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Lawyers want Supreme Court to block Texas from executing man
Court Watch |
2017/10/14 10:09
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Attorneys for an inmate convicted in a prison guard's death are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to halt his Thursday evening execution.
Robert Pruett's lawyers want justices to review whether lower courts properly denied a federal civil rights lawsuit that sought additional DNA testing in the case. They are also questioning whether a prisoner who claims actual innocence, as Pruett does, can be put to death.
If the execution is carried out Thursday, Pruett would be the sixth prisoner executed this year in Texas, which carries out the death penalty more than any other state. Texas put seven inmates to death last year. His execution would be the 20th nationally, matching the U.S. total for all of 2016.
Pruett avoided execution in April 2015, when a state judge halted his punishment just hours before he could have been taken to the death chamber. His lawyers had convinced the judge that new DNA tests needed to be conducted on the steel rod used to stab the 37-year-old Nagle.
The new tests showed no DNA on the tape but uncovered DNA on the rod from an unknown female who authorities said likely handled the shank during the appeals process after the original tests in 2002.
In June, Pruett's execution was rescheduled for October. Pruett's attorneys then unsuccessfully sought more DNA testing and filed a federal civil rights lawsuit in August, arguing Pruett had been denied due process. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the lawsuit last week, and Pruett's attorneys appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday. |
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Supreme Court declines to hear Megaupload case
Headline Legal News |
2017/10/12 10:07
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The Supreme Court is leaving in place lower court rulings against internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom and others associated with his now defunct file-sharing website Megaupload.
The Supreme Court said Monday it would not take a case in which a lower court ordered the forfeiture of bank accounts, cars, and a property in New Zealand linked to the group.
U.S. authorities shut down Megaupload in 2012 and filed charges against Dotcom and several colleagues, alleging they conspired to commit copyright infringement, racketeering and money laundering. Two years later, officials moved to have assets forfeited that the government said were proceeds of the alleged conspiracy.
Courts found that Dotcom, who lives in New Zealand, and others were fugitives avoiding prosecution in the United States and ordered the assets forfeited.
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Supreme Court refuses to hear Kentucky foster care case
Court News |
2017/10/11 10:08
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The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to hear a case involving a growing number of Kentucky relatives providing free foster care for children.
The result is that Kentucky must begin paying those relatives the same as they do licensed foster families, news outlets report.
The nation's high court on Tuesday refused to hear an appeal from the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services. The cabinet was seeking to overturn a ruling earlier this year by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that said the state must pay relatives who take in foster children.
The case revolved around a lawsuit filed by Lexington lawyer Richard Dawahare on behalf of a great-aunt who took in two young boys but was denied foster payments from the state.
"We have won, our clients have won and it's a big deal," Dawahare said. "Right now, the relatives are entitled and they need to make their claim."
A cabinet spokesman didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
The news will be celebrated by many relatives across Kentucky caring for children but not eligible for daily payments even as licensed foster parents are paid a base rate of about $25 a day or $750 a month.
Among them is Kimberly Guffy of Russellville, Kentucky, who said she and her husband have been caring for two small grandchildren for more than three years with no foster care help from the cabinet.
"The days of the cabinet's reliance on relatives to balance its budget are over," she told The Courier-Journal.
Guffy said she didn't hesitate to take in the children, one a newborn and the other a 16-month-old, but it has been a struggle, especially for the first year when child care costs reached $10,000.
The cabinet has since agreed to assist with child care costs but refused foster payments. Social workers at one point told her that if the family couldn't afford to care for the children, they would be placed in a foster home. |
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Australia's High Court to consider fate of 7 lawmakers
Headline Legal News |
2017/10/10 09:32
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Australia's prime minister said Monday that he was confident that government lawmakers would win a court challenge this week that threatens his administration's slender majority.
Seven High Court judges will decide whether seven lawmakers should be disqualified from Parliament because of a constitutional ban on dual citizens being elected. The three-day hearing begins Tuesday.
The fate of Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce is most crucial to the government in an unprecedented political crisis.
If the court rules that he was illegally elected in July last year due to New Zealand citizenship he unknowingly inherited from his father, the ruling conservative coalition could lose its single-seat majority in the House of Representatives, where governments are formed.
Joyce could stand in a by-election, having renounced his Kiwi citizenship. But with the government unpopular in opinion polls, voters in his rural electoral division could take the opportunity to throw both the deputy prime minister and his administration out of office.
Two of the six senators under a cloud are government ministers. Fiona Nash inherited British citizenship from her father and Matt Canavan became an Italian through an Australian-born mother with Italian parents. Disqualified senators can be replaced by members of the same party without need for an election.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has given no indication of what his government would do if the court rules against any of the three ministers. |
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Bosnian court acquits ex-Srebrenica commander of war crimes
Court News |
2017/10/10 09:31
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Bosnia's war crimes court on Monday acquitted the wartime commander of Srebrenica, who was accused of committing atrocities against Serbs during the 1992-95 Balkan conflict.
The acquittal of Naser Oric immediately prompted anger from Serbian leaders, with Serbian Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin saying the court ruling "threatens security, trust and reconciliation in the whole of the Balkans."
Oric was accused of war crimes against three Serb prisoners of war who were slain in villages around the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in the early days of the conflict. A panel of judges presiding over the trial ruled Monday the prosecution did not present evidence proving the case against Oric.
Oric had previously been tried by a U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague, where he was also acquitted in 2008.
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Investment Fraud Litigation |
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Securities fraud, also known as stock fraud and investment fraud, is a practice that induces investors to make purchase or sale decisions on the basis of false information, frequently resulting in losses, in violation of the securities laws. Securities Arbitration. Generally speaking, securities fraud consists of deceptive practices in the stock and commodity markets, and occurs when investors are enticed to part with their money based on untrue statements.
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The content contained on the web site has been prepared by Securities Law News as a service to the internet community and is not intended to constitute legal advice or a substitute for consultation with a licensed legal professional in a particular case. | Affordable Law Firm Website Design by Law Promo |
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