Courthouse News has identified nearly 100 cases this year in which the government was ordered to pay attorney’s fees to an immigrant it unlawfully detained, totaling more than $1.1 million.

The Trump administration has dropped its case against a former Olympic canoeist charged in connection with damage to the Reflecting Pool, acknowledging their allegations against David “Davey” Hearn don’t hold water.

officials obtained information that undermined “the evidentiary basis for the indictment” against Hearn.

After the supreme court denied Trump's petition for cert in the $5 million defamation case, the district judge has ordered the clerk to pay out the now $5.8 million judgement to E Jean Caroll's lawyers.

The original judgement was for $5 million, and it earned about $800k interest during the appeal. The money is coming directly from the court because Trump earlier paid the full amount into the court registry in lieu of posting an appeal bond.

Trump immediately appealed the pay-out order. But since there's no stay, it's still effective.

E Jean Caroll also has a separate judgement against Trump for about $80 million. That case is still on appeal.

Washington, DC resident Sam O'Hara noticed a couple of national guard soldiers patrolling the streets, and he decided to follow them around playing the Star Wars "Imperial March" on a portable speaker.

For this he was handcuffed and detained for about 20 minutes. Now he has reached a settlement where the government will pay him an undisclosed amount of money in compensation.

Breaking now, Judge Emmet Sullivan has granted a preliminary injunction that orders the Department of Justice to either release a number of specific Epstein files to the public, or to "show cause" why they shouldn't.

The government has until July 2 to file responses.

Lawyer and journalist Katie Phang filed suit to enforce the Epstein Transparency Act. The judge has evidently determined that she has suffered harm from being unable to report on the unreleased files, and therefore has standing to sue.

This decision seems like it might be headed for an appeal, but Judge Sullivan declined to stay, or delay implementation, to allow the government time to appeal. So the clock to July 2 is currently ticking.

Bates numbers that are mentioned:

Ordered to unredact names:

• EFTA00749245
• EFTA01187999
• EFTA01930501
• ETFA01928255
• EFTA00628112
• EFTA02648868
• EFTA02504630
• EFTA01022356
• EFTA01703108
• EFTA00038227

Ordered to produce underlying FBI notes:

• EFTA01245620
• EFTA02858481
• EFTA02858491
• EFTA02858495

Opinion: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.291779/gov.uscourts.dcd.291779.16.0_2.pdf

Full court docket: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73246595/phang-v-blanche/

UPDATE: July 2 is now here. In a move that should surprise absolutely no one, the government decided to produce no additional documents, and they filed a lengthy response explaining reasons why they should not. Short version:

• All of the redacted email addresses are either victims; or the email address appears in both the name and email fields (like "[email protected]" [email protected]); or in one case Thomas Massie already outed the guy, so there's no need for the government to comply with the court order (?)
• The government claims that they count people as "victims" if they started out as victims, but later performed reprehensible acts (according to the files)
• One indictment was over-redacted, but they claim it's okay because they unredacted some of the same names in some other documents. Another indictment only contains redacted "victims."
• No need to produce FBI interview notes because the FBI always types up exactly the stuff in their notes into the final report.
• Reviewing foreign language documents for release is just too darn hard to do.
• The government plans to publish the redaction log as required, but the law doesn't put a deadline on that, so the judge shouldn't either.

A lawyer working with the Minnesota attorney’s office said she just wants some sleep, after working so hard to try to get ICE to follow court orders.

“I wish you would just hold me in contempt of court so I can get 24 hours of sleep,” Le said. “The system sucks, this job sucks, I am trying with every breath I have to get you what I need.”

Edit clarification: This attorney works for the federal government, not the State of Minnesota.

Over the weekend, Judge Nachmanoff made it clear that a large amount of discovery material is to be delivered to James Comey today. The prosecution team from North Carolina seem to be engaging in a series of stall tactics to delay this.

The eastern district of Virginia is known informally as the "rocket docket" because of its fast resolution times for cases.

While sitting for a deposition in a defamation lawsuit that she filed, Laura Loomer was asked to explain under oath what she meant by the phrase "Arby's in her pants" (which she earlier penned in a tweet).

Transcript:

Q  Can you explain to me what it means to say to her that "the Arby's in her pants"?
A  Well, Arby's --
    MR. KLAYMAN:  Objection.  Relevancy.
BY MS. BOLGER:
Q Answer the question.
A  Arby's sells roast beef.
Q  Right.  Can you tell me what -- why you were talking about "the Arby's in her pants"?
A  Well, it's just a -- an expression.
Q  What is the expression trying to convey?
A  It conveys the reason why she got a divorce by her own admission.
Q  Because she had roast beef in her pants?
A  Yeah.
Q  She'd put roast beef in her pants; that's what you're trying to say there?  You're literally saying she put Arby's in her pants?
A  I'm saying she literally -- it's so ridiculous.  I'm saying she literally put Arby's in her pants.  Yes.
    MR. KLAYMAN:  Objection.  Relevancy.
BY MS. BOLGER:
Q  You're not making a slur about her?
A  No.
Q  You're literally saying she put an Arby's sandwich in her pants; is that right?
A  Yes.  That's correct.  That's correct.
Q  Why are you laughing?
A  Because I just think it's so funny.
Q  What is your basis for saying she put Arby's in her pants?
A  I just think it's so funny.  I just think it's so funny.
Q  What is your basis for saying she put Arby's in her pants?
A  She carries roast beef in her pockets.
Q  What is your basis for saying she puts roast beef in her pockets and in her pants?
    MR. KLAYMAN:  Objection. Relevancy. Harassment.