September 2013

Okay, we promise this is the last of our reviews of movies that are part of our firm’s upcoming law film festival, “Let’s Film All the Lawyers,” which starts tomorrow and runs through Friday, September 20, 2013, at the Honolulu Museum of Arts’ Doris Duke Theatre.

And as for what 12 Angry Men has to do with this blog? Not a whole lot, since the Men are deliberating a murder case, not how much compensation a property owner may be entitled to. While we’re not sure we’d want or get twelve angry men adjudging us (many juries these days are less-than-twelve, we’d prefer them to be dispassionate not angry, and a jury comprised entirely of men will get you a reversal for gender discrimination), as Ken Kupchak‘s review of this classic legal film discusses, the jury remains an integral part of the justice system. 

Update: here’s…

Continue Reading What The Heck Does “12 Angry Men” Have To Do With Inverse Condemnation?

As we noted here, where we posted the petition for review, what might be the first major appellate decision following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Koontz may be on the way.

Today, the California Supreme Court agreed to review (order here) the Court of Appeal’s decision in California Building Industry Ass’n v. City of San Jose (6th District June 6, 2013), which held that under rational basis review (and not heightend scrutiny) the city of San Jose’s affordable housing exaction might survive because it was designed to promote the development of affordable housing, and not to mitigate the impacts of market priced housing.

This is not only a chance for the Cal Supreme Court to resolve the lower appellate court split on the issue, but whether, as the Petition‘s Question Presented argued, Koontz “governs the judicial review of in-lieu development fees in California. Koontz clarifies…

Continue Reading Cal S Ct To Review “Inclusionary Housing” Money Exaction – First Major Post-Koontz Decision On The Way?

 Norfolk

Earlier today, the Virginia Supreme Court, in PKO Ventures, LLC v. Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority, No. 121534 (Sep. 12, 2013), invalidated takings of non-blighted properties which were part of a larger area designated as blighted.

In 2007, Virginia adopted a statute requiring that if property is taken to eliminate blight, the property itself must be blighted. That might seem like an obvious proposition, but as readers certainly know, since the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Berman, it has been ok to take the baby with the bathwater under the Fifth Amendment, and as long as a legislator rationally could have believed that taking a perfectly fine property would somehow help alleviate other blight, then the courts would not stand in the way.

The Virginia statute defines “blighted property” as one that is in bad shape “at the time of the filing of the petition for condemnation,”…

Continue Reading Virginia S Ct: No Taking Of Non-Blighted Property That Happens To Be In An Area Designated “Blighted”

Nothing! But as we noted yesterday, that doesn’t mean you might not be interested in our Damon Key colleague’s review of the film, part of our firm’s upcoming law film festival, “Let’s Film All the Lawyers” (September 14-20, 2013, Honolulu Museum of Arts’ Doris Duke Theatre).

Here’s Mark Murakami‘s review of this new classic.

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“My Cousin Vinny” – Knowing the Judge, and the Making of a Great Lawyer Movie

by Mark M. Murakami

Sometimesit is about the process. In law school, students may learn “the law,” but inorder to actually represent clients, they need to know the process, and figureout the rules—written and unwritten—that make courtrooms work. As the old jokegoes, “a good lawyer knows the law, a great lawyer knows the judge.”

Despite its slapstick cover, legalprocedure is what My Cousin Vinny isall about. This 1992 film is a comic fish-out-of-water take on…

Continue Reading What The Heck Does “My Cousin Vinny” Have To Do With Inverse Condemnation?

Dwight Merriam, familiar to our readers for the items of interest he frequently forwards, as a co-author of a recent brief in the New York rent control case, chapter author in the seminal eminent domain treatise Nichols on Eminent Domain, for being the editor of the ABA’s annual “Cutting Edge” land use books, the author of “The Complete Guide to Zoning” (which could be our favorite book on the subject), and the moderator of perhaps the most well-attended legal teleconferences on the planet (we understand this recent example had over 800 participants), has authored “Eminent Domain for Underwater Mortgages: A Cure Worse Than the Disease?,” a piece for The Abstract, the magazine of the American College of Mortgage Attorneys. 

It’s a good quick summary of the facts in the case of the plan for the city of Richmond, California to…

Continue Reading Merriam On Taking Underwater Mortgages: “Lindsay Lohan has a greater chance of staying out of trouble than the city of Richmond”

It’s troubling when someone whom you regard as a mentor disapproves of something you’ve done, especially if the criticism is harsh, done publicly, and is in parts unfair.

That’s my reaction to “What the Hell Does the Holocaust Have to do With Inverse Condemnation?,” Professor Gideon Kanner’s objections, posted on his own Gideon’s Trumpet blog yesterday, to my review of “Hannah Arendt,” an award-winning movie which we are screening at our upcoming “Let’s Film All The Lawyers” legal film festival at the Honolulu Museum of Art’s Doris Duke Theatre (September 14-20, 2013). Along with that film we’ll be showing 12 Angry Men and My Cousin Vinny, and leading post-screening discussions of the movies. 

Of course, the short answer to Gideon’s rhetorical question is “absolutely nothing.” A review about a movie that’s decidedly not about inverse condemnation, property law, land use, or eminent…

Continue Reading What Does The Holocaust Have To Do With Inverse Condemnation? A Response To Professor Kanner

Missouri has a peculiar statute that we wish were more widespread. In 2006, state legislators adopted the “heritage value” statute requiring courts award an additional 50% over fair market value as just compensation when property owned by a family for more than 50 years is taken by eminent domain. Thus, when heritage property is taken, the owner is entitled to 150% of fair market value.

We like.

Congratulations to our Owners’ Counsel colleague Robert Denlow for defending the heritage value statue in the Missouri Supreme Court in St. Louis Cnty v River Bend Estates Homeowners’ Ass’n, No. SC92470 (Sep. 10, 2013), a decision which, among other things, resulted in the court upholding the statute against a constitutional challenge. The two main claims of illegality were that (1) the legislature went outside of its authority and defined just compensation to mean “too much,” and (2) the payment of the heritage…

Continue Reading The Descendants Win A Just Compensation Case In The Missouri Supreme Court – “Heritage Value” Statute Is Constitutional

University of Hawaii lawprofs Carl Christensen and Williamson Chang have kindly asked me to visit their Legal History of Hawaii class (Law 520D) on Thursday, September 19, 2013, and guest lecture on the topic of “Land Reform and the ‘Public Use’ Factor in Eminent Domain: Midkiff, Kelo, County of Hawaii v. C & J Coupe.”

In preparation for that session, here’s the reading list:

If you have additional time, read these two briefs as well:

…
Continue Reading Reading List For Sept 19 Guest Lecture For Hawaii Legal History Class

Here’s the Opinion and Order of the Court of Federal Claims after the damages trial in Childers v. United States, No.  08-1981 (Aug. 5, 2013). It’s a very long opinion (145 pages, with a table of contents!), so we’re not going to summarize it, but if you want to know how a rails-to-trails case is tried, you can’t do better than this. Here’s the court’s overview:

This Fifth Amendment taking case comes before the Court following a trial on damages. Plaintiffs, landowners of 13 separate properties in Sarasota, Florida, seek just compensation stemming from the imposition of a recreational trail across their properties pursuant to the Rails to Trails Act. Specifically, Plaintiffs seek $8,703,800, representing $4,938,200 for the encumbrance of the trail and $3,765,600 in severance damages. Defendant asserts that compensation should be limited to the encumbrance, which it claims is properly valued at $2,220,900. The Court awards just…

Continue Reading Major CFC Decision On Rails-To-Trails Takings

Hannah

Our law firm’s annual legal film festival at the Honolulu Museum of Art’s Doris Duke Theatre will launch later this week with the Hawaii premiere of Hannah Arendt, an award-winning film about the controversial New Yorker reporting by Arendt about the Jerusalem war crimes trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann in 1961.

During the festival, we show films about lawyers (or, in the case of Hannah Arendt, films that raise issues of interest to lawyers). Our Damon Key colleague Bethany Ace joined us in reviewing the movie. We hope you can join us if you are in Honolulu from September 14-20. If so, and you’d like a ticket or two gratis, let us know.

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Robert H. Thomas and Bethany C.K. Ace

Last week, Rochus Misch, 96, aretired German shopkeeper, died in Berlin of old age. His death was noted byevery major news outlet in the world.

Why…

Continue Reading “Hannah Arendt” – Our Review Of A Legal Movie With No Lawyers