Many new documents have been released in the Dover trial. The docket page with links is here. The most interesting parts are the plaintiff's brief in support of proposed findings of fact and the defendant's proposed findings of fact. Those are essentially the briefs filed by the attorneys for both sides regarding the facts and legal analysis of the case that they are urging the judge to adopt in his ruling. The rest of the documents are exhibits and appendices in support in support of those briefs.
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I'd never seen this court ruling from a Federal district judge in Texas until seeing it quoted in this post at Volokh. You think Scalia is blunt and pointed in his dissents? Wait till you see some of this ruling. He accuses the attorneys on both sides of having written their briefs "entirely in…
The NCSE has posted several new post-trial documents in the Dover case. Essentially, since the testimony phase of the trial ended both sides have been filing briefs with the court making formal arguments for their position and responses to the other side's position. Both sides filed long briefs…
I've been pursuing most of the morning an answer to the question of how the elections last night may change the outcome of the Dover trial. Some have suggested that with the new school board and a presumed change in policy, the case is moot - the policy is reversed, there is no need for a ruling in…
I think this will be the final word on the Shallit issue. I've uploaded the court's rulings on a series of in limine motions, including the defendant's motion to exclude Shallit's testimony. This ruling came down on September 22nd, just before the trial began, and in it the judge refers to an…
I read a major portion of the plantiffs' brief, and a smaller section of the defendants'. As a layman, it appeared to me that the former was of a significantly better quality than the latter, but, as well as not being a lawyer, I also have a horse in the race, so I could well be prejudiced.
Do you have an opinion about the quality of the legal work represented?
Ed Fitzgerald wrote:
I've not gotten all the way through either brief at this point, but I went over much of the defendant's findings of fact brief and it was a mess. I was surprised by how many typos and clerical errors there were, which is just unprofessional. In the trial as a whole, it was obvious that our legal team was just clearly more talented than theirs. One of the reasons we are going to reveal in the article we're writing for Skeptic, which is that Pepper Hamilton went way beyond the call of duty on this one when they took the case.
Most law firms when they do pro bono work reserve that work for newer associates who don't have an established client base. It's a good way to get them litigation experience and test their abilities while boosting the firm's image and getting a healthy writeoff. But in this case, Pepper Hamilton provided 3 full partners full time on the case, plus two associates, plus numerous support staff. That's just unheard of, in my experience, and that's why their legal team was so overmatched.