Gallimore v. Washington

This case requires us to consider two long-established legal maxims and, if possible, to find a way to accommodate them both. I refer to these maxims as Nos. I and II.

Maxim I, which sounds especially formidable in the Latin original,1 and which, while “deeply rooted in our jurisprudence,” remains very much alive today, see Farris v. Compton, 652 A.2d 49, 55 (D.C.1994), teaches us that “no man may take advantage of his own wrong.” Glus v. Brooklyn E. Dist. Terminal, 359 U.S. 231, 232, 79 S.Ct. 760, 762, 3 L.Ed.2d 770 (1959). Maxim II, also of ancient vintage, instructs that “[ejquity abhors…