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Marijuana opponents using racketeering law to fight industry
Legal Topics |
2015/07/16 15:47
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A federal law crafted to fight the mob is giving marijuana opponents a new strategy in their battle to stop the expanding industry: racketeering lawsuits.
A Colorado pot shop recently closed after a Washington-based group opposed to legal marijuana sued not just the pot shop but a laundry list of firms doing business with it — from its landlord and accountant to the Iowa bonding company guaranteeing its tax payments. One by one, many of the defendants agreed to stop doing business with Medical Marijuana of the Rockies, until the mountain shop closed its doors and had to sell off its pot at fire-sale prices.
With another lawsuit pending in southern Colorado, the cases represent a new approach to fighting marijuana. If the federal government won't stop its expansion, pot opponents say, federal racketeering lawsuits could. Marijuana may be legal under state law, but federal drug law still considers any marijuana business organized crime.
"It is still illegal to cultivate, sell or possess marijuana under federal law," said Brian Barnes, lawyer for Safe Streets Alliance, a Washington-based anti-crime group that brought the lawsuits on behalf of neighbors of the two Colorado pot businesses.
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Wisconsin court ends probe of presidential hopeful Walker
Attorney News |
2015/07/15 15:47
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Presidential candidate Scott Walker won a major legal victory Thursday when Wisconsin's Supreme Court ended a secret investigation into whether the Republican's gubernatorial campaign illegally coordinated with conservative groups during the 2012 recall election.
No one has been charged in the so-called John Doe probe, Wisconsin's version of a grand jury investigation in which information is tightly controlled, but questions about the investigation have dogged Walker for months.
Barring an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, the ruling makes Walker's campaign that much smoother as he courts voters in early primary states.
"Today's ruling confirmed no laws were broken, a ruling that was previously stated by both a state and federal judge," said Walker's spokeswoman Ashlee Strong. "It is time to move past this unwarranted investigation that has cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars."
The case centers on political activity conducted by Wisconsin Club for Growth and other conservative organizations during the 2012 recall, which was spurred by Democrats' anger over a Walker-authored law that effectively ending collective bargaining for most public workers.
The justices cited free speech in effectively tossing out the case, ruling state election law is overbroad and vague in defining what amounts to "political purposes."
Justice Michael Gableman, part of the court's conservative majority, praised the groups for challenging the investigation.
"It is fortunate, indeed, for every other citizen of this great State who is interested in the protection of fundamental liberties that the special prosecutor chose as his targets innocent citizens who had both the will and the means to fight the unlimited resources of an unjust prosecution," Gableman wrote in the majority opinion.
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Penn State ex-officials' case heads to appeals court hearing
Legal Topics |
2015/07/14 22:35
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A long delayed criminal case against three former Penn State administrators accused of covering up complaints about Jerry Sandusky is heading to a Pennsylvania courtroom next month, but not for trial.
Superior Court — a state appeals court — last week scheduled oral argument before a three-judge panel in Harrisburg for Aug. 11 to consider the claims by Graham Spanier, Tim Curley and Gary Schultz regarding a county judge's decision earlier this year.
If upheld, the judge's order could clear the way for trial in the matter that has gone on for nearly four years without a trial date being set.
The appeals court file has been sealed, but the online docket indicates the men are appealing a January order by Dauphin County Judge Todd Hoover that rejected arguments they had made about the fairness and legality of the grand jury investigation that resulted in charges.
All three defendants held high-ranking positions at the university in 2011, when Sandusky, the former assistant football coach, was charged with sexual abuse of children; Spanier was president, Schultz was vice president for business and finance and Curley was athletic director. |
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Pakistan court grants bail to top model arrested with cash
Court News |
2015/07/13 22:35
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A Pakistan court granted bail Tuesday to a top model Ayaan Ali, who has been held since March after being caught trying to fly to Dubai with half a million dollars in cash stashed in her luggage, her lawyer said.
In a televised comment, defense lawyer Latif Khosa said the Lahore High Court granted bail to Ali after hearing arguments from both sides.
He said they had started the paperwork for the release of Ali, who has been the focus of Pakistani media's attention since authorities nabbed her at the VIP lounge of Islamabad's airport. Under Pakistani laws, no one can carry over $10,000 on a flight, but authorities found $506,800 tucked into her luggage.
It was unclear when the model would be freed. Ali is being held at a prison in the garrison city of Rawalpindi.
Usually, lawyers take one to two days to complete paperwork to get their clients released. |
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Silicon Valley company starts to take court disputes online
Headline Legal News |
2015/07/12 22:35
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Imagine working out a divorce without hiring an attorney or stepping into court or disputing the tax assessment on your home completely online.
A Silicon Valley company is starting to make both possibilities a reality with software that experts say represents the next wave of technology in which the law is turned into computer code that can solve legal battles without the need for a judge or attorney.
"We're not quite at the Google car stage in law, but there are no conceptual or technical barriers to what we're talking about," said Oliver Goodenough, director of the Center for Legal Innovation at Vermont Law School, referring to Google's self-driving car.
The computer programs, at least initially, have the ability to relieve overburdened courts of small claims cases, traffic fines and some family law matters. But Goodenough and other experts envision a future in which even more complicated disputes are resolved online, and they say San Jose, California-based Modria has gone far in developing software to realize that.
"There is a version of the future when computers get so good that we trust them to play this role in our society, and it lets us get justice to more people because it's cheaper and more transparent," said Colin Rule, Modria's co-founder.
Officials in Ohio are using Modria's software to resolve disputes over tax assessments and keep them out of court, and a New York-based arbitration association has deployed it to settle medical claims arising from certain types of car crashes.
In the Netherlands, Modria software is being used to guide people through their divorces. |
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Court revises test on determining Native American status
Court News |
2015/07/09 20:06
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Attorneys in federal cases stemming from crimes on American Indian reservations have new guidance on what's needed to prove a defendant is Indian.
Federal authorities have jurisdiction over major crimes on tribal land when the victim, suspect or both are American Indian. A two-part test determines who is Indian.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals revised the first part of that test in an opinion Tuesday — no longer requiring that the degree of Indian blood be traced to a federally recognized tribe — and restored an Arizona man's 90-year sentence on assault and firearms charges.
The court said evidence at trial was enough to find Damien Zepeda is American Indian. Zepeda, an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Community, disagreed.
"That's why it was so important to clarify that the proof in this case was sufficient," said Arthur Hellman, a University of Pittsburgh law professor who monitors the 9th Circuit. "This will lay down the rule for future prosecutors."
In 2013, a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit ruled prosecutors did not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zepeda's bloodline of one-quarter Pima and one-quarter Tohono O'odham derived from an American Indian tribe recognized by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. It reversed all but one of nine convictions and ordered a lower court to resentence him.
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Religious beliefs, gay rights clash in court case over cake
Legal Topics |
2015/07/09 20:06
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A suburban Denver baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple will argue in court Tuesday that his religious beliefs should protect him from sanctions against his business.
The case underscores how the already simmering tension between religious-freedom advocates and gay-rights supporters is likely to become more heated in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark ruling last month legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide.
"What the relationship is between that reality and sort of what that will mean for things like service provisions is where I think the battles will really be fought now," said Melissa Hart, a law professor at the University of Colorado.
The 2012 case before the Colorado Court of Appeals has ignited a passionate debate over whether individuals can cite their beliefs as a basis for declining to participate in a same-sex wedding ceremony or if such refusals on religious grounds can lead to discrimination allegations.
Gay couples have won battles in other states.
Last week, the owners of a Portland, Oregon-area bakery that declined to make a wedding cake for a gay couple two years ago were ordered to pay $135,000 in damages. Two years ago, the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled that a photographer who wouldn't take pictures of a gay couple's 2006 commitment ceremony violated the state's discrimination law. |
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