No Retaining Wall For You

It looks like I was too early in claiming the Leus are home free. I sometimes forget how much room for reversal there is in the law...

But it appears that the deal, approved by the U.S. Department of Justice in the waning days of the Bush administration, may not be the final chapter in the three-way legal dispute.

Besides the Leus on one side and the boundary commission on the other, the litigation also involves Schornack, the Michigan man who contends that Bush had no legal right to fire him from his post as U.S. boundary commissioner. Schornack also contends that the Justice Department has no right to approve a legal settlement that, in his view, violates the boundary treaty.

Schornack and his attorney, Elliott Feldman, are still hoping that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals will reinstate him as commissioner.

Even if that doesn't happen, Feldman promised that he or another attorney will file documents in U.S. District Court on Friday, Jan. 16, hoping to block the settlement.

Feldman noted that U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman had earlier imposed a stay on the Leus' case, pending the Ninth Circuit ruling on Schornack's claims. Feldman said he will challenge any lifting of that stay.