Last week there was a case before the Supreme Court involving now deceased attorney Johnnie Cochran.
A man named Ulysses Tory had been picketing Cochran’s office and creating a nuisance and Cochran was able to get a judge to not just issue a restraining order against the man, but also prohibited the man from saying anything about Cochcran in public forever.
This case made its way up to the Supreme Court since it has a potential First Amendment implications.
But now that Cochran is deceased is the case moot?
As they’ve already heard arguments, they’ll almost certainly rule on it. It is not uncommon for courts to rule on cases that are essentially moot, but where there is still a need to clarify the law. Whether or not it is moot for the surviving party in this case may depend on how the court order was worded.
As you mentioned, he and his family were forever barred from saying anything about Cochran. But “forever” is probably newspaper shorthand for what the order actually said.
I expect the court to rule against Cochran. But if they fail to throw out the order entirely, and if the order had no wording voiding it upon the death of Cochran, SCOTUS will probably punt it back to the lower court to rule on what to do now that Cochran is dead. In that case, I again predict the order will be rescinded, or terminated, or whatever is the proper legal term here.
The Supreme Court briefs described the ruling as a permanent injunction to keep the man from saying anything (whether or not it is defamatory) from speaking about Cochran in any public forum.
IANAL, but I thought the SCOTUS was usually pretty careful not to rule on moot cases, as it brings them one step closer to just knocking down laws willy-nilly instead of resolving actual disputes. Of course, you may be correct that this case isn’t moot, as the contract may still be binding despite Cochran’s death.
Yeah, my gf uses it in this sense. It’s rather confusing.
This Court never does. The Rehnquist Court (and specifically, Justice Scalia) reinvigorated the justiciability doctrines and you can bet that if the case is moot, it won’t be decided.
I don’t know if this is moot, though – depending on the terms of the injunction, there might be other members of Cochrane’s firm involved, for instance.
Part of the injunction dealt with Cochran’s law firm:
If the firm was a sole proprietorship, the case may be moot. If it is a partnership, the case may not be moot. So it moot (debatable)whether the case is moot (irrelevant).
If, for example, SCOTUS doesn’t take a position against Cochran and his firm, and the lower court ruling is allowed to stand, couldn’t <fill in the blank> get a court order to prevent anyone from saying anything negative about him?
Doesn’t matter. The federal courts are prohibited by the Constitution (well, by the common reading of the Constitution) from issuing “advisory opinions.” Federal courts can only act when a true case is before them – they are not permitted to address topics as they choose, willy-nilly, but must address only those issues brought forth by actual cases. If one of the parties no longer has any interest in the ltigation (for instance, if he dies, and the relief sought is not something that would be of tangible value to his estate or heirs), then there is no case, and it would be unconstitutional for a court to opine on the matter, regardless of how important it is.
Dictionaries give both senses of the word now, although as an Englishman moot always means debatable to me. I think the meaning academic arose in the US within the last half-century. (No cites for that though and I could well be wrong.)
Interesting. In the US, from my limited observation, Moot almost always means “academic” and the only people that use (or are aware of) the other deffinition are those who have studied law.
SCOTUS reviewed the Communications Decency Act* with there being an actual case (that is, no one was ever charged with violating it), but that was because the act itself had a provision for SCOTUS review (I think)
Brian
and ruled against it 9-0 for most of it and 7-2 for parts
I guarantee there was a case. The first CDA case was Reno v. ACLU, IIRC. I assume the ACLU filed a declaratory judgment action. Regardless of the precice procedureal posture, federal courts don’t decide issues that do not arise within an actual case, and Congress does not have the power to waive this restriction.
But in First Amendment cases, justiciability is a little different. A law prohibitting certain kind of speech is said to have a “chilling effect.” Hence merely passing a statute regulating speech gives the plaintiff standing to seek a declaratory judgment or an injunction against enforcing the statute.
*
See, E.g.,*
Since I’m the OP would the injunction against Mr. Tory still apply after Mr. Cochran’s death. Can you be defamed when your dead? I always thought you were pretty much fair game then.
If there is a right to an injunction against defamation, it might well survive the death of the defamed person. A cause of action for money damages does, at least in some jurisdictions. E.g., http://www.delcode.state.de.us/title10/c037/sc01/
If that is so, then the case is not moot at all. All that is required is a motion.