Harvard University was sued Wednesday for allegedly profiting on the earliest known photographs of African-American slaves. In the complaint, plaintiff Tamara Lanier alleges that the slaves depicted in the daguerreotypes (early photographs) known only as “Renty” and “Delia” are her ancestors. Lanier outlines a rich oral history preserved in her family leading back to “Renty.” [...]
The European Commission called Wednesday for more efforts to ensure adoption of security proposals and fined Google €1.49 billion (USD $1.7 billion) for breaching EU antitrust rules. Market dominance is not illegal under EU antitrust rules. However, dominant companies have a special responsibility not to abuse their powerful market position by restricting competition, either in [...]
The US Supreme Court heard oral arguments Wednesday in Flowers v. Mississippi, in which the state was alleged to have improperly dismissed African American jurors. The petitioner, Curtis Flowers, was convicted of a capital offense in 2010 and appealed his death penalty conviction on the grounds of racial discrimination. The Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed the [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Tuesday rebutted the Trump administration’s claim that no legal restrictions remained to preclude the implementation of a contentious transgender limitation on the military. In a three-page notice, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly called the administration’s assumption that it could move forward with the ban [...]
US air strikes are resulting in civilian casualties in Somalia, Amnesty International reported Wednesday. The report details five incidents resulting in 14 civilian casualties, with eight more civilians injured within the past two years. These issues began to draw increased international humanitarian attention during Barack Obama’s administration. In October 2016 the administration “broadened the president’s [...]
Mississippi senators on Tuesday passed, by a vote of 34-15, the final version of a bill that bans abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected. The Mississippi bill says a physician performing an abortion on a pregnant woman before determining if the unborn human individual has a detectable fetal heartbeat, or one who performs [...]
The International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals’ appeals chamber on Wednesday confirmed the conviction of former Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic for Bosnian war crimes, increasing his sentence to life in prison. After the first-instance judgment rendered in March 2016, which sentenced Karadzic to 40 years of prison, both the defense and the prosecution appealed. [...]
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Pennsylvania filed a new complaint against the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services (DHS) Tuesday over the jailing of mentally ill individuals. The new complaint comes several years after the ACLU of Pennsylvania first brought “a lawsuit on behalf of people who have been found too mentally ill to stand [...]
The US Supreme Court ruled unanimously Wednesday in Obduskey v. McCarthy & Holthus LLP that a business is not a “debtor collector” under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, except in enforcing security interest under 15 USC §1692f(6). Homeowner and political activist Dennis Obduskey sued law firm McCarthy & Holthus when they attempted to carry out [...]
In a per curiam decision Wednesday, the US Supreme Court remanded, for further review of standing, a case concerning whether cy pres settlements satisfy Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(e)(2). The class action case, Frank v. Gaos, originated with an alleged violation of the Stored Communications Act (SCA) by Google. Plaintiffs claimed that Google’s use of referrer headers breached the [...]
