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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   25177 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 16, 2023

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you are appealing to a consensus that does not exist.

No, I am correcting OP's incorrect statement of the law.

Defense that it is entirely at the court's discretion to honor. What stops the judge from saying "Nah, Fuck you, we're going to charge you with contempt anyway"?

A higher court is what stops him. "Discretion" does not mean, "I can do whatever I want." Judges are reversed for abuse of discretion every day:

"`The discretion of a trial judge is not a whimsical, uncontrolled power, but a legal discretion, which is subject to the limitations of legal principles governing the subject of its action, and to reversal on appeal where no reasonable basis for the action is shown. [Citation.]'" (Westside Community for Independent Living, Inc. v. Obledo (1988) 33 Cal.3d 348, 355 [188 Cal. Rptr. 873, 657 P.2d 365], citing to 6 Witkin, Cal. Procedure (2d ed. 1971) Appeal, § 244.) The scope of discretion always resides in the particular law being applied, i.e., in the "legal principles governing the subject of [the] action...." Action that transgresses the confines of the applicable principles of law is outside the scope of discretion and we call such action an "abuse" of discretion. (See Hurtado, supra, 167 Cal. App.3d at p. 1022.)

City of Sacramento v. Drew, 207 Cal. App. 3d 1287 (1989)

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