2nd suspect arrested in Oregon bank bombing
Legal Topics | 2008/12/16 18:21
Two law enforcement officers killed in a bank bombing last week believed the device was a hoax and were trying to open it when it exploded, according to court documents released on Tuesday.

A probable cause statement in the case of bombing suspect Joshua Turnidge says a state trooper inspected and X-rayed a green metal box found Friday outside the West Coast Bank building in Woodburn.

The document says Oregon State Police Senior Trooper William Hakim, a bomb disposal technician, was confident it was a hoax device, so he took it inside.

The statement says a bank employee saw Hakim trying to open it while Woodburn Capt. Tom Tennant held it, and then it exploded.

Hakim and Tennant were killed. Woodburn Police Chief Scott Russell was critically injured — he has lost his right leg from the knee down and his left leg was mutilated, according to the statement. The bank employee was treated at Salem Hospital and released.

According to the statement, at 10:19 a.m. Friday a man called in a bomb threat to the Wells Fargo Bank in Woodburn, which is close to the West Coast Bank branch. The man said "if 'they' didn't leave the building, all of them would die," the court document states.



States increasingly put criminal records online
Legal Topics | 2008/12/15 18:23
Worried your daughter's new boyfriend might have a nefarious past? Want to know whether the job applicant in front of you has a rap sheet?

Finding out can be a mouse click away, thanks to the growing crop of searchable online databases run directly by states. Vermont launched its service Monday, and now about 20 states have some form of them.

The Web sites provide a valuable and timesaving service to would-be employers and businesses by allowing them to look up criminal convictions without having to submit written requests and wait for the responses. And they're popular: Last month alone, Florida's site performed 38,755 record checks.

But the Internet debut of information historically kept in courthouses in paper files can magnify the harm of clerical errors, expose states to liability for mistakes and spell new headaches for people who've long since done their time, only to have information about their crime bared anew.



Financially 'struggling' gov had big legal bills
Legal Topics | 2008/12/12 17:25
Rod Blagojevich is the third-highest-paid governor in the country, but you wouldn't know it from conversations recorded by federal authorities.

He is heard on six weeks of recordings saying he is "struggling" financially, even though he makes $177,412 a year and his household income has averaged $344,000 annually for the past five years. He allegedly says he feels he is "stuck" as governor and imagines making as much as $300,000 as the head of a group pushing organized labor's agenda or a not-for-profit organization.

If he could land his wife a seat on one or more corporate boards and she "picks up another $150 grand or whatever," according to the recordings, it would help him "get through" his remaining two years as governor.

Federal authorities arrested Blagojevich on Tuesday on charges that include allegedly scheming to sell an appointment to the U.S. Senate for anything from an ambassadorship to a corporate-board post for his wife.

"I want to make money," Blagojevich is quoted by authorities as saying on a federal wiretap recording, discussing whether President-elect Barack Obama would name him to a Cabinet post in exchange for who he thought was Obama's choice to take his Senate seat.



Obama legal team meets with anti-torture generals
Legal Topics | 2008/12/03 23:12
A dozen retired generals met with President-elect Barack Obama's top legal advisers Wednesday, pressing their case to overturn seven years of Bush administration policies on detention, interrogation and rendition in the war on terror.

"President-elect Obama has said that Americans do not engage in torture, that we must send a message to the world that America is a nation of laws, and that we as a nation should stand against torture. He believes that banning torture will actually save American lives and help restore America's moral stature in the world," said an official close to the transition who asked not to be named to discuss internal matters. "This meeting is timely and very helpful to advancing this work."

Among those who met with Eric Holder, Obama's pick to be attorney general, and Greg Craig, tapped to be White House counsel, were Gen. Charles Krulak, a former Marine Corps commandant, and retired Marine Gen. Joseph Hoar, former chief of the Central Command.

Hoar called the meeting "productive."

"It's important that the dialogue is going," Hoar said. "Part of the challenge here is big and philosophical. Part is nuts and bolts. How do you translate the rhetoric of the campaign and the transition period into action?"

The generals would like to see authority rescinded for the CIA to use harsh interrogation methods that go beyond those approved for use by the military, an end to the secret transfer of prisoners to other governments that have a history of torture, and the closing of the U.S. jail at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.

President George W. Bush vetoed legislation championed by the retired officers that would have held the CIA to the military's interrogation methods in March.

Obama has criticized the use of torture in interrogating detainees and promised to close Guantanamo Bay's military prison. The transition team official said no decisions about the detainee policies will be made until after the inauguration and Obama's full national security and legal teams are in place.



Court upholds $156M Palestinian terror verdict
Legal Topics | 2008/12/03 23:03
A federal appeals court has upheld a $156 million judgment against three Palestinian charities accused of bankrolling terrorism, but dropped a Chicago man from the long-running civil suit.

The opinion was filed over the killing by Hamas terrorists of American-born student David Boim (BOYM). It says donors to charities are liable if those charities engage in terrorist acts.

But the court dropped Chicagoan Muhammad Salah (suh-LAH') from the case, saying he was in jail when the anti-terrorism law was passed, so he couldn't have violated it.

Boim was fatally shot in May 1996 while standing at a bus stop in a West Bank town near Jerusalem.

The case isn't over who pulled the trigger, but who must pay damages.



Bally Total Fitness again files for Chapter 11
Legal Topics | 2008/12/02 23:11
Bally Total Fitness Corp. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Wednesday for the second time in less than two years, hindered by debt and limited refinancing options amid the credit crunch.

The Chicago-based gym operator will use existing cash reserves to continue operating. Bally, which again filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, plans to sell itself or reorganize under Chapter 11.

Early last year, faced with more than $800 million in debt and just $45 million in cash, Bally defaulted on its debt. The company's shares were delisted from the New York Stock Exchange for failing to meet minimum price and market capitalization requirements. Bally also was delinquent in filing its 2006 annual report because of errors in historical member data.

Bally then filed for Chapter 11 under the control of Harbinger Capital Partners Master Fund I Ltd. and Harbinger Capital Partners Special Situations Fund LP, which invested about $233.6 million in exchange for Bally's common equity. It emerged in the fall of 2007 as a private company.

Chief Executive Michael Sheehan, who replaced former CEO Paul Toback this June, said Bally's long-term debt and lack of refinancing options left limited alternatives, despite ongoing efforts to cut expenses and streamline operations.

According to CapitalIQ, Bally's has total debt of $811.3 million and cash and short-term investments of just $70.8 million. Total assets are listed as $411.4 million.

"The burden of Bally's long-term indebtedness, coupled with the lack of refinancing options in today's constrained credit markets, have limited our ability to restructure using out-of-court vehicles, leaving Bally with no alternative other than the actions announced today," said Sheehan in a statement.

The company hopes to emerge from bankruptcy "as promptly as possible."

Bally has retained Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP as bankruptcy counsel and Houlihan Lokey Howard & Zukin as financial advisors.



Clintons' ex-NY neighbor gets 25 years for murder
Legal Topics | 2008/12/02 23:10
A man who lived a few doors down from Bill and Hillary Clinton was sentenced Tuesday to 25 years to life in prison for shooting and killing his wife.

Carlos Perez-Olivo, 60, listened impassively as Westchester County Judge Barbara Zambelli imposed the maximum sentence and said, "You are a master of deceit who contrived a diabolical plan to murder your wife for your own financial gain."

Perez-Olivo, a disbarred lawyer, was convicted two months ago of second-degree murder and weapon possession in the death of his 55-year-old wife, Peggy.

She was shot in the back of the head in November 2006 as they drove home to Chappaqua, the New York City suburb where the couple lived on the same cul-de-sac as the Clintons. Perez-Olivo also was wounded, but prosecutors said the gunshot wound he suffered was minor and self-inflicted.

Perez-Olivo declined the opportunity to speak before sentencing, saying "I have nothing to add."

His lawyer, Christopher McClure, had asked the judge for the minimum sentence, 15 years to life, after asserting that the jury came to the wrong decision about a case built entirely on circumstantial evidence. Outside court, he promised an appeal.

Prosecutors said Perez-Olivo killed his wife to get her life insurance, worth nearly $900,000.

Perez-Olivo, who had been disbarred for misconduct in his representation of criminal clients, blamed the attack on a carjacker, possibly a hit man hired by an angry client.



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