University of Baltimore Law Review

Elephant in the Mirror: One Elephant’s Legal Journey to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness

*Torra Hausmann

I. From Animal Welfare to Animal Rights

For more than two decades, the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP), a Florida-based animal rights group, has advocated for judicial recognition of legal personhood for nonhuman animals.[1] Although animal law traditionally focused on animal welfare and protection, NhRP has pushed animal law to expand and include a focus on legal rights for nonhuman animals.[2] NhRP’s advocacy efforts currently focus primarily on filing writs of habeas corpus, seeking to free animals from “imprisonment” within zoos and other forms of captivity.[3] NhRP’s most recent success in campaigning for animal personhood involved its habeas corpus petition for an elephant named Happy.[4]

“The New Hotness”: Jukebox Cops and Their DMCA Threat to the First Amendment

*Chase Hoffberger

I. “Record All You Want”

Sergeant David Shelby likely did not anticipate that a video of him queuing up a recording of a Taylor Swift song, during an otherwise unremarkable standoff with activists, would go viral on Twitter and YouTube, but that’s exactly how things played out.[1] Shelby, a sheriff’s deputy within California’s Alameda County Sheriff’s Office, was running crowd containment outside the county’s courthouse during a protest of another killing of a Black man by American police.[2] In the video, Shelby speaks with James Burch, the Anti Police-Terror Project policy director, ostensibly about the efforts Shelby and his colleagues were taking to keep activists from demonstrating where they wanted.[3]

Less than thirty seconds into the recording, Shelby redirects the conversation.[4] Buying some time, Shelby pulls his iPhone from his pocket and thumbs through it to find and begin playing Swift’s 2014 chart-topper “Blank Space.”[5] “Are we having a dance party now?” Burch asks as Swift slides into the hook.[6] “No, sir,” says Shelby.[7] The woman recording the conversation asks if Shelby is playing Swift to “drown out the conversation.”[8] “You can record all you want,” he tells the woman.[9] “I just know that it can’t be posted to YouTube.”[10]

Burch points a finger at Shelby, amused. “This is the new hotness, right here,” Burch says, suggesting that Shelby began playing the Swift song “so they can get a copyright strike.”[11]

For Whom the Bell Tolls: Challenges with Applying the Obstruction Statute to the Nonviolent Capitol Breach Defendants and Crafting Appropriate Sentences

*Bradley Rosen

I. The Attack on the Capitol

On January 6, 2021, a mob stormed the United States Capitol to stop Congress from “certifying the vote count of the Electoral College of the 2020 Presidential Election.”[1] Fortunately, the mob failed in its mission, but it nonetheless succeeded in delaying the vote by causing the Capitol to temporarily enter a lockdown until the building was secure.[2] The Justice Department described the criminal probe as the largest in American history, both in the number of defendants charged as well as in the nature and quantity of evidence gathered.[3] So far, more than 500 defendants have been charged in connection with the attack, with offenses ranging from misdemeanors to felonies.[4]

II. The Charges Against Defendants

Despite the violent efforts to stop the democratic process, rioters did not face charges of “treason” or “seditious conspiracy.”[5] Instead, allegations against the rioters include civil disorder, assaulting federal officers, disorderly conduct in a Capitol building, and parading in a Capitol building.[6] The difficulty for prosecutors, however, lies in levying appropriate charges against nonviolent defendants who entered the Capitol, but who are otherwise first‑time offenders who were swept into the mob mentality.[7]

Eviction Moratoriums: Blurring the Lines Between Holdover Tenants and Squatters

*Alina Pargamanik

I. Introduction

Recent eviction moratoriums on the federal and state level have changed the landscape of landlord-tenant law, blurring the line between holdover tenants and squatters.[1] Existing state laws distinguishing between holdover tenants and squatters may influence the application of eviction moratoriums and relief available to renters and landlords alike. By addressing the distinctions between holdover tenants and squatters, states can prevent costly implications for landlords and tenants that arise as a result of these ambiguities in the law.

II. Federal Eviction Law in the Face of COVID-19

A. Eviction Moratorium

On August 3, 2021, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr. Rochelle Walensky, issued a limited order (Order) extending the CDC’s June 2021 eviction moratorium until October 3, 2021, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and rising Delta-variant cases.[2] The moratorium applied to areas experiencing “substantial and high levels of community transmission” and to two kinds of evictions: (1) failure to pay rent and (2) failure to pay late fees.[3]

Action Needed at the Federal Level to Enable Marijuana-Related Businesses to Operate Legally, Safely, and Profitably

*Joseph Canner

I. Introduction

On November 6, 2012, voters in Washington and Colorado approved ballot initiatives aimed at legalizing marijuana, becoming the first states in the U.S. to do so.[1] What was at first a trickle has become a flood: as of mid-2021, medical marijuana is legal in thirty-six states and recreational marijuana is legal in eighteen states.[2] However, marijuana growing, distribution, sale, and possession remain completely illegal in three states and under federal law.[3] Differences between state and federal laws cause significant hardships for marijuana-related businesses (“MRBs”), particularly growers.

II. Hardships Imposed by Enforcement of Federal Law

The Controlled Substances Act (CSA) applies to the possession and distribution of marijuana on federal property, as well as to the transportation of marijuana across state lines or from other countries.[4] Notably, the CSA applies not only to marijuana plants and dried leaves, but also to seeds, which are key to starting and maintaining a marijuana-growing enterprise.[5] This results in a conundrum sometimes referred to as the “immaculate conception,” whereby growers in a state where marijuana is newly legal must violate federal law to obtain the seeds from a state or country where marijuana is already legal.[6]