MEET AND GREET

UPDATE: And your 2019 Survivor of the award winning, earth shaking and mostly Viagra taking Survivor Pool is....drum roll please....DUSTIN TISCHLER. 
Judge Faber went down with the Fish losing to the J...E...T...S, and Fake Alex Michaels flamed out on the Arizona Cardinals. 

Fantasy Football. Rumpole was upset and is upset. After rolling to a lead leading 10-2 mark, in the first round of the playoffs Rumpole faced his old nemesis from last year- Judge De La O. In 2018 your blogger beat the jurist for the championship. In 2019 the Judge got his revenge after the Rams defense was too much for Seattle (and Rumpole) QB Russell Wilson. Throw in a few lucky career games for the Judge's other players, and he nipped Rumpole by just a few points. 
Judge De La O has made the finals two years in a row, and that says something about his FF prowess. The Judge at 8-5 (did we mention we were 10-2?) now faces off against AB's Foot Helmut (Gary Bass). Lets hope for the Judge's sake he doesn't become the Buffalo Bills of Fantasy Football and he manages to grab the brass ring. We congratulate him on a well played year (even though he was 8-5 and we were 10-2 and by all rights should have had a bye this week). 


There are a lot of things to like about federal court. No meddlesome depositions. The guidelines are advisory. Judges are granting downward variances, and the safety valve does away with the worst of drug minimum mandatory sentences.  The prosecutors are easy pickings. Most of them have never come up through the REGJB and don't know the first thing about the rough and tumble of a real trial. Take away the lead agent whispering in their ear, and they are often bewildered during a trial. 

The cases move quicker, and the fees are often better. 

So of course the judges had to ruin it. 
Now we have to hobnob with those flag toting bureaucrats who come from large firms or have clerked for the same judges ruining all our fun. 
The new local rules in SDFL require the defense and prosecution to...meet (yuck) and confer and even try to agree on timetables. 
What is this- a railroad or a court system? 
Where are we going to meet? Rumpole doesn't set foot in a DOJ office building unless absolutely necessary (if they want a plea, let them come to us we say) and the hoi polloi who labour there do not frequent our bistros and are not welcome in our  "members only" establishments. 
Will Skype satisfy the local rules? 
How about a real chatty phone confab? 

We implore our judges to reconsider. Does Nancy Pelosi have lunch with Matt Gaetz?  Did Lee break bread with Grant? All is fair in war- we shot down Yamamato's plane after all.  Why do we have to meet and fake smiles and be civil when there are a myriad of better things we could be doing?

LR 88.1

(5) In accordance with Fed. R. Crim. P. 16.1(a), no later than fourteen (14) days after a defendant’s arraignment, the attorney for the government and the defendant’s attorney must confer and try to agree on: (A) any anticipated request for modification of the timetables and procedures for pretrial disclosure prescribed by this rule and Fed. R. Crim. P. 16; or (B) a timetable and procedures for pretrial disclosure under Rule 16 if the Standing Discovery has not been requested and entered. 

In accordance with Fed. R. Crim. P. 16.1(b), to facilitate preparation for trial, one or both parties may ask the court to modify the time, place, manner, or other aspects of disclosure prescribed by this rule or Fed. R. Crim. P. 16, or to determine the time, place, manner or other aspects of disclosure that have not already been determined by this rule or Fed. R. Crim. P. 16.