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Ohio to court: Privatizing prisons in budget is legal
Areas of Focus |
2014/09/08 23:01
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State lawyers tell the Ohio Supreme Court that using a budget bill to privatize state prisons didn’t violate a constitutional provision holding bills to a single subject.In a brief filed today, Ohio said the state’s budget, like any family’s, involves both revenues and expenses — not just appropriations.
The filing comes in a legal dispute with the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association. The prison workers’ union filed suit over privatization in 2012, contending that lawmakers extended beyond the single-subject rule when they used the budget to sell a state prison and turn others over to private operators.
An appellate court agreed, finding in October there was no “rational relationship” between the privatization plan and state spending.The state says privatization saved Ohio money and so had “obvious budget connections.” |
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Hawaii, Idaho, Nevada gay marriage laws in court
Areas of Focus |
2014/09/07 23:01
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For the first time since it declared California's gay marriage ban unconstitutional, the federal appeals court in San Francisco is readying to hear arguments over same-sex weddings in a political and legal climate that's vastly different than when it overturned Proposition 8 in 2012.
State and federal court judges have been striking down bans in more than a dozen states at a rapid rate since a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling last year.
Now, three judges on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — all appointed by Democrats and one of whom wrote the opinion overturning Proposition 8 — are set to hear arguments Monday on gay marriage bans in Idaho, Nevada and Hawaii.
"It seemed like such an uphill battle when I started," said Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights. "I really couldn't imagine then that we would be where we are now."
Minter has been fighting for gay marriage for 21 years, was instrumental in challenging bans in California and Utah and is representing gay couples seeking to overturn Idaho's prohibition. |
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NC Supreme Court again weighs Duke Energy rates
Areas of Focus |
2014/09/06 23:01
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North Carolina's highest court is examining whether state utilities regulators correctly weighed the consumer impact of two rate increases for a Duke Energy operating unit.
The state Supreme Court was scheduled to hear arguments Monday in two lawsuits in which Attorney General Roy Cooper argues regulators didn't sufficiently consider the size of rate increases. The two rate cases involve Duke Energy Carolinas, a Duke Energy subsidiary serving customers in Durham and western North Carolina.
One case involves a 4.5 percent average increase approved last year for two years, growing to a 5.1 percent increase thereafter. The second involves a 7.2 percent rate increase originally approved in 2012. Consumers are already paying the higher rates.
Cooper appealed the 2012 rate increase and the Supreme Court last year ordered the North Carolina Utilities Commission to reconsider its size in light of its effect on customers. The commission did, but came to the same conclusion.
Cooper's staff attorneys argued in court filings that regulators didn't really make the findings of fact about the effect of changing economic conditions on customers required by the Supreme Court in last year's ruling. |
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Texas abortion clinic to reopen after court ruling
Legal Business |
2014/09/04 23:47
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Women in South Texas facing a 200-mile drive for access to legal abortions learned Wednesday that a local clinic shuttered by a sweeping anti-abortion law would reopen, marking the first tangible effect of a court ruling last week that blocked key parts of the state law.
Whole Woman's Health clinic in McAllen, a city near the Mexico border, closed in March after its doctors said they couldn't obtain admitting privileges at nearby hospitals as the state now requires. But a federal judge ruled Friday that the law created unconstitutional barriers to abortions in South Texas, and the clinic is now set to reopen later this week, chief executive Amy Hagstrom Miller said.
Questions are now also being raised about whether the ruling had other broader ramifications than first thought.
U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel made two key rulings in Friday's 21-page decision. He struck down a mandate that required all abortion clinics in Texas to adopt costly hospital-level operating standards and exempted clinics in McAllen and El Paso from an already upheld requirement that doctors who perform abortions obtain admitting privileges at nearby hospitals.
A four-day trial last month narrowly focused on the El Paso and McAllen areas because clinics there serve regions where access to abortions would otherwise be particularly difficult. But language Yeakel included in a separate final judgment has left some questioning whether his order — inadvertently or not — banned the admitting-privileges law at all Texas abortion clinics. |
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Court agrees to review Alaska Roadless Rule case
Headline Legal News |
2014/09/02 23:47
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A full federal appeals court will review the decision allowing Alaska's Tongass National Forest to be exempt from federal restrictions on road-building and timber harvests in "roadless" areas."
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday announced an 11-member panel will review a split decision rendered by a three-judge panel in March, which said the U.S. Department of Agriculture had legitimate grounds in 2003 to temporarily exempt the Tongass from the Roadless Rule.
Earthjustice attorney Tom Waldo said by phone from Juneau that the decision was great news for residents of southeast Alaska.
"This case is about the wild and undeveloped part of the Tongass, which are really important for hunting, fishing, tourism and recreation," he said. "These are the driving forces of the local economy, and today's order ensures that those places will remain protected until the court can give the issue a thorough review."
"Today's decision is extremely disappointing," said Sharon Leighow, spokeswoman for Gov. Sean Parnell. "It was the state's position that this case did not meet the criteria for a rehearing and was properly decided by the three-judge panel."
"As a result of today's ruling, the status of the Roadless Rule in the Tongass will remain in doubt well into 2015, further harming the economy in Southeast Alaska," she said in a statement. |
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Chris Brown due back in DC court for plea hearing
Legal Topics |
2014/09/01 23:46
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Singer Chris Brown is scheduled to appear in a District of Columbia court for what would be a third attempt at a plea deal to resolve an assault case that dates to October 2013.
According to court filings, Brown was scheduled to appear in D.C. Superior Court on Friday for a plea hearing but was unable due to travel issues. The hearing was rescheduled for Tuesday at 9 a.m.
Bill Miller, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney, confirmed Brown is due in court. But he declined to comment on the case.
In January and June, Brown rejected plea deals on a misdemeanor assault charge. At the time of the incident, Brown was on probation in California for a 2009 attack on his then-girlfriend singer Rihanna.
Brown's attorney, Stuart Sears, declined to comment on the case. |
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Guilty plea in California meat recall case
Legal Topics |
2014/08/28 18:40
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A co-owner of a Northern California slaughterhouse accused of processing cows with cancer has pleaded guilty to a criminal charge.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports that 77-year-old Robert Singleton, co-owner of Petaluma-based Rancho Feeding Corp., entered the plea on Friday to aiding and abetting in the distribution of adulterated, misbranded and uninspected meat. He has agreed to work with prosecutors who have filed charges against the company's other owner, Jesse Amaral Jr., and two employees, Eugene Corda and Felix Cabrera.
They have pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors say the company slaughtered dozens of cows with skin cancer of the eye, and plant workers swapped the heads of diseased cattle with those of healthy cows.
Operations were halted in February after a series of recalls, including one for 8.7 million pounds of beef. |
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