Minnesota Lawyer Blog

We just passed the one-year anniversary of the day (April 5, 2007) when three top deputies and one administrator at the office of then-U.S. Attorney Rachel Paulose stepped down from their leadership posts in protest of her management style. It's an interesting milestone to reach as we await the results of a preliminary investigation by the legislative auditor into what's going on at the Minnesota Attorney General's Office, where similar issues regarding management style have been raised.

Of course, that's not what the auditor is looking into. His investigation is limited to determining whether there is any basis to allegations that AG Lori Swanson committed any ethical or legal lapses in how she has run the office. The narrow focus was designed to show respect for the wide discretion public officials -- particularly elected ones -- are afforded in managing their own offices.

Because the standard for ethical and legal violations is fairly high, it is not an unlikely result that the auditor will find that none exist. If that happens, it would be taken by some as a "clean bill of health" for the AG's Office, even though the underlying management-related concerns would continue to fester. That is unfortunate.

If I had my druthers, there would be a managerial boot camp or some sort of roving advisor who could counsel people such as Swanson or Paulose who, depite their intelligence and work ethic, run into difficulties managing a major public office. It's easy when you're locked into a combative management situation to lose sight of the forest for the trees. An outside perspective would be very helpful.

Ramsey County District Court Chief Judge Gregg Johnson has denied a defendant’s motion to disqualify the Ramsey County Attorney’s office and the entire county bench from the murder trial of Gordon Weaver.

Weaver was convicted was convicted of second-degree murder in the 1999 death of his wife, Jean. But last July, the Minnesota Court of Appeals granted him a new trial, saying the trial court judge shouldn't have allowed testimony about blood-test results after they were destroyed. The blood test would show if Jean Weaver died in an accidental fall or as a result of a fire that Weaver set.

Prosecutors have said that information about the person who tested Jean Weaver's blood and the machine used to measure her carbon monoxide levels was lost and later found. Defense attorney Joe Friedberg has said that prosecutors knew about that evidence but sat on it until Weaver's conviction was overturned. He also said that Ramsey County District Court Judge Joanne Smith may have known of the prosecutor’s misconduct. Smith recused herself from the case.

Weaver argued that since Friedberg filed an ethical complaint against Smith, the entire bench should be disqualified. “If such a complaint were grounds for removal of a judge or an entire bench, parties could exercise continuing veto power over the assignment of trial court judges,” Johnson wrote. He also said there was no reason to disqualify the county attorney’s office.

Lawyers and history buffs have been enjoying an up close and personal look at the Watergate era this week thanks to the efforts of the University of St. Thomas to bring to Minnesota John Dean, Bud Krogh, Jill Wine-Banks and Judge Charles Breyer, the former being defendants and the latter being prosecutors in the illegal activities and cover-up thereof during the administration of President Richard Nixon. The panel discussion was “Watergate Revisited: The Ethics of the Lawyers.” Dean observed that of all the participants in the wide-ranging scandal, about 22 had law degrees. “So why did so many lawyers get involved? Blind loyalty to the president, incompetence and an absolute arrogance in believing that the law was inapplicable to them,” he said.

The good news from Watergate is proof that the constitutional process works, Breyer said. The Pentagon Papers incident showed that the First Amendment works, the hearings showed that Congressional oversight works, and the investigation and special prosecution showed that an independent judiciary is important, he said. Furthermore, when Nixon fired the special prosecutor in what came to be known as the Saturday Night Massacre, outraged citizens made their voices heard. In other words, they petitioned for redress of grievances and that made an enormous difference to the successful prosecution of wrongdoers, said Breyer, who is now a U.S. District Court judge in San Francisco

The cover story in this week's City Pages is a provocative look at what one former judge feels are unduly political machinations behind the scenes in Minnesota's courts system.

In Paul Demko's article, retiring Ninth District judge Terrance Holter talks about the complications and gamesmanship involved in the 2006 judicial campaign that resulted in the election of a former clerk of Holter's, John Melbye -- and how outgoing Supreme Court Chief Justice Russell Anderson declined to appoint Holter as a retired judge after he lost the race to Melbye.

The article has a tinge of sour grapes to it, but the article is an interesting look at how loyalties and even family ties can become knotted in politics when a place on the bench is at stake.

OK, OK, not really, but we had to give you at least one April Fool's Day headline on the Minnesota Lawyer blog. Ventura, of course, is not now, nor has he ever been, a lawyer, but he used to quip that he had "never lost a case." (Apparently a reference to the fact that he had gone to court representing himself once and "won." I have no idea whether his "record" remains intact.)

Ventura is a wrestler, turned actor (is there really a difference?), turned Minnesota's governor (again, is there really a difference?) and, most recently, I guess you'd have to call him an author. His latest book -- "Don't start the Revolution without Me!" -- was, appropriately enough, released today, on April Fool's Day.

Here is an excerpt from the books description on Amazon.com --"Ventura pulls no punches in discussing our corrupt two-party system, the disastrous war in Iraq, and what he suspects really happened on September 11. ... He reveals the illegal role of the CIA in states like Minnesota."

I have not yet read this scholarly tome, and surely do not intend to. I tend to shy away from books with exclamation points in the title. In fact, I haven't read any of Ventura's stuff since I leafed through "Do I Stand Alone? Going to the Mat against Political Pawns and Media Jackals." I didn't think that diatribe was very good at all, but I'm a media jackal, so you can take that with a grain of salt if you like. I note with some satisfaction Amazon is currently advertising the book with a "new or used" price starting at $ .01. Another book, "The Wit and Wisdom of Jesse 'the Body...the Mind' Ventura" is listed as starting at $ .90, which I think is 45x too much to pay for Ventura's two cents worth. But then again, it's probably a popup book, so maybe your kids will enjoy it.

I almost hate to say it, but from the legal community's perspective, Ventura was not a bad governor at all. He was good with court funding and made excellent, nonpartisan judicial picks. Much of the credit for the judicial appointments has to go to the efforts of the Commission on Judicial Selection and its then chair, Minneapolis attorney George Soule, but Ventura had the good sense to listen to their advice. As a result, Ventura's lasting legacy on the bench is one of the best of any Minnesota governor. That doesn't mean I'd want Ventura in the U.S. Senate though, something he coyly hints that he would at least consider ("Never say never.") It might make C-SPAN more interesting, but so would releasing a bag full of rabid squirrels with sparklers on their tails into the Senate chamber during a debate.

As has been previously reported, a recent University of California-Davis law review study shows that the Minnesota Supreme Court ranks fifth in the nation among state high courts that are followed by other courts. The study analyzed each state's Supreme Court opinions back to 1940, some 24,000 rulings. The full text is available here.

Responding to the reports at a panel discussion with students at the University of St. Thomas School of Law yesterday, Chief Justice Russell Anderson said he was proud, but not surprised, at the study’s findings. The court’s opinions are often followed because the court is not result-oriented, he said. “We [want] reasoned, rational decisions explaining how we got [to our conclusions],” he said.

Justice Helen Meyer also attributed the study’s results to the high level of practice before the court. “It’s also because we have a great bar,” she said.