Weekly Docket
Dive into the world of law with 'Weekly Docket,' hosted by Silberman Law Firm's Phil Silberman. Get the latest on landmark cases, practical law, and a unique perspective on the legal landscape. Join us for a weekly exploration of law like you've never heard it before.
Weekly Docket
P Diddy Indicted, Texas’ Phone Ban in Schools, Ground Leases Explained, Rescuing Animals from Hot Cars and Parental Liability Debate
Join Phil Silberman and Austin Black in Episode 36 of the ‘Weekly Docket’ as they break down the federal charges against Sean 'Diddy' Combs for sex trafficking and racketeering, sparking major legal and industry implications. Explore the Texas Education Commissioner’s push to ban cellphones in schools, raising questions about student safety and learning. Get answers to legal questions on the complexities of ground leases in real estate, when landlords can legally enter tenant properties in Texas, and whether it's legal to break a car window to save a pet trapped in a hot vehicle. Plus, hear a rant on whether parents should be held legally responsible for their children's actions at school. Don’t miss this episode filled with legal insights and lively discussions!
Welcome to Silverman Law Firm's weekly docket episode 36, where we talk legal news and practical law today is September 19th, 2024. And I'm Phil Silverman, owner of the firm and your host. And I'm joined by my cohost, Austin Black, who works out of our Dallas office. How are you doing today, Mr. Black?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:I'm doing great. I'm glad to be doing episode 36 today.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Let's get it going. What's on our docket today, Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:so it is a slow legal news week. I saw this in the news and was really hoping we weren't gonna have to talk about it, but alas and alack, so Diddy, Sean Diddy Combs was charged with sex trafficking and racketeering. So we're going to talk about that because I'm sure Diddy is at the top priority list of all of our listeners right now. So we will make sure to get that in for you today on the Silverman Law Firm podcast. Okay. And then next, we will be talking about a Texas education commissioner who called for a cell phone ban in schools for students. not for college students, but for students lower than that. Yeah. we'll be What goes into that exactly, and the legal implications there. Then we'll be moving on to our legal questions section. talking about first, What are ground leases? how do they work? can you get one? Do you need one? Etc. and then, Can a landlord enter a tenant's property without notice in Texas? The answer is, it depends, but we'll get to that. That's always the legal answer. and then, is it legal to break a hot car window to rescue an animal in Texas? It depends on how cute the animal is. no, that's not really the answer. We'll let you know. And then, finally, our Ranted Rave section. Should parents be responsible the school related activities of their children? What do you think?
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:There you go. That animal thing is actually pretty interesting. I saw that in the show outline.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah, no, my response to how that should be analyzed is actually what I think, but that's not the legal application,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:No, we'll do the law according to Austin and we'll do the legal application. So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Okay.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:all right, let's kick off our legal news section. And we're talking about Sean Diddy Combs. And I think that this is big news. And we had to do this because it really is All over and people are very much interested in it. So not that we are, but we are here to serve the listener. So we need to talk a little bit about it. I knew him as puff daddy. So when I was like a kid in, in high school He was puff daddy and he was basically. Biggie Smalls sidekick is how I know Notorious B. I. G. He was the sidekick. I remember his most famous song, the best song he ever had. I think it's one of the top selling singles ever. Was I'll be missing you from 1997. If you heard of that one, Austin.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:I think that's the only song I've heard from him,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:okay,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:it was a tribute because biggie was murdered and. Puff Daddy at the time. he did this tribute song. It's still very popular song. that's the one Austin heard of. number one on the Billboard Hot 100 for 11 weeks. Certified, yeah, certified best selling singles of all time. So net worth of Mr. Combs there. It's hard to pin that kind of stuff down, but depending upon the source. Some, somewhere between 400 million and$1 billion, depending upon the source of
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:around that range. Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:somewhere in there.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:those like websites that do analyses of people's net worth and when they have this broad of a range, it's very funny, they could be making 50, 000 a year or they could be making 20 million. It's somewhere there.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:you don't really know. and When you get to have enough money, it's difficult to calculate. Net worth. because you, you have a lot of, assets that are not super liquid and you get into valuation issues and all that, but. He's a fairly rich guy for comparison purposes. Taylor Swift's net worth is about 1. 3 billion. And I think my guess would be P Diddy's net worth quite a bit less than Taylor Swift, especially after all the trouble that he's been getting into. So, he's, accused of some doing some very bad stuff.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yes. Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:And I, have you ever been to a freak off Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:A freak off.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Okay. So freak off.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:it involves sex trafficking or racketeering, no,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Okay.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:not. I
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:describes that Puff Daddy or P. Diddy would organize these multi day events, referred to as freak offs where Combs coerced victims into performing sexual acts, often involving commercial sex workers. I don't know, I guess a commercial sex worker would be like a porn star maybe? So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:don't know. I don't know what the difference is between a commercial sex act, a commercial sex worker, and a non commercial sex worker.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:the, I can just say you apparently if you're into that kind of thing, maybe, but I don't think you want to go to a freak off, and these that they were often recorded and used, they were controlling the victims and. Through threats of violence and they would often, I guess beat'em up and maybe put'em in hotel rooms and then they would imprison them in hotel rooms for a while. All this occurring between 2008 and the indictment in 2024. abuse, exploitation, that kind of thing. But I, he had, I think he had two houses, or he probably had more than that, who knows. But he had one in Miami and one in Los Angeles. And the authorities seized more than 1, 000 bottles of lubricant, baby oil, drugs, multiple firearms, including AR 15 rifles. That's a lot of lubricant and baby oil. these must have been some huge freak offs that he was engaged in. So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:I'm
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I just want to get,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:glad we do not have any evidence of that. that's great. I'm glad we're
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:of that. I would not want to.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:no, I, this is not the kind of law that we practice. Obviously, what can we say about this from a legal standpoint? the thing that comes to my mind is racketeering, because he's being charged with the federal RICO statute. And you hear, I think as the public, you always hear the term racketeering, so and so high profile person. was engaged in racketeering. But do we really know what that means? And I'll tell you, I'm not a criminal lawyer. I was curious, what does it really involve for the federal government to find you guilty of racketeering?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:think probably like normal people, when they hear the word racketeering, they most likely associate it with watching mob TV
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yes.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:like that. You hear like Al Capone charged with racketeering, Things like that. So yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah. And so I pulled a definition and it's a really bad definition because it uses the term racketeering to define racketeering, which is not very helpful, but it's, the government has to prove beyond a reasonable doubts. Criminal Laws has got to be beyond a reasonable doubt. That an enterprise existed. Okay, that's one enterprise existed. I guess in this case it's going to be all the freak offs or whatever this corporation or however P. Diddy was organizing these things. That the enterprise affected interstate commerce. I guess maybe they were buying their baby oil and their lubricants across state lines. That's a pretty easy standard by the way. You would, in order for the federal government to get involved in something there has to, be some sort of interstate commerce that goes on, and that's a fairly low bar and that the defendant in this case, Puff Daddy or P. Diddy was associated by the enterprise or employed by the enterprise. So probably so he was attending the freak offs and that the defendant engaged in a pattern of racketeering activity. And that's where I say, that's not helpful. I want to know what is racketeering. I think we've got the dictionary definition of racketeering. Do you have that Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah. Dishonest and fraudulent business dealings.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Okay.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:I wish that was more vague.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:does not make me very comfortable. So if I'm a, if I'm a business owner and I'm being accused of racketeering, you're just gonna say, I've done something dishonest and fraudulent. So there's a lot of businesses out there that engage in dishonest dealings. Now, when you go over the line to fraudulent, that's where you, I can see getting into some illegal activity. the reason, as Austin points out, this has mafiosi type behavior. Is because the common examples of racketeering are prostitution. I guess being a pimp, right? Or illegal lottery, numbers and things like that. loan sharking, charging people, serious interest in violation law, that's all the stuff that the
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Illegal, illegal gambling rings, things
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:right, that's all the stuff the mob did there. the first instance of racketeering being applied to a civil act is I think there was a guy back in the eighties and he Did something to rig the junk bond market. I want to say his name was like Michael Milken.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:he was charged with securities and reporting violations. he pleaded guilty to both of those, but not to racketeering or insider trading. he was sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined 600 million.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I don't remember a lot about it, but there was some debate, it starts going off the rails when they apply it to civil activity. it's easy to say, okay, you're a pimp. You're operating in a legal gambling ring, you're racketeering, but
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:be careful with some of this stuff. We need to start spreading the government start spreading its tentacles over into legitimate businesses. So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:that are not explicitly illegal, it becomes like a balancing act. Okay. this might be dishonest, but it's not illegal. And like how much of it is just being a smart business person? I don't know.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah, like I was really mad at some big HVAC companies that came and tried to extort me for like new units when I didn't need a new AC unit. can I charge those big HVAC companies? You're just someone want to charge those guys with racketeering, right? Yeah. I've heard most of those, big h, hp, those big HVAC companies are owned by hedge funds and they're coming and they're charging people 18, 20 grand for units when they need a$700 repair. I think that's racketeering. that's my, my 2 cents on the matter.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:I'm actually really happy now that we are covering this. I wasn't super happy at first, but because this reminded me that, there's a new show coming out on, I think, Max, what used to be HBO.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Colin Farrell's playing the penguin, in the Batman universe. It's like a mob show about the penguin. And so I'll be watching that and watching out for anything that I think could be labeled as racketeering as we're
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yes. Yeah, you do. Do your go back and watch the Sopranos to
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Oh great show.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:tell and tell us about. All right. Mr Combs and his freak offs. obviously he's in some trouble. I see his net worth plummeting. He's had all kinds of problems, and I think we'll see how it goes. He's gonna expected to plead not guilty and innocent until proven guilty. So we'll see how all that goes. All that comes out. our next legal news topic is switching gears completely. Texas Education Commissioner calls for student cell phone ban in school. This is most, this is a already a thing at a lot of private schools, right? you come to the private school, you put your phone in the bin or whatever, and you don't get it back till the end of the day. But in public school system, we've got to debate this. And the commissioner of education in Texas, He made the recommendation, as the concern drives that phones are generally harmful to students What's your take on it, Austin? You think, you think a phone's a good thing, bad thing for kids to have in school?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:phones are a very bad thing for kids to have in school for a lot of different reasons
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:it's simple stuff. it's the one, it's the one you would expect. and Morath, the commissioner, he's quoted saying, if it were in my power, I would have already banned them in all schools in the state. So I would encourage you to consider that as a matter of public policy going forward for our students and our teachers. people supporting the ban obviously note that the device, distracting to teachers, trying to learn, play games. And they're also harmful to kids mental health. that's an obvious type of thing. Here's a statistic that shocked me as part of this story. And this is the evidence. I don't know if you can blame phones for this. But on the most recent, this came up in this story, on the most recent state exam, only 41 percent of Texas students demonstrated an adequate understanding of math. So that means, about 60 percent of all the kids in Texas can't do math. It's bad.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:like some period around, like when I like took the bar, I was like waiting for my results. I did some substitute teaching and some public schools, just like during that period of time. And, it was crazy because 18 year old, 17 year olds in public high schools, the majority of them that I came across. Have a lower understanding of math than 11 year olds in Korea did. It was just like crazy. Yeah. I am not
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:It's bad. I do remember one time we did a firm event, where we went to trivia night and you told us that you were like a mental math whiz or something.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:just, I used to teach it. and that wasn't when I was doing the, substitute thing, but yeah, I used to teach it. And because of that, like the way I taught, we tried to make sure that people could do mental math of this. And to the extent that it can be done to solve problems. But yeah, so
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Okay. so I think the reasons to ban phones are pretty obvious, but there are opponents of the law, of the new proposed law.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:of
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:And I was curious, what would the opponents have to say? And, their position is, it prevents young people from exercising personal responsibility. Well,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:that the problem?
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I just want to know, how did my generation exercise personal responsibility when we didn't have cell phones in school?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:the answer is obviously you couldn't, right?
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:No, I
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:that's why your generation is so deprived of just any understanding of what personal responsibility is because you didn't have cell phones
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I did. I could not exercise the personal responsibility. Some of this stuff that these people come up with is just crazy. now there's other reasons that the opponents have, the ones that don't want the law to pass. It's legitimate, but it's extremely rare. if there's an emergency situation, there's a shooting on campus, the kid wants to be able to call mom and dad. I get that. it's just so rare that I don't know that's a reason to, to oppose something that's really would be a very, a net good. I,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:if someone is promoting kids having phones in schools for this reason, but is also wanting, or teachers to have guns, I think that's a little bit strange. So,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:I don't get that one, but bad school shootings are a bad thing for certain. there's way too many of them, but they're not statistically significant in the sense where we can start, outlining entire policy based on the school.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:on the possibility. Yeah, because we have school shootings, you need to have a phone in the school.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:but we'll see how this law comes out. I think they're set to vote on it or, see what happens if it takes effect anytime soon. But I, I know that my, I know that some of my kids, they, the ones that go to public school, they call me from their school all the time. Like, why are you on your phone? Why are you not learning? Why are you calling me? So let's answer some legal questions. And the first one we've got is what are groundless? Is it, how do they work? So interestingly, I came across this topic when I was reading Leviticus and that's not a very typical thing to read. I, mind you, I guess I was having trouble sleeping that night, but, nonetheless, when we were studying about the year of Jubilee, which is every seven times seven years. So every 49 years, there's this. idea that the land should be returned to its original owner. And I've got a, I've got a quote here, a citation. It's Leviticus 25th, chapter 14 through 16. It says, if you sell land to any of your own people or buy land from them, do not take advantage of each other. You are to buy from your own people on the basis of the number of years since the Jubilee, and they are to sell to you on the basis of the number of years left for harvesting the crops. When the years are many, you are to increase the price, and when the years are few, you are to decrease the price. Because what is really being sold to you is the number of crops. there you have it. That's the first ground lease, as far as I know of, in the history of the world. And you've got this concept of, of jubilee, of, okay, you're going to sell the land is going to be restored at a certain time or reverted to its rightful owner. So the only value in the land is actually the years left on the lease, or in that time during agrarian times, the only value, would be the years of the crop, the agricultural production of the property. And we have the same concept today. with the ground lease, typically you see them for 50 years or 99 year ground leases and a lot of buildings all throughout Texas are leased to somebody for 99 years and they build, gigantic skyscrapers on them. In fact, my family owns a parking garage in Grand Rapids, Michigan. That is on a 99 year ground lease that my great grandfather, leased to somebody. And it's something ridiculous. it's like the total lease price is like 1, 000 a month for an entire, piece of land and down downtown Grand Rapids. And you Austin, you, my, my grand, my great grandfather, Sam, who was a very wise man in the wrecking yard, but who was not very wise when it came to real estate things. Yeah. He did not put any rent increases on that ground base.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:ah,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah, so you,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:good idea.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah, so you sign a ground lease like in the 1940s or 50s or whatever, you're going to want to have rent increases that keep up with inflation, right?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Otherwise,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:it's the same thing with like rent control departments right in certain cities.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah, exactly. I'm going to say what's happening in New York. So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Seattle, I know someone paying 200 a month
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:in Seattle, if you're going to do a ground lease, they're not terrible ideas. If you're a landlord, you just have to put the right stuff in there. You do a 99 year ground lease can be a very good thing, but you have to account for inflation with what rent bumps or rent increases. So there's no actual transfer of the ownership. It is. It is a lease. the tenant is making rent payments. It's a traditional landlord tenant situation. It's just for a very long time. and often the times these things are developed. On my mother's side, my grandfather who fought in the Korean War, Austin, you love Korean people. So my, my grandfather who fought in the Korean War, they, as part of his service, he was given a 99 year ground lease to build a cabin on up in Michigan. and the cabin still there, no one really, we really don't want to maintain it because of the ground lease, might have another 25 years left that or something like that. So you. there's good and bad things about these properties about these ground leases and you have reversion. you can put special reversion rights in there. what happens if the property reverts to, if somebody does something and the property revert. So maybe you're not allowed to do something to it, and then you can refer to the seller. So you can have. all of that type of stuff. But at the end of the lease, there's the natural reversion where, it's going to revert to the lesser. So yeah, that's how ground leases work. And a lot of them out there, a lot of people don't know about them, but they are a thing and they are, popular. all right. That brings us to our next legal question. And we're talking about, can a landlord still in landlord tenant law, can a landlord enter a tenant's property? without notice in Texas. what do you think Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:If it's an emergency, yes.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Okay. yes, fire, flood, significant property damage. Your landlord can come in there and he can stop, destruction to the property. So, or if a tenant makes a request for maintenance, then you've got abandonment. The tenant can abandon a property in Texas under our typical lease, our TAR residential lease, Texas Association of Realtors. That's the most common lease used in Texas. you'll see that you typically post a notice of abandonment on the property. And then once the property is abandoned, you can go and enter the property. usually in our leases that we do, whether it's, at our law firm or from a management company, we will have the landlord give notice for non emergency situations. there's not, Texas law does not actually require a specific, notice period, but, good idea for the tenant to, and landlord to negotiate a notice period, or at least have it in the lease. have you always leased apartments Austin, or have you ever leased like a single, like a standalone, single family type of place?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Always apartments.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah, and most of the big apartment complexes, they do this thing, fairly, corporate and professional, but if you're out there living in a. in a small, maybe mom and pop landlord situation. You'll see a lot of variety and how landlords deal with that. all right, that brings us to our next legal question. Our third and final legal question. Is it legal to break a hot car window? So it's, maybe you see dog, a dog. Okay. Cute little dog and it's 100 degrees outside and there's a sitting in the car, owner left him in the car. Can you break that window in Texas to rescue the dog? What do you think Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:As I said, only if it's a cute dog. If it is not, then no. So I think you can probably, don't know for certain, though.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:First of all, let's talk about something. I know everyone loves dogs. if it's a child, a human child there, we have a good Samaritan law in, in Texas. which, says, yeah, you can obviously. And, you save a child by all means and not be prosecuted for, property damage. that's not an issue, but if it's an animal, there's no real, good Samaritan law for animal rescue in Texas. But we. we do have, an animal cruelty law, and that is a, thing where you're not supposed to be unkind to your animals, you're not supposed to treat them, harm them kind of thing, so we do have an animal cruelty law, that's Texas Penal Code section 42. 092. And that says, it's, it is illegal to subject your animal to bad things like leaving them in a hot car. That's not going to help you save the dog in that. But unfortunately, Austin, for all of our animal lovers out there, Texas, the sort of the old historical law applies in that, a dog is chattel property and you can't, if it were like an inanimate object, you can't break the window. to go and rescue the dog that could be considered criminal mischief or some sort of other vandalism. But Austin, good news. There's always the jury factor.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah, I would love for a Drury to see that situation.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah. do you really think when we in panel a jury in Dallas County or Harris County and the prosecutor, the district attorney's office wants to bring a criminal mischief case. against some person who saved a dog from a hot car. I don't see the jury ever convicting that person. And in fact, I could potentially see the prosecutor, the district attorney being not getting reelected for the next term.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah, no kidding.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:this is an example where you have some technical things on the law that don't always play out in
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:so Phil,
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:real life.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:you're running for, if you're running for a reelection as a DA, you think that like making that your platform, that you're going to prosecute criminal mischief or people breaking car windows would be bad. You
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:That would be, that, that would be bad.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:No.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:genius things if you're running for district attorney's office, like I don't, I think we had a district attorney and In Harris County, okay, we're not going to prosecute marijuana charges and have enough people smoke marijuana or use marijuana. That's a great way to get elected. it's like what Trump and Harris are doing with their campaign promises. they're trying to 1 up each other tax on tips. And it was t Winfrey name where it's l stuff for everybody. So
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:exactly. Exactly. it's funny.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:all right. So if you see a cute animal in a car, if you want to rescue it, go ahead. you might be committing criminal mischief, but I doubt you're going to find a jury to convict you. And, that's our official legal advice on that. Even though the show in the show, we don't give legal advice.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:but
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Hey,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:gonna call it official legal advice.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:exactly. And that brings us to my favorite part of the show, our rant rave section. And we're talking about should parents be responsible for their children's school related actions? Everybody is on edge. School shootings are terrible violence against schools. All that is terrible stuff. My kids, some of my kids go to a public school and they go to this, in the school district called Spring Branch ISD. Okay. Fairly nice school district. one of the one, probably one of the better school districts in the country, I would suspect. and there's been some threats, some kids out there. making some threats, whatever. I don't think anything came of the threats, but we, I got this email from the school district and it was a rather bizarre email and it was all about, parents, one, it was this vague notice of the threats, but it's also about, okay, parents, we're going to hold you responsible. And it was shocking to me. And I think I've got the quote here. from this email. Austin, do you have that quote down there on the end?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:quote parents, please be aware that we will hold you responsible for the actions of your child. We reserve the right to exclude you from any SBISD campus or school or district activities. We will also take legal action where possible.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Yeah, so that is extremely interesting and the idea it really set me off because it's the idea that these bureaucrats, they have the audacity to mass email, thousands of parents saying we're going to hold you accountable and take legal action, but they don't really have the law on their side for that. And there's been some instances, some recently, also you can think of, I think there was a Michigan school shooting. there's been some instances where we're talking about parental responsibility. Now, as parents, we all want our kids to, to do good things and we don't want them to do awful, terrible things. But, if you do have a child that may be suffering from a mental illness, and goes and does something awful with a gun and commits a school shooting. Do you think the parent ought to be held responsible and accountable for that, Austin?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Not normally without, special situations like in the Ethan Crumbly case, but yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:Can you just tell the listeners briefly about that case and what happened there?
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah, there was also a more recent one, but, Ethan Crumbly committed a school shooting, this is in Michigan, 2021, at Oxford High School, his parents were charged with involuntary manslaughter for buying him the weapon, and ignoring signs of his mental state, they were charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter. and the prosecution was arguing that because they bought him the gun, and they were aware of his intentions to do these things, that they should be responsible in some
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah. And that, the basis of this type of accountability is involuntary. there are elements of involuntary manslaughter. Austin's. idea of not usually. you're, you have to, as a parent, you don't become vicariously, you're automatically liable for your child's criminal actions absent taking some affirmative act or failing to do something. So, yeah,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:though, is like, constantly saying to you, Ah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna shoot up my school, and stuff like that, and then, And you hear that, and then you buy him a gun, Yeah, I do think that you probably, Maybe even voluntary manslaughter at that point.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:if those truly are the facts, then so be it. But, The implication by S. P. I. S. D. Is we somehow have this power to hold parents accountable. if you're a parent out there, you're doing everything you can, or even if you're even if you're not doing everything you can, even you're just an average parent or a lackadaisical parent. if you I'm not sure you live in Texas, you own a gun, maybe you have a hunting rifle or something, and you've got a kid that maybe suffers from depression and some anxiety and some mental illness, and he goes and gets the hunting rifle and shoot somebody. I don't think that's enough to get you criminal liability in Texas anyway. the prosecutor's gonna be up there arguing as well. You knew your son had all these problems, so you know, you shouldn't have owned a hunting rifle.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:or, okay, I actually could, I actually think I could buy the argument That you knew your son had these problems, Why did you have the hunting rifle and the mantle loaded?
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:right. Okay.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:not have it in the gun case? Let's
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah, these are all gonna be very fact specific things. Um. you have to show here's the standards for involuntary manslaughter and not necessarily in Texas, but generally you typically have to show the parents acted with gross negligence or failed to fulfill a duty of care or preventing their child from causing harm. The key there is gross negligence and in our hunting rifle example, you got your hunting rifle in a safe and your ammunition and another safe and somehow the kid manages to get a hold of it. I don't think that's gross negligence.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:don't Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:but if that crumbly case is true, bottom of gun, that kind of thing. That's pretty bad. the, one of the first, you know, the Colorado, the Columbine high school shooting in 1999, Austin, Texas.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Yeah.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:were no parents were charged criminally at that time, but there were several civil lawsuits, which, probably, I don't know how the civil lawsuits came out. But, my rant on this is really more just about the school district and the teachers and the education system. They're just Thank you. They're so shocked and they're in just such a state of terror and fear of everything going on with these school shootings that sometimes their reactions are just completely over the top and not well thought out. And I really wonder if these school districts have general counsel that look at some of these emails, and there aren't better ways to communicate the threats to the parents and potential actions. That's a school district may take.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:agree. I do think it'd be weird, especially with the fact that In that, not in the quote that we read, but I believe that they, that the SBIC was implying that like need to make sure their kids don't make terroristic threats. It's like, how can you be responsible for that? If your child's an idiot
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah,
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:on Instagram, et cetera, things like that. do you have to take away their social media if they've posted it once? I don't know what that looks like. I think you probably gathered from, from the course of us talking about this. I'm pretty on board with holding the parents liable if they do exhibit gross negligence related to their child, actually committing acts that harm other people. But as far as making terroristic threats, I don't know how you could ever hold the parent liable for threats that their child is making.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:yeah, that, that would be a, that would be a tough one for certain. But all right, that brings our show to a close. I've been your host, Phil Silverman. Austin Black has been my co host. Like us, follow us, review us wherever you get your podcasts. Nothing in this show is to be considered legal advice. This is all Ben Frederick.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:not official legal advice.
phil-silberman_3_09-19-2024_135117:No, all for entertainment purposes only. If you have a legal question, email us at info at sylvlawfirm. com and say you want it publicly answered in the podcast. Thanks for listening, everybody. Have a great rest of your week.
austin_3_09-19-2024_135119:Thanks guys.
