About $1 Million in Fees Awarded in Bullet Train Settlement.
Although the bullet train proposal in California has generated a lot of controversy, Juliet Williams of the AP, in an April 19, 2013 article in The Orange County Register, reports that a Sacramento County Superior Court approved a settlement of a challenge from Central Valley farmers to the train. Under the settlement, the California High-Speed Rail Authority agreed to establish a $5 million fund to preserve farmland and pay nearly $1 million in legal fees to the groups that sued, mainly Madera/Merced County farm bureaus. The settlement also details how the Authority will work with landowners to acquire land along the proposed train route.
Cell Phone Embarrassed Michigan Jurist Holds Himself in Contempt/Pays Fine.
Martha Neil, in an April 15, 2013 post in the ABA Journal, give us an off topic humorous story to share with you. Chief Ionia District Judge Raymond Voet of Michigan was in the midst of a prosecutor’s closing argument in a domestic violence trial. He had a new cell phone and it went off, in violation of a noticed policy that such an occurrence will result in a $25 fine. True to form, he held himself in contempt and fined himself $25, taking a recess so he could go to the clerk’s office and pay the fine. There you go; or, as Shakespeare said in Act I, scene 7 of Macbeth, “This even-handed justice.”