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An item from the news. As always, my comments follow.

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) --

A Texas judge ordered a defendant's mouth to be taped shut after the man kept interrupting his lawyer and the judge during an aggravated assault trial.

For about 20 minutes Tuesday, Carl Wiley, 36, ignored pleas from state District Judge Jim Bob Darnell and his own mother to keep quiet during a hearing outside the jury's presence.

Finally, Darnell ordered bailiffs to seal Wiley's mouth with duct tape.

"He was being very disruptive and he was trying to fire his second court-appointed attorney, and I informed him that when the attorney is appointed by the court, only the court can fire the attorney," Darnell said.

"Mr. Wiley continued to interrupt him," Darnell said, referring to attorney Steve Hamilton, "so the court duct-taped his mouth until the jury came in. Then I had him removed from the courtroom."

Hamilton declined to comment on the incident or on his client's conviction later Tuesday for ramming his vehicle into his estranged wife's car. She was not injured.

No sentencing date has been set.

Over these past weeks, I have often heard it said that the best use for duct tape was not to seal one's home up in some kind of terror induced frenzy, but to apply it liberally to Rumsfeld's mouth. It seems now that the Texas justice system has taken the central theme of this message to heart.

I can't tell you how many lawyers dream of sealing the gobs of their clients, but to know that such a thing is actually a possibility, is almost enough to make me want to take up the practice in that state, despite the state wide mispronunciation of the term "voir dire."

Well, maybe not.

Can you imagine what it must have been like to have been there? It would have been like attending the trial of Peter Haskett or Ray Huffman. How belligerent do you have to be to warrant the duct tape treatment?

Oh, dear reader. How long do you think we'll have to wait before the transcript becomes available?

Posted at 1:14 p.m.

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