Dear listeners,

Welcome to another episode of Serious Trouble!

This week, Ken and I talked about a substantial sanctions order — nearly $1 million — that Donald Trump and his attorney Alina Habba must pay for the frivolous RICO lawsuit they brought against dozens of defendants. As sanctions orders go, this is really big — and Ken thinks Habba should worry about being disbarred — but is this really an effective deterrent against Trump, who got lots of publicity and fundraising opportunities from the suit?

We also looked at criminal charges against Alec Baldwin. He is to be tried for involuntary manslaughter related to his fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of his film Rust in 2021. When is a terrible accident also a crime? Ken got to know the New Mexico manslaughter statute — thanks Ken — and has some thoughts on how Baldwin’s comments in public interviews, and his choice to make himself a plaintiff in civil litigation related to the shootings, have complicated the defense he’ll need to offer.

And we talked about Brian Walshe, whose Google searches helped lead to his arrest for the murder of his still-missing wife, Ana. It turns out, Googling “10 ways to dispose of a dead body if you really need to” before your wife disappears can help with the issuance of an arrest warrant against you. We talked how this evidence is used after the fact, and why it’s not practical to use this real-time information to stop crimes in progress.

We hope you enjoy the episode.

Josh

Episode links and references

Click here for a transcript of this episode.

Trump/Habba sanctions order.

CNN: A chronology of Brian Walshe’s Google searches.

Boston Globe: After Brian Walshe, should Google warn police of an impending murder?