[JURIST] Inventor Judas Klausner filed a patent infringement suit Tuesday against nine companies, including Google, Inc., Verizon Communications, and LG Electronics [corporate websites], alleging that they infringe on his visual voicemail technology patent. The technology involves providing a visual list of voicemail through which a user can view and retrieve individual messages. In anticipation of Klausner's attack, Verizon brought an action [complaint, PDF] seeking a declaratory judgment that their proprietary visual voicemail services do not infringe on the inventor's patents. Reuters has more.

Klausner, inventor of the personal digital assistant (PDA) and the electronic organizer, has successfully brought suit for infringement against multiple telephone companies, voice-over-internet providers (VoIP) [FCC backgrounder], and internet service providers, including AOL, Time Warner, and eBay. Klausner filed [complaint, PDF] a similar claim against Apple Computer and AT&T late last year, alleging that the technology used by Apple's iPhone infringes on the same visual voicemail patents. The parties settled in July [Reuters report] after the patents were licensed to Apple, but the financial details of the settlement were not disclosed. Last October, internet VoIP Vonage settled a patent lawsuit [JURIST report; press release] concerning Vonage's use of Verizon's technology.

[JURIST] Chinese authorities have released activist Hu Shigen [profile] after 16 years of imprisonment, the group Human Rights in China (HRIC) [advocacy website] announced Tuesday. Hu had been sentenced to 20 years in prison for carrying out counterrevolutionary propaganda and incitement and organizing a counterrevolutionary group. HRIC Executive Director Sharon Hom said in a press release [text]:

We welcome the release of Hu Shigen, but it is tragic that Hu had to suffer so many years of abuse, serious health problems, and harsh conditions. He should have been released immediately in November 2005, when the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention determined that his detention was arbitrary.

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] has asked the Washington Supreme Court [official website] to determine whether the sister of a man whose bodily tissues were harvested for medical research without consent may sue for damages. In an order [PDF] issued Tuesday, a Ninth Circuit panel found that plaintiff Robinette Amaker had raised dispositive issues of unsettled state law, certifying to the Washington court the questions of whether Amaker, as the decedent's sister, has standing to sue for tortious interference with a corpse and whether the state's now-repealed version of the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act [materials] created a private right of action. The court wrote:

This case presents an opportunity for the state supreme court to identify which claims may be brought in cases arising out of non-consensual organ donation. Likewise, the court may wish to consider the interplay between the Anatomical Gift Act and claims for tortious interference with a corpse...Amaker argues there is tension between the two [district court] holdings: she was legally permitted to donate [her brother's] organs, but she did not have the legal right to dispose of the body. The Washington court may wish to remedy this tension, or it may conclude that the policy rationales behind the common law claim and the [Uniform Act] compel this outcome.

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] on Tuesday ruled [opinion, PDF] that a Chinese couple are eligible for asylum because they reasonably feared persecution as members of the Falun Gong sect [group website; BBC backgrounder]. Zhao and Duan came to California in 2001, several months after an incident in which Chinese police had entered their home, arrested them and beaten them during a four-day detention. The couple were released after paying a fine and agreeing not to practice Falun Gong. The Ninth Circuit panel relied on Falun Gong asylum cases it had decided in 2004 and 2006 [opinions, PDF]. Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote:

Much like in the two previous cases, the Chinese authorities have already identified Zhao and Duan as Falun Gong adherents and have shown an interest in monitoring their movements. In fact, unlike [those cases], Zhao and Duan have already been arrested, detained for four days, physically abused, coerced into signing a promise to refrain from their practice, and ordered to report to the police once a week. Zhao was abused to the point that he sought medical attention and was threatened with death or disappearance.

[JURIST] The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) [official website] announced Tuesday that a military court had sentenced a former West Bank mayor to six years in prison after finding him guilty of belonging to and assisting the militant group Hamas [JURIST news archive; CFR backgrounder]. Former Mayor Hatam Ridah Jarrar (also "Grar"), of the city of Jenin, was convicted last week of membership in a terrorist organization. An army statement quoted the court's sentence as saying that Jarrar had used his position to aid Hamas [Reuters report]. According to the statement, the court treated Jarrar's status as an orthopedic surgeon as an aggravating factor [AFP report] in sentencing because he was "expected to save human lives." Jarrar also must serve three years' probation. Ha'aretz has more.

Jarrar had spent more than two years in custody since the Israeli military detained more than 20 Palestinian officials [JURIST report] following the 2006 abduction of IDF Cpl. Gilad Shalit [JURIST news archive] in Gaza. This June, the Israeli Supreme Court upheld a law [JURIST report] allowing the indefinite detention of unlawful combatants suspected of belonging to terrorist groups. Israel [JURIST news archive] and Hamas have so far failed to negotiate a prisoner exchange [JURIST report].

[JURIST] Followers of the Kansas-based fundamentalist Westboro Baptist Church [JURIST news archive; BBC report] plan to stage a protest at the funeral [press release] for late Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-OH) [profile] Saturday, despite a federal appeals court ruling last week that upheld an Ohio law limiting funeral protests. The US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit [official website] last week upheld Ohio's funeral protest law [text] against a constitutional challenge raised by Westboro member Shirley Phelps-Roper. Westboro church members have been going around the country picketing military funerals in recent years, claiming US soldiers have been killed because America tolerates homosexuals. Phelps-Roper claimed that the Ohio law was unconstitutionally overbroad, in violation of the First Amendment. The district court rejected Phelps-Roper's challenge, concluding that the provision was a constitutional content-neutral regulation of the time and manner of protests and that the state of Ohio has a significant interest in protecting its citizens from disruptions during funeral events. The Sixth Circuit affirmed [opinion, PDF], stating that the law was reasonable and that:

Individuals mourning the loss of a loved one share a privacy right similar to individuals in their homes or individuals entering a medical facility...Unwanted intrusion during the last moments the mourners share with the deceased during a sacred ritual surely infringes upon the recognized right of survivors to mourn the deceased. Furthermore, just as a resident subjected to picketing is 'left with no ready means of avoiding the unwanted speech,' mourners cannot easily avoid unwanted protests without sacrificing their right to partake in the funeral or burial service.

[JURIST] A federal judge has rejected constitutional challenges to civilian charges against former US Army Pvt. Steven D. Green in connection with the rape and killing of a 14-year-old girl [JURIST news archives] and the killing of her family in Mahmudiya, Iraq (also "Mahmoudiya"). US District Judge Thomas Russell [official profile] of the Western District of Kentucky [official website] ruled Tuesday that charging Green with voluntary manslaughter as a civilian following his discharge from the Army did not violate his due process rights. Defense lawyers had argued [JURIST report] that Green should have been tried in the military justice system rather than charged under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act [text], which Congress amended in 2004 to permit the prosecution of US civilians who commit crimes in combat zones. Jury selection for Green's trial, scheduled for April 2009, began this month [JURIST reports]. The government is seeking the death penalty against Green, who intends to raise an insanity defense [JURIST reports]. AP has more.

Four other soldiers [JURIST report] from the Army's 101st Airborne Division have already been convicted in military court for crimes stemming from the rape and killings. Spc. James P. Barker and Sgt. Paul E. Cortez [JURIST reports] received prison sentences of 90 and 100 years respectively after they pleaded guilty to participating in the attack. Pfc. Bryan L. Howard, who stayed at the soldiers' checkpoint but had prior knowledge of the plan, was sentenced to 27 months after pleading guilty [JURIST report] in March to conspiracy to commit rape and premeditated murder and conspiracy to obstruct justice. Pfc. Jesse Spielman was sentenced to 110 years in prison after being convicted [JURIST report] on four counts of felony murder, rape, conspiracy to commit rape, and housebreaking with intent to commit rape. All four will be eligible for parole in 10 years.

[JURIST] The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website] has ordered the prosecution of Florence Hartmann [book publicity interview], former spokeswoman for ICTY chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte [BBC profile], on two counts of contempt for allegedly disclosing protected information [AP report] about the trial of former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic [JURIST news archive]. The ICTY issued an Order in Lieu of an Indictment [PDF, text] on Wednesday, which alleges that Hartmann knowingly divulged confidential decisions in the Milosevic case both in her memoirs [Amazon profile, in French] and through subsequent public statements.

Hartmann drew media attention to herself earlier this month by repeating allegations [JURIST report] that former US President Bill Clinton and French President Jacques Chirac had planned a campaign [JURIST report] to capture Radovan Karadzic [BBC profile; JURIST news archive], but later backed down following a change in policy. Hartmann has also said that Russia aided in moving Karadzic to safety in Belarus, and alleged that the West helped in order to hide information about the Srebrenica massacre [BBC backgrounder; JURIST news archive].

[JURIST] A judge in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York [official website] on Tuesday ordered the federal government to release eight more grand jury transcripts from the Julius and Ethel Rosenberg espionage case [trial transcript, PDF; JURIST backgrounder]. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein [official profile] emphasized the historical value of the testimony, given in 1950 and 1952 by witnesses who either did not consent to the release or could not be located. The ruling, which the government may appeal within two months, clears the way for testimony from all but three witnesses to be unsealed. AP has more. Reuters has additional coverage.

In January, George Washington University's National Security Archive petitioned the court [text, PDF; memorandum, PDF] for the release of the transcripts, arguing that "The overwhelming historical interest outweighs any secrecy interests that may have survived." Last month, Hellerstein ordered the disclosure of 36 witnesses' testimony [JURIST report] while denying the archive's request [New York Times report] to unseal the testimony of Ethel Rosenberg's brother and key witness David Greenglass [profile], who objected to the release. The Rosenbergs were found guilty [verdict transcript] in 1953 on charges of violating US espionage statutes [50 USC 4 materials]. They were sentenced to death and executed the same year.

[JURIST] The Pakistani government reinstated eight judges in the Sindh High Court [official website] in Karachi on Wednesday. The judges had previously refused to take office until the reinstatement of all 60 judges dismissed last year [JURIST report] by former President Pervez Musharraf [JURIST news archive], including former Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry [JURIST news archive]. Rashid Razvi, head of the Karachi bar council, told AFP [AFP report] that the appointments were a "conspiracy" intended to undermine support for the legal profession's campaign [AHRC backgrounder] for total reinstatement. The Pakistan People's Party (PPP) reportedly plans to reappoint another 16 judges [PakTribune.com report] in the near future. The Times of India has more.

On Monday, Pakistan's coalition government dissolved [JURIST report] after former prime minister Nawaz Sharif withdrew his Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz (PML-N) party over the failure to reach an agreement with the PPP to reinstate the ousted judges. Musharraf announced his resignation [JURIST report] from the presidency earlier this month, largely to avoid impeachment for the judges' dismissals and other alleged abuses of authority.

[JURIST] The North Atlantic Council (NAC) [NATO backgrounder], made up of representatives from 26 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) [official website] member nations, urged Russia [JURIST news archive] to reverse its recognition of the independence of two Georgian territories [AP report] on Wednesday. The representatives denounced the decision as violative of international law, and released a statement [text] elaborating on their position:

Russia's decision violates the many UN Security Council resolutions it has endorsed regarding Georgia's territorial integrity, and is inconsistent with the fundamental OSCE principles on which stability in Europe is based. Russia's actions have called into question its commitment to peace and security in the Caucasus.

Georgia's recovery, security and stability are important to the Alliance. NATO calls on Russia to respect Georgia's territorial integrity and to fulfill its commitments under the six-principle agreement signed by President Saakashvili and President Medvedev.

inconsistent with numerous United Nations Security Council Resolutions that Russia has voted for in the past, and is also inconsistent with the French-brokered six-point ceasefire agreement which President Medvedev signed. ... The six-point agreement offered a peaceful way forward to resolve the conflict. We expect Russia to live up to its international commitments, reconsider this irresponsible decision, and follow the approach set out in the six-point agreement.

The territorial integrity and borders of Georgia must be respected, just as those of Russia or any other country. Russia's action only exacerbates tensions and complicates diplomatic negotiations. In accordance with United Nations Security Council Resolutions that remain in force, Abkhazia and South Ossetia are within the internationally recognized borders of Georgia, and they must remain so.