October 22, 2025 • 57 mins
Recorded Live at Baltimore Comic Con!
It’s a Bird! It’s a Plane! It’s a Felony? Did Superman Cause Us to Go to War?
Our favorite Kryptonian and adopted Earthling returned to the big screen in 2025, but legal issues abound in this movie, including: Is Superman an American citizen or even legally adopted? Can his actions represent the United States Government? Did Lex Luthor violate the Espionage Act? Which kind of license should Krypto have: dog or pilot? Can Supergirl be held legally responsible for drunk partying? Join our team of lawyers and comic book aficionados as they educationally and hilariously analyze these questions and more, with Michael Dennis, David Donovan, Joel Schwarz, and Mark Zaid. Presented by The Legal Geeks (TheLegalGeeks.com) in their first Baltimore Comic-Con appearance!
No part of this recording should be considered legal advice.
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok @TheLegalGeeks
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:02):
All right.
Thank you guys for yourpatience.
Good evening.
You guys having a good time atthe con?
We'd like to see, especially inBaltimore, we we we do this
presentation uh in San Diegoevery year.
Not this one, different topicsevery year.
Uh and of course we get lots ofpeople.
We don't generally have a lot ofpeople at Baltimore Panel Cons.
(00:25):
It's starting to get better eachyear, which is awesome.
Uh so really appreciate youcoming here.
Uh my name is Mark Zayd.
I'm an attorney in Washington,D.C.
I do national security work.
Some of that will actually bepart of tonight's presentation.
Uh I'm also a comic book dealerpart-time, uh, do a lot of legal
work in the comic community.
(00:45):
I'm an advisor to the OverstreetComic Book Price Guide and
Grading Guides, represent CGCuhwise when comic dealers get in
trouble, which is not as oftenas my federal government clients
uh who do.
Um here's our legal geeksensemble.
Dave Donovan is a luckilyretired lawyer, uh big big firm,
(01:09):
retired lawyers, uh lawyer.
And I'm gonna let them, as theystart a little bit of their
presentations as we go along, toadd in details about what they
do in their practices to whythey might have chosen a
particular topic.
Joel Schwartz and I went to lawschool together uh back in New
York and has worked for theJustice Department and the New
(01:32):
York State Attorney General.
And Michael Dennis gets ouraward for traveling the furthest
because he's come fromCalifornia just to be here with
you guys.
He is my fellow legal geekmember.
Uh we were supposed to have theour founding legal geek father
(01:52):
show up, but he got sick,unfortunately.
Uh but a shout out to Josh, whowho isn't here and hopefully
will listen uh in the recording.
Uh so the Legal Geeks is a groupof lawyers, mostly on the West
Coast.
A few of us now brought it outto the East Coast, and we will
analyze comic books, movies,television shows, whether
(02:16):
they're related to comics ornot.
Uh we've done Daredevil.
We did a uh mock trial of Jaws afew years ago at San Diego.
That's where those pictures arefrom.
SPEAKER_03 (02:25):
That is where the pictures are from.
That's Mark's closing argument.
And um, that's me saying I'llfight for you.
1-800 shark bites if you'relooking for representation.
SPEAKER_00 (02:33):
Jurassic Park, Star Wars, Star Trek, you know, all
sorts of uh Transformers,Indiana Jones.
It's a lot of fun.
This is the first time we'vebrought it here.
Uh so hopefully this will besomething we will continue.
Someone who's like eight feettall just walked by the door
there.
That was very strange to see.
Uh so we will uh see how thisworks out, and hopefully you'll
(02:56):
all enjoy it, and we'll bring itback again for next year.
So, our topic tonight, as wassaid, uh it's a bird, it's a
plane, it's a felony, didSuperman cause us to go to war?
So, the latest Superman film, Itrust, hope everybody has seen
it, right?
Uh, because otherwise you willbe so lost uh for as we talk
about this tonight.
(03:17):
But you'll still get it becauseit's it's a hoot.
And we were gonna go through abunch of issues because what
happens for those of us as legalgeeks, uh, and now we have two
newest members, you we sit inthese movies and go, oh, there's
a tort that just happened there,or no, he would be sued for
that.
There's no way this washappening.
And it it actually kind of ruinsa lot of movies as we go through
(03:40):
them uh to have that on.
Uh, or like that would neverhappen in the real courtroom
scene in Daredevil or somethingof that sort.
Superman 2025 presented a lot ofgood legal issues.
And we're gonna start off withuh Joel telling us, well, for
one thing, was Superman adoptedlegally, he came here obviously
from another planet.
(04:01):
Now, in the comic book, it's the1930s, Kansas, so it's probably
easier to adopt a child that youdid not have and just showed up
on your doorstep.
But as I remember, this film ismodern.
So Superman was born in the1990s, and someone told me the
metropolis was like Delaware.
SPEAKER_03 (04:20):
Yeah, it is Delaware.
SPEAKER_00 (04:21):
It's supposed to be in Delaware.
SPEAKER_03 (04:23):
Seriously?
SPEAKER_00 (04:23):
Yeah, yeah.
So I'm not sure what happened.
Joel, what would happen?
SPEAKER_02 (04:27):
Right, thank you.
Well, first, since I've neverdone this before, it's great
that I get to go first.
Um so and and the movie does,and I saw this movie a few uh
recently, but it doesn't reallygo into the question of
Superman's origin.
I think most of the peopleassume they know it at this
point in time, and Tim Gunndidn't spend a lot of time about
the, you know, as a baby part.
So if you assume that he wasadopted, and I'm gonna raise
(04:50):
that for a second because theremight be an assumption that he
actually was born here in theUS, which I know people are
gonna be shocked about.
We'll talk about it in a second.
So if he was adopted, looking atthe Kansas statute, what would
happen is obviously Martha andum uh Jonathan Ken did not have
the baby.
So they would have found thebaby, and the way it works in
Kansas, under the statutecurrently in place, is you'd
actually take the baby,surrender the baby because it's
(05:11):
not theirs, they can't legallykeep it, surrender it to one of
the authorities, lawenforcement, the firehouse, etc.
Um, they would have to thenreport that to the secretary of
the state, who would thendeliver the infant to a specific
facility set aside for that.
What happens at that point intime?
They become a ward of the state,foster child.
Now, that's where I thought wasthe most interesting part, and
I'm looking at my slides overhere to make sure they're up
(05:31):
there, but you know, JonathanKent would and Martha Kent would
have had to apply for adoption,to be an adoptive parent.
But there's no guarantee,because you brought the child
in, that you actually get toadopt them.
And in fact, actually, thechallenge would have been that
when you try to, you know, whenyou bring the child in and try
to get the adoption going, youhave a lot of questions you
gotta answer.
A lot of questions like, wheredid the child just get found?
Do you know who the parents are?
(05:52):
What were the circumstancessurrounding coming into
possession of the child?
Those are gonna be a littlechallenging.
Even in 1980, 1990, with all theUFO you know discussions today,
explaining that's gonna be hardto do when you're filing an
adoption certificate.
And if you do, it's veryunlikely you're gonna think
you're well enough to give themchild custody of you.
You custody.
But I do want to talk a littleabout foster care.
So just to qualify this, Iactually was a prosecutor for
(06:13):
the DC attorney's office for acouple of months, six months,
dealing with domestic violencecases.
I met a lot of kids who actuallywere very brave.
One actually had to testifyagainst his own mother because
she had stabbed him, to put herinto a mental site board to help
her, but then by doing that, hebecame a foster child.
So some of these kids are reallybrave.
But I've also seen the otherside where foster care doesn't
work out that well, and that'swhat some of these pictures are.
(06:35):
So, Superman, if he had actuallygotten to foster care.
So you have a few differentoptions here.
Red Sun, which was a great uhmovie, we still uh rented a few
years ago.
Um theoretically, I guess inthis case, he wasn't he didn't
crash in Russia, but he wasadopted by Russian parents and
moved back to Russia, SovietUnion back then.
Or you have Brightburn, one ofthe scarier movies.
I don't know.
Has anybody here seen Brightburnthe movie?
(06:56):
Basically, I mean I have fourkids, so I can tell you, when
you get a boy who doesn't wantto listen to you is scary,
that's bad enough.
A superhuman boy who has nothingto stop him, has laser eyes, he
can do anything he wants, that'svery scary.
So, you know, you never knowwhere Brightburn came from.
They don't talk whether he'sadopted or not.
And Homelander, come on, Amazonthe boys.
Again, absolutely norestrictions whatsoever on what
he does, and no sort of filter,if you will.
(07:18):
So those are possibilities withfoster care.
But let's turn to slide, becauseI think there's a good argument
here that he was actually maynot have been adopted at all.
Because if you read, and this isthe last com one of the last
comics I read when I grew up,the 1986 version of The Man of
Steel, you actually haveSuperman um the um pod crashing,
(07:38):
and the way it works in, youknow, in on Krypton, apparently,
you put them in the gestationchamber.
So when the gestation chamberopens, theoretically, they're
born here.
But assuming you put that asidefor a second, there was also the
idea in this comic that they'dbeen snowed in for five months
in a snowstorm, and thereforethey claim that they actually
gave birth to the child.
They had a couple of pre uhprevious miscarriages, they had
(07:58):
a still birth.
So it is feasible, given a bigsnowstorm, if they had the
child, which means they mighthave gone and actually filed the
birth certificate, claiming it'stheir child.
Which gets the final question Iwant to cover here, which is
fraud.
Um because clearly we know thetruth that he did not actually
give that Martha didn't givebirth.
(08:19):
So now you have the questionabout perjury.
Did Jonathan Kent commit perjuryby filing for the social
security number?
Um you'll see at the bottom overthere, there is a sworn
statement that you do actuallyhave to sign under penalty of
perjury.
Now, the good news for Jonathanis the five-year statute of
limitations, so I think he'spassed it at this point in time.
However, it runs from the dateif you could seal the crime.
So the question is, when wouldyou have figured out that
(08:40):
Superman really wasn't theirchild and they was actually a
superhero from another planet?
Finally, I just want to note Ialso looked at the Nazi
questions about Nazicitizenship.
Back in the old days, you know,people from the World War II
would claim to get citizenshiphere, become naturalized.
You could revoke it if you foundout they lied on their
application.
Um theoretically, you coulddenaturalize Superman if he
actually was naturalized throughhis parents.
(09:00):
But given that his parentsweren't the aliens from another
country, but aliens from anotherplanet, I'm pretty sure the
naturalization laws did applyanyway.
So I'm going with they think hewas born here, he wasn't
adopted.
Jonathan did lie, but he's waypast the statute of limitations,
so we're cool.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
So the movie starts out with Superman lying in the
as we learn to be the Antarctic,and crypto brings him to the
fortress of solitude.
And there's a comment by LexLuthor that that violated uh 12
treaties.
Did it?
SPEAKER_03 (09:33):
I can go to the next one.
Of course, you you all followLex Luthor Corp on the socials,
and there is an active Twitteraccount that you can follow
where he does post Superman hasviolated 12 treaties.
I would counter with uh hashtagdo better because he's wrong.
(09:54):
It's one treaty signed by 12countries.
It is the Antarctic Treaty, and12 countries originally signed
it, and what it's designated todo is say, hey, we can make
Antarctica special.
And we're gonna sign a treatythat says everyone who has a
claim to it, you get to keepyour claim.
And no one's gonna say yourclaim should be something
(10:16):
different.
And we're gonna make this anarea where all we're gonna do is
science.
There is gonna be no militaryaspect to it.
What does Superman build inAntarctica?
A fortress.
It's not a bungalude of peace,it's not a like a charming
little quaint fixer-upper.
He builds a fortress.
(10:36):
I mean, like the T spheres onthis guy.
So if you look at it, this well,you know, just gotta look at it.
People don't violate treaties,countries violate treaties when
it comes down to so the US canactually violate a prosecute a
(11:01):
citizen that violates it.
So let's look what Superman hasdone here.
This is a comic when he wasracing Flash, and apparently he
decided to stop off and give atour of his house.
He goes, here's all the things Ihave, people, that uh come and
come see.
To my fortress.
The stuff he has there, he hasan alien zoo.
You're not allowed to bringanimals or vegetation to
(11:21):
Antarctica.
He brings an entire zoo withhim.
And it's not just a fortress.
He has the miniature city ofCandor, the capital of Trypton
in a bottle with a complete redsun there.
Yeah, that's a completeviolation of the when he saw it
there.
So would a kid be prosecuted forthis?
Most likely, yes, because theUSA could come in, and now we've
(11:44):
established she's a citizen, andactually prosecute a citizen for
violating one of the treaties.
There's an old not old, but it'scalled Uh Bond versus US.
This lady caught her husbandcheating on her.
So what she did was applychemicals to the mistress's
doorknob, mailbox, and car,hoping she'd get chemical burns.
(12:04):
They prosecuted her for aviolation of the Chemical
Treaties Act for improperlyusing chemicals, something they
tried to ban to the convenerconvention.
They never got to the subject,but she was brought up on that.
So it has happened.
He could get charged, but at theend of the day, he's an
individual.
He did not violate any treatiesbecause he's an individual.
SPEAKER_00 (12:24):
So, Joel, we talked a little bit about whether he
could be legally adopted in theUnited States, but is he
actually a U.S.
citizen?
SPEAKER_02 (12:32):
Thank you for asking the question.
And by the way, I wasn't goingto say the fortress is out now
available actually on Airbnb ifyou want to look at it.
So, first of all, gratuitousLatin, because every time a
lawyer speaks, you want to hearLatin.
And since we're doing this forfree, I can say equilibrius
unum.
So I'm going to go for jussanguinis and jus soli.
Basically, the right of blood,meaning you're born to parents,
(12:53):
people who are actually citizensof the country.
And basically, jus soli meansright of soil, born in the soil.
We hear this today a lot aboutbirthright citizenship, right?
So going back to my idea aboutthe pod crashing here, the idea
in the more recent comic booksis that the pod, he was actually
still gestating when he wastraveling here to the um to the
earth.
When he landed in the podopened, that is when he was
(13:14):
actually born.
And thus, therefore, he was bornhere on American soil, born in
the USA.
I was actually hoping to get theBruce Springs thing song, but I
didn't know how we were gonnaget that going.
So if he was born in the USAunder the 14th Amendment of the
Constitution, he is a naturalborn citizen.
And yes, you can try to revokecitizenship under very rare
circumstances when children areborn to aliens.
(13:37):
There's a famous case actuallyfrom the 1800s, a US Supreme
Court case, US v.
Wang Kim Ark, where they triedto deny him citizenship based
upon the fact that he was bornto parents.
But the only exceptions theSupreme Court finds to this
birthright idea born on Americansoil is when either you're born
to a diplomat, becausetheoretically you're not really
here as a citizen, or you'reborn by on a hostile territory,
(14:00):
by the to an alien on a hostilewho's there hostile.
So in other words, you're inpossession of a piece of
territory and the child's bornthere.
You're not there truthfully andvoluntarily.
Now I don't think either ofthose work, um, is this case,
especially, and plus thealienation thing, again,
intergalactic aliens, probablynot part of the Supreme Court
case in 1898.
So I think the idea here that hehas birthright citizenship makes
(14:21):
a lot of sense.
Which then, of course, now wecome to the current time when
we're now litigating whether ornot you can revoke birthright
citizenship.
Um I did want to note that rightnow it's actually still sitting
with the Supreme Court.
Um, the um Trump administrationin September of this layer, last
month, asked the Supreme Courtto review the constitutionality
of an executive order where hewas trying to remove birthright
citizenship if at least one ofyour parents is not a U.S.
(14:43):
citizen or a legal permanentresident.
And in this case, I think we canbe very clear that neither of
Superman's parents were legalresidents or U.S.
citizens.
But I want to do a couple ofalternative theories here.
So if you could turn the page.
So in action comics number 900,Superman actually renounced his
American citizenship.
Has anybody read this one?
Yeah, because again, it's becomemore controversial over time,
(15:06):
and he said, I'm tired of beingconsidered an instrument of U.S.
policy, I'm a citizen of theworld.
Now, if you renounce yourcitizenship, you potentially
could lose that citizenship.
But I think there's an easierquestion to answer here, which
is in the movie we learned thatSuperman's parents did not send
him here for beneficentpurposes.
They sent him here to rule theworld, to take over, to have
(15:27):
many wives, to um do us proudand rule without mercy, quote
unquote.
And I just, by the way, I justfinished watching the um last
season of Cobra Kai, so I kepton thinking about Cobra Kai
without mercy when I waswatching the movie.
But to rule without mercy here.
And there is a statute thatallows you, if you have
terrorists or parents who areterrorists, who come here under
(15:47):
false pretenses and getcitizenship, and they actually
gotten to citizenship, you candenaturalize them, you can
denaturalize the child as well.
But I'm going to go back to myoriginal theory here because I
think it's how it works a lotbetter and I like Superman, um,
which is that he's theoreticallyborn here, they think he's a US
citizen, and he thinks Marthaand Clark Kent, sorry, Martha
and Jonathan Kent gave birth tohim.
(16:07):
Um and finally, I did want tonote, because it's also very um
concurrent, you know, the otheroption is that Superman's a
dreamer.
Right?
You have to DACA people, youknow, deferred action for
childhood.
So even assuming that heactually came here and he wasn't
a citizen, he wasn't born here,etc., and he was brought here by
his parents without his ownwill, because he was still just
(16:27):
dating a baby, he is then adreamer under US law.
As of mid-2025, Congress has notyet granted a citizenship for a
right to passage way tocitizenship for dreamers.
So right now, Superman isprobably the best poster child
for the dreamer community, andDACA to approve DACA in Congress
to pass the law.
So next time you talk about DACAin Congress, say, make Superman
a citizen, pass DACA.
SPEAKER_00 (16:50):
Well, since we're not sure if he's a citizen, is
he not a citizen, whichever oneit is, can he be arrested by the
US government?
Right?
We saw that.
He's called an extraterrestrialorganism.
Uh so do they have rights?
Right?
They he talks about though, theydon't give any details of the
Department of Justice issued anarrest warrant.
(17:13):
They don't say what the basis ofthe arrest warrant was, did it
go to a grand jury or not?
But without getting toopolitical, at least if you were
an alien, you did still haverights in the United States, and
if you got arrested, you wouldstill, by the Fifth and the 14th
Amendment, have, as it appliesto all persons.
It doesn't speak to citizenshipof whether or not you would
(17:36):
still have constitutionalrights.
Uh, of course, we have this verystrange deportation, so to
speak, uh, where he's sent tothe pocket universe, which we'll
talk uh a little bit about uh alittle bit later.
Uh but as the Supreme Court casesaid, even 25 years ago, uh even
aliens have rights.
So uh pretty confident he couldnot be sent to the pocket
(17:59):
universe without going throughat least some due process system
of whichever city he wasactually in, whether it was
fictitious or under the UnitedStates.
Now, Lex Luther, we learn, has avery secret plan with the
president of Boravia.
Uh at first we know he's sellingarms, military weaponry to
(18:22):
Boravia, and then we learn thathe has a much closer
relationship to the Boravians,where he's going to actually
take part or take over some ofthe neighboring country, so he's
acting in cohoots with thePresident of Boravia.
So, does he need to register asa foreign agent?
We have in the United States theForeign Agents Registration Act
(18:44):
in 22 USB 611.
Uh, and without having to gothrough all the language there
on the screen, basically theanswer is uh yeah.
I think way the way you areworking with the President of
Boravia, that you're engaging inpolitical activities or in the
interests of such foreignprinciple, you would need to
(19:06):
register with the Department ofJustice.
It's not that difficult.
I've done it uh at times in someof the cases that I have worked
in.
You just file a bunch ofpaperwork.
But if you don't submit thatpaperwork, you can be convicted
and have a fine of not more than$10,000.
Probably Lex Luther doesn't careabout that.
Uh but hey, for each count, youcould get up to five years
(19:29):
imprisonment.
Uh so we don't see what happensto Lex Luthor towards the end uh
with respect to his relationshipwith Boravia, other than he gets
beat up by crypto, uh, whichcould be a separate tort in and
of itself that we can talkabout.
Uh but there is an issue thathe's going to have among many,
as we saw in the film.
(19:49):
One of the things that he wasdoing, of course, was these damn
monkeys.
The army of monkeys def was hebeing defamed by the armies of
monkeys.
SPEAKER_02 (20:09):
I think you're asking me that question.
So the question, so there isdefamation has defamation has a
number of elements.
And for those of you who are notlawyers, which those of you who
are very fortunate who are notlawyers, um there's an every
crime has a number of elements.
In this case, there are fourelements.
You have to have a falsecommunication of facts.
Can we all agree that what hewas having the monkeys transmit
(20:31):
were false communications?
Yes or no?
Raise your hands, come on.
Yeah, alright, okay.
Publication communicated to thethird party.
You don't see who it's sent to,but we're pretty sure it's going
up to third parties on theinternet.
Causing material or reputationalharm and negligent- he does so
negligence or with malice.
Now, pretty sure that wasn'tnegligence, but how many people
(20:52):
here think malice?
Yeah, there we go.
Alright.
I'm not even gonna talk aboutdefamation per se, because I
just want to talk about some ofthe defenses to defamation.
So the question is can we talkabout Lex Luther?
Is he subject to prosecution fordefamation?
And there's of course civildefamation, there's also
criminal uh charges you couldbring.
So some of the defenses aretruth.
Now, truth is an absolute um,you know, absolute defense to
(21:16):
defamation, but we're prettysure he didn't have super
harems.
We know that um so and some ofthe things he put up there were
actually not true as well.
Opinion.
Clear opinions are notprosecutable under defamation.
Now I will say the hashtags likesuper shit.
I hope there are no kids inhere.
That probably is consideredopinion and probably not gonna
be defamation.
(21:36):
But he said enough other stuffas well.
And then there's alsoprivileges.
There's an absolute privilege,such as when you're testifying
before a congressionalcommittee, testifying in court,
or qualify privilege, such aswhen if you have a legal or
moral duty to say something,whistleblowers is a good
example.
But then you have lack of fault.
If it's a public figure, thestandard is higher, and
basically it's not defamationunless you have actual malice.
(21:59):
So again, I think we get back tothe idea that there is actual
malice here.
Clearly, Lex Luthor has it outfor him, not happy with him.
So that's the easy one.
So I did want to touch on onething though, which is the
social media liability.
Thank you.
So, first of all, is Lex Luthorguilty of, let's say,
cyberbullying?
So, I will tell you actually,one of the cases I prosecuted,
(22:19):
one of the first cases I workedon as the Justice Department,
was a case called Lori Drew.
You probably all might rememberit.
There was a girl named Megan.
Her Lori Drew and her daughterwere defaming the Megan online.
Megan ended up committingsuicide, which led to a
conviction.
She actually had her convictionoverturned on appeal, but many
states started passingcyberbullying laws.
Sadly, by the way, I thought uhmetropolis was in New York, so I
(22:41):
went to New York here.
So New York actually does nothave a cyber bullying statute.
So once again, Lex Luther getsaway with it.
But there are harassmentstatutes, which is a
misdemeanor.
There is an aggravatedharassment statute, which is a
felony.
I think we can all concede thatit's probably aggravated
harassment.
So I do think Lex Luthor couldpotentially be liable for a few
of those things.
Now, could he be liable as thepublisher?
(23:03):
That is where section 230 of theCommunications Decency Act comes
in.
And you probably remember fromlike 10 years ago, five years
ago, we were all trying torepeal it because platforms
aren't responsible for thepublishing information published
in the site as long as they takeit down when they get notice
it's false and untrue.
So the CDA provides a lot ofimmunity, and probably I'm
assuming Lexaluther who runs theplatform will probably get away
with it.
(23:23):
But I just want to say onething, and I think I have one
more thing I want to talk abouthere.
Nobody talks about this.
There's lots of memes about thewhole monkey thing and monkey
bots and trolls, etc.
But nobody yet, and this wasepiphany the major in the movie,
nobody once talked about howamazing the connection was.
I mean, I can't get an internetconnection from my basement to
my office, and he's sitting in apocket universe on the internet
(23:45):
and getting great connectivity.
Elon Musk can't even producethat.
So, putting everything elseaside, I want to know the
provider that Lex Luthor usesfor his monkeys.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
The other thing we saw was that Luther had said he
was authorized to kill Superman.
Now that is a complicated matterfor anyone in the United States
to be authorized by thegovernment to murder someone or
to legally kill if it is notmurder.
There's no indication of reallywhat basis it was that he was
(24:18):
relying on, or an indication ofwhether it was a defense
contractor like Blackwater inIraq, which, if you might
remember, there were numerousinstances of contractors who had
killed Iraqis or Afghanis andwere then prosecuted here in the
United States because theyweren't authorized to just
outright kill anyone without uhfollowing the rules of
(24:42):
engagement.
Uh so there was one possibility.
I've worked on terrorism casesuh on the civil side going after
terrorist states, and we alwaystried to look into could a
letter of mark and reprisal beused?
Could that have been what Lutherwas authorized to do?
This dates back to the earliestdays of the founding of our
country.
(25:02):
It was used to go after thepirates by Thomas Jefferson.
It was used in the War of 1812to help go after British ships,
where we would hire the Frenchto help us uh seize our enemies.
It hasn't been used for 150years, although Congress keeps
trying to uh initiatelegislation to bring this back.
(25:25):
Now that, right, you can imaginehow great that would be if
Congress gave the authority tohave civilians go out and kill
anyone the United Statesgovernment wanted.
It would work well for LexLuther, perhaps, but it doesn't
appear that there was any typeof real authority, I think, that
would have been given uh theallowance for Luther to actually
kill Superman, especiallywithout any, can we say, due
(25:47):
process?
Although if he's not an alien,maybe due process, if he is an
alien, maybe due processwouldn't have mattered.
But I think more importantlythan this type of issue of
killing Superman would be (25:59):
does Jimmy actually have to spend the
whole frickin' weekend with Eve?
SPEAKER_03 (26:09):
I I do enjoy that Joel got the super serious child
abuse issues, and I'm handlingwhether someone has to fulfill a
contract to Netflix and chillthis coming weekend.
And I'd also like to point outthis is the first time we've had
an American Sign Languageinterpreter with us, and we're
forcing her to come up withsigns for hashtag Segret Harum.
(26:34):
I just hope that's uh video.
Thank you very much.
Uh first off, do we have any?
SPEAKER_00 (26:39):
But I always but I always love the the the one for
hashtag super shit doesn't it'sright?
Isn't it supposed to like withthe she does quit bullshit?
Alright, sorry.
SPEAKER_03 (26:51):
Don't don't challenge the sign language.
Do we have any attorneys with ustonight?
unknown (26:56):
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_03 (26:57):
Our apologies.
Yeah.
Um thank you.
My analysis takes us back to thefirst day of law school, so it
might be a little triggering.
Um look at contract 101.
What do you need to form acontract?
And I'm gonna take Jimmy's parton this because it's more fun to
take someone's position whenyou're an attorney and argue
that no, it is not a contract.
(27:18):
On its face, it looks like wehave one.
Do we have parties?
We got even Jimmy.
Do we have a subject matter?
I send you the text that willget all the dirt you want on
Lex, and you spend the weekendwith me.
Time of performance, I send itnow.
You come over on the weekend.
Uh consideration.
This consideration is consideredsomething you're giving up that
(27:38):
you're not legally responsibleor legally required to do.
Such as pay money for something.
Jimmy's not required by law tohang out with her, she's not
required to give him the dirt onLuther.
Um, another example of this isby pay Mark$50 not to murder me.
It's not a contract because he'slegally obligated not to murder
me.
(27:58):
That's not a consideration.
I would argue we don't have to.
Yeah.
Wait, are we bidding here?
Yeah.
30.
The problem we have here is dowe have parties?
Parties require someone to makean offer and for someone to
accept that offer.
She makes the offer, I give youthe dirt, you spend the weekend
with me.
(28:18):
What's his response?
The whole weekend?
And before they can negotiatethis term, she gets nabbed.
So he never really accepted theoffer.
She gets nabbed and she hitssend.
So Jimmy is in a position of,hey, I never agreed to this.
I was still negotiating what theweekend meant.
(28:41):
So we have a thing calledquasi-contract where the law can
step in.
I'm gonna call it meta-contractfor the purposes of a Comic-Con.
And they're gonna say, we'regonna create one where one did
not exist because someone wouldget unjustly enriched by one
person performing who expects tobe paid for what they're doing,
the other person accepting that,and then not paying.
(29:02):
Their traditional quasi-contractyou see is if an ambulance takes
you to the hospital, you get amedical bill, and you're like,
wait a minute, I never consentedto pay for this doctor to
perform surgery for me.
Well, yeah, you accepted thebenefit, like having your spleen
removed, you're gonna pay forit.
Uh same thing, uh, a kid comesover and moves your lawn.
(29:23):
You know the kid's going aroundhouse to house paying for it,
you watch them do it, and youtry to sniff them saying, Hey, I
never agreed to pay for that.
Um I'll step in and form aquasi-contract for you.
This is another case where Isay, hey, we don't even have one
of these.
Because first, Netflix ain't inchilling.
I was one of the last people tocome around to what that
actually meant.
(29:44):
You can't exchange sex and havethat be the consideration of
your contract.
That is illegal.
Illegal contracts areunenforceable.
Second, she voluntarily hit thesend button.
So she was gonna be nabbed, shesent it.
Knowing that Jimmy had not yetaccepted it, but she sent it
anyway because she wanted to getone over on Lex there.
(30:08):
So she was what's called anofficious intermittler or a
volunteer.
So there's no contract there.
But if you watch the movie,after that frown, he kind of
smiles and he comes around.
So I think he's going to fulfillthat end of the contract anyway.
SPEAKER_00 (30:27):
So I think we can all agree one of the hits and
the hit star of this movie wasCrypto.
Who is not a real dog.
Oh, there he goes.
And you can actually read,there's a whole bunch of
(30:49):
articles and and uh newsprograms about how dog adoptions
went through the roof after themovie.
And actually the the ASPCA andthe other organizations were
getting upset because uh peoplethen were trying to return the
dogs after uh because I guess itwasn't crypto.
(31:10):
But the question, hopefully, thecase.
SPEAKER_08 (31:13):
People really wanted AI dogs, no.
SPEAKER_00 (31:14):
They wanted an AI dog, right?
Didn't eat, didn't care, justtook care of himself.
Uh but does this dog have alicense?
First of all, we don't know whoowns him, which we will get to,
but you know, does he have alicense?
So we can look here inBaltimore.
I didn't know this.
I had to double check.
So anyone who's here inBaltimore lives here in
Baltimore City, you have to havea license for your dog if he's
(31:36):
over four months old.
And there's a whole bunch ofdifferent, you know, fees, and
and there are fines, of course,if you don't have a license.
I did not see any collar oncrypto that indicated he has a
license.
I've had dogs in the past, andthey've always had that either
their, you know, they had theirvaccines and they had their
license.
And we do see this is a one hellof a super dog.
(31:59):
We don't have any indication inthe movie of how he got to the
earth, but he's clearly aKryptonian dog and he has
superpowers.
He pounds Supergirl into the theuh floor uh of the fortress of
solitude, so and he goes afterLex Luther and he fights against
whatever the bots were that hewas using, I forget what they
(32:21):
were called.
So, what kind of liability canwe have because of crypto?
Um, if crypto was here inMaryland, we are now a
statutory, strict liabilitystate.
So if you know that dog can bedangerous, and I'm pretty
confident that since cryptocould bite the arm off of
(32:41):
anybody really easily, and Ididn't seem to me that he had a
lot of degree of care of what hewas doing at different times,
that that would make the ownerliable for what crypto was
doing.
Uh now, some of it could bedepending on what kind of breed
the dog was, and has there beenany type of previous uh violence
(33:05):
that the dog has shown?
We don't know enough aboutcrypto, uh, but without a doubt,
uh there are some possiblepossibilities there that the
owner, whether it's Superman orsomeone else, is gonna have to
bear some possibly criminal andor civil liability.
We do have in Maryland that ifthe victim contributes in any
(33:27):
way, even 1%, that that couldlimit the liability.
And I think we could at leastsay that Lex Luthor brought it
on himself for for doing what hedid, and so maybe Superman and
uh anybody else could get awaywith that.
But I mean, who the heck doesown crypto?
SPEAKER_03 (33:49):
All right, this is my next subject.
Um, just let you know, I'm a I'ma Southern California beach kid,
and I went to college, and so II've seen a lot of drunk people,
and that's how they introducedSupergirl to the movie at the
very end to launch her nextphase, and I think it's gonna be
fun.
I'm gonna take on her defense.
(34:11):
And when I was in law school, Iinterned at the DA's office, and
as an intern with only one yearof law school underneath me, I
handled the misdemeanorcalendar, and one of the things
we used to enforce was drunk inpublic.
And so the question now becomeswas she drunk in public?
And this is something we canprosecute her for.
In the bio for this, we said uhexcessive partying.
(34:35):
So, usually you're not everarrested just because you're
drunk in public, it's becauseyou did something else while you
were drunk in public.
You vandalized something, youmaybe decided to go to the
bathroom in a park, or uh you'rejust loud breaking the peace.
That's where it comes down to.
(34:56):
Delaware code is different thanwhat I've had to prosecute in
California.
They've added an extra layer.
Before it's are you so drunk youcan't take care of yourself, or
can you not take care of others?
That's California statute.
Delaware threw in, or you'reannoying.
I'd love that part of thestatute because that's something
(35:17):
that attorney, a nice weasleyword we can lock on to.
Like, at what level do youbecome annoying?
She is super annoying when theyintroduce her.
Why did you move the door, dude?
Thanks for watching my dog beepboard.
Um so that's something thatwould definitely have to be
argued about later on.
Yeah, but why would Delaware lawapply?
(35:38):
She did it in Antarctica.
Well, we're gonna apply Delawarebecause that's eventually when
she goes into public because shehas to she leaves the fortress
and will go home.
So I'm assuming she probably hasa some sort of studio apartment
in downtown.
I don't know, where she ends upgoing to.
The bigger question it's gonnaface her is DUI.
(36:01):
There are in the comics, theysay, well, there is a line of
reasoning that Superman doesn'tactually have to breathe and he
doesn't actually have to eat.
He gets all his power from thesun.
He's just a giant battery.
So he can fly through space andthey can go to these red planets
where they can lower theirimmunity enough to get drunk.
But in the movie, they saySuperman can only hold his
(36:22):
breath for one hour.
When Gary, which is a greatname, gives his list of injuries
to talk about all the internalorgans that are injured.
So more than likely, shewouldn't be able to fly to this
red planet under her own speedbecause she'd have to breathe or
do something.
She had to fly there.
And then she had to be therelong enough for that red sun to
lower her powers enough whereshe can get drunk.
(36:44):
She piloted something to getthere, and who knows what the
closest planet is with the redsun?
She drove a vehicle a long timebecause when she gets back to
the fortress, she's stillhammered.
So more than likely, she did um,yeah, she did get it, wouldn't
be eligible for DUI.
The trouble being that DUI lawsapply to vehicles, and the
(37:07):
Delaware code does not includeaircraft as being a vehicle.
So she maybe be able to getaround on that, but there's
probably a whole host of FAAregulations she would violate by
doing it.
So at the end of the day, yeah,in Delaware, she would probably
be susceptible to excessivepartying.
California, probably not.
SPEAKER_02 (37:27):
And I think everybody drinks in Antarctica.
I mean, what else can you dothere?
SPEAKER_00 (37:30):
Now we saw especially at the end of the
movie where Metropolis wasalmost destroyed by the pocket
universe.
And la and you had the bigcreature, I don't remember if it
had a name or not.
Uh but there was a lot ofdestruction going on throughout
the movie.
And Dave's not sitting up herejust to look pretty for us.
(37:52):
He's gonna tell us who the hellis responsible for all of this.
SPEAKER_08 (37:57):
Well, uh, my practice when I have one and I
don't anymore was much simplerthan the fancy stuff these guys
do.
Uh early in my career I dealtwith insurance law, and so
that's I thought what I would uhask ask that question.
The first question that occurredto me would be uh, is there
gonna be insurance to pay forthis mess?
And frankly, this may just showwhat a nerd I am.
(38:18):
This occurred to me when I sawthe first Avengers movie, and
then again when I saw FantasticFour, and then when I got I saw
this, because all thesebuildings are getting destroyed,
and some commercial liabilityinsurance company is gonna get
tagged for this damage, but willthey have to pay?
Uh first thought I had, well,are is this all covered as acts
of God?
I said, Well, you know, as it'sbeen pointed out, Superman is
(38:38):
not a god, he's an alien.
This case doesn't involve Thoror uh Captain Marvel, the uh
Shazam, the original CaptainMarvel.
There might be a question there.
The bad news is that acts of Godcoverage in insurance policies
doesn't really apply to acts ofdeities at all.
It's really acts of nature, likeearthquakes and hurricanes and
floods and tornadoes and thelike.
Uh the good news is that itdoesn't really matter because
(39:00):
acts of God isn't really a termused in insurance policies
anymore.
Insurance policies cover damagecaused by anything unless
there's an exclusion.
And the bad news is there's lotsof potential exclusions here.
Uh and I I preface uh some ofthe rest of this by telling you
that as a young lawyer, 45 yearsago, I was at a firm that, like
(39:23):
uh 12 or 15 other big firms inthe United States spent the
better part of a decadelitigating about what the
meaning of the terms sudden andaccidental.
And if if you think sudden andaccidental is ambiguous enough
to need 15 law firms to fightabout it for 15 years, try some
of these as applied to the factsuh in this case.
(39:44):
Typical exclusions that applythat exist in most insurance
policies bar any coverage forloss caused by bulging,
expansion, shrinking, settling,resultant cracking of
foundations, floors, walls,patios, earth movement, damages
caused by volcanoes, landslides,mud flows, the sinking, rising,
or shifting of land, surfacewater damage.
And if you remember that scenewhere the earth is splitting in
(40:06):
two because of the rift, youknow, uh loss caused by floods,
surface water, waves, tidalwater, overflow of a body of
water or spray from any ofthese, or groundwater damage.
Uh water below the surface,including water that exerts
pressure or seeps through thebuilding or sidewalks or
foundation or other structure,which seems to me is gonna be
great defenses for any insurancecompany that you're trying to
(40:29):
tag with this liability.
And then you have acts of warexclusions, which are even more
esoteric and changingconstantly.
You ought to I check myhomeowner's policy, and it had
my own homeowner's policy, andit had some of these terms, and
I didn't know what they meant,and they're not terribly well
defined.
We don't cover loss caused byhostile action by a military
force or cybermeasures.
(40:50):
Action in hindering or defendingan attack by any combatant or an
agent acting on behalf of acombatant.
Well, and you know, we'vealready talked about Luther.
He maybe he's an agent ofMoravia, maybe he's an agent of
the United States.
It's hard to tell, but he'sprobably arguably an agent of
some sovereign power.
They don't cover lossesresulting from war or warlike
action or cyber hostilities.
(41:11):
And even if the peril iscovered, if it's if the damage
is covered, is covered under oneportion of your policy, for
example, you spent the extramoney for earthquake insurance.
But it's not covered under theact of war exclusion, you don't
get anything.
Uh uh trust me on that.
But can't All State save you?
Uh All State?
(41:31):
Well, will Allstate let thismayhem get the best of you?
Again, you have to tick throughall these issues.
Was Luther a government actor oran agent of a state?
Were he were he or his agents?
I remember all those militaryguys that seem to be answering
to him.
Uh they a military force?
Was the rift a cyber hostility?
Was setting the kaiju, if I'mpronouncing that correctly, off
to attack Superman a warlikeaction.
(41:54):
And so at the end of the day,you uh you you remember Superman
and uh Mr.
Terrific uh chatting at the end.
I've changed the dialogue alittle bit, where Superman is
speculating this looks like itmight be the result of a
structural movement or earthmovement or loss caused by
pressure or weight of water,don't you think?
And that's when Mr.
Terrific walks away, andSuperman sadly claims he didn't
(42:15):
mean to bum you out.
So I think ultimately, unlessFEMA shows up with a big bag of
cash, metropolitanmetropolitans, if that's what we
call them, are probably uh shitout of luck.
SPEAKER_00 (42:28):
It's better to say bullshit to watch her do it.
SPEAKER_03 (42:33):
He's waiting for you to do it now.
I didn't see it.
My question for you is like,where does what if Percy Jackson
caused this damage where he's ademi-god?
He's half human and half son ofZeus.
SPEAKER_08 (42:46):
Well, again, you know, the acts of gods and the
exagon.
They're gonna correct you.
SPEAKER_03 (42:52):
Like didn't get anything wrong.
I just kept all over myself in aComic-Con.
unknown (42:56):
Is that climate running comic?
SPEAKER_08 (43:02):
Yeah, you still got all the things.
SPEAKER_02 (43:04):
The son of Poseidon, you know he's involved with
water.
You should have ordered FloodRider.
SPEAKER_00 (43:07):
That's right.
Now there are obviously a lotmore issues like did Superman
torture the president of Boraviaby putting him up against the
cactus?
And then why can Hawk girl justapparently kill the president of
Moravia without anyrepercussions?
But we'll have to save that foranother time.
Really appreciate that you guyscame.
We can stay, because this is theend of the night.
(43:29):
We can stay for a tiny bit ifanyone has questions.
Look us up on Legal Geeks.
There's a lot more contentthat's online of programming
we've done over the years.
Uh, it's a lot of fun,especially for the for the
lawyers.
So, questions?
SPEAKER_04 (43:47):
Luther and a presidential agent of the U.S.
government just put apresidential finding apply.
And the second one was personal.
SPEAKER_00 (43:58):
So first question was whether Luther could be an
agent of the U.S.
government uh and presidentialfinding.
A presidential finding.
I mean, obviously, we've seenwith this administration a much
greater use of presidentialmemorandums and executive
orders, uh, and and even whenattempts to modify the
Constitution.
(44:18):
Uh so probably would depend onwhich administration.
There's no indication of, ofcourse, who's in power.
We do see, I guess, cabinetofficers or at least senior
leadership at the Pentagon.
Uh and there's discussion, itappears there's uh interaction
with Luther with respect tocontractual relations, but we
don't know all the details.
Uh I would probably say if itwere now, the Trump
(44:41):
administration would say, yes,we can do it.
Uh in the future, we don't know.
And the second question was,John?
SPEAKER_04 (44:48):
Uh personhood.
So the question of whether,like, whether he has any rights
or not, based on a combinationof what you said and what's on
the slide, it looks like itdeals with whether or not he is
a person.
So, like, I mean, I knowScartrack covered this in depth,
but on data and others, but butit is a is uh a non-Homo sapian
(45:09):
who seems to have all the mentalqualities or whatever of a human
being.
Is he legally a person?
SPEAKER_02 (45:16):
It hasn't been a lot of like what I'll tell you is
because this came up in theartificial intelligence world
recently.
So it's gonna depend upon thestatute, of course, but I will
tell you that somebody tried torecently, about a year or two
ago, register a piece of artdrawn solely by artificial
intelligence.
The copyright office denied theright, they appealed it all the
way up to the federal circuitcourt, and the federal circuit
court said no, because if youlook at the Copyright Act, which
(45:37):
sends back to the Constitution,it talks about things that only
humans can do.
Creativity.
Um, you and your children, yourprogeny.
You can't have progeny if you'renot a person.
So I suspect, depending upon thelaw involved, you'd have to look
up and see the types of verbiageused to see whether they intend
to include persons as humanbeings or entities that are
basically still breathingoxygen, reproductive, etc.
SPEAKER_00 (45:58):
And it will depend also where and what laws we're
talking about.
Uh Michael and I were on aTransformers panel uh for the
legal geeks.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (46:07):
It was can you murder a transformer?
SPEAKER_00 (46:09):
Yeah, is that against the law to murder a
transformer?
And in, I think I'm trying toremember, was it Saudi Arabia uh
has has made AI a person undertheir laws.
So if you did it in SaudiArabia, it could be against the
law.
If you do it here, it might notbe.
So it would it would just wealways say it depends.
(46:30):
That's that's the best legalanswer.
SPEAKER_02 (46:31):
So if you get pissed in your Alexa, don't hit it.
SPEAKER_00 (46:41):
All right, question was what uh would it be an
affirmative defense if you wererepresenting a meta human?
SPEAKER_06 (46:48):
Affirmative defense is a I guess it would depend.
SPEAKER_00 (46:59):
I mean it would depend on the factual context,
obviously.
Is there a a scene?
SPEAKER_06 (47:04):
Are you referring to the Are you referring to like
when like a hot girl murderedthe president?
SPEAKER_00 (47:23):
I mean self-defense would obviously always be a
possibility.
SPEAKER_08 (47:28):
Where are situations where you can think that in the
movie context is a clearself-defense or say clear I can
kind of argue either way, or youmight have some situations where
if these actions took place inthe pocket universe, you have a
question of extraterritorialapplication of U.S.
(47:49):
law, and so maybe the U.S.
SPEAKER_00 (47:51):
courts wouldn't accept jurisdiction over that.
And it would also depend on, Imean, we don't have a good sense
of the justice gang, uh, which Iguess ends up being the name at
the end if if they let uhmetamorpho, metamorphosis,
metamorpho, uh, into the justicegang because he liked the name.
You know, were they acting,whose authority are they acting
under?
(48:11):
Uh there are arguments underArticle 51 of the UN Charter of
affirmative violence,affirmative strikes if someone
is going to attack you, uh,before they do.
It doesn't have to beself-defense of they attacked
us, we strike back.
It could be a preventativestrike.
Uh, you know, was that what theywere doing when they went into
(48:35):
uh Boravia or or the neighboringcountry?
Janinpur?
Very good.
Did I get that right?
Was that one?
Something like that?
Close enough?
SPEAKER_02 (48:43):
Um good question.
And then there's also one morething to think about.
There's also the laws of armedand conflict and laws of armed
engagement.
So those same laws that apply toyou know peacetime in a country,
murder, etc., there's adifferent standard when you're
coming to acts of war and thelaws of armed conflict.
What is considered minimal, whatbasically collateral damage,
etc.
So I would argue that youprobably this is a war scenario
(49:05):
and you probably look at some ofthose questions.
SPEAKER_00 (49:06):
Yeah, and what kind of combatant they might be, uh
like Al Qaeda, do they belong toa country, do they not?
SPEAKER_03 (49:12):
There's a instead of just looking at affirmative
fences, there'll be a lot ofenhancements against meta-humans
where the law is gonna come downharder against them because of
their special abilities.
The law doesn't like it when youbring a gun to a knife fight.
They're more, if you're gonna bea mutual combatant, you both
have knives, you can't bringsomething extra to it, and all
these meta-humans are bringingsomething extra to the fight.
(49:33):
That happens a lot with peoplethat are trained in martial
arts.
If they get in a fight, they'reright.
They're considered to have thesespecial skills over and above,
and they um the law comes downharder on them when they're like
that.
And then the best one, the bestone is temporary insanity.
SPEAKER_02 (49:49):
Come on, green lantern.
I don't like the guy.
His character, you might be ableto plead for temporary insanity,
which is the defense in itself.
Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_03 (50:07):
Well, it's weird because you start off with the
first the fortress was builtjust outside Metropolis.
He burrowed it out of a hill,and it was kind of cool than my
picture he had.
The way he locked it was a giantkey that only supposedly he was
powerful enough to lift and openthe door.
And then they moved it toAntarctica or to Arc to the
(50:27):
Arctic.
I really don't know why he movedit to Antarctica except to be
able to throw that line in aboutviolating the 12 treaties.
SPEAKER_05 (50:34):
The cool part is not the Roman version of the back.
SPEAKER_03 (50:40):
Yeah.
So that was and I I run intothis when I'm trying to get into
deeper into the comic book lore,where depending on who the
writer was, it kind of changesthe story a little bit.
And with Superman, I discoveredwas they decided that every
three years they'd have a newgeneration of people reading the
(51:01):
comics.
So it was okay to go back andchange things or add stuff or
rewrite plots because no onewould catch up, because it'd be
a next generation comingthrough.
So stuff got moved around quitea bit.
Any others?
Yes, ma'am.
SPEAKER_01 (51:19):
Yes, ma'am.
SPEAKER_00 (51:37):
That's a great question.
That's that's an awesome I Ihaven't even thought about this.
This is a great question.
All right, so what laws wouldapply?
We mentioned theextraterritorial jurisdiction or
application.
What laws would apply to thepocket?
I'm just repeating the questionhere, and I'm gonna let you guys
answer because I don't know theanswer.
Uh does it is it the law whereyou enter and you bring that
(51:59):
with you, or is it the laws inthe pocket universe or where you
exit?
SPEAKER_08 (52:05):
Well, and who's gonna decide?
I think there's a real goodchance that U.S.
courts, certainly state courts,would just say, find another
court because it's not me.
SPEAKER_02 (52:15):
But jurisdiction also depends upon whether or not
you impose actions that are haveeffect or impact on another
place.
So, for example, the computercrime and a few computer fraud
abuse act was amended many timesto deal with the fact that
people might hack in fromthird-party countries and
computers might be locatedoutside of this country, but you
still want it to be able to dosomething about it.
But again, it's focused oncountries.
(52:37):
Another dimension, I'm not sureit would cover.
And then it has an impact on thearea.
Exactly.
But if but if you're doing astrict construction as to the
statute, I'm pretty sure you'regonna struggle.
And then the most importantquestion is dual criminality.
Can you extradite somebody?
You need to have it a crime inboth the place you're
extraditing from and the placeyou're extraditing to.
I don't know if there are anylaws about dual criminality that
(52:58):
would cover the pocket universe,so probably staying there is
where I keep you.
SPEAKER_08 (53:02):
And does the court have jurisdiction, personal
jurisdiction over the monkeys?
SPEAKER_04 (53:07):
Unlawful imprisonment.
Does it matter if the does itmatter where you imprison?
Because couldn't you get legs onunlawful imprisonment in the
popular universe?
SPEAKER_00 (53:16):
Well, and and some uh the question about unlawful
imprisonment, and I'll tie itback into your great question on
the universal on thejurisdiction.
He mentions that some of thepeople were imprisoned there
under the authority of the U.S.
government.
And then others, like hisex-girlfriends who pissed him
off, uh, he brought and put in.
And that just raises all sortsof questions, obviously, due
(53:39):
process, uh, questions under uhFourth Amendment and etc.
Eighth Amendment.
Eighth Amendment, cruel andhuman punishment.
SPEAKER_03 (53:46):
The legal gigs thing was the phantom zone, a
violation of the EighthAmendment, where you stick
somebody where time doesn'texist.
So when you get out, no time hasactually gone by.
Is that cruel and unusual?
Kind of be a punishment becauseyour kids are grown?
SPEAKER_00 (53:57):
Now there are some jurisdictional principles to go
back to your question, uh, thatthere's called universal
jurisdiction.
There are certain crimes, whatwe call Yous Kogan's crimes, so
I can use my Latin uh phrase,that are crimes of all nations,
that no one can derogate andcommit that.
Genocide, war crimes, crimesagainst humanity, everyone has
(54:19):
jurisdiction over them, uhalthough it still does depend.
Uh if there's a crime on anairplane, for example, or it's
over the Atlantic, who hasjurisdiction over something, an
assault and battery, a a drunkperson, uh uh some uh sexual
harassment?
And it will often be the countryfrom where the plane left, the
(54:42):
country to which the plane isgoing.
The if it's a ship, they used togo if you ever look at a ship,
look at the back of the ship tosee where the ship is
registered.
That country has jurisdictionover it as well, no matter where
the ship, it's called a f it's afloating island all around the
world, no matter where it goes.
Isn't it sometimes the stateover which the airplane is
(55:03):
flying?
That it can be also that,depending on where it is.
SPEAKER_06 (55:07):
Yes, sorry, get what occasion is on registering.
SPEAKER_00 (55:16):
We sued the government of Libya for the
bombing of Pan Am Flight 103,and we made the argument that
the U.S.
had jurisdiction because Pan Amwould have a big American flag
on the back of its tail and thatit was essentially a flying
island just as if a ship was,that it was registered with the
United States.
(55:37):
Uh that argument didn't work, soI changed the law to make sure
we had jurisdiction over Libya,and then that worked.
Yes, sir.
unknown (55:45):
What country are we talking about?
SPEAKER_00 (55:47):
What country do you want to talk about?
I don't know if there's laws.
There are.
Whenever they want to make oneof you get executed.
So, where do you thinkmetropolis is?
Where's Metropolis?
Ben, where's Metropolis?
Is it in the United States or isit just made up?
(56:11):
That would be part of thequestion.
We can take a final question.
Anyone got anything else?
Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_06 (56:18):
Oh, how many laws is we're going to break when we're
flying over other countries'interfaces in the book?
SPEAKER_00 (56:26):
Uh with with did you say with the fly when they're
flying?
So when Superman, Super DrunkSupergirl is flying over all
countries, is she violating anylaws?
Let's say she creates a sonicboom and that causes damage.
SPEAKER_03 (56:40):
I would go with uh episode of in Superman, I'll
play it to him, where he wasgiven the golden ticket by the
UN, which granted him theability to go to every single
country that's a member of theUN.
Without a visa.
Without yeah, having a visa orsomething.
SPEAKER_00 (56:54):
But so insurance, Supergirl, drunk Supergirl flies
over a country, creates a sonicboom, and blows out the windows.
Does insurance cover that?
SPEAKER_08 (57:03):
Uh yeah, I'd no exclusion jumps to mind.
SPEAKER_02 (57:07):
But it's not a vehicle, also.
Well, it doesn't have to be avehicle.
Wind.
SPEAKER_08 (57:15):
Wind, there's usually wind exclusions unless
you have tornado insurance.
SPEAKER_00 (57:20):
Well, we're not gonna solve all these issues,
unfortunately, tonight.
Thank you all for coming.
Have a great rest of your con ifyou're coming back tomorrow.
And hopefully come back nextyear to another Legal Geeks
Imposium.
All right.
Thank you guys for yourpatience.
Good evening.
You guys having a good time atthe con?
We'd like to see, especially inBaltimore, we we we do this
presentation uh in San Diegoevery year.
Not this one, different topicsevery year.
Uh and of course we get lots ofpeople.
We don't generally have a lot ofpeople at Baltimore Panel Cons.
(00:25):
It's starting to get better eachyear, which is awesome.
Uh so really appreciate youcoming here.
Uh my name is Mark Zayd.
I'm an attorney in Washington,D.C.
I do national security work.
Some of that will actually bepart of tonight's presentation.
Uh I'm also a comic book dealerpart-time, uh, do a lot of legal
work in the comic community.
(00:45):
I'm an advisor to the OverstreetComic Book Price Guide and
Grading Guides, represent CGCuhwise when comic dealers get in
trouble, which is not as oftenas my federal government clients
uh who do.
Um here's our legal geeksensemble.
Dave Donovan is a luckilyretired lawyer, uh big big firm,
(01:09):
retired lawyers, uh lawyer.
And I'm gonna let them, as theystart a little bit of their
presentations as we go along, toadd in details about what they
do in their practices to whythey might have chosen a
particular topic.
Joel Schwartz and I went to lawschool together uh back in New
York and has worked for theJustice Department and the New
(01:32):
York State Attorney General.
And Michael Dennis gets ouraward for traveling the furthest
because he's come fromCalifornia just to be here with
you guys.
He is my fellow legal geekmember.
Uh we were supposed to have theour founding legal geek father
(01:52):
show up, but he got sick,unfortunately.
Uh but a shout out to Josh, whowho isn't here and hopefully
will listen uh in the recording.
Uh so the Legal Geeks is a groupof lawyers, mostly on the West
Coast.
A few of us now brought it outto the East Coast, and we will
analyze comic books, movies,television shows, whether
(02:16):
they're related to comics ornot.
Uh we've done Daredevil.
We did a uh mock trial of Jaws afew years ago at San Diego.
That's where those pictures arefrom.
SPEAKER_03 (02:25):
That is where the pictures are from.
That's Mark's closing argument.
And um, that's me saying I'llfight for you.
1-800 shark bites if you'relooking for representation.
SPEAKER_00 (02:33):
Jurassic Park, Star Wars, Star Trek, you know, all
sorts of uh Transformers,Indiana Jones.
It's a lot of fun.
This is the first time we'vebrought it here.
Uh so hopefully this will besomething we will continue.
Someone who's like eight feettall just walked by the door
there.
That was very strange to see.
Uh so we will uh see how thisworks out, and hopefully you'll
(02:56):
all enjoy it, and we'll bring itback again for next year.
So, our topic tonight, as wassaid, uh it's a bird, it's a
plane, it's a felony, didSuperman cause us to go to war?
So, the latest Superman film, Itrust, hope everybody has seen
it, right?
Uh, because otherwise you willbe so lost uh for as we talk
about this tonight.
(03:17):
But you'll still get it becauseit's it's a hoot.
And we were gonna go through abunch of issues because what
happens for those of us as legalgeeks, uh, and now we have two
newest members, you we sit inthese movies and go, oh, there's
a tort that just happened there,or no, he would be sued for
that.
There's no way this washappening.
And it it actually kind of ruinsa lot of movies as we go through
(03:40):
them uh to have that on.
Uh, or like that would neverhappen in the real courtroom
scene in Daredevil or somethingof that sort.
Superman 2025 presented a lot ofgood legal issues.
And we're gonna start off withuh Joel telling us, well, for
one thing, was Superman adoptedlegally, he came here obviously
from another planet.
(04:01):
Now, in the comic book, it's the1930s, Kansas, so it's probably
easier to adopt a child that youdid not have and just showed up
on your doorstep.
But as I remember, this film ismodern.
So Superman was born in the1990s, and someone told me the
metropolis was like Delaware.
SPEAKER_03 (04:20):
Yeah, it is Delaware.
SPEAKER_00 (04:21):
It's supposed to be in Delaware.
SPEAKER_03 (04:23):
Seriously?
SPEAKER_00 (04:23):
Yeah, yeah.
So I'm not sure what happened.
Joel, what would happen?
SPEAKER_02 (04:27):
Right, thank you.
Well, first, since I've neverdone this before, it's great
that I get to go first.
Um so and and the movie does,and I saw this movie a few uh
recently, but it doesn't reallygo into the question of
Superman's origin.
I think most of the peopleassume they know it at this
point in time, and Tim Gunndidn't spend a lot of time about
the, you know, as a baby part.
So if you assume that he wasadopted, and I'm gonna raise
(04:50):
that for a second because theremight be an assumption that he
actually was born here in theUS, which I know people are
gonna be shocked about.
We'll talk about it in a second.
So if he was adopted, looking atthe Kansas statute, what would
happen is obviously Martha andum uh Jonathan Ken did not have
the baby.
So they would have found thebaby, and the way it works in
Kansas, under the statutecurrently in place, is you'd
actually take the baby,surrender the baby because it's
(05:11):
not theirs, they can't legallykeep it, surrender it to one of
the authorities, lawenforcement, the firehouse, etc.
Um, they would have to thenreport that to the secretary of
the state, who would thendeliver the infant to a specific
facility set aside for that.
What happens at that point intime?
They become a ward of the state,foster child.
Now, that's where I thought wasthe most interesting part, and
I'm looking at my slides overhere to make sure they're up
(05:31):
there, but you know, JonathanKent would and Martha Kent would
have had to apply for adoption,to be an adoptive parent.
But there's no guarantee,because you brought the child
in, that you actually get toadopt them.
And in fact, actually, thechallenge would have been that
when you try to, you know, whenyou bring the child in and try
to get the adoption going, youhave a lot of questions you
gotta answer.
A lot of questions like, wheredid the child just get found?
Do you know who the parents are?
(05:52):
What were the circumstancessurrounding coming into
possession of the child?
Those are gonna be a littlechallenging.
Even in 1980, 1990, with all theUFO you know discussions today,
explaining that's gonna be hardto do when you're filing an
adoption certificate.
And if you do, it's veryunlikely you're gonna think
you're well enough to give themchild custody of you.
You custody.
But I do want to talk a littleabout foster care.
So just to qualify this, Iactually was a prosecutor for
(06:13):
the DC attorney's office for acouple of months, six months,
dealing with domestic violencecases.
I met a lot of kids who actuallywere very brave.
One actually had to testifyagainst his own mother because
she had stabbed him, to put herinto a mental site board to help
her, but then by doing that, hebecame a foster child.
So some of these kids are reallybrave.
But I've also seen the otherside where foster care doesn't
work out that well, and that'swhat some of these pictures are.
(06:35):
So, Superman, if he had actuallygotten to foster care.
So you have a few differentoptions here.
Red Sun, which was a great uhmovie, we still uh rented a few
years ago.
Um theoretically, I guess inthis case, he wasn't he didn't
crash in Russia, but he wasadopted by Russian parents and
moved back to Russia, SovietUnion back then.
Or you have Brightburn, one ofthe scarier movies.
I don't know.
Has anybody here seen Brightburnthe movie?
(06:56):
Basically, I mean I have fourkids, so I can tell you, when
you get a boy who doesn't wantto listen to you is scary,
that's bad enough.
A superhuman boy who has nothingto stop him, has laser eyes, he
can do anything he wants, that'svery scary.
So, you know, you never knowwhere Brightburn came from.
They don't talk whether he'sadopted or not.
And Homelander, come on, Amazonthe boys.
Again, absolutely norestrictions whatsoever on what
he does, and no sort of filter,if you will.
(07:18):
So those are possibilities withfoster care.
But let's turn to slide, becauseI think there's a good argument
here that he was actually maynot have been adopted at all.
Because if you read, and this isthe last com one of the last
comics I read when I grew up,the 1986 version of The Man of
Steel, you actually haveSuperman um the um pod crashing,
(07:38):
and the way it works in, youknow, in on Krypton, apparently,
you put them in the gestationchamber.
So when the gestation chamberopens, theoretically, they're
born here.
But assuming you put that asidefor a second, there was also the
idea in this comic that they'dbeen snowed in for five months
in a snowstorm, and thereforethey claim that they actually
gave birth to the child.
They had a couple of pre uhprevious miscarriages, they had
(07:58):
a still birth.
So it is feasible, given a bigsnowstorm, if they had the
child, which means they mighthave gone and actually filed the
birth certificate, claiming it'stheir child.
Which gets the final question Iwant to cover here, which is
fraud.
Um because clearly we know thetruth that he did not actually
give that Martha didn't givebirth.
(08:19):
So now you have the questionabout perjury.
Did Jonathan Kent commit perjuryby filing for the social
security number?
Um you'll see at the bottom overthere, there is a sworn
statement that you do actuallyhave to sign under penalty of
perjury.
Now, the good news for Jonathanis the five-year statute of
limitations, so I think he'spassed it at this point in time.
However, it runs from the dateif you could seal the crime.
So the question is, when wouldyou have figured out that
(08:40):
Superman really wasn't theirchild and they was actually a
superhero from another planet?
Finally, I just want to note Ialso looked at the Nazi
questions about Nazicitizenship.
Back in the old days, you know,people from the World War II
would claim to get citizenshiphere, become naturalized.
You could revoke it if you foundout they lied on their
application.
Um theoretically, you coulddenaturalize Superman if he
actually was naturalized throughhis parents.
(09:00):
But given that his parentsweren't the aliens from another
country, but aliens from anotherplanet, I'm pretty sure the
naturalization laws did applyanyway.
So I'm going with they think hewas born here, he wasn't
adopted.
Jonathan did lie, but he's waypast the statute of limitations,
so we're cool.
SPEAKER_00 (09:15):
So the movie starts out with Superman lying in the
as we learn to be the Antarctic,and crypto brings him to the
fortress of solitude.
And there's a comment by LexLuthor that that violated uh 12
treaties.
Did it?
SPEAKER_03 (09:33):
I can go to the next one.
Of course, you you all followLex Luthor Corp on the socials,
and there is an active Twitteraccount that you can follow
where he does post Superman hasviolated 12 treaties.
I would counter with uh hashtagdo better because he's wrong.
(09:54):
It's one treaty signed by 12countries.
It is the Antarctic Treaty, and12 countries originally signed
it, and what it's designated todo is say, hey, we can make
Antarctica special.
And we're gonna sign a treatythat says everyone who has a
claim to it, you get to keepyour claim.
And no one's gonna say yourclaim should be something
(10:16):
different.
And we're gonna make this anarea where all we're gonna do is
science.
There is gonna be no militaryaspect to it.
What does Superman build inAntarctica?
A fortress.
It's not a bungalude of peace,it's not a like a charming
little quaint fixer-upper.
He builds a fortress.
(10:36):
I mean, like the T spheres onthis guy.
So if you look at it, this well,you know, just gotta look at it.
People don't violate treaties,countries violate treaties when
it comes down to so the US canactually violate a prosecute a
(11:01):
citizen that violates it.
So let's look what Superman hasdone here.
This is a comic when he wasracing Flash, and apparently he
decided to stop off and give atour of his house.
He goes, here's all the things Ihave, people, that uh come and
come see.
To my fortress.
The stuff he has there, he hasan alien zoo.
You're not allowed to bringanimals or vegetation to
(11:21):
Antarctica.
He brings an entire zoo withhim.
And it's not just a fortress.
He has the miniature city ofCandor, the capital of Trypton
in a bottle with a complete redsun there.
Yeah, that's a completeviolation of the when he saw it
there.
So would a kid be prosecuted forthis?
Most likely, yes, because theUSA could come in, and now we've
(11:44):
established she's a citizen, andactually prosecute a citizen for
violating one of the treaties.
There's an old not old, but it'scalled Uh Bond versus US.
This lady caught her husbandcheating on her.
So what she did was applychemicals to the mistress's
doorknob, mailbox, and car,hoping she'd get chemical burns.
(12:04):
They prosecuted her for aviolation of the Chemical
Treaties Act for improperlyusing chemicals, something they
tried to ban to the convenerconvention.
They never got to the subject,but she was brought up on that.
So it has happened.
He could get charged, but at theend of the day, he's an
individual.
He did not violate any treatiesbecause he's an individual.
SPEAKER_00 (12:24):
So, Joel, we talked a little bit about whether he
could be legally adopted in theUnited States, but is he
actually a U.S.
citizen?
SPEAKER_02 (12:32):
Thank you for asking the question.
And by the way, I wasn't goingto say the fortress is out now
available actually on Airbnb ifyou want to look at it.
So, first of all, gratuitousLatin, because every time a
lawyer speaks, you want to hearLatin.
And since we're doing this forfree, I can say equilibrius
unum.
So I'm going to go for jussanguinis and jus soli.
Basically, the right of blood,meaning you're born to parents,
(12:53):
people who are actually citizensof the country.
And basically, jus soli meansright of soil, born in the soil.
We hear this today a lot aboutbirthright citizenship, right?
So going back to my idea aboutthe pod crashing here, the idea
in the more recent comic booksis that the pod, he was actually
still gestating when he wastraveling here to the um to the
earth.
When he landed in the podopened, that is when he was
(13:14):
actually born.
And thus, therefore, he was bornhere on American soil, born in
the USA.
I was actually hoping to get theBruce Springs thing song, but I
didn't know how we were gonnaget that going.
So if he was born in the USAunder the 14th Amendment of the
Constitution, he is a naturalborn citizen.
And yes, you can try to revokecitizenship under very rare
circumstances when children areborn to aliens.
(13:37):
There's a famous case actuallyfrom the 1800s, a US Supreme
Court case, US v.
Wang Kim Ark, where they triedto deny him citizenship based
upon the fact that he was bornto parents.
But the only exceptions theSupreme Court finds to this
birthright idea born on Americansoil is when either you're born
to a diplomat, becausetheoretically you're not really
here as a citizen, or you'reborn by on a hostile territory,
(14:00):
by the to an alien on a hostilewho's there hostile.
So in other words, you're inpossession of a piece of
territory and the child's bornthere.
You're not there truthfully andvoluntarily.
Now I don't think either ofthose work, um, is this case,
especially, and plus thealienation thing, again,
intergalactic aliens, probablynot part of the Supreme Court
case in 1898.
So I think the idea here that hehas birthright citizenship makes
(14:21):
a lot of sense.
Which then, of course, now wecome to the current time when
we're now litigating whether ornot you can revoke birthright
citizenship.
Um I did want to note that rightnow it's actually still sitting
with the Supreme Court.
Um, the um Trump administrationin September of this layer, last
month, asked the Supreme Courtto review the constitutionality
of an executive order where hewas trying to remove birthright
citizenship if at least one ofyour parents is not a U.S.
(14:43):
citizen or a legal permanentresident.
And in this case, I think we canbe very clear that neither of
Superman's parents were legalresidents or U.S.
citizens.
But I want to do a couple ofalternative theories here.
So if you could turn the page.
So in action comics number 900,Superman actually renounced his
American citizenship.
Has anybody read this one?
Yeah, because again, it's becomemore controversial over time,
(15:06):
and he said, I'm tired of beingconsidered an instrument of U.S.
policy, I'm a citizen of theworld.
Now, if you renounce yourcitizenship, you potentially
could lose that citizenship.
But I think there's an easierquestion to answer here, which
is in the movie we learned thatSuperman's parents did not send
him here for beneficentpurposes.
They sent him here to rule theworld, to take over, to have
(15:27):
many wives, to um do us proudand rule without mercy, quote
unquote.
And I just, by the way, I justfinished watching the um last
season of Cobra Kai, so I kepton thinking about Cobra Kai
without mercy when I waswatching the movie.
But to rule without mercy here.
And there is a statute thatallows you, if you have
terrorists or parents who areterrorists, who come here under
(15:47):
false pretenses and getcitizenship, and they actually
gotten to citizenship, you candenaturalize them, you can
denaturalize the child as well.
But I'm going to go back to myoriginal theory here because I
think it's how it works a lotbetter and I like Superman, um,
which is that he's theoreticallyborn here, they think he's a US
citizen, and he thinks Marthaand Clark Kent, sorry, Martha
and Jonathan Kent gave birth tohim.
(16:07):
Um and finally, I did want tonote, because it's also very um
concurrent, you know, the otheroption is that Superman's a
dreamer.
Right?
You have to DACA people, youknow, deferred action for
childhood.
So even assuming that heactually came here and he wasn't
a citizen, he wasn't born here,etc., and he was brought here by
his parents without his ownwill, because he was still just
(16:27):
dating a baby, he is then adreamer under US law.
As of mid-2025, Congress has notyet granted a citizenship for a
right to passage way tocitizenship for dreamers.
So right now, Superman isprobably the best poster child
for the dreamer community, andDACA to approve DACA in Congress
to pass the law.
So next time you talk about DACAin Congress, say, make Superman
a citizen, pass DACA.
SPEAKER_00 (16:50):
Well, since we're not sure if he's a citizen, is
he not a citizen, whichever oneit is, can he be arrested by the
US government?
Right?
We saw that.
He's called an extraterrestrialorganism.
Uh so do they have rights?
Right?
They he talks about though, theydon't give any details of the
Department of Justice issued anarrest warrant.
(17:13):
They don't say what the basis ofthe arrest warrant was, did it
go to a grand jury or not?
But without getting toopolitical, at least if you were
an alien, you did still haverights in the United States, and
if you got arrested, you wouldstill, by the Fifth and the 14th
Amendment, have, as it appliesto all persons.
It doesn't speak to citizenshipof whether or not you would
(17:36):
still have constitutionalrights.
Uh, of course, we have this verystrange deportation, so to
speak, uh, where he's sent tothe pocket universe, which we'll
talk uh a little bit about uh alittle bit later.
Uh but as the Supreme Court casesaid, even 25 years ago, uh even
aliens have rights.
So uh pretty confident he couldnot be sent to the pocket
(17:59):
universe without going throughat least some due process system
of whichever city he wasactually in, whether it was
fictitious or under the UnitedStates.
Now, Lex Luther, we learn, has avery secret plan with the
president of Boravia.
Uh at first we know he's sellingarms, military weaponry to
(18:22):
Boravia, and then we learn thathe has a much closer
relationship to the Boravians,where he's going to actually
take part or take over some ofthe neighboring country, so he's
acting in cohoots with thePresident of Boravia.
So, does he need to register asa foreign agent?
We have in the United States theForeign Agents Registration Act
(18:44):
in 22 USB 611.
Uh, and without having to gothrough all the language there
on the screen, basically theanswer is uh yeah.
I think way the way you areworking with the President of
Boravia, that you're engaging inpolitical activities or in the
interests of such foreignprinciple, you would need to
(19:06):
register with the Department ofJustice.
It's not that difficult.
I've done it uh at times in someof the cases that I have worked
in.
You just file a bunch ofpaperwork.
But if you don't submit thatpaperwork, you can be convicted
and have a fine of not more than$10,000.
Probably Lex Luther doesn't careabout that.
Uh but hey, for each count, youcould get up to five years
(19:29):
imprisonment.
Uh so we don't see what happensto Lex Luthor towards the end uh
with respect to his relationshipwith Boravia, other than he gets
beat up by crypto, uh, whichcould be a separate tort in and
of itself that we can talkabout.
Uh but there is an issue thathe's going to have among many,
as we saw in the film.
(19:49):
One of the things that he wasdoing, of course, was these damn
monkeys.
The army of monkeys def was hebeing defamed by the armies of
monkeys.
SPEAKER_02 (20:09):
I think you're asking me that question.
So the question, so there isdefamation has defamation has a
number of elements.
And for those of you who are notlawyers, which those of you who
are very fortunate who are notlawyers, um there's an every
crime has a number of elements.
In this case, there are fourelements.
You have to have a falsecommunication of facts.
Can we all agree that what hewas having the monkeys transmit
(20:31):
were false communications?
Yes or no?
Raise your hands, come on.
Yeah, alright, okay.
Publication communicated to thethird party.
You don't see who it's sent to,but we're pretty sure it's going
up to third parties on theinternet.
Causing material or reputationalharm and negligent- he does so
negligence or with malice.
Now, pretty sure that wasn'tnegligence, but how many people
(20:52):
here think malice?
Yeah, there we go.
Alright.
I'm not even gonna talk aboutdefamation per se, because I
just want to talk about some ofthe defenses to defamation.
So the question is can we talkabout Lex Luther?
Is he subject to prosecution fordefamation?
And there's of course civildefamation, there's also
criminal uh charges you couldbring.
So some of the defenses aretruth.
Now, truth is an absolute um,you know, absolute defense to
(21:16):
defamation, but we're prettysure he didn't have super
harems.
We know that um so and some ofthe things he put up there were
actually not true as well.
Opinion.
Clear opinions are notprosecutable under defamation.
Now I will say the hashtags likesuper shit.
I hope there are no kids inhere.
That probably is consideredopinion and probably not gonna
be defamation.
(21:36):
But he said enough other stuffas well.
And then there's alsoprivileges.
There's an absolute privilege,such as when you're testifying
before a congressionalcommittee, testifying in court,
or qualify privilege, such aswhen if you have a legal or
moral duty to say something,whistleblowers is a good
example.
But then you have lack of fault.
If it's a public figure, thestandard is higher, and
basically it's not defamationunless you have actual malice.
(21:59):
So again, I think we get back tothe idea that there is actual
malice here.
Clearly, Lex Luthor has it outfor him, not happy with him.
So that's the easy one.
So I did want to touch on onething though, which is the
social media liability.
Thank you.
So, first of all, is Lex Luthorguilty of, let's say,
cyberbullying?
So, I will tell you actually,one of the cases I prosecuted,
(22:19):
one of the first cases I workedon as the Justice Department,
was a case called Lori Drew.
You probably all might rememberit.
There was a girl named Megan.
Her Lori Drew and her daughterwere defaming the Megan online.
Megan ended up committingsuicide, which led to a
conviction.
She actually had her convictionoverturned on appeal, but many
states started passingcyberbullying laws.
Sadly, by the way, I thought uhmetropolis was in New York, so I
(22:41):
went to New York here.
So New York actually does nothave a cyber bullying statute.
So once again, Lex Luther getsaway with it.
But there are harassmentstatutes, which is a
misdemeanor.
There is an aggravatedharassment statute, which is a
felony.
I think we can all concede thatit's probably aggravated
harassment.
So I do think Lex Luthor couldpotentially be liable for a few
of those things.
Now, could he be liable as thepublisher?
(23:03):
That is where section 230 of theCommunications Decency Act comes
in.
And you probably remember fromlike 10 years ago, five years
ago, we were all trying torepeal it because platforms
aren't responsible for thepublishing information published
in the site as long as they takeit down when they get notice
it's false and untrue.
So the CDA provides a lot ofimmunity, and probably I'm
assuming Lexaluther who runs theplatform will probably get away
with it.
(23:23):
But I just want to say onething, and I think I have one
more thing I want to talk abouthere.
Nobody talks about this.
There's lots of memes about thewhole monkey thing and monkey
bots and trolls, etc.
But nobody yet, and this wasepiphany the major in the movie,
nobody once talked about howamazing the connection was.
I mean, I can't get an internetconnection from my basement to
my office, and he's sitting in apocket universe on the internet
(23:45):
and getting great connectivity.
Elon Musk can't even producethat.
So, putting everything elseaside, I want to know the
provider that Lex Luthor usesfor his monkeys.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
The other thing we saw was that Luther had said he
was authorized to kill Superman.
Now that is a complicated matterfor anyone in the United States
to be authorized by thegovernment to murder someone or
to legally kill if it is notmurder.
There's no indication of reallywhat basis it was that he was
(24:18):
relying on, or an indication ofwhether it was a defense
contractor like Blackwater inIraq, which, if you might
remember, there were numerousinstances of contractors who had
killed Iraqis or Afghanis andwere then prosecuted here in the
United States because theyweren't authorized to just
outright kill anyone without uhfollowing the rules of
(24:42):
engagement.
Uh so there was one possibility.
I've worked on terrorism casesuh on the civil side going after
terrorist states, and we alwaystried to look into could a
letter of mark and reprisal beused?
Could that have been what Lutherwas authorized to do?
This dates back to the earliestdays of the founding of our
country.
(25:02):
It was used to go after thepirates by Thomas Jefferson.
It was used in the War of 1812to help go after British ships,
where we would hire the Frenchto help us uh seize our enemies.
It hasn't been used for 150years, although Congress keeps
trying to uh initiatelegislation to bring this back.
(25:25):
Now that, right, you can imaginehow great that would be if
Congress gave the authority tohave civilians go out and kill
anyone the United Statesgovernment wanted.
It would work well for LexLuther, perhaps, but it doesn't
appear that there was any typeof real authority, I think, that
would have been given uh theallowance for Luther to actually
kill Superman, especiallywithout any, can we say, due
(25:47):
process?
Although if he's not an alien,maybe due process, if he is an
alien, maybe due processwouldn't have mattered.
But I think more importantlythan this type of issue of
killing Superman would be (25:59):
does Jimmy actually have to spend the
whole frickin' weekend with Eve?
SPEAKER_03 (26:09):
I I do enjoy that Joel got the super serious child
abuse issues, and I'm handlingwhether someone has to fulfill a
contract to Netflix and chillthis coming weekend.
And I'd also like to point outthis is the first time we've had
an American Sign Languageinterpreter with us, and we're
forcing her to come up withsigns for hashtag Segret Harum.
(26:34):
I just hope that's uh video.
Thank you very much.
Uh first off, do we have any?
SPEAKER_00 (26:39):
But I always but I always love the the the one for
hashtag super shit doesn't it'sright?
Isn't it supposed to like withthe she does quit bullshit?
Alright, sorry.
SPEAKER_03 (26:51):
Don't don't challenge the sign language.
Do we have any attorneys with ustonight?
unknown (26:56):
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_03 (26:57):
Our apologies.
Yeah.
Um thank you.
My analysis takes us back to thefirst day of law school, so it
might be a little triggering.
Um look at contract 101.
What do you need to form acontract?
And I'm gonna take Jimmy's parton this because it's more fun to
take someone's position whenyou're an attorney and argue
that no, it is not a contract.
(27:18):
On its face, it looks like wehave one.
Do we have parties?
We got even Jimmy.
Do we have a subject matter?
I send you the text that willget all the dirt you want on
Lex, and you spend the weekendwith me.
Time of performance, I send itnow.
You come over on the weekend.
Uh consideration.
This consideration is consideredsomething you're giving up that
(27:38):
you're not legally responsibleor legally required to do.
Such as pay money for something.
Jimmy's not required by law tohang out with her, she's not
required to give him the dirt onLuther.
Um, another example of this isby pay Mark$50 not to murder me.
It's not a contract because he'slegally obligated not to murder
me.
(27:58):
That's not a consideration.
I would argue we don't have to.
Yeah.
Wait, are we bidding here?
Yeah.
30.
The problem we have here is dowe have parties?
Parties require someone to makean offer and for someone to
accept that offer.
She makes the offer, I give youthe dirt, you spend the weekend
with me.
(28:18):
What's his response?
The whole weekend?
And before they can negotiatethis term, she gets nabbed.
So he never really accepted theoffer.
She gets nabbed and she hitssend.
So Jimmy is in a position of,hey, I never agreed to this.
I was still negotiating what theweekend meant.
(28:41):
So we have a thing calledquasi-contract where the law can
step in.
I'm gonna call it meta-contractfor the purposes of a Comic-Con.
And they're gonna say, we'regonna create one where one did
not exist because someone wouldget unjustly enriched by one
person performing who expects tobe paid for what they're doing,
the other person accepting that,and then not paying.
(29:02):
Their traditional quasi-contractyou see is if an ambulance takes
you to the hospital, you get amedical bill, and you're like,
wait a minute, I never consentedto pay for this doctor to
perform surgery for me.
Well, yeah, you accepted thebenefit, like having your spleen
removed, you're gonna pay forit.
Uh same thing, uh, a kid comesover and moves your lawn.
(29:23):
You know the kid's going aroundhouse to house paying for it,
you watch them do it, and youtry to sniff them saying, Hey, I
never agreed to pay for that.
Um I'll step in and form aquasi-contract for you.
This is another case where Isay, hey, we don't even have one
of these.
Because first, Netflix ain't inchilling.
I was one of the last people tocome around to what that
actually meant.
(29:44):
You can't exchange sex and havethat be the consideration of
your contract.
That is illegal.
Illegal contracts areunenforceable.
Second, she voluntarily hit thesend button.
So she was gonna be nabbed, shesent it.
Knowing that Jimmy had not yetaccepted it, but she sent it
anyway because she wanted to getone over on Lex there.
(30:08):
So she was what's called anofficious intermittler or a
volunteer.
So there's no contract there.
But if you watch the movie,after that frown, he kind of
smiles and he comes around.
So I think he's going to fulfillthat end of the contract anyway.
SPEAKER_00 (30:27):
So I think we can all agree one of the hits and
the hit star of this movie wasCrypto.
Who is not a real dog.
Oh, there he goes.
And you can actually read,there's a whole bunch of
(30:49):
articles and and uh newsprograms about how dog adoptions
went through the roof after themovie.
And actually the the ASPCA andthe other organizations were
getting upset because uh peoplethen were trying to return the
dogs after uh because I guess itwasn't crypto.
(31:10):
But the question, hopefully, thecase.
SPEAKER_08 (31:13):
People really wanted AI dogs, no.
SPEAKER_00 (31:14):
They wanted an AI dog, right?
Didn't eat, didn't care, justtook care of himself.
Uh but does this dog have alicense?
First of all, we don't know whoowns him, which we will get to,
but you know, does he have alicense?
So we can look here inBaltimore.
I didn't know this.
I had to double check.
So anyone who's here inBaltimore lives here in
Baltimore City, you have to havea license for your dog if he's
(31:36):
over four months old.
And there's a whole bunch ofdifferent, you know, fees, and
and there are fines, of course,if you don't have a license.
I did not see any collar oncrypto that indicated he has a
license.
I've had dogs in the past, andthey've always had that either
their, you know, they had theirvaccines and they had their
license.
And we do see this is a one hellof a super dog.
(31:59):
We don't have any indication inthe movie of how he got to the
earth, but he's clearly aKryptonian dog and he has
superpowers.
He pounds Supergirl into the theuh floor uh of the fortress of
solitude, so and he goes afterLex Luther and he fights against
whatever the bots were that hewas using, I forget what they
(32:21):
were called.
So, what kind of liability canwe have because of crypto?
Um, if crypto was here inMaryland, we are now a
statutory, strict liabilitystate.
So if you know that dog can bedangerous, and I'm pretty
confident that since cryptocould bite the arm off of
(32:41):
anybody really easily, and Ididn't seem to me that he had a
lot of degree of care of what hewas doing at different times,
that that would make the ownerliable for what crypto was
doing.
Uh now, some of it could bedepending on what kind of breed
the dog was, and has there beenany type of previous uh violence
(33:05):
that the dog has shown?
We don't know enough aboutcrypto, uh, but without a doubt,
uh there are some possiblepossibilities there that the
owner, whether it's Superman orsomeone else, is gonna have to
bear some possibly criminal andor civil liability.
We do have in Maryland that ifthe victim contributes in any
(33:27):
way, even 1%, that that couldlimit the liability.
And I think we could at leastsay that Lex Luthor brought it
on himself for for doing what hedid, and so maybe Superman and
uh anybody else could get awaywith that.
But I mean, who the heck doesown crypto?
SPEAKER_03 (33:49):
All right, this is my next subject.
Um, just let you know, I'm a I'ma Southern California beach kid,
and I went to college, and so II've seen a lot of drunk people,
and that's how they introducedSupergirl to the movie at the
very end to launch her nextphase, and I think it's gonna be
fun.
I'm gonna take on her defense.
(34:11):
And when I was in law school, Iinterned at the DA's office, and
as an intern with only one yearof law school underneath me, I
handled the misdemeanorcalendar, and one of the things
we used to enforce was drunk inpublic.
And so the question now becomeswas she drunk in public?
And this is something we canprosecute her for.
In the bio for this, we said uhexcessive partying.
(34:35):
So, usually you're not everarrested just because you're
drunk in public, it's becauseyou did something else while you
were drunk in public.
You vandalized something, youmaybe decided to go to the
bathroom in a park, or uh you'rejust loud breaking the peace.
That's where it comes down to.
(34:56):
Delaware code is different thanwhat I've had to prosecute in
California.
They've added an extra layer.
Before it's are you so drunk youcan't take care of yourself, or
can you not take care of others?
That's California statute.
Delaware threw in, or you'reannoying.
I'd love that part of thestatute because that's something
(35:17):
that attorney, a nice weasleyword we can lock on to.
Like, at what level do youbecome annoying?
She is super annoying when theyintroduce her.
Why did you move the door, dude?
Thanks for watching my dog beepboard.
Um so that's something thatwould definitely have to be
argued about later on.
Yeah, but why would Delaware lawapply?
(35:38):
She did it in Antarctica.
Well, we're gonna apply Delawarebecause that's eventually when
she goes into public because shehas to she leaves the fortress
and will go home.
So I'm assuming she probably hasa some sort of studio apartment
in downtown.
I don't know, where she ends upgoing to.
The bigger question it's gonnaface her is DUI.
(36:01):
There are in the comics, theysay, well, there is a line of
reasoning that Superman doesn'tactually have to breathe and he
doesn't actually have to eat.
He gets all his power from thesun.
He's just a giant battery.
So he can fly through space andthey can go to these red planets
where they can lower theirimmunity enough to get drunk.
But in the movie, they saySuperman can only hold his
(36:22):
breath for one hour.
When Gary, which is a greatname, gives his list of injuries
to talk about all the internalorgans that are injured.
So more than likely, shewouldn't be able to fly to this
red planet under her own speedbecause she'd have to breathe or
do something.
She had to fly there.
And then she had to be therelong enough for that red sun to
lower her powers enough whereshe can get drunk.
(36:44):
She piloted something to getthere, and who knows what the
closest planet is with the redsun?
She drove a vehicle a long timebecause when she gets back to
the fortress, she's stillhammered.
So more than likely, she did um,yeah, she did get it, wouldn't
be eligible for DUI.
The trouble being that DUI lawsapply to vehicles, and the
(37:07):
Delaware code does not includeaircraft as being a vehicle.
So she maybe be able to getaround on that, but there's
probably a whole host of FAAregulations she would violate by
doing it.
So at the end of the day, yeah,in Delaware, she would probably
be susceptible to excessivepartying.
California, probably not.
SPEAKER_02 (37:27):
And I think everybody drinks in Antarctica.
I mean, what else can you dothere?
SPEAKER_00 (37:30):
Now we saw especially at the end of the
movie where Metropolis wasalmost destroyed by the pocket
universe.
And la and you had the bigcreature, I don't remember if it
had a name or not.
Uh but there was a lot ofdestruction going on throughout
the movie.
And Dave's not sitting up herejust to look pretty for us.
(37:52):
He's gonna tell us who the hellis responsible for all of this.
SPEAKER_08 (37:57):
Well, uh, my practice when I have one and I
don't anymore was much simplerthan the fancy stuff these guys
do.
Uh early in my career I dealtwith insurance law, and so
that's I thought what I would uhask ask that question.
The first question that occurredto me would be uh, is there
gonna be insurance to pay forthis mess?
And frankly, this may just showwhat a nerd I am.
(38:18):
This occurred to me when I sawthe first Avengers movie, and
then again when I saw FantasticFour, and then when I got I saw
this, because all thesebuildings are getting destroyed,
and some commercial liabilityinsurance company is gonna get
tagged for this damage, but willthey have to pay?
Uh first thought I had, well,are is this all covered as acts
of God?
I said, Well, you know, as it'sbeen pointed out, Superman is
(38:38):
not a god, he's an alien.
This case doesn't involve Thoror uh Captain Marvel, the uh
Shazam, the original CaptainMarvel.
There might be a question there.
The bad news is that acts of Godcoverage in insurance policies
doesn't really apply to acts ofdeities at all.
It's really acts of nature, likeearthquakes and hurricanes and
floods and tornadoes and thelike.
Uh the good news is that itdoesn't really matter because
(39:00):
acts of God isn't really a termused in insurance policies
anymore.
Insurance policies cover damagecaused by anything unless
there's an exclusion.
And the bad news is there's lotsof potential exclusions here.
Uh and I I preface uh some ofthe rest of this by telling you
that as a young lawyer, 45 yearsago, I was at a firm that, like
(39:23):
uh 12 or 15 other big firms inthe United States spent the
better part of a decadelitigating about what the
meaning of the terms sudden andaccidental.
And if if you think sudden andaccidental is ambiguous enough
to need 15 law firms to fightabout it for 15 years, try some
of these as applied to the factsuh in this case.
(39:44):
Typical exclusions that applythat exist in most insurance
policies bar any coverage forloss caused by bulging,
expansion, shrinking, settling,resultant cracking of
foundations, floors, walls,patios, earth movement, damages
caused by volcanoes, landslides,mud flows, the sinking, rising,
or shifting of land, surfacewater damage.
And if you remember that scenewhere the earth is splitting in
(40:06):
two because of the rift, youknow, uh loss caused by floods,
surface water, waves, tidalwater, overflow of a body of
water or spray from any ofthese, or groundwater damage.
Uh water below the surface,including water that exerts
pressure or seeps through thebuilding or sidewalks or
foundation or other structure,which seems to me is gonna be
great defenses for any insurancecompany that you're trying to
(40:29):
tag with this liability.
And then you have acts of warexclusions, which are even more
esoteric and changingconstantly.
You ought to I check myhomeowner's policy, and it had
my own homeowner's policy, andit had some of these terms, and
I didn't know what they meant,and they're not terribly well
defined.
We don't cover loss caused byhostile action by a military
force or cybermeasures.
(40:50):
Action in hindering or defendingan attack by any combatant or an
agent acting on behalf of acombatant.
Well, and you know, we'vealready talked about Luther.
He maybe he's an agent ofMoravia, maybe he's an agent of
the United States.
It's hard to tell, but he'sprobably arguably an agent of
some sovereign power.
They don't cover lossesresulting from war or warlike
action or cyber hostilities.
(41:11):
And even if the peril iscovered, if it's if the damage
is covered, is covered under oneportion of your policy, for
example, you spent the extramoney for earthquake insurance.
But it's not covered under theact of war exclusion, you don't
get anything.
Uh uh trust me on that.
But can't All State save you?
Uh All State?
(41:31):
Well, will Allstate let thismayhem get the best of you?
Again, you have to tick throughall these issues.
Was Luther a government actor oran agent of a state?
Were he were he or his agents?
I remember all those militaryguys that seem to be answering
to him.
Uh they a military force?
Was the rift a cyber hostility?
Was setting the kaiju, if I'mpronouncing that correctly, off
to attack Superman a warlikeaction.
(41:54):
And so at the end of the day,you uh you you remember Superman
and uh Mr.
Terrific uh chatting at the end.
I've changed the dialogue alittle bit, where Superman is
speculating this looks like itmight be the result of a
structural movement or earthmovement or loss caused by
pressure or weight of water,don't you think?
And that's when Mr.
Terrific walks away, andSuperman sadly claims he didn't
(42:15):
mean to bum you out.
So I think ultimately, unlessFEMA shows up with a big bag of
cash, metropolitanmetropolitans, if that's what we
call them, are probably uh shitout of luck.
SPEAKER_00 (42:28):
It's better to say bullshit to watch her do it.
SPEAKER_03 (42:33):
He's waiting for you to do it now.
I didn't see it.
My question for you is like,where does what if Percy Jackson
caused this damage where he's ademi-god?
He's half human and half son ofZeus.
SPEAKER_08 (42:46):
Well, again, you know, the acts of gods and the
exagon.
They're gonna correct you.
SPEAKER_03 (42:52):
Like didn't get anything wrong.
I just kept all over myself in aComic-Con.
unknown (42:56):
Is that climate running comic?
SPEAKER_08 (43:02):
Yeah, you still got all the things.
SPEAKER_02 (43:04):
The son of Poseidon, you know he's involved with
water.
You should have ordered FloodRider.
SPEAKER_00 (43:07):
That's right.
Now there are obviously a lotmore issues like did Superman
torture the president of Boraviaby putting him up against the
cactus?
And then why can Hawk girl justapparently kill the president of
Moravia without anyrepercussions?
But we'll have to save that foranother time.
Really appreciate that you guyscame.
We can stay, because this is theend of the night.
(43:29):
We can stay for a tiny bit ifanyone has questions.
Look us up on Legal Geeks.
There's a lot more contentthat's online of programming
we've done over the years.
Uh, it's a lot of fun,especially for the for the
lawyers.
So, questions?
SPEAKER_04 (43:47):
Luther and a presidential agent of the U.S.
government just put apresidential finding apply.
And the second one was personal.
SPEAKER_00 (43:58):
So first question was whether Luther could be an
agent of the U.S.
government uh and presidentialfinding.
A presidential finding.
I mean, obviously, we've seenwith this administration a much
greater use of presidentialmemorandums and executive
orders, uh, and and even whenattempts to modify the
Constitution.
(44:18):
Uh so probably would depend onwhich administration.
There's no indication of, ofcourse, who's in power.
We do see, I guess, cabinetofficers or at least senior
leadership at the Pentagon.
Uh and there's discussion, itappears there's uh interaction
with Luther with respect tocontractual relations, but we
don't know all the details.
Uh I would probably say if itwere now, the Trump
(44:41):
administration would say, yes,we can do it.
Uh in the future, we don't know.
And the second question was,John?
SPEAKER_04 (44:48):
Uh personhood.
So the question of whether,like, whether he has any rights
or not, based on a combinationof what you said and what's on
the slide, it looks like itdeals with whether or not he is
a person.
So, like, I mean, I knowScartrack covered this in depth,
but on data and others, but butit is a is uh a non-Homo sapian
(45:09):
who seems to have all the mentalqualities or whatever of a human
being.
Is he legally a person?
SPEAKER_02 (45:16):
It hasn't been a lot of like what I'll tell you is
because this came up in theartificial intelligence world
recently.
So it's gonna depend upon thestatute, of course, but I will
tell you that somebody tried torecently, about a year or two
ago, register a piece of artdrawn solely by artificial
intelligence.
The copyright office denied theright, they appealed it all the
way up to the federal circuitcourt, and the federal circuit
court said no, because if youlook at the Copyright Act, which
(45:37):
sends back to the Constitution,it talks about things that only
humans can do.
Creativity.
Um, you and your children, yourprogeny.
You can't have progeny if you'renot a person.
So I suspect, depending upon thelaw involved, you'd have to look
up and see the types of verbiageused to see whether they intend
to include persons as humanbeings or entities that are
basically still breathingoxygen, reproductive, etc.
SPEAKER_00 (45:58):
And it will depend also where and what laws we're
talking about.
Uh Michael and I were on aTransformers panel uh for the
legal geeks.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (46:07):
It was can you murder a transformer?
SPEAKER_00 (46:09):
Yeah, is that against the law to murder a
transformer?
And in, I think I'm trying toremember, was it Saudi Arabia uh
has has made AI a person undertheir laws.
So if you did it in SaudiArabia, it could be against the
law.
If you do it here, it might notbe.
So it would it would just wealways say it depends.
(46:30):
That's that's the best legalanswer.
SPEAKER_02 (46:31):
So if you get pissed in your Alexa, don't hit it.
SPEAKER_00 (46:41):
All right, question was what uh would it be an
affirmative defense if you wererepresenting a meta human?
SPEAKER_06 (46:48):
Affirmative defense is a I guess it would depend.
SPEAKER_00 (46:59):
I mean it would depend on the factual context,
obviously.
Is there a a scene?
SPEAKER_06 (47:04):
Are you referring to the Are you referring to like
when like a hot girl murderedthe president?
SPEAKER_00 (47:23):
I mean self-defense would obviously always be a
possibility.
SPEAKER_08 (47:28):
Where are situations where you can think that in the
movie context is a clearself-defense or say clear I can
kind of argue either way, or youmight have some situations where
if these actions took place inthe pocket universe, you have a
question of extraterritorialapplication of U.S.
(47:49):
law, and so maybe the U.S.
SPEAKER_00 (47:51):
courts wouldn't accept jurisdiction over that.
And it would also depend on, Imean, we don't have a good sense
of the justice gang, uh, which Iguess ends up being the name at
the end if if they let uhmetamorpho, metamorphosis,
metamorpho, uh, into the justicegang because he liked the name.
You know, were they acting,whose authority are they acting
under?
(48:11):
Uh there are arguments underArticle 51 of the UN Charter of
affirmative violence,affirmative strikes if someone
is going to attack you, uh,before they do.
It doesn't have to beself-defense of they attacked
us, we strike back.
It could be a preventativestrike.
Uh, you know, was that what theywere doing when they went into
(48:35):
uh Boravia or or the neighboringcountry?
Janinpur?
Very good.
Did I get that right?
Was that one?
Something like that?
Close enough?
SPEAKER_02 (48:43):
Um good question.
And then there's also one morething to think about.
There's also the laws of armedand conflict and laws of armed
engagement.
So those same laws that apply toyou know peacetime in a country,
murder, etc., there's adifferent standard when you're
coming to acts of war and thelaws of armed conflict.
What is considered minimal, whatbasically collateral damage,
etc.
So I would argue that youprobably this is a war scenario
(49:05):
and you probably look at some ofthose questions.
SPEAKER_00 (49:06):
Yeah, and what kind of combatant they might be, uh
like Al Qaeda, do they belong toa country, do they not?
SPEAKER_03 (49:12):
There's a instead of just looking at affirmative
fences, there'll be a lot ofenhancements against meta-humans
where the law is gonna come downharder against them because of
their special abilities.
The law doesn't like it when youbring a gun to a knife fight.
They're more, if you're gonna bea mutual combatant, you both
have knives, you can't bringsomething extra to it, and all
these meta-humans are bringingsomething extra to the fight.
(49:33):
That happens a lot with peoplethat are trained in martial
arts.
If they get in a fight, they'reright.
They're considered to have thesespecial skills over and above,
and they um the law comes downharder on them when they're like
that.
And then the best one, the bestone is temporary insanity.
SPEAKER_02 (49:49):
Come on, green lantern.
I don't like the guy.
His character, you might be ableto plead for temporary insanity,
which is the defense in itself.
Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_03 (50:07):
Well, it's weird because you start off with the
first the fortress was builtjust outside Metropolis.
He burrowed it out of a hill,and it was kind of cool than my
picture he had.
The way he locked it was a giantkey that only supposedly he was
powerful enough to lift and openthe door.
And then they moved it toAntarctica or to Arc to the
(50:27):
Arctic.
I really don't know why he movedit to Antarctica except to be
able to throw that line in aboutviolating the 12 treaties.
SPEAKER_05 (50:34):
The cool part is not the Roman version of the back.
SPEAKER_03 (50:40):
Yeah.
So that was and I I run intothis when I'm trying to get into
deeper into the comic book lore,where depending on who the
writer was, it kind of changesthe story a little bit.
And with Superman, I discoveredwas they decided that every
three years they'd have a newgeneration of people reading the
(51:01):
comics.
So it was okay to go back andchange things or add stuff or
rewrite plots because no onewould catch up, because it'd be
a next generation comingthrough.
So stuff got moved around quitea bit.
Any others?
Yes, ma'am.
SPEAKER_01 (51:19):
Yes, ma'am.
SPEAKER_00 (51:37):
That's a great question.
That's that's an awesome I Ihaven't even thought about this.
This is a great question.
All right, so what laws wouldapply?
We mentioned theextraterritorial jurisdiction or
application.
What laws would apply to thepocket?
I'm just repeating the questionhere, and I'm gonna let you guys
answer because I don't know theanswer.
Uh does it is it the law whereyou enter and you bring that
(51:59):
with you, or is it the laws inthe pocket universe or where you
exit?
SPEAKER_08 (52:05):
Well, and who's gonna decide?
I think there's a real goodchance that U.S.
courts, certainly state courts,would just say, find another
court because it's not me.
SPEAKER_02 (52:15):
But jurisdiction also depends upon whether or not
you impose actions that are haveeffect or impact on another
place.
So, for example, the computercrime and a few computer fraud
abuse act was amended many timesto deal with the fact that
people might hack in fromthird-party countries and
computers might be locatedoutside of this country, but you
still want it to be able to dosomething about it.
But again, it's focused oncountries.
(52:37):
Another dimension, I'm not sureit would cover.
And then it has an impact on thearea.
Exactly.
But if but if you're doing astrict construction as to the
statute, I'm pretty sure you'regonna struggle.
And then the most importantquestion is dual criminality.
Can you extradite somebody?
You need to have it a crime inboth the place you're
extraditing from and the placeyou're extraditing to.
I don't know if there are anylaws about dual criminality that
(52:58):
would cover the pocket universe,so probably staying there is
where I keep you.
SPEAKER_08 (53:02):
And does the court have jurisdiction, personal
jurisdiction over the monkeys?
SPEAKER_04 (53:07):
Unlawful imprisonment.
Does it matter if the does itmatter where you imprison?
Because couldn't you get legs onunlawful imprisonment in the
popular universe?
SPEAKER_00 (53:16):
Well, and and some uh the question about unlawful
imprisonment, and I'll tie itback into your great question on
the universal on thejurisdiction.
He mentions that some of thepeople were imprisoned there
under the authority of the U.S.
government.
And then others, like hisex-girlfriends who pissed him
off, uh, he brought and put in.
And that just raises all sortsof questions, obviously, due
(53:39):
process, uh, questions under uhFourth Amendment and etc.
Eighth Amendment.
Eighth Amendment, cruel andhuman punishment.
SPEAKER_03 (53:46):
The legal gigs thing was the phantom zone, a
violation of the EighthAmendment, where you stick
somebody where time doesn'texist.
So when you get out, no time hasactually gone by.
Is that cruel and unusual?
Kind of be a punishment becauseyour kids are grown?
SPEAKER_00 (53:57):
Now there are some jurisdictional principles to go
back to your question, uh, thatthere's called universal
jurisdiction.
There are certain crimes, whatwe call Yous Kogan's crimes, so
I can use my Latin uh phrase,that are crimes of all nations,
that no one can derogate andcommit that.
Genocide, war crimes, crimesagainst humanity, everyone has
(54:19):
jurisdiction over them, uhalthough it still does depend.
Uh if there's a crime on anairplane, for example, or it's
over the Atlantic, who hasjurisdiction over something, an
assault and battery, a a drunkperson, uh uh some uh sexual
harassment?
And it will often be the countryfrom where the plane left, the
(54:42):
country to which the plane isgoing.
The if it's a ship, they used togo if you ever look at a ship,
look at the back of the ship tosee where the ship is
registered.
That country has jurisdictionover it as well, no matter where
the ship, it's called a f it's afloating island all around the
world, no matter where it goes.
Isn't it sometimes the stateover which the airplane is
(55:03):
flying?
That it can be also that,depending on where it is.
SPEAKER_06 (55:07):
Yes, sorry, get what occasion is on registering.
SPEAKER_00 (55:16):
We sued the government of Libya for the
bombing of Pan Am Flight 103,and we made the argument that
the U.S.
had jurisdiction because Pan Amwould have a big American flag
on the back of its tail and thatit was essentially a flying
island just as if a ship was,that it was registered with the
United States.
(55:37):
Uh that argument didn't work, soI changed the law to make sure
we had jurisdiction over Libya,and then that worked.
Yes, sir.
unknown (55:45):
What country are we talking about?
SPEAKER_00 (55:47):
What country do you want to talk about?
I don't know if there's laws.
There are.
Whenever they want to make oneof you get executed.
So, where do you thinkmetropolis is?
Where's Metropolis?
Ben, where's Metropolis?
Is it in the United States or isit just made up?
(56:11):
That would be part of thequestion.
We can take a final question.
Anyone got anything else?
Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_06 (56:18):
Oh, how many laws is we're going to break when we're
flying over other countries'interfaces in the book?
SPEAKER_00 (56:26):
Uh with with did you say with the fly when they're
flying?
So when Superman, Super DrunkSupergirl is flying over all
countries, is she violating anylaws?
Let's say she creates a sonicboom and that causes damage.
SPEAKER_03 (56:40):
I would go with uh episode of in Superman, I'll
play it to him, where he wasgiven the golden ticket by the
UN, which granted him theability to go to every single
country that's a member of theUN.
Without a visa.
Without yeah, having a visa orsomething.
SPEAKER_00 (56:54):
But so insurance, Supergirl, drunk Supergirl flies
over a country, creates a sonicboom, and blows out the windows.
Does insurance cover that?
SPEAKER_08 (57:03):
Uh yeah, I'd no exclusion jumps to mind.
SPEAKER_02 (57:07):
But it's not a vehicle, also.
Well, it doesn't have to be avehicle.
Wind.
SPEAKER_08 (57:15):
Wind, there's usually wind exclusions unless
you have tornado insurance.
SPEAKER_00 (57:20):
Well, we're not gonna solve all these issues,
unfortunately, tonight.
Thank you all for coming.
Have a great rest of your con ifyou're coming back tomorrow.
And hopefully come back nextyear to another Legal Geeks
Imposium.
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