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Ethics measure backers ask high court to let them join case
Court News |
2017/01/22 22:53
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Supporters of a voter-approved government ethics overhaul are asking the state Supreme Court to allow them to join a lawsuit challenging the initiative filed by Republican lawmakers.
South Dakotans for Integrity, a political committee that supported the initiative, is arguing that a lower court judge was wrong in denying their push to intervene in the case.
The judge in December issued an order blocking the entire law from taking effect while the court challenge moves forward.
The group can't appeal that order because they aren't intervenors. South Dakotans for Integrity says the majority of voters who enacted the measure have the right to be represented by advocates whose allegiance is "unquestionable."
Those bringing the lawsuit contend that provisions in the law are unconstitutional. The attorney general's office is defending it.
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Aaron Hernandez expected in court as murder trial nears
Court News |
2017/01/21 06:54
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Former NFL star Aaron Hernandez is expected in a Boston courtroom for a pretrial hearing in his upcoming double murder trial.
Hernandez is accused of killing two men he encountered at a Boston nightclub in 2012. Prosecutors say the former New England Patriots tight end followed the men and opened fire on their car at a stop light after one of them accidentally bumped into Hernandez and spilled his drink.
Hernandez is due in Suffolk Superior Court Thursday, when a judge is expected to hear arguments on defense motions. Hernandez's trial is scheduled to begin next month.
Hernandez has pleaded not guilty. He's already serving a life sentence in the 2013 killing of semi-professional football player Odin Lloyd.
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State high court to hear wind power appeal
Court News |
2016/12/06 00:05
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A decision on a proposed high-voltage power transmission line that would run through several Illinois counties is now heading to the state Supreme Court after an energy company decided to appeal a ruling against construction.
The high court agreed last week to review an appellate court's decision on the Rock Island Clean Line, a 500-mile electric project transmitting wind energy from Iowa turbines. The appellate court reversed a 2014 decision from the state Commerce Commission, which approved construction of the line.
Evidence presented by Rock Island in the case suggests the project would reduce electricity costs by hundreds of millions of dollars. The construction of the project would also create construction jobs.
Rock Island also would pay each county through which the transmission line passes $7,000 per year for each mile for 20 years.
The company has faced four years of legal opposition by the Illinois Landowners Alliance, the Illinois Farm Bureau and ComEd. The groups argue that the project doesn't meet Illinois Public Utilities Act requirements.
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German court upholds former Auschwitz guard's conviction
Court News |
2016/12/01 21:06
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A German federal court has rejected a former Auschwitz death camp guard's appeal against his conviction for being an accessory to murder, a decision greeted Monday as setting an important precedent for future prosecutions of Holocaust perpetrators.
Oskar Groening, now 95, was convicted in July 2015 of being an accessory to the murder of 300,000 Jews and sentenced by a court in Lueneburg to four years in prison. Judges found that he knew Jews were being slaughtered and supported the killings through his actions.
The Federal Court of Justice's decision to uphold the former SS sergeant's conviction boosts ongoing cases against other suspects and raises the possibility of further investigations against others who served at Nazi death camps or in other functions.
"It's very exciting news," said Efraim Zuroff, the head Nazi hunter at the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Jerusalem. "The door is open."
Groening, who has been dubbed the "accountant of Auschwitz," testified at his trial that he oversaw the collection of prisoners' belongings and ensured valuables and cash were separated to be sent to Berlin. He said he witnessed individual atrocities, but did not acknowledge participating in any crimes.
Presiding Judge Franz Kompisch ruled last year, however, that Groening was part of the "machinery of death," helping the camp function and also collecting money stolen from the victims to help the Nazi cause, and could thus be convicted of accessory to the murders committed there.
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Supreme Court rejects church's appeal over marijuana laws
Court News |
2016/11/29 21:06
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The Supreme Court won't take up an appeal from a Native American church in Hawaii that wants to be exempt from federal marijuana laws.
The justice on Monday let stand a lower court ruling that said laws banning the possession and distribution of cannabis don't interfere with church members' right to exercise their religion.
The Oklevueha Native American Church of Hawaii filed a lawsuit in 2009 asking for relief from marijuana laws under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The church's leader claims his members use marijuana during sweat lodge ceremonies to help regain their relationship with their creator.
A district court ruled that the church didn't produce enough evidence about its religion other than a strong belief in the benefits of marijuana. A federal appeals court upheld that ruling. |
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French court restores far-right candidate's ties to father
Court News |
2016/11/20 20:56
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French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen thought she had cut the political cord with her controversial father by expelling him from the far-right party he founded, but a court ruled Thursday Jean-Marie Le Pen still is the National Front's honorary president.
While campaigning in next spring's presidential election, Marine Le Pen has worked to smooth her image and distance herself from her father's extremist views and anti-Semitic comments. Kicking him out of the party was part of her strategy.
The civil court outside that heard Jean-Marie Le Pen's reinstatement claim upheld the National Front's decision last year to expel him as a rank-and-file member. But the court also ruled that the 88-year-old firebrand can remain the party's honorary president.
As a result, the court ordered the National Front to summon the elder Le Pen to any high-level party meetings and to give him voting rights as an ex-officio member of all the party's governing bodies.
"No statutory provisions specify that the honorary president must be a member of the National Front," the judges said.
The court sentenced the party to pay Jean-Marie Le Pen 23,000 euros ($24,500) in damages and lawyers' fee.
"This can be called a success," his lawyer, Frederic Joachim, told reporters after the ruling was returned.
Joachim had asked the court for 2 million euros ($2.1 million) in damages because "it's a political life they tried to destroy at home and to cast scorn on abroad."
The party's lawyers didn't immediately comment on the ruling, which both sides can appeal.
The National Front ousted the party patriarch for a series of comments, including referring to Nazi gas chambers as a "detail" of World War II history.
Le Pen contends his comments were protected by freedom of expression, though he has been sentenced repeatedly in France for inciting racial hatred and denying crimes against humanity. |
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Supreme Court stays execution of Alabama inmate
Court News |
2016/11/18 20:56
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The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday night stayed the execution of an Alabama man convicted of the 1982 shooting death of a woman's husband in a murder-for-hire arrangement.
Five justices voted to stay the execution of Tommy Arthur as the high court considers whether to take up his challenge to Alabama's death penalty procedure. Arthur, 74, was scheduled to be executed Thursday by lethal injection at a south Alabama prison.
"We are greatly relieved by the Supreme Court's decision granting a stay and now hope for the opportunity to present the merits of Mr. Arthur's claims to the Court," Arthur's attorney Suhana Han said in a statement.
This is the seventh time that Arthur, who has waged a lengthy legal battle over his conviction and the constitutionality of the death penalty, has received a reprieve from an execution date, a track record that has frustrated the state attorney general's office and victims' advocacy groups.
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote Thursday that he did not think the case merited a stay, but voted to grant it as a courtesy to the four justices who wanted to "more fully consider the suitability of this case for review." The execution stay will expire if the court does not take up Arthur's case.
The attorney general's office had unsuccessfully urged the court to let the execution go forward and expressed disappointment at the decision. |
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