The VLW Blog

John Brownlee, the former U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Virginia, says he’s raised nearly $100,000 a little more than a month after announcing he would run for the Republican nomination for Virginia’s Attorney General in 2009. As WSLS reports, Brownlee’s campaign raised the money during the first 40 days of his campaign, according to records filed at the State Board of Elections.

Reports say that Brownlee’s opponent for the GOP nomination, Sen. Ken Cuccinelli, R-Fairfax, raised more than $125,000 in the latest reporting period, to add to the $110,000 he already had.

By Peter Vieth

Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell says that he will appeal the 2-to-1 ruling by a 4th U.S. Court of Appeals panel that Virginia’s ban on so-called “partial-birth” abortions is unconstitutional. According to the report from the Daily Press (via AP), McDonnell will ask for review by the full appeals court on Monday.

Hardly out the door of his office as Western Virginia’s federal prosecutor, John Brownlee is now officially in the race for Virginia attorney general. The Roanoke Times says Brownlee is styling himself “Virginia’s conservative prosecutor.” He faces patent lawyer and Virginia Senator Ken Cuccinelli in his bid for the Republican nomination.

Cuccinelli tells us, “Mr. Brownlee strikes me as a gentleman who will give us a good run.” Nevertheless, Cuccinelli points to the endorsements he has received to date, saying, “We are well on our way to the nomination.”

The Daily Press carries the AP report that Virginia’s Medicaid fraud unit, part of the attorney general’s office, recovered more last year than any other state.

Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell credits a Charlottesville weekly paper for exposing violations of Virginia’s consumer finance act. The AG news release is here.

John Brownlee, the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Virginia, will step down in a month after seven years as the region’s top federal prosecutor. He confirmed today that he is considering a bid for the Republican nomination for Virginia Attorney General, but has not made any final determination.

Julie Dudley, now First Assistant U.S. Attorney, will serve as U.S. Attorney when Brownlee steps down on May 16.

Fairfax State Senator Ken Cuccinelli is the only announced candidate for the GOP Attorney General nomination. Brownlee joins a field of potential candidates that includes Mechanicsville State Senator Ryan McDougle and former Delegate Paul C. Harris.

The second annual Legal Food Frenzy starts Monday and runs through April 11.

The competition among law firms for the Attorney General’s Cup is aimed at raising a million pounds of food, a substantial increase over the 679,000 pounds raised last year.

The drive is being coordinated by the Young Lawyers Division of the Virginia Bar Association and regional foodbanks in the state.

Attorney General Bob McDonnell has issued a statement supporting the competition that includes Web links to the foodbanks.

Attorney General Bob McDonnell has filed papers for the state to intervene in the Episcopal Church case in Northern Virginia.

The case, tried last fall, pits the diocese against 11 congregations that want to break away; millions of dollars in church property hangs in the balance. McDonnell said that since the constitutionality of a state statute was challenged in the case, the commonwealth needs to be a party.

The Washington Post has details.

The attorney general’s office is sponsoring a legislative fix to a problem that it doesn’t believe really exists.

The issue is the practice of having nonlawyers sign motions to hold in contempt parents who are delinquent in their support obligations.

Kimberly J. Daniel, a juvenile and domestic relations district judge in Fairfax County, ruled in October that Virginia Code § 8.01.271.1 requires such pleadings to be signed by an attorney.

A logical extension of that ruling, and one pressed unsuccessfully in a federal lawsuit last year, is that thousands of such orders are unenforceable because they are void ab initio.

A more practical problem is that those nonlawyer employees could be guilty of practicing law without a license, said Craig M. Burshem, a senior assistant attorney general who represents the Department of Child Support Enforcement. That’s a risk he is unwilling to run, he said.

Although he said he disagrees with Daniel’s ruling, he has directed that an attorney sign all such motions.

As a permanent fix, the office has asked Del. Sal R. Iaquinto, R-Virginia Beach to introduce House Bill 1382, which would amend Virginia Code § to 16.1-260 and related statutes to make it clear that nonlawyers can file such motions.

Yesterday, the American Bar Association renewed its call for a nationwide moratorium on use of the death penalty; the group issued a report based on several states’ experience, calling the system “deeply flawed.” Virginia was not one of the states studied.

Through a spokesman, Attorney General Bob McDonnell says he disagrees with the ABA study, adding that the death penalty is constitutional and that the system works.

As a practical matter, there has been a general freeze in executions across the country since Sept. 25, when the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case of a Kentucky man challenging lethal injections as cruel and unusual punishment.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch has the story.