Not Guilty!

I've done a total of two trials so far, and I won my second trial! My client was accused of six counts in total. One was dismissed per a Rule 20 motion after the state rested. The jury found my client not guilty of the remaining five counts at the conclusion of the case. Those counts were Aggravated DUI x 4, and Criminal Damage (a misdemeanor).

I never expected to win a trial so soon in my career, especially an Aggravated DUI trial. But this is very exciting and very emotionally rewarding. I already felt like my decision to attend law school was validated when I got this job, but this reaffirmed that.

Banned Books and Advanced Placement

Not recommended (and note that the quality of writing goes down when passions are up and time is short).

http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/censored/Content?oid=1092825

That's old news. What's changed? "Another Country" was on the 2010 Advanced Placement (AP) exam again, a year and a half after Empire High School* pulled the book from its curriculum.

I don't practice Education Law, and I only took one course in the subject area. So at the time this happened, I believed that the Pico decision controlled this issue, and that the district failed to contact their lawyer before taking action.

Well, I was probably wrong about both things. What happened in Vail School District is distinguishable from Pico, and probably only because the district sought legal counsel, who advised them to make changes to keep them nominally distinguishable from Pico. In Pico, the school board yanked the book out of libraries. In Vail School District, the principal* yanked the book out of the curriculum, but it was still available in the library.

Not being an Education Law scholar or practitioner, I don't know if that difference is meaningful. And anyway, this happens all the time: only 20% of books pulled for the wrong reason are ever challenged. This most likely occurs because one must have constitutional standing to bring a claim, only students have standing on these issues, and no one educates them about their rights.

Does it matter that the banned book appeared on the AP test this year? Probably not, but it should. The book already appeared on an AP test before, and it didn't matter when this decision was made. It didn't matter because the decision was not made based on the educational value of the book, per the standard set in Pico. In fact, the decision was made for the reasons expressly forbidden in Pico. Google Pico, 457 U.S. 853, and look at some of the passages from books that were banned but that were found to have educational value.

What's the point, Herb? The point is, if I were a student who was kept from reading and discussing "Another Country," and I was unprepared for the AP Exam as a result, I would feel robbed of the fruits of my education. The responsible parties should make amends for future generations.