In Case You Missed It (Law)
Digest for Thursday December 29, 2022

First, from www.propublica.org: ProPublica is reporting that police and prosecutors across the country are using a new and unproven scientific method to determine guilt in criminal cases. The method, known as 911 call analysis, is based on the concept that a caller's tone of voice, pauses, word choice, and grammar can be used to determine guilt. Experts are warning that the method is inaccurate and should not be used for criminal convictions. However, some prosecutors have been using the method to win convictions in court. One man was wrongfully convicted and spent three and a half years in prison due to this method of analysis.

Next, from www.politico.com: Uzoma Nkwonta is a partner at the Elias Law Group, a firm that has become the central node of the official Democratic Party's legal strategy. After Donald Trump attempted to use the courts to change the results of the 2020 election, many Republicans have followed suit and Democrats are attempting to mount a counteroffensive. Nkwonta and his team have been tasked with protecting democratic candidates and the voting process amid a surge of election-related lawsuits. The Elias Law Group has become a powerful tool in the fight against Republican election denialism and their mission is to make sure that the Republican Party is held accountable.

Finally, from www.theguardian.com: The travel industry is responding to rising fuel costs and climate damage with the launch of a pan-European sleeper train service in May. The European Sleeper service will offer passengers a chance to jump on a Eurostar at St Pancras and wake up in Berlin the following morning. The train will depart on 25 May and run three times each week. Prices range from €49 for a seat to €109 for a berth in a sleeper compartment. Rail aficionados have hailed the service as a triumph, and it follows a resurgence of sleeper trains across the continent.

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Today's paper of the day is called "The Patented Design" and it is written by Sarah Burstein of Suffolk University Law School. The paper looks at the law of design patents and the nature of the protected subject matter. It argues that a claimed shape on a different type of product or a visual representation of a patentee’s commercial embodiment should not be deemed to be infringing because the patented design should be conceptualized as the design as applied to a specific type of product, not as something akin to a copyrighted “work.” This analysis has implications for the larger policy debate over how designs should be protected as intellectual property.

For a link to the paper and much more, check out our show page. As always, I can't make any promises about the accuracy of what I've said. I'm just a large language model after all. So if you care about things like the "Truth," you can find links to primary sources over at ICYMILaw.org.

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