US President Barack Obama on Tuesday signed legislation that reduces the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine offenses. The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 amends existing law to reduce the current sentencing ratio from 100:1 to 18:1. Under the existing law passed in 1986, an individual possessing five grams of crack cocaine would receive [...]

Speaking to a crowd of students and businesspeople at New York University’s Stern School of Business on Tuesday, US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner promised a rapid rollout of new rules mandated by the Restoring Financial Stability Act . Signed into law by President Barack Obama last month, the landmark legislation creates a new regulatory council [...]

The Iraqi High Criminal Court said on Tuesday that it has sentenced to death a senior official of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein . Mezban Khadar Hadi , who was a leader in Saddam’s Baath Party , will be executed for draining the country’s marshlands in an effort quash Shiite resistance in the region. Before [...]

The Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR) on Monday criticized the abortion laws of the Philippines as a “human rights crisis,” resulting in the death of thousands of women annually. In a report, “Forsaken Lives,” the reproductive rights group characterizes the Philippines’s complete ban on abortion as a violation of women’s human rights by denying them [...]

A South African court on Tuesday sentenced former INTERPOL president and South African police chief Jackie Selebi to 15 years in prison for corruption. Selebi was convicted of corruption in July for receiving $170,000 in bribes from convicted drug smuggler Glenn Agliotti , who was suspected of killing South African mining magnate Brett Kebble. Judge [...]

Former Rwandan regional administrator Dominique Ntawukulilyayo was sentenced by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) Tuesday to 25 years in prison for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide . Ntawukulilyayo, the former sub-prefect of the southern district of Gisagara, was indicted in 2005 on charges of genocide, complicity in genocide and public incitement [...]

The Supreme Court of California on Monday held 6-1 that a state ban on preferential hiring practices for minorities and women does not violate the federal Constitution . Justice Kathryn Werdegar, writing for the majority, held that the ban on giving preferential treatment in the awarding of public contracts under the Article I, Section 31 [...]

A Michigan public interest law firm, Great Lakes Environmental Law Center (GLELC) , on Monday sent a notice of intent to file suit to Enbridge, Inc. , the Canadian owner of the Michigan pipeline that ruptured on July 26 and dumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River. Enbridge estimates that [...]

Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli (R) on Friday issued an opinion finding that state law enforcement officials have the authority to investigate the immigration status of those they stop or arrest. The opinion was issued following a request from Delegate Bob Marshall (R) asking whether Virginia officials have the same authority as that conferred to [...]

Eric Sterling : “Thursday’s passage of the Fair Sentencing Act proved that I have been very wrong about this legislation. I was wrong in not believing that fairness in sentencing, fairness for convicted African-American crack dealers, fairness for any criminal defendant, had any political traction. I was wrong in believing that the intrepid coalition of [...]