gamepolitics: Illinois Picks an Attorney to Battle the Video Game Industry

Game Politics (

gamepolitics) wrote,
@ 2005-09-14 16:52:00

Illinois Picks an Attorney to Battle the Video Game Industry

And in this corner...

Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan today announced the appointment of Chicago attorney Patrick Deady to represent Governor Rod Blagojevich in a First Amendment case filed by the ESA on behalf of video game publishers.

The ESA is challenging the constitutionality of video game legislation signed by the Guv in July. The measure is designed to keep violent and sexually explicit games out of the hands of younger players.

Deady brings a quarter-century of legal experience to the state's upcoming battle with the ESA. He has experience as a trial attorney with the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, and has served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Baltimore and Chicago. He is currently a partner at Hogan Marren, a prominent Chicago law firm.

(Post a new comment)

	(Anonymous) 2005-09-14 09:12 pm UTC (link)
	Well, our state has been doing some stupid stuff under the current governor, Rod Blagoiovich, or Rod Blagoyab*tch as I like to call him. (Reply to this)

	Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser jabrwock 2005-09-14 09:16 pm UTC (link)
	So we know when he does argue for the state, it won't be through name calling and half-corked innuendo. It'll be interesting, though, to see what arguments he brings up as to why this isn't a 1st Amend issue... Hey Dennis, you should see if he'd be willing to do an interview. :) (Reply to this)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser (Anonymous) 2005-09-14 09:23 pm UTC (link)
	An interview would be nice, but I doubt this gentlemen cares about video games one way or another. I would assume that to him this case is about 1) Money and 2) an issue of Civil Rights and Expression. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser jabrwock 2005-09-14 10:17 pm UTC (link)
	Civil Rights and Expression His firm specializes in Health Care issues so I suspect his arguments are not going to be why this isn't a 1st Amendment issue, but more why health concerns overshadow 1st Amendment protection. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser (Anonymous) 2005-09-14 10:21 pm UTC (link)
	If he's intending to prove that the video games that will be restricted in the proposed bill actually harm health then he definetly has an uphill battle to fight here. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser

jabrwock
2005-09-14 10:34 pm UTC (link)

If he's intending to prove that the video games that will be restricted in the proposed bill actually harm health then he definetly has an uphill battle to fight here.

It's the only way I can see him arguing that it should not be allowed 1st Amendment protection. Because claiming that children don't get 1st Amendment, or that violence needs to be banned, will only go against how the courts have ruled for 100 years. He needs to show precedent, or come up with a good argument as to why 100 years of precedent needs to be tossed.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser (Anonymous) 2005-09-14 10:40 pm UTC (link)
	Or just stall to milk this baby for as long as it can go D: (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	hourly wages jabrwock 2005-09-14 10:54 pm UTC (link)
	True, lawyers are paid by the hour, aren't they? :P (Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser

mrfalcon
2005-09-15 12:14 am UTC (link)

The Supreme Court has overturned all laws like this on First Amendment grounds, so the state hires... a health care lawyer. Makes perfect sense, because the state legislature has absolutely no intention of making these laws a reality. Because if these laws were put into effect, a year later they would have a lot of angry parents at their doorstep whose children have been downloading violent games off the Internet. Whereas, if they fail, they can always say they tried, but the uber-powerful videogame lobby used their incredible influence to overturn the law. Thus completes the circle of life.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser (Anonymous) 2005-09-15 12:52 am UTC (link)
	Here is the websites bio about Deady: http://www.hmltd.com/bio_pdeady.htm Seems he doesn't do health care at all, but commercial litigation. BTW, can somebody show me how to make a link. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser mrfalcon 2005-09-15 01:27 am UTC (link)
	There's something about Medicaid Fraud in there, but I think you're right. That's not his primary field. The bio also mentions some civil rights litigation, but that seems to be for age and sex discrimination. I still don't think he's going to be able to address the First Amendment problems to the satisfaction of the Supreme Court. He's just there to put on a good show. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser bm03 2005-09-15 01:56 am UTC (link)
	Link: <a href="YOUR URL HERE">DISPLAY TEXT</a> eg: <a href="http://www.hmltd.com/bio_pdeady.htm">Bio</a> Sometime LJ auto-links URLs, though. /b (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser (Anonymous) 2005-09-15 01:43 pm UTC (link)
	Thanks. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: Well at least he's not an ambulance chaser bm03 2005-09-15 01:54 am UTC (link)
	Games aren't strictly Jack's field either, Wikipedia claiming that he started in Medical Malpractice. Do we have a secondary Figure Of Fun™ in cheapo Puff Daddy knockoff P. Deady? Probably not. Although there's a limited amount of mileage about a health-related lawyer having "Dead" in his name. ;D /b (Reply to this)(Parent)

	An ally of Jack Thompson? quartermaine 2005-09-14 10:42 pm UTC (link)
	I hope not. I hope he doesn't get involved with games in the same way JT does. Perhaps he's doing this strictly for the pay check and that's it. It'd suck if he hopped on the band wagon that Jack built and got passionate about anti-gaming activism. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	Re: An ally of Jack Thompson? jabrwock 2005-09-14 11:09 pm UTC (link)
	An ally of Jack Thompson? Doubtful, he's probably just a really good arguer on points of law. He probably doesn't care either way, he's just being paid to argue for one side rather than the other. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	I fucking hate blagoiovich ihtelvjournal91 2005-09-14 11:24 pm UTC (link)
	He and His goddamned laws and lawyers have given Illinois a bad name. What a dick. (Reply to this)

	Not Concerned sothasil 2005-09-15 05:16 am UTC (link)
	The courts are going to rule in favor of the ESA. Why? First Amendment. This Deady stands no chance. Violent games cause no more harm than violent movies do, and the courts know this. (Reply to this)

	k joshdavis271 2005-09-15 06:08 am UTC (link)
	so we have a battle over a machine, and who should control the content that comes out and who shall be held accountable for all thouse murders, I just hotpe it is all ruled in our favor or else I will protest they have those same laws enforced on the movies. (Reply to this)

THE ILLINOIS ATTORNEY GENERAL IS TRYING TO NEGATE A CONFLICT OF INTEREST
(Anonymous)
2005-09-15 02:37 pm UTC (link)

As Lisa Madigan has an interest in this lawsuit, she has appointed a Special Asst. Attorney General from an outside lawfirm in an attempt to negate a blatant conflict of interest.

As I currently have in the Circuit Court of Cook County, a motion to disqualify the Illinois Attorney General. The conflict of interest in my case is proven as well as Lisa Madigan is a defendant and also has an interest in the lawsuit.

This is why she hired Deady. His Healthcare background is to investigate the allegations in my complaint of Paternity Fraud in Child Support and the Illinois Dept. of Healthcare and Family Services violations of the False Claims Act of 1863.

After the Illinois Attorney General is disqualified, she will seek to appoint Deady to this case as well. But I have a shocking legal suprise for her.

Case #05L4617, Circuit Court of Cook County

Eugene "Geno" Brown Jr.
Organizing President/Founder
ONE MAN CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOUNDATION

(Reply to this)

ESA & ??? VS. ILLINOIS & DEADY

(Anonymous)
2005-09-15 02:50 pm UTC (link)

So we got an upcoming legal battle ahead of us. It's the main video game trade organization versus the state of Illinois, and right now, the ESA has a very good argument on its hands with pointing out the unconstitutionality and unfair singling out of video games over other forms of media.

Illinois, however, is probably going to try and counter by saying that there is documented evidence that video games clearly increase aggrssion and make children more violent.

OH REALLY?

Well if video games were so harmful, then why does THIS person disagree:

http://culturalpolicy.uchicago.edu/conf2001/papers/goldstein.html

And what's this? He refers to a test that Anderson did back when he was working on showing the negative effects of video games back in NINTEEN EIGHTY SIX! That's right, 1986! What games did he use as the violent video game and neutral game? Why, ZAXXON AND CENTIPEDE, because EVERYONE knows that Zaxxon is REALLY violent and aggressive!

GOOD GOING ANDERSON! What a way to start your career! So, is Dr. Goldstein alone in this feeling? HECK NO! If you look at Purdue University's Dr. John Sherry, you see that he believes that much more research is needed on video games and that there is NO WAY that an event like Columbine could have been caused by video games alone. There was much more behind Klebold and Harris than just games!

http://info.cas.msu.edu/icagames/vgma.pdf
http://my.webmd.com/content/article/23/1728_56903

And let's not forget Prof. Dmitri Williams who did the first long term study on video games and aggression using Asheron's Call 2!

http://www.physorg.com/news5758.html

And then there's the argument by other people with PHd's that violence is ESSENTIAL for children's growth. Not just from games, but from things like comic books, television and more! Look at what the Incredible Hulk did!

http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2000/06/violent_media.html

And finally, one person who I enjoy reading material from is Laurie Taylor, a woman who has a chapter on the benefits of video games and how they might not be as harmful as some think, coming up in a new book being published by the APA! Hailing as a Professor in the English Department on the topics of digital media, Prof. Laurie Taylor works at the UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA! Apparently, she has quite a bit of clout going for her. Especially if the APA is taking notice of her work in their new book coming out in November!

http://web.nwe.ufl.edu/~ltaylor/
http://www.sagepub.com/book.aspx?pid=11482
http://www.sagepub.com/booktoc.aspx?pid=11482&sc=1

Oh wait! I almost forgot! There's Henry Jenkins and also a rather extensive list on the group of people who work on ACADEMICS with games!

http://web.mit.edu/21fms/www/faculty/henry3/
http://www.academic-gamers.org/contributors.shtml

WOW! That's quite a few professors and psychological studies that the ESA has to fall back on! Who does Illinois have?

http://www.apa.org/science/psa/sb-anderson.html

What Illinois officials should be saying right now:

"OH $#!&"

~Otaku-Man

(Reply to this)(Thread)

	Re: ESA & ??? VS. ILLINOIS & DEADY (Anonymous) 2005-09-15 03:02 pm UTC (link)
	Henry Jenkins is cool. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: ESA & ??? VS. ILLINOIS & DEADY (Anonymous) 2005-09-15 03:04 pm UTC (link)
	Also, as for that Anderson article, I find it pretty funny that about 05% of the references are his own work. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: ESA & ??? VS. ILLINOIS & DEADY (Anonymous) 2005-09-15 03:04 pm UTC (link)
	Ugh, "95%" Dang! Bad typist! (Reply to this)(Parent)

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