Benjamin Ward : "The Home Office announced on December 6 that it will ask Parliament to grant it special powers to extend the 28-day pre-charge detention period in terrorism cases. The proposal would give the Home Secretary the power to authorize the detention of terrorism suspects for up to 42 days, upon the recommendation of [...]

About one dozen officers on trial in the Philippines in connection with a failed 2003 mutiny apologized to the court Tuesday for an aborted coup attempt against Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo last month. In a letter provided by their lawyers, the defendants said they walked out of court in the heat of the moment, [...]

A retired US CIA agent told ABC News Monday that CIA interrogators have successfully used waterboarding to get crucial information about planned terror attacks, though the agent did say he considered the technique to be torture. Retired agent John Kiriakou, in an ABC News interview , confirmed the use of waterboarding during the interrogation of [...]

Thailand will pardon as many as 25,000 prisoners in honor of King Bhumibol Adulyadej's 80th birthday, Thai Department of Corrections Director Wanchai Roujanavong told AFP Tuesday. Approximately 25,000 inmates are eligible for pardons and a number of other prisoners will have their sentences reduced, though Wanchai said that a final number has not been set. [...]

Lawyers from the CIA's clandestine operations branch, formerly known as the Directorate of Operations, provided written approval for the CIA's destruction of videotapes showing the interrogation of terror suspects, the New York Times reported Tuesday. According to the Times' source, a former CIA official speaking on the condition of anonymity, discussions about destroying the videotapes [...]

Portions of the 1996 Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) and its 2004 amendment, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act which make it a crime to help groups considered to be terrorist organizations by the US government are too vague, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled Monday. Judge Harry [...]

JURIST Contributing Editor Peter Shane of Moritz College of Law, Ohio State University, says that last week's executive privilege ruling by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy shows that Congress has the stronger argument in its fight for White House documents on U.S. attorney firings, but that a rule of law ethos cannot be restored [...]

Humanitarian Law Project et al. v. Michael V. Mukasey, United States Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit, December 10, 2007 . Read the full text of the opinion . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

The New Jersey Senate Monday voted 21-16 to pass a bill that would abolish the death penalty in the state and replace capital punishment with life in prison. The New Jersey Assembly is scheduled to vote on the bill Thursday , and proponents of the legislation hope it will pass both houses before the legislative [...]

Mark Earley : "The Eighth Circuit recently clarified the law surrounding government funding for faith-based services that address America's intractable social problems. Americans United for Separation of Church and State had challenged the state of Iowa's establishment of a voluntary faith-based pre-release program for prisoners launched by Prison Fellowship. In the ruling, the Eighth Circuit [...]