Stories in this week's episode:

The troubling implications of the Supreme Court's transgender athlete decision

Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of UC Berkeley School of Law, argues the Supreme Court's ruling in West Virginia v. B.P.J. weakens intermediate scrutiny by accepting broad generalizations rather than requiring an individualized showing of harm. Chemerinsky ties the 6-3 decision to a broader pattern in which the Court has repeatedly declined to protect transgender individuals from discrimination.

The limits of inadvertent disclosure

Sanford Jay Rosen and Ernest Galvan, of Rosen Bien Galvan and Grunfeld LLP, break down the Fourth District's ruling in Popa v. Simpson, arguing that stretching Rico v. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. to disqualify counsel over discoverable material undermines a trial's basic function as a search for the truth. They also lay out guidance on responding to inadvertent disclosures.

Remote workers, noncompetes and the new choice-of-law battlefield

David S. Cunningham III, a retired judge and neutral at JAMS, examines how remote work has turned noncompete enforcement into a choice-of-law problem, since an employee's residence, work location and customer base can each point to a different state's rules. Cunningham proposes early mediation and arbitration to resolve these disputes — without a multi-jurisdictional legal battle.

Cite Out at the Big Nerd Corral

Benjamin G. Shatz stages The Bluebook and the California Style Manual as gunslingers fighting for supremacy under Rule 1.200, with practitioner survey data giving the Yellowbook a real edge.

Licensed in Illinois, untouchable in California: The extraordinary career of Sidney Korshak

William M. Paparian traces how an unlicensed Chicago lawyer ran labor deals and Hollywood contracts from a Beverly Hills corner table without ever facing indictment, and asks what that model would face today.

I lied

Arthur Gilbert confesses to letting ChatGPT soften his headline, then questions whether AI can ever capture the irony of good legal writing as California's courts move to regulate its use.

Columns in this episode:

After J.O., when should attorneys expect a CCP 170.6 challenge?

J.O. v. Superior Court stripped blanket CCP 170.6 challenges of their immunity from attack. Trial and litigation attorney James G. Perry asks the harder question: when unrelated attorneys all paper the same judge, how does anyone prove the coordinated "policy" Batson burden-shifting demands?

An extraordinary right, narrowed by an extraordinary abuse

The CCP 170.6 affidavit that once ended all inquiry can now begin one. Okorie Okorocha of Toxicolawgy.com argues J.O. narrowed the right for every litigant — hitting hardest the lawyer who challenges a judge he genuinely believes is biased.

Capital punishment's forgotten Barbara Graham

Likely guilty, almost certainly denied a fair trial. Los Angeles lawyer John S. Caragozian revisits Barbara Graham's 1955 execution — a buried witness statement, a staged alibi, a hanging judge — and the death-penalty debate it briefly forced open.