The New York Times Sunday reported Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter was among several Democrats who voiced a certain degree of uneasiness with the Obama administration’s lawsuit challenging Arizona’s new immigration law.

At the summer meeting of the National Governors Association in Boston, the Times reported Democrats already worried about their re-election prospects in November given the weak economy now find themselves grappling with immigration reform – a highly divisive issue.

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State Bill Photo: Jamie Cotten
Bob Roper, chief courts technology officer, and State Court Administrator Jerry Marroney were photographed speaking to people after a recent meeting about the proposed takeover of two computer systems.

STATE BILL COLORADO

The Colorado House tonight bucked a bipartisan attempt to delay a proposed state takeover of two Judicial Department computer systems operated currently under contract by information giant LexisNexis.

The effort failed by the narrowest of margins: 33 voting no, 32 voting yes.

The House, as part of the annual budget approval process, rejected an amendment proposed by Rep. Joe Rice, D-Littleton, that would have allowed the Lexis and state systems to operate simultaneously during a transition period.

Rice said that the operating plan for the two systems hadn’t been fully vetted by the state’s technology office. The transition period, he said, would allow legislators to be sure that the systems are fully operational at the time the Lexis systems are shut down.

Under the plan, the first system to be taken over provides electronic access to dockets and other records. It’s primarily used by background-screening companies to determine whether applicants have clean records.

The second system allows attorneys to file lawsuits and pleadings electronically.

The State Court Administrator’s Office has argued that Lexis won’t modify the systems to make enhancements in some areas that are regarded as less profitable or not profitable. Court officials insist they have the expertise to provide both systems, and they asked for 19 additional employees to operate them.

Democratic State Reps. Beth McCann and Claire Levy, both lawyers, joined Reps. Max Tyler and Dickey Lee Hullinghorst in arguing for the state takeover, which is expected to generate millions in additional income to the budget-strapped courts through search and filing fees now received by LexisNexis and subvendors, including BIS and Axciom Risk Management. The Joint Budget Committee initially requested the takeover, noting, in part, the severity of the cash crunch.

Joining Rice in arguing for the transition period were Rep. Bob Gardner, also a lawyer, and Rep. Jim Kerr. Both are Republicans. Kerr complained that the state has a poor track record when it comes to launching and running computer systems, and he urged the state to build in a fail-safe period through the transition.

In the end, the amendment failed by a non-recorded vote of legislators standing and sitting. An attempt to revive the amendment produced the recorded 32-33 vote. The full House later gave preliminary passage to the state’s budget, HB10-1376. A final vote is expected tomorrow. The bill moves to the Senate next week. If the two bodies disagree about how to handle the court computer systems, a conference committee will iron out the two versions for another round of approvals before the full budget package goes to Gov. Bill Ritter.

The takeover of the court systems has been heavily lobbied for the past two years. Joining the state in arguing for the takeover were lobbyists for Pasadena, Calif.-based Courthouse News Service, which advocates for reducing or dropping fees the state charges for access to court records on the day that they are filed. CNS makes money by selling new filings to law firms nationwide.

Either fighting for the takeover or advocating a transitional period were LexisNexis and BIS. Both also retained lobbyists.

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Willie Shepherd

Willie Shepherd, a Democratic political insider whose departure in 2009 from the law firm he co-founded raised a stir in local legal circles, received a public censure today for misrepresentations he made while at that firm, The Denver Post reports. He did not contest it. The censure states that Shepherd misrepresented to a potential client, E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, the diversity at the firm where he worked, then Kamlet Shepherd & Reichert. Shepherd said in a Dec. 6, 2007, e-mail that his firm had a collective women and minority equity ownership interest of 48.5 percent; in fact it was 30.1 percent.

Read the Law Week Colorado story on Shepherd’s disappearance in May 2009 on our sister site, State Bill News.

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STATE BILL COLORADO
President Barack Obama this morning signed comprehensive health reform into law. Here’s how Colorado news organizations covered Colorado Attorney General John Suthers’ promise to join a lawsuit over the legislation.

Associated Press: Colorado Attorney General John Suthers is joining a national lawsuit to try to block federal health care legislation — over the objections of Gov. Bill Ritter and the Democrats who control the state Legislature. Suthers said Monday he would join fellow Republican attorneys general in at least nine other states in opposing the bill because he thinks a provision requiring most Americans to purchase insurance is an unconstitutional expansion of federal power. Congress has the right to control interstate commerce but can’t force people to participate in commerce, he said.

KDVR: Suthers, a Republican up for reelection in November, announced Monday afternoon that he was adding Colorado to the list of states joining in a lawsuit to block the federal health care legislation. Suthers and other Republicans argue that the federal government has no right to force Americans to buy health insurance or face a fine.

The Denver Post: So far, all of the attorneys general challenging the bill — which President Barack Obama is expected to sign into law today — are Republicans. But Suthers said the legal action isn’t about politics, saying the new health care bill “has serious ramifications for states’ rights and individual freedoms.”

Denver Daily News: Republican Attorney General John Suthers at an afternoon news conference yesterday announced plans to join with other states in a lawsuit to exempt Colorado from provisions in the sweeping health care overhaul. The lawsuit alleges that Congress does not have the authority to regulate interstate commerce that would force consumers to carry health insurance.

Grand Junction Daily Sentinel: Colorado will join nine other states in a legal attack on just-passed heath care legislation, questioning the constitutionality of the requirement that individuals purchase health insurance. Congress can’t simply force individuals to purchase a product or service because it’s convenient, Attorney General John Suthers said.

Denver Business Journal: In requiring that Americans buy a product — health insurance — rather than just regulating the sale of products, the “Patient Protection and Health Care Affordability Act,” passed by the U.S. House of Representatives late Sunday, sets a new precedent, Suthers said.

The Colorado Independent: U.S. Senate candidate Jane Norton is feeling heat again on the right Monday. Although health care reform legislation passed Sunday, the battle against it continues around the country and in Colorado. Attorney General John Suthers today joined a lawsuit targeting the health bill on Constitutional grounds and local right bloggers are pressing for Norton to pledge to work to repeal the bill should Coloradans send her to Washington.

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When discrimination happens in the workplace, employees who have unfairly lost their jobs have few places to turn for help, particularly on the Western Slope, supporters of a bill to fix that say, the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel reports. That’s why Rep. Claire Levy, D-Boulder, introduced a measure into the Colorado Legislature this session that would implement a new provision in discrimination cases tried in state courts that could leave small businesses liable for compensatory and punitive damages should they lose.

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Raymond L. Gifford

By Matt Masich, STATE BILL COLORADO
DENVER — Six attorneys have left Denver law firm Kamlet Reichert to join Washington, D.C.-based Wilkinson Barker & Knauer, a firm that does not currently have a Denver office. Leaving Kamlet Reichert’s Denver office are Raymond L. Gifford, Eric D. Gunning, Adam M. Peters, Philip J. Roselli and Mark A. Walker. Leaving the D.C. office is Kyle D. Dixon.
Gifford, the former head of Colorado’s Public Utilities Commission, was for the last three years in charge of Kamlet Reichert’s communications, Internet and intellectual property practice. From 2003 to 2006, he led the Washington, D.C.-based Progress & Freedom Foundation think tank. Gifford was chairman of the PUC from 1999 to 2003, serving as an appointee of former Gov. Bill Owens. Last year he led a successful pro bono legal push to get PUC approval for Union Taxi to operate.
Wilkinson Barker & Knauer bills itself as one of the nation’s leading communications law firms. The firm does not now list a Denver office. Its clients range from the largest communications companies in the world to small start-ups. Kathleen Abernathy, a partner in the firm, previously served as a Commissioner at the Federal Communications Commission.
Kamlet Reichert’s attorney roster has dwindled from a firm-wide 48 in 2008, to 35 in 2009, to 21 at present, according to Law Week Colorado research.

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By Allie Winter, STATE BILL COLORADO
Sen. Ted Harvey, R-Highlands Ranch, doesn’t want branches of government to hire outside counsel, the way Gov. Ritter did last year, without a decent explanation. That’s why he’s sponsoring SB10-136, a bill that would require the governor or chief justice to put in writing why they need to hire a third-party lawyer instead of using state-funded Attorney General John Suthers.
Harvey referred to Ritter employing his former law firm, Hogan & Hartson, as an example of unnecessary money being spent. “We spent [thousands of dollars] to the governor’s former law firm to be able to do this service when the attorney general’s office most likely could have done it,” Harvey said.
While John Suthers’ camp is saying it’s neutral when it comes to this bill, Harvey said Suthers helped him with the wording of the bill to make sure that legally everything was correct.
The bill is not meant to prohibit the executive branch from doing what it wants to do, Harvey said, but it just makes them justify it.
He suspects there will be some opposition from the liberals in the General Assembly. “I think it will be interesting to see how the Democrats handle it,” he said. “[The bill] is bringing up the fact that Gov. Ritter did do that, and it puts limits on the government’s ability in the future.”
The bill is scheduled to be heard in a Senate State Affairs committee early next week.

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A bill that makes a third DUI conviction a felony is scheduled to be heard Monday afternoon by a House committee, The Denver Post reports. House Bill 1184 doesn’t have a fiscal note attached to it yet but several Capitol observors say they believe the price tag will be too prohibitive for the budget-challenged stat

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“If there’s one thing personal injury lawyers are especially good at, it’s exploiting the misfortunes of their clients while devising new ways to line their own pockets,” Mark Hillman writes in The Denver Post. “Colorado House Bill 1168 is this year’s prime example. While claiming to help injured parties receive full compensation for damages caused by the fault of someone else, what it really does is guarantee that the injured person, in order to be fully compensated, must hire a lawyer.”

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For Rep. Cory Gardner, three strikes don’t mean he’s out when it comes to trying to amend the so-called “Make My Day” law, The Colorado Statesman reports. The Yuma Republican will make a fourth attempt this session to expand to business owners and employees the law that allows residents to use deadly force to protect their households.

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