Hundreds of Chinese families seek wartime compensation from Japan

Richard Buxbaum quoted in Reuters, May 12, 2014

The families base their claim on the belief that Beijing did not forfeit the rights of individual war victims to seek compensation…. “German courts, interestingly enough, do not read these treaty waivers as barring such direct suits,” Richard Buxbaum, an expert on international reparations, said in emailed comments. He added that the courts, however, do bar them on other grounds such as statutes of limitations and prescriptions against “old” claims.

Lawyers David Boies, Ted Olson inspire UC Berkeley Law grads

Gillian Lester and Kristen Holmquist cited in San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 2014

>Acting Dean Gillian Lester cheers as litigators Ted Olson and David Boies hug after delivering their keynote addresses to about 400 graduates and their families at the UC Berkeley School of Law.

>Along with Lester, lecturer-in-residence Kristen Holmquist, class co-Presidents Cathy Kwon and James Unger and graduate student Kirian Claeye, the men spoke on a sunny day to an almost-full Greek Theatre.

Much ado about copyright’s ‘making available’ right

Peter Menell writes for The Media Institute, May 9, 2014

Concern over outsize statutory damage awards in file-sharing and user-generated content platform cases has distorted statutory interpretation of other provisions of the Copyright Act and contributed to growing public disdain and disregard for the copyright system.

White privilege 101

Russell Robinson cited in Salon, May 9, 2014

Robinson argues that the very different frameworks in which most blacks and whites are raised and live give rise to very different experiences of the world. … Because their life situations remain highly segregated for a large part of their lives, their resulting perceptions of the world remain segregated as well. … Robinson writes: While many whites expect evidence of discrimination to be explicit, and assume that people are colorblind when such evidence is lacking, many blacks perceive bias to be prevalent and primarily implicit.

Why Oklahoma matters in California

Elisabeth Semel writes for Daily Journal, May 9, 2014 (subscription required)

Those who are chomping at the bit for California to resume executions would do well to pay heed not only to last week’s debacle in Oklahoma, but also to the botched executions that took place in other states over the past few months.

Could Donald Sterling succeed in a legal fight against selling the Clippers?

Jesse Choper quoted in The Christian Science Monitor, May 8, 2014

The remarks were recorded illegally and disseminated without Sterling’s consent, says Jesse Choper, a constitutional specialist. Therefore, he says, they might not meet the NBA constitution’s admonition that “an owner will not take any position or action that will materially and adversely affect a team or the league,” as ESPN puts it. “This was a confidential conversation with a lady friend: He certainly wasn’t taking any position, and he never made it public,” Mr. Choper says. “The key words are ‘position’ and ‘action.’”

SF family of man killed by neighbor calls for murder charge

Franklin Zimring and Andrea Roth quoted in San Francisco Chronicle, May 8, 2014

“The question is whether there’s an imminent threat of bodily injury, and home invasion is very high on the list of things people get frightened of, particularly in the middle of the night,” said Franklin Zimring. “This case is well within the confines of circumstances where citizens will not be criminally prosecuted.”

Andrea Roth said that if a jury was asked to determine whether a shooter in Kachepa’s situation reasonably feared for his life, the panel would be “allowed to consider that this was an elderly man at 2 a.m. who faced an intruder who broke the doorknob.”

UC Berkeley names new dean

Sujit Choudhry quoted in The Recorder, May 5, 2014

“Berkeley’s big advantage is culture,” Choudhry said in an interview Monday. “The place has gusto, it has get up and go. It’s very energetic and forward-looking and there’s a lot of appetite to be innovative.”

Should doctors participate in executions?

Ty Alper interviewed on NPR Weekend Edition, May 4, 2014

“I am opposed to the death penalty, and I don’t think that we should be executing people. But if we are, and particularly if we’re going to do it by way of procedures that are shrouded in secrecy and that use experimental combinations of drugs that have never been used before, then we need to have competent medical personnel involved. And I think that courts should require that qualified, competent medical personnel participate.”

Former Telecom exec calls on Obama to fire FCC chairman

James Tuthill interviewed on The Peter Collins Show, May 2, 2014

“Ten, twelve years ago, cable was not a significant provider of Internet access service. So the commission wanted to apply ‘light regulation,’ and they declared in a very, in my opinion, twisted logic decision, that what cable was offering as Internet service was not a ‘telecommunications service’ under the 1934 Act, but instead, an information service.”