Showing posts with label Judiciary. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judiciary. Show all posts

Monday, June 27, 2016

Joe Getty sworn-in to Md. Court of Appeals


Getty sworn-in to Md. Court of Appeals

June 27, 2016 by Kevin Dayhoff


Joseph Getty was sworn in Monday morning in the House of Delegates chamber in the Maryland State House in Annapolis to represent the 3rd Appellate Judicial Circuit on the state's highest court.

Getty, a Manchester resident and former Republican state senator representing Carroll County, had most recently served as Republican Gov. Larry Hogan's chief legislative officer. He was appointed to the Maryland Court of Appeals on June 1 to fill a vacancy created by the retirement of Judge Lynne Battaglia.

Friends, family, former and current judges, and members of the General Assembly filled the legislative chamber to witness Hogan administer the oath of office for Getty to become the fifth judge from Carroll County to sit on the Court of Appeals since 1867.

Many speakers at the ceremony mentioned that Getty also made history by having served in all three branches of Maryland government — the legislative, executive branches and now the judiciary. It was a point not missed by local historian, Jay Graybeal, the former executive director of the Historical Society of Carroll County; a position also held by Getty from 1987 to 1994.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

How much for the Heller case lawyers?

How much should the Heller lawyers be paid for winning the case against the DC gun law?

A controversy is growing over the proper payment of the three lawyers who handled the Heller case that result in the DC gun law being struck down as unconstitutional.
The trio make their case today in the Examiner.

How much for the Heller case lawyers?

Alan Gura, Robert A. Levy, and Clark Neily, Guest columnists 10/3/08

Prevailing parties in civil rights cases are entitled to a "reasonable" attorney's fee. We are the attorneys who represented Dick Heller in the landmark Supreme Court case striking down Washington, D.C.'s handgun ban on Second Amendment grounds, and we have asked the court to award us $3.5 million for six years of litigation.

The Washington Post has characterized that request as "adding insult to injury" and a "windfall" to which we are not entitled. The Post's editorial is long on rhetoric but short on analysis. In fact, the $3.5 million request is perfectly reasonable under existing court precedent.

The purpose of the fee-shifting provision is to ensure "vigorous enforcement" of civil rights laws, especially when monetary damages are not available and the claimants may not be able to afford competent legal counsel. To attain that goal, prevailing lawyers should receive a market rate for their efforts.

[…]

With respect to our recorded hours, the total was under 3,100 for three lawyers over six years. No reasonable person could consider those hours excessive, particularly considering that we were up against more than a dozen lawyers – some of them eminent Supreme Court practitioners – from the D.C. Attorney General's office and three of the nation's largest and most elite law firms.

[...]

More: How much for the Heller case lawyers?

20081003 How much for the Heller case lawyers