|
|
|
Court grants appeals from 2 people without lawyers
Law Firm Legal News |
2012/09/27 15:38
|
Well-heeled clients pay tens of thousands of dollars to hit the legal jackpot — Supreme Court review of their appeals. But on Tuesday, the court decided to hear cases filed by two people who couldn't afford or didn't bother to hire an attorney.
One was written in pencil and submitted by an inmate at a federal prison in Pennsylvania. The other was filed by a man with no telephone living on Guam.
Neither case seems destined to join the ranks of Gideon v. Wainwright, the landmark 1960s case filed by a prisoner with no lawyer that established a criminal defendant's right to a lawyer. Both show, however, that when the court is looking to resolve finicky legal issues and the right case shows up, it doesn't matter whether the author of the appeal wears a natty suit or prison garb.
Longtime Supreme Court practitioner Tom Goldstein called the granting of two such lawyerless cases at the same time unheard of. But both cases chosen by the justices will help resolve the ability of civilians to sue the government over claims of improper actions of federal and military employees on the job.
Kim Lee Millbrook, a prisoner at the federal prison in Lewisburg, Pa., sued the government after accusing prison guards at the Special Management Unit of sexually assaulting him in May 2010. Prison officials said Millbrook's claim was unsubstantiated. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Pa. city's immigration rules back in US court
Law Firm Legal News |
2012/08/15 11:04
|
The dispute over a northeast Pennsylvania city's attempt to crack down on illegal immigrants is back before a federal appeals court Wednesday.
The six-year case involving Hazleton returns to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals because of a recent Supreme Court ruling.
The city rules would fine landlords who rent to illegal immigrants and deny business permits to companies that employ them. A companion piece requires tenants to register with City Hall and pay for a rental permit.
But they've all been on hold since a federal judge struck them down, and the federal appeals court affirmed the decision, saying they usurp the federal government's power to regulate immigration.
Now a mixed decision from the Supreme Court in a related case in Arizona is sending the Pennsylvania case back to court. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Tenn. court says convicted killer can keep money
Law Firm Legal News |
2012/07/20 12:13
|
A Tennessee appeals court has reluctantly ruled that a Johnson City man convicted of killing his wife in a bathtub for the insurance money can keep $200,000 in life insurance proceeds.
The Knoxville News Sentinel reported Wednesday that the Tennessee Court of Appeals agreed with a trial court's decision to let Dale Keith Larkin keep the life insurance proceeds he collected in a settlement with the daughter of his wife, Teresa Larkin, who was found dead in a bathtub in 2003.
This court is not happy with the results of our decision, wrote Appellate Judge D. Michael Swiney in the opinion released last week.
Teresa Larkin's body was found by her then-11-year-old daughter, Tia Gentry, in the bathtub of the Johnson City home she shared with her stepfather, Dale Keith Larkin.
The Johnson City Police Department continued to work the case and in 2009 convinced prosecutors to have her body exhumed. A second autopsy revealed that she had suffered 21 separate injuries, including a broken sternum and bone breaks in her arms, before she was found drowned in the bathtub.
Charges were filed against Dale Larkin and in February 2011 he was convicted in her death. He is now serving a life sentence.
Gentry filed a lawsuit alleging her stepfather tricked her into a settlement in the life insurance case by claiming he was innocent in her mother's death. She also cited a Tennessee law, also known as the slayer's statute, that bars people convicted of murder from inheriting property from the victim. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
FBI investigates missing $17M in trust funds
Law Firm Legal News |
2012/07/09 15:31
|
The FBI is investigating the apparent theft of $17 million from Northern California trust fund accounts.
The San Jose Mercury News says the money has vanished from the trust funds of dozens of Santa Clara County residents who relied on a money manager to oversee their life savings.
Probate court records show the investigation centers on accounts administered by Christine Backhouse. She handles more than $104 million in assets.
Court records show she doesn't have enough insurance to cover the missing funds.
Backhouse says a boyfriend secretly wired millions of dollars out of the trusts.
The Campbell money manager mostly handled private trusts with no judicial oversight of her fees for service. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Court throws out FCC penalties for cursing, nudity
Law Firm Legal News |
2012/06/22 11:05
|
Broadcasters anticipating a major constitutional ruling on the government's authority to regulate what can be shown and said on the airwaves instead won only the smallest of Supreme Court victories Thursday.
The justices unanimously threw out fines and other penalties against Fox and ABC television stations that violated the Federal Communications Commission policy regulating curse words and nudity on television airwaves.
Forgoing a broader constitutional ruling, however, the court concluded only that broadcasters could not have known in advance that obscenities uttered during awards show programs on Fox stations and a brief display of nudity on an episode of ABC's NYPD Blue could give rise to penalties. ABC and 45 affiliates had been hit with proposed fines totaling nearly $1.24 million. |
|
|
|
|
|
Legal News World RSS Feed
