On a Monday in August 2020, Camryn Kuehl and her family embarked on a snorkeling trip in Jupiter, Florida, on a boat operated by a company that specializes in shark encounters. During the trip, the boat's crew, John R. Moore Jr. and Tanner Mansell, spotted what they described to the Kuehls as an "illegal longline fishing line" attached to a buoy. With the Kuehls' help, Moore and Mansell hauled in the line and freed the 19 sharks caught on it—a rescue operation they encouraged the Kuehls to document with their cellphones. Moore called Florida Fish and Wildlife Officer Barry Partelow to report the incident.

As Partelow ultimately discovered, Moore and Mansell had made a mistake. The line had been set by Scott Taylor, a seafood distributor whom the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration had authorized to catch sharks for research purposes. Although Moore and Mansell clearly thought they were doing good by releasing illegally ensnared sharks, they were nevertheless convicted of theft at sea, a federal felony punishable by up to five years in prison. Prosecutors alleged that Moore and Mansell had stolen Taylor's fishing gear, which they left on the dock, where marina employees discarded it in a dumpster.

In addition to a year of probation, Moore and Mansell were saddled with felony convictions that trigger lifelong disabilities, including barriers to employment and loss of their Second Amendment rights. They challenged their convictions on the grounds that the jury instructions included a broad, counterintuitive definition of stealing that did not require an intent to use Taylor's gear for their own benefit. Last September, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit rejected that challenge. Moore and Mansell are now asking the full appeals court to reverse that decision and correct the flagrant injustice of treating them as federal felons based on an honest, well-intentioned error.

Moore and Mansell were convicted under 18 USC 661, which applies to someone who "takes and carries away, with intent to steal or purloin, any personal property of another" within "the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States." During their trial, they asked U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks to instruct the jury that stealing property means wrongfully taking it "with intent to deprive the owner of the use or benefit permanently or temporarily and to convert it to one's own use or the use of another." After the prosecution objected to including a conversion element, Middlebrooks omitted it, although he did tell the jury that the defendants maintained they had "removed property without the bad purpose to disobey or disregard the law and therefore did not act with the intent to steal or purloin."

The jurors, who sent the judge half a dozen notes while deliberating for two days (longer than it had taken to present the evidence against Moore and Mansell), struggled to reach a verdict. When they told Middlebrooks they had been unable to reach a unanimous decision, he gave them an Allen charge, encouraging them to continue deliberating and saying they should be open to changing their positions, provided they could do so "without violating your individual judgment and conscience." After sending one more note asking whether they should consider any other defense theories, the jurors found Moore and Mansell guilty of one charge each.

In an opinion by Judge Charles Wilson, the 11th Circuit panel ruled that Middlebrooks had been right to conclude, based on the relevant precedents, that Section 661's definition of stealing does not require evidence that the defendant "carrie[d] away" property for his "own use or the use of another." But in a concurring opinion, Judge Barbara Lagoa, joined by Judge Britt Grant, highlighted the perverse consequences of that reading and harshly criticized Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Watts-FitzGerald for his "imprudent exercise of discretion" in choosing to prosecute the case.

Lagoa noted that Moore and Mansell had openly stated their motivation in freeing the sharks, had enlisted their customers to help and to take pictures while doing so, had reported the incident to the relevant law enforcement agency, and had "returned the gear to the marina dock as instructed." Kuehl, for her part, "thought [they] were doing a great thing," and she "shared pictures on social media reporting as much to her friends." Yet "for reasons that defy understanding," Lagoa said, Watts-FitzgGerald "learned of these facts and—taking a page out of Inspector Javert's playbook—brought the matter to a grand jury to secure an indictment for a charge that carried up to five years in prison."

Despite evidence that "plainly suggests a good-faith mistake on Moore and Mansell's part," Lagoa wrote, Watts-FitzGerald "determined that this case was worth the public expense of a criminal prosecution, and the lifelong yokes of felony convictions, rather than imposition of a civil fine." Explaining that decision during oral argument last August, the government's lawyer likened the case to car theft on federal property. "If someone steals a car on a military base," she said, "the proper response isn't, well, pay restitution for that. That's a crime." Grant called that "a silly example," adding, "There's no comparison."

In her concurring opinion, Lagoa proposed a different analogy. "Imagine that Bob, walking along a path in a federal park, sees a man rush up to an elderly woman from behind, pull a gun from his pocket, and yell 'Give me your purse or I'll shoot,'" she wrote. "Bob rushes the robber, yanks the gun from his hand, and ushers the old woman out of harm's way."

What if "what Bob witnessed was not a genuine robbery, but a scene being acted out by some students from the local community college"? In other words, Lagoa wrote, "the robber was not a robber at all, but the elderly woman's scene partner for drama class. Bob, of course, had no way of knowing that when he interrupted what he believed to be a violent crime."

Under "the government's theory in this case and applying § 661 as broadly as the government did here," Lagoa noted, "this genuine mistake would be of no moment, because all that matters is that Bob took the 'robber's' property with the intent to deprive him of it. Perhaps it would move the needle if Bob's lawyers requested an instruction on mistake of fact, aiming to undermine the mens rea needed to convict." But for Lagoa, the bottom line is that Bob, like Moore and Mansell, "should not be prosecuted in the first instance."

What happens when prosecutors nevertheless defy fairness and common sense by pursuing criminal charges in a situation like this? In a brief urging the 11th Circuit to reconsider Moore and Mansell's case, the Cato Institute emphasizes the vital role that juries can play in correcting such injustices.

"From a purely originalist standpoint, perhaps the single greatest protection against unjust convictions and punishments was the institution of jury independence,
which included—but was by no means limited to—the power to acquit against the
evidence," writes Clark Neily, Cato's senior vice president for legal studies. "At the Founding, criminal jurors were not relegated to the role of mere fact-finders, as they are today. Indeed, the conception of criminal juries as having no proper role in assessing the wisdom, fairness, or legitimacy of a given prosecution is a more recent invention that early American lawyers and jurists would rightly have condemned as antithetical to centuries of common-law understanding and practice."

Neily notes that "the jury in this case appeared reluctant to convict, and only did
so after sending out seven notes and receiving an Allen charge from the trial judge." If the jury instructions had "better embodied the Supreme Court's directive that 'ambiguity concerning the ambit of criminal statutes should be resolved in favor of lenity,'" he argues, "the verdict would likely have obviated this appeal by more accurately reflecting how ordinary people understand the word 'steal' in the context of potentially ruinous felony charges."

Although "the spectacle of an imperious national government prosecuting virtuous
citizens for activities within its 'special maritime jurisdiction' would have been entirely familiar to the Founders," Neily writes, "they would likely have been dismayed by the identity of that government and by the miscarriage of justice that occurred here. It is
highly doubtful that a Founding-era jury, fully cognizant of its historic powers and
duties, would have branded John Moore and Tanner Mansell lifelong felons for their
misguided attempt to fulfill what they perceived to be a civic duty. The Court can still avoid that result by granting the Petition and applying a suitably restrained interpretation of the relevant statute."

The post 2 Florida Men Who Thought They Were Freeing Illegally Caught Sharks Are Now Felons appeared first on Reason.com.

It started, like so many overwrought home optimization projects, during the pandemic.

My wife and I, like many people stuck inside, were ordering takeout more frequently. We wanted to support local restaurants, reduce the dish load, and live a little. It became clear early on that app-based delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats were not the best way to support local businesses. If a restaurant had its own ordering site or a preferred service, we wanted to use that—or even, heaven forfend, call the place.

The secondary issue was that we kept ordering from the same places, and we wanted to mix it up. Sometimes we'd want to pick something up nearby. Sometimes we wanted to avoid an entire category ("Too many carbs this week, no pasta") or try the newest places we knew about, or maybe a forgotten classic. Or just give me three places randomly, creative constraints, please—it's Friday.

Read full article

Comments

This holiday season, thousands of foreign-born religious workers find themselves unsure whether they'll be allowed to continue serving their communities in the coming years thanks to a backlog in green card applications. Religious leaders are pushing for solutions as the Trump administration prepares to take office next month.

Many churches and other places of worship rely on foreign-born religious workers to provide services, particularly as fewer native-born Americans enter the vocation. "From 1970 to 2020, the number of priests in the U.S. dropped by 60%, according to data from the Georgetown [University Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate]," reported the Associated Press in 2021. "This has left more than 3,500 parishes without a resident pastor."

Foreign religious workers come to the U.S. on R-1 visas, which provide a temporary pathway for "ministers and non-ministers in religious vocations and occupations." The R-1 visa is valid for five years, at which point the holder must either petition for permanent residence status or leave the country for at least a year and apply for a new R-1 visa.

Following a spring 2023 State Department change in green card allocation, religious workers began facing long wait times. The Biden administration started processing neglected and abused immigrant kids in the same green card queue as religious workers, meaning they were competing for the same limited number of green cards—just 10,000 per year. Roughly 100,000 immigrant kids joined the pool. As of this August, the A.P. noted, the backlog "stands at more than 3.5 years and could increase"—potentially up to a decade or more.

Five foreign-born priests and the Catholic Diocese of Paterson, New Jersey, sued the federal government in August over the 2023 change and the long wait times it created. Without relief, the lawsuit argued, the priests would have to "remain unlawfully in the United States" or leave the country and "abandon thousands of Roman Catholics that each Individual-Plaintiff spiritually guides." They would then have to "wait years, if not decades, outside of the United States" before seeking another R-1 visa "to return to their religious calling."

Earlier this month, several anonymous sources told The Pillar, a news site that covers the Catholic Church, that "bipartisan legislation is in the works to address the problem, and is expected to be introduced early next year." An interfaith group listed several potential fixes in a letter to the Department of State and the Department of Homeland Security last year, such as increasing the number of available visas, reducing the amount of time an R-1 holder must spend outside the U.S. before applying for a new R-1 visa, and extending the term of an R-1 visa beyond five years. The letter also called for Congress to exempt neglected and abused immigrant kids from visa limitations.

"Religious workers provide innumerable services to American communities, including culturally competent religious instruction and rituals, as well as direct social services to those in need," wrote Rev. Mark J. Seitz, bishop of El Paso and chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Migration, in a letter to Congress last summer.

"Unfortunately," he continued, "the current situation violates both Congress' intent to provide religious organizations and our communities with needed workers and its express desire to protect vulnerable immigrant youth."

The post Foreign-Born Religious Workers Are Trapped in a Green Card Backlog appeared first on Reason.com.

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Anyone who thinks AI endangers poets should first prove that there exists a poetry journal with more readers than contributors.

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Don't at me, history of international politics scholars!

American media is abuzz with news of President-elect Donald Trump's nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be the head of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Seemingly every story mentions his controversial views on topics from vaccines to fluoride in the water to raw milk—a longtime libertarian cause célèbre. Though it's hard to envision a more unlikely catalyst, RFK Jr.'s nomination may be the final push that gets raw milk across the legalization finish line.

Until the late 1800s, raw milk was simply known as "milk" and was the only game in town for Americans desiring a delicious dairy beverage. But when it was discovered that heating up products like milk could reduce the presence of potentially harmful bacteria, the pasteurization craze was underway. Given reports of thousands of babies dying from bacteria-riddled milk around this time period, pasteurization was seen as a remarkable public health breakthrough.

This set off a wave of 20th century state and local government mandates that required milk to be pasteurized. Finally, in 1987, a federal court cemented a federal ban on all interstate raw milk sales. But not long afterward, the modern organic food movement was born, and raw milk became a cult favorite among the crunchy political left. Now, raw milk has increasingly been adopted as a sort of culture war status symbol on the political right.

"Long a fringe health food for new-age hippies and fad-chasing liberal foodies, raw milk has won over the hearts and minds of GOP legislators and regulators in the last few years," writes Marc Novicoff in Politico. In addition to its inherent deregulatory appeal, Novicoff recounts that "conservatives discovered that raw milk fit neatly inside a worldview that was increasingly skeptical of credentialed expertise."

Over the last decade, numerous states have passed laws to legalize raw milk, leading food policy expert Baylen Linnekin to declare that the "raw milk restoration is underway." Could it now be about to kick into overdrive, potentially even spreading to an overturn of the federal interstate sales ban?

Whatever one's views of RFK's potential adeptness—or lack thereof—at navigating the federal bureaucracy to pursue his agenda, he may not be the only member of Trump's cabinet to be a raw milk enthusiast. Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.), who has run a bill in Congress for the last decade to overturn the federal ban, is heavily rumored to be the next Secretary of Agriculture.

To further contribute to the momentum, there is at least some evidence that the political left may embrace raw milk again as well. Although most states that have passed recent raw milk reforms skew red, states like Colorado have seen Democratic lawmakers introduce raw milk bills this past year (with Governor Jared Polis supporting the effort). Additionally, deep-blue Delaware just became the latest state to legalize raw milk. According to the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, a majority of states have now legalized raw milk in some form and only a handful still ban it outright.

At the federal level, in addition to raw milk's ideological virtue-signaling appeal to GOP lawmakers and administration officials, Senators like Cory Booker (D–N.J.) have taken strong anticorporate agriculture stances during their time in office, thereby making it at least conceivable they could join Republican colleagues in overturning the federal ban.

The pushback, however, is still significant. Numerous studies and health experts warn of the dangers of raw milk compared to pasteurized milk. Data from the Centers for Disease Control found that between 1998 and 2018, there were 202 outbreaks of foodborne illnesses from raw milk, which led to 2,645 people becoming ill, 228 hospitalizations, and three deaths.

While few would seriously dispute that pasteurized milk reduces the chance of acquiring a food-borne illness, it raises an interesting question: What should the comparison point be for raw milk in terms of safety? Should it be compared to pasteurized milk, or is it fairer to compare it to other raw (or even non-raw) foods?

For instance, raw oysters—a delicacy enjoyed by many Americans that are not legally prohibited—kill around 100 people per year, compared to the 3 raw milk deaths the CDC found over two decades. A 2024 salmonella outbreak linked to backyard poultry—another legal activity in most jurisdictions—resulted in 125 hospitalizations and one death in less than a year. In the 12-year period from 1998 to 2010, the CDC recorded 1,345 illnesses, 104 hospitalizations, and 19 deaths
from deli meat, while even the humble fruit salad caused 1,323 illnesses, 29 hospitalizations, and 1 death during this period.

In other words, raw milk doesn't appear to be uniquely dangerous compared to other completely legal and freely available foods but is still prohibited in a handful of states and subject to a federal ban. As improbable as it may seem, RFK's nomination—with a potential Rep. Massie add-on nomination—could be what finally breaks open the raw milk legal dam.

The post Is America Finally Having Its Raw Milk Moment? appeared first on Reason.com.