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Court weighs warrantless blood tests in DUI cases
Legal Business |
2013/01/10 03:54
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The Supreme Court is considering whether police must get a warrant before ordering a blood test on an unwilling drunken-driving suspect.
The justices heard arguments Wednesday in a case involving a disputed blood test from Missouri. Police stopped a speeding, swerving car and the driver, who had two previous drunken-driving convictions, refused to submit to a breath test to measure the alcohol level in his body.
The justices appeared to struggle with whether the dissipation of alcohol in the blood over time is reason enough for police to call for a blood test without first getting a warrant.
In siding with defendant Tyler McNeely, the Missouri Supreme Court said police need a warrant to take a suspect's blood except when a delay could threaten a life or destroy potential evidence. |
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Ohio schools officer to plead guilty to sex charge
Headline Legal News |
2012/12/27 09:25
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A former Ohio school resource police officer is pleading guilty to a charge that he coerced sexual behavior from minors.
A federal judge had called Todd Smith's alleged actions "violence of the worst sort" earlier this year after listening to a prosecutor and FBI agent read sexually graphic text messages Smith exchanged with two 15-year-old girls at a Columbus high school.
Smith's attorney Sam Shamansky said Wednesday that Smith will plead guilty to one count of using a cell phone to entice two underage minors to engage in sexual activity.
Columbus federal judge Algenon Marbley has not set a court date for Smith's plea hearing. |
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Appeals court sides with newspaper in labor fight
Headline Legal News |
2012/12/20 22:04
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A federal appeals court on Tuesday sided with the publisher of the Santa Barbara News-Press in a long-running labor dispute between the newspaper and reporters who were fired after they complained about its editorial practices.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled that the newspaper's publisher was protected by the First Amendment when it dismissed eight reporters and disciplined others who claimed the owner was interfering with news coverage.
The reporters claimed they were illegally fired for union activity and legitimate complaints about their terms of employment. But the court found the dispute was all about editorial control.
"The First Amendment affords a publisher — not a reporter — absolute authority to shape a newspaper's content," Judge Stephen Williams wrote for a three-judge panel.
The ruling stems from a dispute between Ampersand Publishing LLC and employees that began in 2006. Nearly every top editor at the paper quit in protest over what they said was owner Wendy McCaw's meddling in news coverage.
Newsroom employees later voted to form a union, and they have been fighting with the newspaper since then over bargaining rights. |
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Firm settles with W.Va. AG over mortgage case
Headline Legal News |
2012/12/04 03:12
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A Texas law firm has reached an agreement with West Virginia Attorney General Darrell McGraw to resolve a case stemming from a national mortgage settlement.
Officials said Wednesday that Murray LLP has agreed to stop offering services in West Virginia to help homeowners receive benefits from a settlement between lenders and states.
Claim forms already were sent to more than 5,000 West Virginians who lost their homes to foreclosure eligible for payments under the settlement.
McGraw had sued the company earlier this month for allegedly charging fees to consumers for completing the claim form.
Officials say the company has agreed it would not represent or collect payments from West Virginia consumers in relation to the settlement. |
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Lawyer accused of laundering money to request bail
Headline Legal News |
2012/11/15 21:17
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A U.S. lawyer who faces charges of laundering more than $600 million for a Mexican drug cartel is scheduled to ask to be released on bail.
Marco Antonio Delgado will have his detention hearing Wednesday in federal court in El Paso, Texas.
Prosecutors say Delgado conspired to launder a cartel's drug profits from July 2007 through December 2008. The indictment doesn't say which cartel.
Delgado is a former Carnegie Mellon University trustee and gave a $250,000 endowment to create a scholarship named after him to assist Hispanic students.
A profile later removed from the university's website says he left his professional duties to work with Mexican president-elect Enrique Pena Nieto. Pena's team denies knowing Delgado. The university says the biographical information was submitted by Delgado. |
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Lawyer for NY man suing Facebook wants out of case
Headline Legal News |
2012/11/06 18:57
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The latest lawyer to represent a New York man in what authorities now say is a fraudulent lawsuit against Facebook is seeking to withdraw from the case.
Dean Boland, in a motion filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Buffalo, did not publicly say why he wants off Paul Ceglia's case, instead providing the reason in a private document to the judge.
The Lakewood, Ohio, lawyer did say, however, it has nothing to do with any belief that Ceglia engaged in fraud.
Given media coverage of the case, Boland wrote, "it is important to emphasize in the strongest terms possible, that the reasons underlying this request, provided to the court for its review, have nothing to do with any belief by the undersigned that plaintiff is engaged in now or has been engaged in during the past, fraud regarding this case."
Boland is among more than a half dozen lawyers and law firms to have signed on and then withdrawn from Ceglia's 2010 lawsuit. Ceglia claims in the suit that he's entitled to half-ownership of Menlo Park, Calif.-based Facebook based on a 2003 contract with founder Mark Zuckerberg when he was still at Harvard. |
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Fla. to execute mass killer after court lifts stay
Legal Business |
2012/10/27 21:02
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A convicted mass killer from the 1970s is again scheduled for execution Tuesday after an appeals court lifted a last-minute stay that was based on his mental illness. His attorneys sought a last-minute reprieve from the U.S. Supreme Court.
The execution of John Ferguson, 64, was tentatively back on for 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison pending a final order from the governor's office, state corrections officials said. Ferguson has been on Florida's death row for 34 years.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday lifted a stay put in place over the weekend by a judge in Florida. Ferguson's lawyers argued he is mentally ill and therefore the Constitution prohibits the state from executing him.
His attorneys sought reinstatement of the stay in an emergency filing Tuesday morning with the U.S. Supreme Court. There was no immediate ruling from the justices.
Ferguson was convicted of killing eight people in South Florida in 1977 and 1978, including a teenage couple.
Two of the three appeals court judges in Atlanta ruled that U.S. Judge Daniel Hurley "abused" his discretion on Saturday when he issued a stay in the case. |
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