Welch's Significant Cases- How Does She Do It?

The comment originates with Wayne Turner, whose firm Hoover, Hull, Turner, LLP regularly finds itself in Judge Heather Welch's court. In a December 2017 review of the then pilot project for Commercial Courts, Turner offered the following suggestion:

Help the higher volume Commercial Courts to clear their dockets of matters from non-Commercial Court cases; I don't know how Judge Welch keeps up, but she does it somehow.

That's not even considering her numerous ongoing obligations and contributions to the broader legal profession detailed in this post Welch's Amazing Professional Contributions.

Let's see if maybe we can solve Mr. Turner's mystery for him.

Worse Than Regulatory Capture

In the realm of regulation and protecting the public interest, how could anything be worse than regulatory capture, right?

Excuse the crass word, but what if there was regulatory incest? Extend the proverbial fox hen house to having foxes protecting the hen house and judging claims of harm by hens against foxes. What I am suggesting isn’t an otherwise neutral third party that starts taking bribes, as if a cow favored foxes for some side benefit. 

Welch's Amazing Professional Contributions

We previously detailed Judge Welch's amazingly busy courtroom that for some odd reason gets a large percentage of the most notable cases in Indiana courts. Yet with all that, Judge Heather Welch still finds a few minutes to give back to the profession:

Valpo Law Closing: Final Straw 3/3

This is post #3 of 3 on the closing of Valparaiso School of Law, looking at recent events. But this is only the mere effects with very little usefulness to the consideration of long-term systemic injustice. For root historic causes, refer to Doomed to Fail, (post #2). Full overview and disclosure of conflict here

Valpo Law Closing: Doomed to Fail 2/3

I am sure that each of you would want to go beyond the superficial social analyst who looks merely at effects and does not grapple with underlying causes.

--Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Yes, Valparaiso Law School has announced it is closing after failing at transferring the program to Middle Tennessee State.

Many autopsies will understandably point to recently metastasizing issues within the entire legal profession, especially education. But for Valpo Law School, the forces fighting against its survival have been fighting a long war while Valpo as a school and most of its alumni focused on winning individual battles for justice with what appear to be very unfortunate consequences.

The first post in this series, Injustice looked briefly at historic developments that fomented the Crusaders of Valparaiso towards a law school that engages social injustice causes.

Here we are going to grapple with underlying causes, consider specific situations, and the motives by those who appear to have schemed an end run around strategy to eliminate lawyers actively fighting for social justice. "Fair fights" on what is already home turf for elitists, the gentleman's pomp of the legal system, were difficult enough, but they were losing. So their long-ago instituted strategy has been paying off. But is it possible that many claimed defenders of social justice are complicit losing focus (or seduced) from their mission?

Recent challenges are only symptoms... 
Sure recent developments didn't help Valpo. But if a terminal patient dies during an experimental and moonshot surgery, was surgery or the illness the cause of death? Based on 2014 statistics of the prior seven years, the ABA sanctioned Valpo Law in November 2016. If the ABA sanction was the first recognition of serious illness, this June 2016 New York Times article was the terminal diagnosis, the attempt to transfer was the moonshot surgery, and the Tennessee's Ed Board rejection of the transfer was the surgery gone wrong followed by the death knell.

Valpo Law Closing: Injustice 1/3

This is post 1 of 3 on the closing of Valpo (Valparaiso) Law School - overview and disclaimer here.

Valpo Law School, its graduates, and the greater university, have earned their Crusaders nickname through decades of fighting for social justice. But as those fights grew in scope and consequence, opposition has similarly increased by those who profited from injustice.

Having now succeeded at flushing Valpo Law School down the toilet, a vortex may be developing that draws in a substantial amount of its prior foes and the entire system of justice. As the judiciary continues to lean toward favoring the 1%, the chance increases of a breaking point for widespread social revolt, sinking any remaining public trust down to (or even below) the other two branches.

Valpo Law: Overview

Today's post is an overview of the three coming posts addressing the closing of Valparaiso Law School (Valpo Law).

Full disclosure I am currently pursuing a federal lawsuit against, and this is confusing, The Lutheran University Association, Inc. dba Valparaiso University and Law School. I have also named Valpo President, Dr. Mark A. Heckler as well as his daughter, Susanne Heckler Johnson, one of a number of Valpo Law grads, the others being Indiana judges that previously decided another case I was party to. As if that isn't enough reason to dismiss everything I have to say about Valpo, both the judge and magistrate over the federal case are Valpo Law grads. So my opinion might surprise you...

The closing of Valpo Law School is a major injustice...

...but not primarily the small injustice to graduates and employees of Valpo Law, but a BIG injustice that will certainly compromise the ability of society's most helpless and indigent to receive due process, likely for generations.

Andy Hull on Mercy- Word and Deed

Let's dig into the tragedy and trial of Sharon Land, and Seth her schizophrenic son, who was denied Medicaid while IBM revamped Indiana's welfare system. One night he gouged out one of her eyes (already did his own), and broke her face bones. Guess who the court said was at fault?

Andy Hull's Word on Mercy
Andrew (Andy) W. Hull, appears to have found the below video tweet by NowThis very compelling. It was taken from Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-MA) March 8, 2017 Congressional testimony.