The suit in this case suffers from two independent jurisdictional defects, either one of which provides a basis for reversing the judgment of the Court of Appeals. The first is that the United States has not waived its sovereign immunity from suits challenging its title to Indian trust lands. And the second is that Patchak, the plaintiff, lacks prudential standing because the interests that he seeks to vindicate in the suit are not within the zone of interests protected or regulated by section 5 of the Indian Reorganization Act, the provision whose alleged violation forms the basis for his complaint.

The Fourth Circuit, in upholding the dismissal of the initial suit, held that Padilla could not use a lawsuit seeking monetary damages to review an issue involving national security and that the judiciary was not the proper forum to rule on the legislature-adopted policies responsible for his detention. The court reasoned that allowing such lawsuits "would expose past executive deliberations affecting sensitive matters of national security to the prospect of searching judicial scrutiny." Padilla was arrested in 2002 at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport and thereafter detained as an enemy combatant. He was convicted on terrorism charges in 2007 and sentenced [JURIST reports] to 17 years in prison. In September, the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled that sentence was too lenient and ordering a new sentencing hearing [JURIST report]. The court noted Padilla's 17 prior arrests and objected to a reduction of his sentence for the three-and-a-half years he was detained as an "enemy combatant" on a base in South Carolina before charges were brought against him.

Transgender rights remain a controversial issue throughout the world. The US Supreme Court [official website] denied certiorari [order list, PDF] last month in Fields v. Smith [opinion, PDF], allowing a lower court decision that transgender hormone therapy is a medically necessary procedure to stand. The US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit found [JURIST report] the Inmate Sex-Change Prevention Act (Act 105) [text], a 2005 Wisconsin law, was unconstitutional under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. In February the UK Home Office Government Equalities Office [official website] announced the UK's first ever government action plan promoting transgender equality [JURIST report].

Earlier this month the Connecticut legislature voted to repeal the death penalty [JURIST report] making it the seventeenth state to do so and the fifth in the past five years. New Jersey, New Mexico, New York and Illinois [JURIST reports] have all recently eliminated the death penalty, while 34 states retain its use. Last month Amnesty International reported that the number of worldwide executions increased from 2010 to 2011 [JURIST report], while the number of recorded death sentences decreased.

The problem with allowing a creditor the right to credit bid under all circumstances is, in a case like ours, we don't believe we will ever get to an auction because no one else will show up. ... In this particular instance, I would suggest that the—the creditor simply does not want the asset sold. It would rather take the asset back and hold it for some time period. ... [W]hat they bargained for was that the asset be liquidated and all of the proceeds applied to their loan. And that's exactly what we propose to do under our sale procedure.

The Solicitor General also filed an amicus brief [text, PDF] in support of the bank and the right to credit bid. In arguments, they contended that the government requires the right to credit bid. "[T]he government is in the position of—that actually many secured creditors are in these days, which is that we have constraints on our ability to cash bid at the sale of our collateral through a bankruptcy, and the detailed cramdown provisions of chapter 11 are designed to protect the rights of secured creditors. The essence of being a secured creditor, of course, as the Court has suggested, is that the secured creditor has bargained for the right either to get its money back or to get the thing that secures its loan, to get its collateral."

According to several sources, including senior United Nations officials, crimes such as killings, abductions, rapes and conscription of children may have been committed by various groups in the northern part of the country. The Office will further scrutinize the possible commission of ICC crimes on Malian territory by any party and will make a decision in due course as to whether to undertake a preliminary examination of the situation under Article 15 and Article 53.1 of the Rome Statute.

Mali has experienced military turmoil since Taureg rebels began attacking Malian soldiers [Al Jazeera report] in January. Many in the international community have expressed concern over the situation, including UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay and the UNHCR [JURIST reports]. All of this has come after Malian soldiers took control of the government [JURIST report] and suspended the constitution in March.

A few days ago, the Egyptian Constitutional Court [official website, Arabic] announced [JURIST report] that it cannot rule on the constitutionality of the law until after it has taken effect. Egypt has been in the process of restructuring its government since protests led to the resignation of Mubarak [JURIST report] last year. Earlier this month, an Egyptian court ordered the suspension of a constitutional panel [JURIST report], which consisted of about 100 people, charged with writing the country's new constitution because Egyptian lawyers alleged its members were not chosen constitutionally. Egypt is also in the process of trying Mubarak for assisting in the killing of protestors last year. His trial ended in February, and a judge has set the verdict date [JURIST reports] for June 2.

In short, the State knew it had an "arguable" statute of limitations defense, ... yet it chose, in no uncertain terms, to refrain from interposing a timeliness "challenge" to Wood's petition. The District Court therefore reached and decided the merits of the petition. The Tenth Circuit should have done so as well.

The court heard arguments [JURIST report] in the case in February. Wood's attorney argued that the state of Colorado had acted strategically in failing to raise the claim and could not be rewarded for this. The Solicitor General of Colorado argued, in response, that the Supreme Court should, "recognize that courts are not bound by a State's failure to properly argue and preserve a procedural bar to a habeas claim; and second, to the extent there is an exception to that rule for deliberate waivers, the court should apply the common rule that a waiver must be unequivocal."

Homeless individuals who have been forced to leave an area or whose belongings have been confiscated by law enforcement during sweeps of homeless encampments have successfully brought civil rights challenges on the grounds that law enforcement violated their Fourth Amendment rights to be free from unreasonable search and seizure and their due process rights. The Fourth Amendment also serves as a basis to challenge government actors who confiscate an individual's property during sweeps and either destroy, or fail to provide meaningful procedures to reclaim seized property. Laws imposing criminal penalties for engaging in necessary life activities when there are no other public options that exist have been found to violate the Eighth Amendment.

These reports come after economic and financial problems have caused an increase in the US homeless population. The OHCHR suggests that any law disproportionally affecting those living in poverty should be repealed. In 2008, New York City reached a settlement in a long-standing lawsuit over homeless families' right to use shelters [JURIST report] throughout the city. The lawsuit stemmed from a claim that shelters in the city were deficient and did not institute proper standards. In 2006, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit [official website] ruled Los Angeles homeless ordinances violated the Eighth Amendment [JURIST report]. They found LA ordinances subjecting the homeless to arrest if they were caught sitting, lying or sleeping in public was cruel and unusual punishment.