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High court won't hear challenge to Vermont campaign law
Court and Trial |
2015/01/13 14:56
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The Supreme Court won't hear a challenge to part of Vermont's campaign finance laws that impose contribution limits on political action committees.
The justices on Monday declined to hear an appeal from the Vermont Right to Life Committee, an anti-abortion group. The group argued that Vermont's campaign finance registration, reporting and disclosure requirements for PACs were too broad and unconstitutional.
The group argued that a subcommittee it created should not be subject to Vermont's $2,000 limit on contributions to PACs because the subcommittee does not give money directly to candidates and makes only independent expenditures.
But a federal judge rejected those arguments, finding that there was no clear accounting between the two committees. A federal appeals court agreed. |
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Egyptian court sentences 188 people to death
Court and Trial |
2014/12/04 16:50
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An Egyptian court sentenced 188 people to death Tuesday pending the opinion of the country's top religious authority, the latest mass death sentence handed down by the country's judicial system despite widespread international criticism.
The 188 were charged over the killing of 11 policemen last year in Kerdasa, a restive town west of Cairo considered a militant stronghold. The attack, which saw the policemen's bodies mutilated, is considered one of the country's grisliest assaults on security forces.
The defendants also were accused of attempting to kill 10 more policemen, damaging a police station, setting police cars on fire and possessing heavy weapons.
The attack happened on the same day that security forces brutally cleared two protest camps of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi's supporters, killing hundreds. Protesters were demanding the reinstatement of Morsi, who hails from the Muslim Brotherhood group.
Some 22,000 people have been arrested since Morsi's ouster, including most of the Brotherhood's top leaders, as well as large numbers of others swept up by police during pro-Morsi protests. |
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Appeals court reinstates Texas voter ID law
Court and Trial |
2014/10/20 14:44
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A federal appeals court on Tuesday temporarily reinstated Texas' tough voter ID law, which the U.S. Justice Department had condemned as the state's latest means of suppressing minority voter turnout.
The ruling by a three-judge panel of the New Orleans-based 5th Circuit Court of Appeals allows the law to be used in the November election, despite a lower judge's ruling that the law is unconstitutional. The 5th Circuit did not rule on the law's merits; instead, it determined it's too late to change the rules for the election.
The judge said the Supreme Court has repeatedly told courts to be cautious about late-hour interruptions of elections. Early voting starts Oct. 20.
"It will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the state to adequately train its 25,000 polling workers at 8,000 polling places" in time for the start of early voting, the appeals court wrote.
While some voters may be harmed, the greater harm would come in potentially disrupting an election statewide, the court said. |
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Court to hear cases over employment, housing bias
Court and Trial |
2014/10/03 14:00
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Did retailer Abercrombie & Fitch discriminate against a Muslim woman who was denied a job because her headscarf clashed with the company's dress code? That's the question in one of the 11 cases the Supreme Court said Thursday it will take on in its new term.
The justices took no action on the highly anticipated issue of same-sex marriage, though a decision on the gay marriage cases could come later this month.Among the new cases, the court will consider the scope of housing discrimination laws, the First Amendment rights of judicial candidates to raise campaign money and a challenge from Arizona Republicans over who can draw the state's congressional districts.
In the Abercrombie dispute, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the retailer after it refused to hire Samantha Elauf at a Tulsa, Oklahoma, store in 2008 because her Muslim hijab conflicted with the company's "look policy."
The policy was described at the time as a "classic East Coast collegiate style."A federal judge initially sided with the EEOC, but the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, saying Elauf never directly informed her interviewer she needed a religious accommodation, even though she was wearing the headscarf during her interview.
Government lawyers say the appeals court ruling undercuts legal protections for religious practices because it unfairly places the entire the burden to raise the issue with job applicants who often aren't aware of a potential conflict. |
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Argentina's embattled vice president back in court
Court and Trial |
2014/07/25 12:52
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Argentina's embattled Vice President was back in court Wednesday, this time over false data in documents for an old car that he bought about 20 years ago.
Amado Boudou appeared before a federal judge and presented a written statement instead of speaking in his defense. Boudou is accused of transferring a Honda CRX automobile to his name irregularly in 2003.
The judge is expected to decide in 10 days whether to charge Boudou or dismiss the case for lack of evidence.
In a separate case, the vice president was charged last month with bribery and conducting business incompatible with public office. He is accused of using shell companies and secret middlemen to gain control of a company that was given contracts to print Argentine currency as well as material for President Cristina Fernandez's election campaign.
Boudou is the first sitting Argentine vice president to face such charges. If convicted, he could be sentenced to between one and six years in prison and be banned for life from elective office.
The charges against the vice president come as Fernandez is struggling to curb double-digit inflation and court rulings in the United States that threaten to force Argentina into default on its debts. |
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