Her appointment could further shrink the property rights of homeowners and small businesses, says law professor Ilya Somin in an editorial. Somin says that Sotomayor takes the Supreme Court's controversial 5-to-4 Kelo decision, which allowed homes to be seized for the benefit of developers, and expands it beyond even what the Supreme Court intended:"In 1999 the village of Port Chester, N.Y., established a 'redevelopment area,' giving designated developer Gregg Wasser a virtual blank check to condemn property within the area. When local property owners Bart Didden and Dominick Bologna sought a permit to build a CVS pharmacy in the area, Wasser demanded that they pay him $800,000 or give him a 50 percent partnership interest in the store, threatening to have their land condemned if they said no. They refused, and a day later the village condemned their property. Didden and Bologna challenged the condemnation on the ground that it was not for a "public use," as the Constitution's Fifth Amendment requires. Their argument was simple and compelling: Extortion for the benefit of a private party is not a public use. In a short, cursory opinion, Sotomayor's panel upheld the condemnation."Leading law professor Richard Epstein has also expressed concern about Sotomayor's ruling and how it could be used by government officials and politically-connected people to effectively seize property from the politically-powerless.