[JURIST] The US Judicial Conference [official website] Tuesday recommended a complete review of judicial security inside and outside the courtroom after recent high-profile killings of a Georgia state judge and a federal district judge's family members [JURIST reports]. In its biannual meeting, the group headed by Chief Justice William Rehnquist [Oyez profile] adopted a a resolution emphasizing a grave concern with "off-site judicial security" [PDF press release]. A Judicial Conference spokesman said US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales had ordered the Marshals Service [official website] to review off-site judicial security in the federal courts. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] The insurgency in Iraq is increasingly made up of organized crime and hired criminals, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers [official profile] said Tuesday after visiting the country. Myers acknowledged that Saddam Hussein loyalists and insurgents from other countries are still a threat, but more of those arrested [Defense Department news release] by US and Iraqi forces are criminals. Myers said his assessment was based on talking to those he visited with throughout the country. Myers said he expected violence to ramp up again prior to another round of elections this summer. He would not say when he thought US forces would be able to begin withdrawing from the country. It was his first trip to Iraq since the Jan. 30 elections were held. Following his visit to Iraq, Myers traveled on to Afghanistan [Defense Department news release], where he said progress continued to be made. AP has more.

[JURIST] In Tuesday's environmental law news, the US Department of Transportation's Surface Transportation Board official website] has announced it has upheld a petition by railroad company CSX Co. [corporate website] that contends a Washington DC City Council [official website] prohibition on hazardous materials within two miles of the Capitol building should be ruled invalid [decision text]. The Board's ruling has no regulatory authority, but may be cited when the case goes before the US District Court in DC on March 23. The City Council had voted down the ban [JURIST report] in November 2004, but reintroduced and approved the measure [official press release] on February 1, 2005. Reuters has more.

In other news,

• Environmental and energy ministers from 20 countries, including the UK, US, China, India, and Brazil, are meeting in the UK for a 2 day summit to exchange ideas and discuss new technologies for decreasing fossil fuel dependence and air pollution. The discussions will not include any new binding committments on the part of any of the nations, but hopefully will lead to improvements in technology sharing and future international environmental agreements. BBC News has more.
  
  
• The EPA [official website] has issued the Clean Air Mercury Rule (text not yet online, factsheet and press release from EPA) to permanently cap and reduce mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants. The US is the first country to regulate mercury from power plants. JURIST's Paper Chase has more.

[JURIST] The insurgency in Iraq increasingly is made up of organized crime and hired criminals, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers [official bio] said Tuesday after visiting the country. Myers said that Saddam Hussein loyalists and insurgents from other countries are still a threat, but more of those arrested [Defense Department news release] by US and Iraqi forces are criminals. Myers said his assessment was based on talking to those he visited with throughout the country. Myers said he expected violence to ramp up again prior to another round of elections this summer. He would not say when he thought US forces would be able to begin withdrawing from the country. It was his first trip to Iraq since the Jan. 30 elections were held. Following his visit to Iraq, Myers traveled to Afghanistan [Defense Department news release], where he said progress continued to be made. AP has more.

[JURIST] Paul Clement is awaiting confirmation by the Senate after President Bush nominated him [White House press release] Friday as US Solicitor General, a position he has filled on an acting basis ever since predecessor Theodore Olson's departure for the private sector eight months ago. Clement has been with the US Solicitor General's Office [official website] since 2001, and served as deputy during Olson's tenure. Clement spent much of last year [Legal Times profile] defending the administration's tactics in the war on terror and in leading several high-profile terrorist cases. AP has more.

[JURIST] Leading Tuesday's corporations and securities law news, the SEC [official website] has filed a lawsuit against former Qwest Communications International Inc. [corporate website] CEO Joseph Nacchio and six other former executives alleging they filed false financial statements that led to a massive financial fraud on investors. The scheme caused Qwest to fraudulently report about $3 billion of revenue and led to the company's merger with US West Inc. in 2000. Read the SEC press release and litigation release. Read the SEC complaint [PDF]. Reuters has more.

In other news...

• Former Enron [corporate website; JURIST Hot Topic] chairman Ken Lay [Wikipedia profile] has asked for different juries to hear the two criminal cases currently pending against him. Judge Sim Lake had told Lay and prosecutors that he was considering hearing the two cases either with the same jury or no jury at all. Lay's lawyers believe having one jury hear both cases would be deny Lay his Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury. Read the indictment [text, PDF] and SEC complaint [text, PDF] against Lay. The Houston Chronicle has more and continuing coverage of the Enron trials.
  
  
• Russian state oil firm Rosneft [corporate website] has sued embattled oil giant Yukos [corporate website; JURIST Hot Topic] for $11 billion to cover the back-tax bills of Yuganskneftegaz, a former subsidiary of Yukos which was purchased by Rosneft following the firm's seizure and auction by tax officials. Yukos called the lawsuit "ridiculous" and maintains it is the rightful owner of Yuganskneftegaz. Read the Yukos press release. BBC News has more.
  
  
• As previously reported on JURIST's Paper Chase, former WorldCom [JURIST Hot Topic] chief Bernard Ebbers [Wikipedia profile; JURIST Newsmaker] was found guilty on all counts including conspiracy, securities fraud, and seven counts of false regulatory filings relating to the massive accounting fraud at the company. Ebbers could face upwards of 85 years in prison. Read the indictment [PDF] against Ebbers. AP has more.

[JURIST] At the opening of the new Holocaust History Museum [official website] in Jerusalem Tuesday, Israeli President Moshe Katsav [official bio] warned of increasing anti-Semitism and called on European leaders to confront the problem. The ceremony was attended by leaders of about 40 countries, including New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was also present, and said the UN needed to be at the forefront of the fight against renewed anti-Semitism and other forms of racism. Haaretz has local coverage of the museum opening. AP has more.

[JURIST] The PA Superior Court [official website] has dismissed clergy abuse lawsuits filed by 17 adults in the state because the statute of limitations had run on the claims. The alleged abuse dated between 1957 to 1983, but the plaintiffs argued that it could not be known that the Archdiocese of Philadelphia [official website] was negligent in overlooking the abuses until the issue came to light in 2002. The archdiocese has admitted that credible allegations have been made against 44 priests. The Monday ruling disposes of almost all suits pending against the Philadelphia archdiocese, but it could have an impact on similar suits across the state. In its opinion, the court wrote:

[W]e must also note that the abuses committed by agents of the Catholic Church are, by far, not isolated events. Nevertheless, we are constrained to agree with the Archdiocese in this matter, that the statute of limitations bars these claims from proceeding, and we decline to create a judicially crafted exception to the statute of limitations solely with regard to the Catholic Church.

[JURIST] The Environmental Protection Agency [official website] Tuesday issued new mercury regulations for power plants that are designed to reduce emissions to 70 percent of 1999 levels once fully implemented. The Clean Air Mercury Rule [preliminary text, PDF] uses a market-based cap-and-trade program similar to that in the recently announced [JURIST report] Clean Air Interstate Rule to cut emissions of coal-fired power plants. The rule has drawn criticism from some that a market-based program could result in mercury "hot-spots," or concentrated levels of mercury at power plants that buy credits rather than cut emissions. Proponents of the rule have countered that cap-and-trade programs are a more efficient means to cut emissions than other options. The Ban Mercury Working Group [advocacy website] also criticized the administration's failure to participate [Ban Mercury Working Group press release] in a United Nations Environment Program [official website] forum on developing international strategies [UNEP press release] for mercury reduction. Read the EPA press release and more on the mercury rule. AP has more.

[JURIST] The number of federal appeals cases filed in 2004 was a new all-time high, according to a report released Tuesday [PDF press release] by the Administrative Office of the US Courts [official website]. There were 62,762 appeals filed last year in federal Courts of Appeals, up 3 percent from the previous year. 2004 was the ninth year in a row that filings reached new record levels. There were 352,360 cases filed in federal district courts, with a 90 percent conviction rate in criminal cases. Read the full report on the federal courts' 2004 caseload.

[JURIST] The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) issued its final indictment on Tuesday, after over a decade of bringing war criminals to justice. A spokeswoman for the court said that the indictments [ICTY official site] against former Macedonian Interior Minister Ljube Boskovski and a former senior police officer would be the last from the tribunal, established in 1993 to investigate atrocities committed following the breakup of the former Yugoslavia. The court's goal is to finish trials by 2008 and close by the end of 2010. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] AP is reporting that former WorldCom chief Bernard Ebbers has been convicted on all counts at his fraud trial.

12:51 PM - Reuters now has a story here. The Manhattan jury found Ebbers guilty of fraud, conspiracy, and filing false documents with regulators. When sentenced June 13 he could face up to 85 years in prison. Review a copy of the original Ebbers indictment [PDF] from March 2004, and the subsequent supplemental indictment [PDF]. In headier days, TIME magazine profiled Ebbers in its Digital 50 of 1999 [Ebbers was #26], offering this (not ironically, at the time) as Ebbers' "Best Line":

I believe God has a plan for people's lives, and I believe he had a plan for me ... You'll see people who in the early days of WorldCom took their life savings and trusted this company with their money. And I have an awesome responsibility to those people to make sure that they're done right.

[JURIST] The court-martial of Army 1st Lt. Jack Saville began Tuesday at Fort Hood over charges that he ordered an Iraqi man to be thrown into the Tigris River, where he drowned, after the man was detained during a December 2003 raid. Saville faces a reduced assault charge after agreeing to plead guilty Monday to charges involving two other Iraqis. He also agreed to give testimony against another officer. Saville pleaded guilty to two assault charges, dereliction of duty and obstruction of justice for forcing two other Iraqis into a river for violating a curfew in January 2004. He faces up to nine years in prison for those charges and could receive an additional three years for the current charge. Saville has argued that he was given a list of names of Iraqis who "were not to come back alive" if found during the raids he was on. AP has more.

Previously on JURIST's Paper Chase...

• Military judge approves exhuming body of Iraqi civilian
• Four US soldiers charged in drowning death of Iraqi man

[JURIST] The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals [official website] has upheld a $4 million verdict against a former Chilean Army officer for the killing of a political prisoner during the 1973 coup in Chile [JURIST Countries archive]. The 2003 jury verdict was the first for a charge of crimes against humanity. Winston Cabello's family had sued Armanda Fernandez Larios, who served as a bodyguard to a leading Chilean general in the coup, over Cabello's killing during the coup. The 11 Circuit's per curiam opinion [text, PDF] rejected appeals of a statute of limitations violation, the jury's findings, the admission of certain evidence against Fernandez, who currently lives in Florida. The appeals court ruled the Alien Tort Claims Act [text] statute of limitations barred a similar case [JURIST report] against Salvadoran generals last month. AP has more.

[JURIST] Former NAACP President Kweisi Mfume [Wikipedia profile] has announced that he will run for US Senate in 2006, entering the race for the MD seat that Sen. Paul Sarbanes said Friday he would vacate after his current term. Mfume, 56, announced his candidacy Monday during a news conference. He is a former five-term US Congressman and led the NAACP [official website] from 1996 until his resignation [Baltimore Sun report] on Dec. 1, 2004. Mfume was largely credited with turning the group around from scandal and debt during his tenure. AP has more.

[JURIST] Former chess champion Bobby Fischer must be deported to the US under Japanese law, Japanese Immigration Bureau [official website in English] chief Masaharu Miura said Tuesday. Fischer has been fighting deportation to his home country, but Miura said that Japanese law requires that any deportation be to the country of a person's citizenship. Fischer and some supporters have requested that he be allowed to go to Iceland, where he has been issued a special passport. The US has sought Fischer since he violated international sanctions against Yugoslavia by playing a chess match there in 1992. AP has more.

Previously on JURIST's Paper Chase...

• Chess champ Fischer wants to take up Iceland asylum offer
• Chess champ appeals Japanese deportation order
• Former world chess champ Bobby Fischer arrested in Japan

[JURIST] The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals [official website] has ruled that Wal-Mart [corporate website; JURIST Hot Topic archive] violated labor laws when it disciplined an employee for wearing a union t-shirt and announcing a union meeting to co-workers. In its ruling, issued Monday, the court held that the employee had not violated a company policy against solicitation inside stores. The court did rule that Wal-Mart could discipline the employee for soliciting signatures for a union authorization card in the store. Read the opinion [text, PDF]. Bloomberg has more.

[JURIST] Leading the international brief, the International Criminal Court [official website] held its first-ever hearing Tuesday, a status conference focusing on the need for witness protection and evidence preservation in the investigation of Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo [official profile] into alleged war crimes [official ICC press release] committed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo [government website in French]. The investigation into possible crimes in the DRC was initiated at the request of Congolese President Denis Sassou-Nguesso [official profile in French]. BBC News has more.

In other international legal news ...

• The drafting committee for Sudan's new constitution has announced that they have finished work on the document and have completed its translation into Arabic. The drafting committee will be presenting the new constitution, which was developed by members from both the Khartoum government [official website] and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement [government website] from the autonomous south, will be presented to the Pan-Sudanese Constitutional Convention sometime next week. The draft constitution is based on the current Sudanese Constitution [official text], the Nairobi Peace Agreements [official PDF text], and the SPLM Constitution [official text]. The draft committee has required that the English version of the constitution be used to settle any future interpretational disputes. JUIRST's Paper Chase has continuing coverage of Sudan [JURIST Country news archive]. The Sudan Tribune has local coverage.
  
  
• The UN Security Council passed Resolution 1586 [official PDF text; embargoed at press time] Tuesday, expanding the mandate of the UN Mission to Ethiopia and Eritrea [official website] until mid-September. The region has been under the supervision of the UN since July 2000, when the UN was called in to help mediate an ongoing border dispute. The UN-created Boundary Commission [official website] is still working to resolve the dispute, but has been able to keep the peace in the Temporary Security Zone established and patrolled by UN Peacekeepers. Read the UN Security Council press release. The UN News Centre has more.
  
  
• The Permanent Council [official website] of the Organization of American States [official website] will Wednesday consider a request from the governments of Chile, El Salvador, and Mexico that elections for Secretary-General of the OAS be held March 30. The post has been filled by Acting Secretary-General Luigi R. Einaudi since October 2004, when Secretary General Miguel Angel Rodríguez resigned. The request was accompanied by a draft resolution urging the election to take place as soon as possible in order to allow the OAS to move on with its urgent business in the Americas. Chile, El Salvador, and Mexico have all nominated individuals for the position of Secretary-General. Read the official OAS press release. Watch the webcast Wednesday, March 16 at 10 AM ET.

[JURIST] Turkey [JURIST Countries archive] is on track with reforms it pledged to undertake in its pursuit of EU membership, Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said Tuesday in an interview [FT report] with the Financial Times. Gul rejected criticism that the country had not lived up to previous agreements and would not be prepared for more negotiations scheduled in October 2005. Some EU leaders have questioned Turkey's implementation of human rights reforms it made last year to gain further talks on EU accession. The EU has more on enlargement. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] A French court Tuesday sentenced six to jail terms for an alleged plot to bomb the US embassy in France [official website] in 2001. French-Algerian Djamel Beghal received a 10-year sentence as the leader of the group, while five others all received terms between one and nine years. Beghal testified that a confession he made after being arrested in 2001 had been extracted by torture. The six were convicted for criminal association in relation with a terrorist enterprise. Beghal allegedly hatched the plan with co-defendant Kamel Daoudi while the two spent time at an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan in 2001. AP has more.

[JURIST] Twenty-eight people died Tuesday during a raid on a Philippine maximum security prison as police acted to suppress an uprising headed by prisoners affiliated with the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group [BBC profile]. Abu Sayyaf is linked to al-Qaida and has been responsible for deadly attacks and ransom kidnappings in which hostages have been beheaded. The inmates attempted a jailbreak Monday, but failed negotiations prompted Tuesday's deadly raid. Among the dead are three Abu Sayyaf leaders and a fourth member of the terror group. Before the raid, the inmates had warned of retaliatory bombings if there was an assault on the jail. AP has more. The Philippine Daily Inquirer has local coverage.

[JURIST] UN High Commissioner for Human Rights [official website] Louise Arbour [official profile] told the 61st session of the UN Commission on Human Rights [official website] Monday that nations are falling short of their responsibilities to protect and promote human rights and that greater action must be taken against violating states. Arbour said:

At the outset of this sixty-first session of the Commission, on the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps, we must assess the progress made in meeting the challenges posed by large-scale, gross human rights abuses. Whatever our differences in answering that question, I suggest that a consensus would rapidly emerge that much remains to be done to prevent the most horrific manifestations of man's inhumanity to man.

We live in a world in which memories of our capacity to wreak unspeakable atrocities on our fellow human beings are never far from the surface. Next month will mark the thirtieth anniversary of the fall of Cambodia to the Khmer Rouge. This summer will mark the tenth anniversary of the massacre at Srebrenica, while last year, we all recall, was the tenth anniversary of the genocide in Rwanda. The Secretary-General used that occasion to demand determined action to bring an end to the mass violation of human rights being perpetrated in Darfur, Sudan. Our response, so far, to that human rights crisis should be examined to see if it falls short of our collective responsibility to the most vulnerable. I suggest to you that it falls very short, whether measured against our obligations or against our means, or both.

Between states working determinedly towards the realization of the full spectrum of human rights, and those in situations of near collapse, there is a category of states in which human rights problems are chronic: in which a range of civil, cultural, economic, political, and social rights are routinely flouted or denied but which do not attract our fickle attention in a systematic, concerted and coordinated manner.

Whether we face acute or chronic human rights violations, our approach to human rights diplomacy - both bilateral and multilateral - remains unsatisfactory. It is sporadic and selective. The Commission must take the lead in developing more effective approaches that allow for dispassionate analysis and focused, contextualized, calls for action, together with sustained, constructive attention, in order to help resolve issues that are our collective concern and responsibility.

[JURIST] Addressing an audience at DC's Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars Monday, Justice Antonin Scalia [Oyez biography] of the US Supreme Court called the recent 5-4 ruling striking down the juvenile death penalty [PDF opinion; JURIST report] the latest example of politics on the court. Scalia said the decision, which was based on "evolving notions of decency," was a mask for personal policy preferences of the majority. Scalia also described his philosophy of Constitutional interpretation according to the text of the document, as understood when it was adopted. Using abortion as an example, Scalia said unelected justices too often read new rights into the Constitution. C-SPAN provides recorded video of Justice Scalia's speech. AP has more.

[JURIST] Here's a run-down of law-related events, expected developments and live webcasts on JURIST's docket for Tuesday, March 15.

The US Senate [official website] convenes at 9:30 AM ET, when it will consider S. Con. Res. 18 [bill summary], the FY 2006 budget resolution. Watch a live webcast of proceedings. In committees, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee [official website] will hold a a 9:30 AM ET hearing to consider the nomination of Howard J. Krongard as inspector general of the Department of State. View the hearing agenda. The committee is holding a business meeting at 2:30 PM ET to vote on Krongard’s nomination and others. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee [official website] Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia Subcommittee is holding a hearing on ensuring the success of the National Security Personnel System. View the hearing agenda, and watch a live webcast at 10 AM ET. The Senate Judiciary Committee [official website] Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security Subcommittee is holding a 10 AM ET hearing on the OPEN Government Act of 2005 and freedom of information. View the hearing agenda. At 2:30 PM ET, the full Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on SBC/AT&T and Verizon/MCI mergers and the telecommunications industry. View the hearing agenda. Watch a live webcast of both hearings.

The US House [official website] convenes at 9 AM ET today. Watch a live webcast of proceedings. The House Energy and Commerce Committee [official website] Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection Subcommittee is holding a 10 AM ET hearing on protecting consumer data. Watch a live webcast of the hearing. The House Financial Services Committee [official website] is holding a hearing at 10 AM ET on the SEC's view of regulation of the National Market System. Watch a live webcast of the hearing.

The Heritage Foundation is holding a forum titled "Congress and the Courts: Judicial Independence and Congressional Checks," at 10 AM ET today. Watch a live webcast of the event.

The 61st session of the Commission on Human Rights [official website] continues in Geneva today.

At the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the trial of Slobodan Milosevic [ICTY case backgrounder] continues today. A webcast begins at 9:30 AM local time [3:30 AM ET]. Also today, the trial of Fatmir Limaj and others [ICTY case backgrounder] continues, with a webcast beginning at 2:45 PM local time [8:45 AM ET].