Supreme Court Cause Nos: Fill & Download for Free

It's an annual expiation ceremony for a set of very rich Delhi based lawyers and judges there who thrive in the Supreme Court of India. Under Article 145 of Constitution of India, the Supreme Court lawfully restricts other lawyers from the rest of the country from appearing or acting as Advocates for their clients. To maintain this oligopoly control over the practice in the Supreme Court, a coterie of vested interests in the SC Bar and judiciary conduct subjective exams in four topics for those interested in acting or appearing before the judges of the Supreme Court. Those who pass the exams with over 60% aggregate marks and after securing over 50% pass mark are admitted as "Advocates on Record". They must have minimum five years (5) years practice and must have completed 12 months training with an AOR who has a minimum ten (10) years practice in AOR'ship before they attempt the exams each year. At the time of applying to write this exam, they must produce a certificate of having successfully completed training of 12 months training. Earlier on, they must provide a commencement of training certificate from the same AOR. This means you cannot manipulate the training period.You must also provide a valid address (use a relative's address) proving that you are a resident of Delhi. Exams are held in June each year and after exactly nine months, the results are "delivered". Exams are conducted in the following four papers : Leading ( SC )cases, SC Practice & Procedure, Drafting in SC, Advocacy and Professional Ethics. Classes are conducted by Sr. Counsel R. Venkatramani (Professional Ethics), Sr. Counsel Indu Malhotra (Practice & Procedure of SC), Sr. Counsels - Indira JaiSingh and Meenakshi Arora (Drafting), Fali S. Nariman (Leading cases in SC). These training sessions are held in the Indian Law Institute Hall in Bhagawan Das Road nearby the SC. Question papers of previous years are available on the SC website. All notes can be obtained by photocopying these from the AOR office. The YouTube is full of videos that train and tutor you to write these four exams. There are online tutorials too apart from classes held by lawyers in the city of Delhi. You cannot seek revaluation of your answer sheets. The identify of the examiners are confidential and High Courts do not interfere against any legal challenge to these exams. Attempts made by General lawyers to do away with this oligopolistic practice were stonewalled by the SC Bar and AOR's. Article 145 of the Constitution restricted and also superseded the right of an Advocate to act and appear for his client in the SC. Challenges made by nonagenarian Adv Lily Thomas in the sixties and by other lawyers as late as in 2011 were thrown out on technical grounds that SC's power under Article 145 of the Constitution of India prevails over all other Articles of the Constitution of India, including the Advocates Act, 1961.The failure rate of the 650 plus candidates who attempt this exam is 80%. Only a hundred and odd candidates pass this exam. Amongst them at least a third are women candidates. A significant number of candidates are repeaters who have cleared three papers with over 60% aggregate marks and failed to get 50% in one paper. There are others who passed all papers but failed to get 60% aggregate marks in all papers together. Under Regulation 12 of the AOR regulations framed under Article 145 Constitution of India, you can seek a copy of your answer sheets within 30 days. You can also seek this under the Right to Information Act 2005 made to the Central Public Information Officer of the Supreme Court. A fee of Rs 10/- is payable through a postal order.The AoR 2017 results were declared by SCI on Friday, the 22nd February 2018. The number of persons who failed was higher at 80%. It had the following unusual pattern :There were cluster groups found in roll number series that either passed or failed 'en masse'.This can be illustrated as under :Roll nos 22. 23. 24 passedWhereas Roll Nos 1-21 barring 11 failed.Roll Nos 34-52 barring 43 failedWhereas 53-61 barring 57 & 58 passedWhereas roll nos from 300-317 barring 301,303,304, 305 and 312 passed , roll nos 343 to 427 barring 346, 366 and 395 failed436 to 485 barring roll nos 441-444 failedRoll no 559-599 barring 573 and 574 failed634 to 642 passed en masse whereas 643 onwards till last all failed.Between Roll Nos 300 and 350, twenty one (21) persons passed and four qualified under R. 11(2). Only 25 people failed. Similarly between roll no 600-650, twenty seven persons (27) passed and only 14 failed.39 out of 125,who passed are women7 out of 19 who cleared under R 11(1) are women13 out of 56 candidates who made in 11(2) are women59 out of those 206 who cleared are women.Hardly seven out of 206 are from South India.Out of 50 persons, on an average at least 30/35 persons failed. That is 70 to 80% of those who appeared failed and cannot appear in the next exam in 2019.Possible reasons for this 'en masse' passes and failures :1. Rolls numbers were consecutively assigned to candidates who fell within the last year category in Rules 11(1) and 11(2) 'in seriatim'. Hence they all probably fell into "pass" clusters.2. Candidates in the pass cluster were all, probably, contact class attendees and knew how to answer. The same person who cast the question paper and took classes also valued the answer papers.3. Inconsistent valuation standards wherein some papers were strictly valued by examiners and others were not as strict resulted clustered passes and failures.4.Mass copying probably took place at exam Hall by some pass clusters. Whether there were cases of unfair means in exams is anyone's guess ?5. Paper leak in one or more of the exams to "pass" clusters before the exam could also be a possibility.6. Gender bias towards male and undue leniency shown to female examinees resulted in more women candidates passing.7. Favoritism shown to persons in one cluster group from the Delhi Bar.Four subjective question papers attempted by 650 candidates means evaluating about 2600 answer papers. Exams were held in June and results were announced only after 240 days.Other unusual patterns in results :Roll Nos. who passed in series.53 54 55 56 59202 203218 219 220241 242283 284300 302 306 307 308 309 310 311 313 314 315 316 317 324329 330441 442 443493 495 497508 509! 510521 522 523573 574605 606610 612615 618622 624634-648 except 643Conclusion :The AOR exams are a sham. An annual expiation ceremony to recruit certain favored persons from the Delhi Bar and also persons (related to the staff and judiciary in Delhi).AOR'ship itself has become redundant since most filings are now expected to be done online. Most AORs do not appear in the SC. They lend their names to lawyers who wish to file themselves. They charge fees from Rs 20,000/- to Rs 1.5 Lakhs apart from expenses. They engage senior counsels with whom they are in cahoots who charge Rs 5-10 Lakhs per appearance in the SC. The tricky part is that you cannot meet a senior counsel of the SC other than through an AOR. You cannot appear in a SC case other than through an AOR. An AOR alone can file papers and seek adjournments. Advance cause lists are published ten days in advance. These are followed by elimination lists where cases from the advance list is eliminated. The final list is published the previous day and there is no way you can reach the SC to present your client's case. The AOR does not show up when the case is called and your case is dismissed with a short half page order. SC judgments do not have to be reasoned/speaking order per Law Commission of India recommendation. Cases once listed will not be adjourned even if you circulate a letter in advance to the "Mentioning Officer". Some favored Senior Counsels and AOR's however getaway by "mentioning" it at 10:30am.Remedy:A person who is being condemned or who is aggrieved by the State has a fundamental right to ensure that the principles of natural justice are complied. A person aggrieved or being condemned has the right to representation by an Advocate of his/her own choice. Such a right cannot be curtailed under Art 145 of the Constitution of India.An AOR cannot thrust himself on an aggrieved or condemned person and insist that he/she must be engaged to act or appear inn the SC. The AOR regulations framed by the SC under Article 145 are "unconstitutional and against the principles of natural justice".AOR professional misconduct is seldom acted upon by the SC even-though they are appointed as AOR's after an elaborate exercise that takes place over 24 months. Since greatest importance is given to professional ethics, SC must have a disciplinary committee that acts against professional misconduct by AOR.Unethical nexus between AOR and senior counsels in the SC must be investigated and persons must be subjected to disciplinary action and punishment if found guilty.Those AOR's who demand excess fees and lend their names must de-barred.Online filing of cases must be made glitch free and anyone in the country must be able to file a case in the SC without having to goto an AOR.

First you need to understand that the political equivalent of slapstick comedy (where the comedian gets hurt by his own buffoonery) rarely happens.The GOP sold themselves the notion that the public thinks we should have an election and then fill the SCOTUS seat that has been empty since February with the death of Justice Scalia sounds more democratic than the President gets 4 years to appoint new judges and Supreme Court justices and his reelection or lame duck status has nothing to do with it (such a notion is not contained in the Constitution). Public opinion has not really been swayed by this argument and most people feel the Senate should do its job.The GOP members of the Senate have been obstructionists since day one for President Obama. Their position gives them a great deal of political cover however. But in all things it comes at a price.Clinton wins in November and the GOP Senate might scramble to approve Garland. Why….well, Clinton might appoint someone more liberal and younger. The Senate might also go Democratic and they might want to see Garland approved before the new Democratic leadership might change the filibuster rules to preclude filibustering SCOTUS nominees (all other judicial appointments cannot be filibustered).Say Trump wins but the Democrats take the Senate. Trump nominates John Judge to fill a SCOTUS vacancy (which will have been empty for a year by then). The Democrats could do the same thing the GOP has done (and the GOP would be making the same arguments that the Democrats are making now). Can you imagine a bunch of GOP Senators being reminded of the petard they created and being hoisted by it. Too funny.Oh by the way…if the above should happen or the Democrats simply string things out till say June 2017………the Supreme Court will have been short a Justice for a session and a half (half of the opinions in 2016 and all of the opinions for 2017). You are going to have a lot of angry corporate lawyers out there and angry institutional lawyers (colleges mostly) and angry government lawyers cause the shortage of a Justice means a tie lets lower court rulings stand. Corporate America might just start giving to Democrats rather than the GOP just to ensure that rules are followed.Of course, if Clinton wins and the Senate is going to have a Democratic majority; Obama could give Mitch McConnell a real middle finger by withdrawing the Garland nomination and say “Hillary, find a liberal judge in his early 40s and let’s really change things”I can feel a rake handle hit a GOP senator in his face right now.

Qualified immunity was first applied to protect Mississippi police officers who arrested a group of ministers who were trying to use a segregated bus terminal. Later it got applied in more and more cases and contexts. Today, qualified immunity sometimes protects police officers who violate citizens’ constitutional rights that are not “clearly established”. However, there is enough precedent making some rights clearly established that often the police are not entitled to qualified immunity.In this answer I will first discuss § 1983, the statute that allows civil rights lawsuits that qualified immunity sometimes protects against. Then I will discuss how qualified immunity first came about and how the doctrine has developed in Supreme Court cases over the last few decades. Finally I will discuss how qualified immunity works today in the context of cases from the courts of appeals, which make the final decision on most of these cases.Section 1983 and BivensQualified immunity comes up in the context of 42 U.S.C. § 1983:Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress, except that in any action brought against a judicial officer for an act or omission taken in such officer’s judicial capacity, injunctive relief shall not be granted unless a declaratory decree was violated or declaratory relief was unavailable.In plain English, this allows anyone whose rights under the U.S. constitution were violated by a state officer to sue them for damages. This provision dates back to 1871 (17 Stat. 13) and was originally passed as part of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 to protect the rights of African Americans during Reconstruction.§ 1983 only allows lawsuits against state officers, but the Supreme Court decided in Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents (1971) that similar lawsuits can also be brought against officers of the federal government. I’ll discuss both § 1983 and Bivens cases below because qualified immunity affects both in the same way.The start of immunities under § 1983The section wasn’t widely used until Monroe v. Pape (1961). In this case, Chicago police officers went into the home of an African American family without a warrant, ransacked the place while making them stand by naked, and then held the husband in custody for two days without letting him talk to anyone. The police officers argued that because what they were doing was patently illegal under Illinois law, they weren’t acting “under color” of State law, so they couldn’t be sued under § 1983. The Supreme Court was having none of that.And “every person” who acts under color of State law can be sued. Every person? That would be a bit much, the Court thought. Enter Pierson v. Ray (1967). A mixed-race group of clergy was arrested for “disorderly conduct” when they entered a whites-only restaurant in Jackson, Mississippi. After their convictions were thrown out, they sued the police officers who arrested them and the judge who convicted them under § 1983. The Supreme Court decided that all of these people were immune from suit:The judge because judges were immune from suit for unlawful arrest because judges were immune under the common law as it established in 1871. According to the Court, if Congress had wanted to abolish this immunity, it would have said so (at 553–555). This created the doctrine of absolute immunity, which later was held to protect prosecutors in addition to judges.The police officers were also immune if they were acting in good faith. The statute the ministers were charged with violating (in 1961) was later found unconstitutional (in Thomas v. Mississippi, 1965), but the police officers could hardly have predicted that (at 555–557). As the Court put it, “A policeman's lot is not so unhappy that he must choose between being charged with dereliction of duty if he does not arrest when he has probable cause, and being mulcted in damages if he does.“ This was again grounded in the common law: if you sued someone for false arrest under the common law, they could defend the suit by alleging that they were acting in good faith and had probable cause to make the arrest. And this was the start of qualified immunity.Justice Douglas dissented in Pierson, arguing forcefully that Congress did in fact intend to abrogate judicial immunity when it enacted the precursor of § 1983 in 1871. Even he endorsed a version of qualified immunity, however: “Nor should a judge [be held liable] who allows a conviction under what is later held an unconstitutional statute” (at 566).Development of qualified immunityIn the decades following Pierson, qualified immunity became an ever broader defense against § 1983 lawsuits.Scheuer v. Rhodes (1974) held that Ohio state officials who were being sued for their role in the Kent State shootings had qualified, not absolute, immunity, but did not clearly define what that meant.Wood v. Strickland (1975) involved some Arkansas high school students who were expelled for serving alcohol at a school event. The Court held that the school officers could only be sued if they knew or should have known that what they did was unconstitutional, or if they acted with malicious intention.In Harlow v. Fitzgerald (1982), the second part of that standard was abolished. The Court noted that “insubstantial claims” had frequently proceeded to trial because of this “malicious intention” standard, and concluded that it was better policy to grant qualified immunity whenever an official’s “conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights” (at 818). This “clearly established” wording is frequently invoked in qualified immunity case law.Another frequently quoted case is Malley v. Briggs (1986): “As the qualified immunity defense has evolved, it provides ample protection to all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.”Saucier v. Katz (2001) was brought by an animal rights activist who was manhandled while protesting a speech by Vice President Al Gore in San Francisco. The Supreme Court held that courts must proceed in two steps when deciding whether qualified immunity applies:Did a violation of constitutional rights occur?If so, was that right clearly established?But this decision was criticized because step 1 is usually the harder question to answer, so courts had to spend time on difficult constitutional questions unnecessarily. As a result, Pearson v. Callahan (2009) allowed courts to follow the steps in either order.In the 2010s the Supreme Court repeatedly reaffirmed that for a right to be clearly established, it must be really clear:Ashcroft v. al-Kidd (2011): not clearly established that it is unconstitutional to arrest someone under false pretensesWhite v. Pauly (2017): not clearly established that police officers have to warn before firing into a houseKisela v. Hughes (2018): not clearly established that police officers can’t shoot a person holding a knife who is not an immediate threat.Qualified immunity todayToday § 1983 lawsuits are common, and the qualified immunity defense is equally common. Many cases involve victims of various forms of police brutality. To overcome qualified immunity, the plaintiff usually has to come up with a very similar legal case that was decided by the same court of appeals. (There are 11 each covering a number of states, plus one for the District of Columbia.) Sometimes it is clear enough from other circuits’ precedent that what an officer did was unconstitutional, and in such cases qualified immunity can also be overcome.When a district court denies qualified immunity to the officer being sued, the officer may immediately appeal to the circuit court of appeal to reconsider whether qualified immunity applies. This is different from the normal rule—by default you can appeal only after the whole case is over. I imagine this increases court costs and slows down resolution for people suing the officers. My understanding is that the lawyers for defendants are often paid for by deep-pocketed police unions.I read Short Circuit, a weekly newsletter by the libertarian Institute for Justice (IJ) that compiles interesting cases from the federal courts. Many cases involve qualified immunity, and I have listed some summaries below IJ doesn’t much like qualified immunity, so perhaps there’s some bias here in favor of the most outrageous cases.Corona v. Aguilar (No. 19–2147, 10th Cir. 2020): No qualified immunity for police officer who arrested someone without probable cause, even though he was being slightly rude.Chamberlain v. White Plains (No. 16–3935, 2nd Cir. 2020): An older African American man with health issues accidentally set off his health monitor (in 2011). Police showed up in riot gear, stayed around even when the man said he was fine and asked them to leave, forced entry into his door, and shot him dead. No qualified immunity.Reich v. Elizabethtown (No. 18–6296, 6th Cir. 2019): Qualified immunity for officers who (in 2015) fatally shot a mentally ill man holding a knife who may or may not have been an immediate threat to others.Stratta v. Roe (No. 18–50994, 5th Cir. 2020): Texas water district that prevented a board member from speaking did not violate his First Amendment rights. If it did, it would have been shielded by qualified immunity.Patel v. Madison (No. 18–12061, 11th Cir. 2020): Officers tackle an older Indian man who spoke little English to the ground, leaving him paralyzed, even though he was mostly compliant. No qualified immunity.Sanford v. Detroit (No. 19–1612, 6th Cir. 2020): No qualified immunity for police officers who fabricated evidence in a murder case against a 14-year-old, sending him to prison for nine years.Waid v. Earley (Nos. 19–1425/1472/1477/1533, 6th Cir. 2020): No qualified immunity for various state and city officials who lied about the safety of the water supply of Flint, Michigan, and made up test results.Cox v. Wilson (Nos. 18–1353 & 18–1376, 10th Cir. 2020): Cox had been driving erratically on an interstate and was eventually shot by police officer Wilson. Wilson’s conduct did not violate the Constitution, and if it did he would have been protected by qualified immunity.Greve v. Bass (No. 18–6069, 6th Cir. 2020): No qualified immunity for officer who arrested Greve without probable cause.