The New York Court of Appeals ruled Monday that towns can use zoning laws to ban hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking , within their town lines. In a 5-2 decision, the court ruled in favor of the towns of Dryden and Middlefield, which passed zoning ordinances in 2011 that prohibited gas drilling and fracking within [...]

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) on Monday unanimously affirmed a 30-year jail sentence for former army chief Augustin Bizimungu for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide . Bizimungu was found guilty in May 2011 on six counts of genocide and crimes against humanity for murder, extermination and rape in addition to violations [...]

The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled Monday that the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia erred in concluding that it lacked jurisdiction over a case of alleged torture in the Abu Ghraib prison because the alleged abuses occurred in Iraq. The case was brought in 2009 by four [...]

The US Supreme Court on Monday denied a petition for certiorari in an appeal from the US Court of Appeals for Ninth Circuit decision that California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard does not violate the Dormant Commerce Clause. The regulation requires reduction of carbon emissions for fuels. Emissions are measured by a “lifecycle analysis,” which includes [...]

JURIST Guest Columnist Tung Yin of the Lewis & Clark Law School comments on the statement made by Donald Sterling and how the public outcry should give us pause to consider the underlying issues … Unless you’ve been completely avoiding TV, the Internet, newspapers, magazines and likely your family members and colleagues, it’s hard not [...]

A group of UN human rights experts for the expressed their anger Monday after an Egyptian court confirmed the death sentences of 183 people . According to the UN, all of the defendants were alleged supporters of ex-president Mohammed Morsi and his party the Muslim Brotherhood . The experts noted that the credibility of the [...]

The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Monday that closely held for-profit corporations can deny coverage of contraception costs because of their religious beliefs. In Burwell v. Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp. v. Burwell the court considered whether, under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA) , a for-profit corporation can opt out [...]

The US Supreme Court granted certiorari Monday in five cases. In Mach Mining v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission the court will consider whether and to what extent a court may enforce the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s (EEOC) mandatory duty to conciliate discrimination claims before filing suit. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 [...]

JURIST Contributing Editor Marjorie Cohn of the Thomas Jefferson School of Law discusses some of the possible implications of the Supreme Court’s recent decision on cell phone searches … In one of the most significant Fourth Amendment rulings ever handed down by the Supreme Court, all nine justices agreed in an opinion involving two companion [...]

The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Monday in Harris v. Quinn that the state cannot require home health care workers to pay union fees. The court stopped short of overruling its 1977 decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education , which held that state employees who choose not to join a public-sector union may [...]