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Did VP Cheney Bribe a Supreme Court Justice? ... you decide
(L.A. Times, January 17, 2004)
Can Justice be blind when a Supreme Court justice spends time in a duck blind with a plaintiff in a case he is about to hear? . . . That's what the Los Angeles Times wants to know after learning that Justice Antonin Scalia was in a party last week of about nine duck hunters including Vice President Duck Cheney, an old friend of Scalia's. . . . According to the Times, Scalia and Cheney were duck hunting together "at a private camp in southern Louisiana [COMMENT: This private camp is owned by an energy industry titan who also has a big stake in the Supreme Court's decision on Cheney's refusal to open public records for scrutiny.] just three weeks after the court agreed to take up the vice president's appeal in lawsuits over his handling of the administration's energy task force." . . . the Times managed to dig up "several experts in legal ethics" to question "the timing of their trip and raise "doubts about Scalia's ability to judge the case impartially." . . . Federal law, according to the Times, says "any justice or judge shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might be questioned." . . . At issue is a case the Supreme Court is due to hear dealing with Cheney's appeal of a lower court decision ordering him to reveal which energy industry officials he met with while he was running the President's task force seeking to help put together an administration energy policy. A lower court ruling held that Cheney must turn over documents detailing who met with his task force but on December 15, the Supreme Court announced it would hear his appeal in April. . . . To bolster their "concerns" over this earth shaking revelation that two close friends went duck hunting with about seven other people the Times, in a departure from its usual practice of quoting "anonymous sources" to back up their biased stories, went out and found a real live "expert" to comment, one Stephen Gillers, a New York University law professor, who told them Scalia should have skipped going hunting with Cheney this year. . . . "A judge may have a friendship with a lawyer, and that's fine. But if the lawyer has a case before the judge, they don't socialize until it's over. That shows a proper respect for maintaining the public's confidence in the integrity of the process," Gillers, touted as "an expert on legal ethics." told the Times "I think Justice Scalia should have been cognizant of that and avoided contact with the vice president until this was over. And this is not like a dinner with 25 or 30 people. This is a hunting trip where you are together for a few days."

posted by LoZo 10:34 AM