"Clay ran through holes that looked as if they had been forged by glaciers."

Pete Thamel reports on the University of Wisconsin football team's thrilling victory over The Ohio State University last night.  Next up for the Badgers is a Gillette-Torvik grudge match:  Iowa, with the Heartland Trophy on the line.

But beating #1-ranked Ohio State wasn't even the best news out of Madison yesterday.  At long last, college basketball season has begun.

Disturbing trend: the letter "K"

I can't help noticing that most of folks we've been discussing over the past month have names that start with the letter "K":

1)  Kenneth Kratz -- the "sexting DA";

2)  Steven Koukios -- the lawyer who loved too much;

3)  Chris Kokenis -- the accused tax cheat who kept mum about his "good faith beliefs"; and

4)  Steven Kutzner -- the man who got busted for downloading "Simpsons" porn.

Coincidence?  Hard to believe.  I think it has something -- something -- to do with this.

Man pleads guilty to possession of obscene "Simpsons" porn. Why?

As reported by The Onion's AV Club:

A former middle school teacher in Idaho is facing up to 10 years in prison for downloading Simpsons porn—that is, pornographic cartoons depicting child characters from The Simpsons engaged in sexual acts. After a search warrant led to the discovery of more than 70 such images on his computer, 33-year-old Steven Kutzner immediately resigned and pled guilty at a subsequent hearing.

The prosecution raises serious constitutional issues.  The Supreme Court has held that "virtual child pornography"--e.g., cartoon depiction of child-characters having sex--is protected by the First Amendment because, unlike real child pornography, it doesn't require the actual abuse of actual children to be created.  See Free Speech Coalition v. Ashcroft.  Congress responded by narrowing the statute somewhat.  Now it is a felony to possess:

A rant

On Slate, Dahlia Lithwick reviews Justice Breyer's new book, Active Liberty Making Our Democracy Work.  I found it to be a frustrating review, mainly because Lithwick advances a thesis--that Breyer and Scalia are more similar than you might imagine--that she actively contradicts.  There is also some sloppy, hard-to-understand writing.  The version of the article I read contained two glaring typos (since fixed), making me wonder if I was reading a blog post rather than a published article.  (Fyi, typos are perfectly acceptable in blog posts.)  The article also contains this indecipherable paragraph:

Big money lost by Menards

I recently came across the very interesting case of Sands v. Menard, Inc., which was decided by the Wisconsin Supreme Court in July.  It raises a number of interesting points, and one basic one:  if an in-house lawyer—particularly a corporation’s General Counsel—is fired for a discriminatory reason, can the court order reinstatement as a remedy, thereby forcing the corporation into an attorney-client relationship with an attorney not of its choosing?  In its typical 4-3 split, the Wisconsin Supreme Court said no.

'“I gave up my rental thinking I would have a house,” said Ms. Ducksworth, a 28-year-old catering assistant. “Now I’m sharing a room with my son. What the hell is up with that?”'

The New York Times reports on the latest housing crisis:  the lack of foreclosures.

Justice Alito is a warrior for justice

Some purple prose from CBS Supreme Court reporter Jan Crawford Greenburg describing Justice Alito at oral argument:

He's like a one-justice Delta Force: He's so quiet and low-key while drawing in the lawyers with his questions that he manages to plant several bombs before they even realize he's on the attack.

Then BOOM!

Guns, drugs, and strippers: what could possibly go wrong with that combination?

Last month, Slate.com ran an article about how the number of vacant judgeships on the federal bench was creating a crisis. As an aside, the Slate article missed the real crisis -- that you and I are not on the federal bench. The crisis Slate describes just got a little worse because Georgia lost a judge. As reported by the AP, Senior Judge Jack T. Camp, a 67-year-old who ought to know better, is in a lot of trouble because his adventures with cocaine, guns, and a stripper. Can we agree to call this particular combination of illegal activities a Camp-trick rather than a hat-trick?

Trade Undress

One kind of trademark is "trade dress," which encompasses the design and appearance of a product and its packaging.  Think of the distinctive shape of a Coca-Cola bottle.  On Friday, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals took up of the issue of whether the "cuffs & collar" uniform of the Chippendales exotic dancers is "inherently distinctive" trade dress under federal law.  It is not.  Some highlights:

The applicant, Chippendales, is in the business of providing adult entertainment services for women. It opened its first strip club in Los Angeles in 1978. In 1979, Chippendales performers began wearing an abbreviated tuxedo—wrist cuffs and a bowtie collar without a shirt—as part of their act. This costume, referred to as the “Cuffs & Collar,” was featured prominently in Chippendales’ advertising and performances over the past several decades. It is set forth below:

I know what you're thinking:  did Chippendales steal Bart Torvik's image for that picture?  This occurred to me as well.  I have no proof and, anyhow, I'm flattered.

Back to the case.  The court found "the Cuffs & Collar mark not inherently distinctive because of the existence of the pervasive Playboy mark, which includes the cuffs and collar together with bunny ears."  Playboy first registered its version of the Cuffs & Collar look in 1964.  Here's a more recent variation:

Pro Boner Publico

Last year, Chicago attorney Steven Koukios was arrested.  As the Chicago Tribune puts it, he "was taken into custody after arriving at a Chicago apartment in April 2009 just moments after police had arrested Shannon Rosillo, 33, for soliciting an undercover police officer. Authorities charged Rosillo with prostitution and Koukios with visiting a 'house of ill fame.'"

As he sat in the back of the squad car with Ms. Rosillo, Koukios stepped up and attempted to make the best of a bad situation:  he offered to represent her free of charge.  And he kept his word.  He appeared in court on Rosillo's behalf, and negotiated a plea agreement for her.  There was just one problem:  he never discussed his potential conflict of interest in the case.  This got him in trouble when, later on the same day that he appeared on Rosillo's behalf he appeared--before the very same judge--on his own behalf to deal with the "house of ill fame" charge against him.

Koukios has agreed to censure from the attorney disciplinary board.  This is just another example how even the best of intentions can get you in trouble.  As Koukios's lawyer put it:

"His only motivation was to help this young lady who was distraught," Ex said. "He did it without charge to her — financial charge."

Hmm.  Was there a non-financial charge?

UPDATE:

I did a little digging, and discovered that this is not the first time Koukios has been censured by the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission.  He was also censured in 2007 for more mundane, but really more troubling, conduct:  he basically quit on a case.  Without his client's consent, he hired another attorney to work on the case and had that attorney settle that case without the client's consent.  The disciplinary board's decision is here.

Given this prior censure, I'm actually a little surprised that the Commission would agree to settle for just another censure in this case.  And, particularly given the publicity the case is generating--which clearly reflects poorly on the profession--I think the Supreme Court might impose a harsher punishment.

UPDATE 1/19/2011:

Koukios skates by with a censure.