an anti-SLAPP law designed to provide courts with an early screening mechanism authorizing quick dismissal of defamation lawsuits aimed at stifling discourse on matters of public importance.

Under the Act, the defendant has to show that the speech on which the lawsuit was based covers a matter of public interest. At that point, to avoid dismissal, the plaintiff has to show (1) his claim has "substantial merit," (2) the defendant has no "valid defense," and (3) the harm to the plaintiff outweighs the public interest in protecting the defendant's speech.

The Supreme Court's holding wasn't actually based on the "truth" of the defendant's statement but rather on plaintiff's failure to prove that the alleged harm to him outweighed the public interest in protecting the speech. The bigoted POS kept on expressing his views and ultimately got reelected. So, limited harm. On the other side, the defendant's speech was counter-expression intended to protect groups that are particularly susceptible to harm from statements like shitboy's/the plaintiff's.

The Supreme Court also found that the trial judge was correct in ruling that the plaintiff failed to adequately rebut the "fair comment" defense:

To constitute fair comment, a factual basis for the impugned statement must be explicitly or implicitly indicated within the publication itself or the facts must be so notorious as to be already understood by the audience. There is, however, no requirement that the facts support the comment, in the sense of confirming its truth. At trial, H need not demonstrate that N is bigoted, transphobic, or promoted hatred, as the question is merely whether the statement can be tethered to an adequate factual basis so the reader can be an informed judge. N’s original online post could provide the requisite factual basis for most statements at issue, as N’s views were available to readers and grounded H’s statements. Additionally, this was a high-profile local controversy that spanned over a year, involving two public figures. N’s statements had likely achieved a level of notoriety such that they would have been known to the reading audience. (Emphasis added.)

The Supreme Court's opinion is available here.

Make no mistake, though; as Ari's link shows, that Neufeld guy is a shitbag's shitbag.

[Stephen Maturin]

The attorney disciplinary proceedings against John Eastman are well under way, and hoo boy! Wingnuts and MSM alike have been casting Eastman as some sort of megagenius, but the unhealthy amount of material I've read regarding Eastman and his his role in 1/6 bespeaks kind of a Jenna Ellis/Lin Wood combo, dumb as dirt and mentally defective.

On Tuesday, Eastman's lolyer wanted to call this here fellow as a witness:

On Tuesday, Eastman called a man named Joseph Fried to the stand, referring to him as an "expert witness." The Daily Beast reported that Fried is a public accountant and author of an eBook that detailed his skepticism about President Joe Biden's 2020 election win.

Dudebro did not get to testify. :sadpanda: Somehow, the judge was unconvinced by the argument of Eastman's lolyer that 40 years as a CPA made the guy an expert on statistics and therefore an expert on elections as well.

Other highlights have included:

- Mountains of "I don't know" and "I don't recall" testimony from Eastman himself.

- Eastman disagreeing with statements in an article he submitted as evidence.

- Failed efforts to keep out evidence of post-1/6 tomfoolery like the Cyber Ninjas () audit in Arizona, based on Eastman's claim that all this theories were, well, theoretical, and that he couldn't be held responsible if the people he was advising were still listening to him.

- There are rumblings that Eastman may also try to call John Yoo, of Shrub administration torture memos fame, and Janice Rogers Brown, wingnut former California Supreme Court justice and federal court of appeals judge.

The trial was expected to run 8 days but now appears destined to go longer, a circumstance the internet has described as the worst Hanukkah miracle of all time.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

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Not sure about this one.

[JoeP]

All your contract are belong to us.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Trump case shows America needs some special verdict options | Financial Times

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

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[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Alex Jones Estate Liquidation Gets Sandy Hook Families' Vote

[specious_reasons]

Originally Posted by Kamilah Hauptmann

Alex Jones Estate Liquidation Gets Sandy Hook Families' Vote

Been listening to "Knowledge Fight," an Alex Jones/Info Wars podcast, and Jones has taken a few days of the show recently, and was quite despondent when he came back, getting angry at the Soros witch judges in his county. Now I know why.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Man without licence seen driving during court call

Three minutes of what the fuck was this guy thinking.

[specious_reasons]

From my experience, the courts that do virtual hearings hate it when people connect while driving. Cook County, IL has that as part of the instructions they send you.

I’m impressed the man’s lawyer kept so calm.

[JoeP]

I mean, at least he didn't connect as a cat.

[BrotherMan]

Let me assure you, I am not a cat.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Bye. lol Alex Jones

[LarsMac]

Originally Posted by Kamilah Hauptmann

Bye. lol Alex Jones

Awww,... Poor Baby.

[specious_reasons]

Originally Posted by LarsMac

Awww,... Poor Baby.

Shit, what is the Knowledge Fight podcast going to cover then?

(Actually, they'll be personally happy that Jones is off the air.)

[specious_reasons]

They wound up doing almost 4 hours on this weekend:

Knowledge Fight: #930: May 30-June 1, 2024

[specious_reasons]

Good news!

Alex Jones agrees to liquidate his assets to pay Sandy Hook families, in move that would end his ownership of Infowars | CNN Business

Jones agreed to convert his personal bankruptcy to Chapter 7 liquidation. The attorneys for the Sandy Hook families have also moved for Free Speech Systems (Jones' company that runs infowars) to convert to Chapter 7.

[Stephen Maturin]

A line from a Richard Pryor bit comes to mind: "Do you have any dreams? We want those too."

[LarsMac]

Watching Jones' "Emotional" caterwallering, the other day, i got to wondering if he ever was a pro Wrestler.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Originally Posted by specious_reasons

Good news!

Alex Jones agrees to liquidate his assets to pay Sandy Hook families, in move that would end his ownership of Infowars | CNN Business

Jones agreed to convert his personal bankruptcy to Chapter 7 liquidation. The attorneys for the Sandy Hook families have also moved for Free Speech Systems (Jones' company that runs infowars) to convert to Chapter 7.

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