US District Judge Vaughn Walker of the Northern District of California on Tuesday temporarily stayed a class action lawsuit brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation against AT&T, pending the appeal of his earlier decision allowing the case to move forward. The EFF lawsuit alleges that AT&T violated citizens' rights to privacy and several federal statutes [...]
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The American Bar Association approved a resolution Tuesday condemning President Bush for his "misuse" of bill signing statements to bypass particular provisions of a bill that the president considers unconstitutional or a risk to national security. Last month, an ABA task force released a report with recommendations on signing statements, saying in an accompanying press [...]
Proposed amendments drafted by the Bush administration to revise the War Crimes Act would protect CIA officers, former military personnel and political appointees from prosecution for humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime detainees, according to a report in Wednesday's Washington Post. The 1996 War Crimes Act makes it a felony to violate the Geneva Conventions [...]
State of Nevada v. Department of Energy, United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, August 8, 2006 . Read the full text of the opinion . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
The Supreme Court of New Jersey on Tuesday ruled 5-1 that the state's Charitable Immunity Act , which protects non-profit organizations from ordinary negligence claims, permits plaintiffs to sue non-profits on sex abuse claims stemming from willful, wanton or grossly negligent conduct. The underlying case, Hardwicke v. American Boychoir School, involved an adult male suing [...]
The UN Security Council approved a resolution Tuesday that encourages Secretary-General Kofi Annan to work more closely with the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) . All 15 Security Council members voted for Resolution 1699 , co-sponsored by the US, Britain and Denmark, which says that more cooperation would increase the effectiveness of UN sanctions such [...]
Zimbabwean Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa's obstruction-of-justice trial began Tuesday, eight days after the charges were tentatively dropped because of alleged intimidation of magistrates by Security Minister Didymus Mutasa. Chinamasa is accused of pressuring witnesses not to testify about political violence linked to Mutasa before parliamentary elections in Zimbabwe last year. After magistrates in Manicaland recused [...]
Former US House Majority Leader Tom DeLay will withdraw his name from the Texas ballot in this fall's congressional elections, a Republican strategist told AP on Tuesday. DeLay's move comes one day after US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia denied a request from the Texas Republican Party to stay a federal appeals court ruling preventing [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit declined Tuesday to review a US Department of Energy (DOE) proposal to move nuclear waste to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository by rail, finding that some claims by the State of Nevada lacked merit while others were unripe. Nevada sued in the DC Circuit to challenge [...]
The Russian Prosecutor General's Office has begun a criminal investigation into possible fraud stemming from bankruptcy proceedings for Russian oil giant Yukos , according to Tuesday reports from the Itar-Tass news agency. The investigation centers on allegations that former Yukos officials embezzled money by securing a $4.5 billion loan from Yukos Capital SARL, a Luxemburg-based [...]
