10.16.2009 - Stephen Barnett, California Supreme Court expert, dies at 73:
"BERKELEY — Stephen Barnett, professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, died of complications resulting from cardiac arrest on Tuesday, Oct. 13. He was 73.
Stephen Barnett (Jim Block photo)Barnett was a prominent expert on intellectual property law; the news media; the legal institutions of California, principally the California Supreme Court; and First Amendment issues.
'In his scholarship, Steve was a devastating critic of the practices of the California Supreme Court and the California State Bar Association,' said Berkeley Law professor Melvin Eisenberg. 'He did a lot of acute, penetrating research that no one else has done regarding judicial transparency and legitimacy.'
Berkeley Law Associate Dean and professor Stephen Sugarman said Barnett 'was probably California's leading analyst and critic of the way the California Supreme Court goes about its business – how promptly it delivers its decisions, when the judges prepare their opinions, the Court's control over the briefs of parties and the role of oral argument, and the role of unpublished opinions and de-published opinions of lower California courts.'"
"BERKELEY — Stephen Barnett, professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, died of complications resulting from cardiac arrest on Tuesday, Oct. 13. He was 73.
Stephen Barnett (Jim Block photo)Barnett was a prominent expert on intellectual property law; the news media; the legal institutions of California, principally the California Supreme Court; and First Amendment issues.
'In his scholarship, Steve was a devastating critic of the practices of the California Supreme Court and the California State Bar Association,' said Berkeley Law professor Melvin Eisenberg. 'He did a lot of acute, penetrating research that no one else has done regarding judicial transparency and legitimacy.'
Berkeley Law Associate Dean and professor Stephen Sugarman said Barnett 'was probably California's leading analyst and critic of the way the California Supreme Court goes about its business – how promptly it delivers its decisions, when the judges prepare their opinions, the Court's control over the briefs of parties and the role of oral argument, and the role of unpublished opinions and de-published opinions of lower California courts.'"