Recent Updates
-
Alabama inmate seeks execution stay from US Supreme Court
Headline Legal News 12/04/2016An Alabama inmate on Friday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay his upcoming execution to consider whether a judge should have been able to give him a death sentence when the jury recommended life imprisonment. Ronald Bert Smith is scheduled ...
-
Green Party taking bid for election recount to federal court
Legal Events 12/04/2016Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is taking her bid for a statewide recount of Pennsylvania's Nov. 8 presidential election to federal court. After announcing Stein and recount supporters were dropping their case in state court, lawyer Jon...
-
State high court to hear wind power appeal
National News 12/03/2016A decision on a proposed high-voltage power transmission line that would run through several Illinois counties is now heading to the state Supreme Court after an energy company decided to appeal a ruling against construction. The high court agreed la...
-
Connecticut court to hear appeal in Newtown shooting case
Recent Cases 12/02/2016The Connecticut Supreme Court has agreed to hear the appeal of families whose wrongful-death lawsuit against the maker of the rifle used in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting massacre was dismissed. The high court decided Tuesday to bypass a l...
-
Court revives lawsuit against California bullet stamping law
Headline Legal News 12/02/2016Gun manufacturers have the right to present evidence supporting their claim that technology does not exist to comply with a California law requiring new models of semi-automatic handguns to stamp identifying information on bullet casings, a state app...
-
Court: Asylum not automatic for former gang members
National News 12/01/2016Immigrants in the United States illegally are not automatically eligible for asylum on the basis that they are former gang members who risk persecution if they return home, a federal appeals court panel ruled Wednesday. Three judges from the 9th U.S....
-
China court clears man 21 years after his execution
Headline Legal News 12/01/2016China's supreme court ruled Friday that a young man executed 21 years ago for rape and murder had been innocent, in a case that has drawn attention to problems in the legal system as well as the frequent application of the death penalty. Nie Shubin w...
-
Election judge pleads not guilty in absentee ballot case
Recent Cases 11/21/2016An 88-year-old election judge from southern Illinois has pleaded not guilty after allegedly sending in an absentee ballot in her late husband's name. The (Belleville) News-Democrat reports that Audrey Cook appeared Thursday in Madison County Circuit ...
-
Ohio sheriff accused of drug theft changing not guilty plea
Headline Legal News 11/21/2016A suspended sheriff in Ohio who has denied stealing prescription drugs and misusing office funds is due in court to change his not guilty plea. Sandusky County Sheriff Kyle Overmyer is scheduled to attend a change of plea hearing Monday in Fremont. O...
-
Lithuania wants Gorbachev to testify in war crimes trial
Trial Coverage 11/01/2016A Lithuanian court has called former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to testify in a mass trial related to the 1991 crackdown on the country's independence movement. Gorbachev and Russian authorities haven't answered previous requests so it's unlikel...
-
Cook County, Illinois, lawyer who posed as judge charged
Notable Attorneys 11/01/2016A Chicago-area judicial candidate who was once on the fast track to a high-salary, high-status job as a judge now faces charges of impersonating a judge when she was a court staff attorney early this year, prosecutors announced Friday. Rhonda Crawfor...
-
Kansas court upholds death sentence in 1996 slaying
Trial Coverage 11/01/2016Kansas' highest court on Friday upheld the death sentence of a man convicted of killing a college student 20 years ago. The Kansas Supreme Court let stand Gary Kleypas' death sentence in the 1996 rape and stabbing death of 20-year-old Pittsburg State...