Recent Updates
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SC high court overturns $11M defamation verdicts
Court Alerts 07/05/2013South Carolina's high court has overturned $11 million in verdicts against a Charleston attorney accused of defaming a businessman by comparing him to television mobster Tony Soprano. The state Supreme Court this week sent a civil case against Paul H...
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Court says human genes cannot be patented
Court Alerts 06/13/2013The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that companies cannot patent parts of naturally-occurring human genes, a decision with the potential to profoundly affect the emerging and lucrative medical and biotechnology industries. The high court's unanimous jud...
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Court Upholds Rifle Sales Reporting Requirement
Court Alerts 06/01/2013A federal appeals court panel has unanimously upheld an Obama administration requirement that dealers in southwestern border states report when customers buy multiple high-powered rifles. The firearms industry trade group, the National Shooting Sport...
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Missouri man sentenced for murder of attorney
Court Alerts 05/23/2013A St. Louis man has been sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to murdering a lawyer who was beaten, stabbed and strangled in a 14-minute struggle. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports 46-year-old Cleophus King entered the plea Wednesday i...
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Judge OKs class-action settlement over Skechers
Court Alerts 05/23/2013A federal judge approved a $40 million class-action settlement Monday between Skechers USA Inc. and consumers who bought toning shoes after ads made unfounded claims that the footwear would help people lose weight and strengthen muscles. U.S. Distric...
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Los Angeles jeweler pleads guilty in KPMG case
Court Alerts 05/21/2013The owner of a Los Angeles jewelry store pleaded guilty Monday for his role in an insider-trading case involving a former senior partner at accounting firm KPMG. Bryan Shaw, 52, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and was scheduled to be senten...
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High court rules for Monsanto in patent case
Court Alerts 05/15/2013The Supreme Court said Monday that an Indiana farmer violated Monsanto Co.'s patents on soybean seeds resistant to its weed-killer by growing the beans without buying new seeds from the corporation. The justices unanimously rejected the farmer's argu...
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SUPREME COURT NOTEBOOK: Sitting out the speech
Court Alerts 02/15/2013While his colleagues got ready to go to the Capitol, Justice Antonin Scalia sat on a stage across town and held forth about why, for the 16th consecutive year, he would not be joining them for the State of the Union. He doesn't go when a Democrat is ...
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Parties in Va. Tech suit seek high court hearing
Court Alerts 02/15/2013Attorneys for the parents of two students who were killed in the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre want a state Supreme Court hearing on their request to put Tech's president on trial for negligence. Meanwhile, the state wants to reverse a jury's conclusio...
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Court: Judges cannot indefinitely delay appeals
Court Alerts 01/08/2013The Supreme Court says federal judges cannot indefinitely delay a death row inmate's federal appeals to see if the convict can become mentally competent enough to help his lawyer. The high court unanimously ruled Tuesday against Arizona death row inm...
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Justices won't reinstate award against Hustler mag
Court Alerts 12/10/2012The Supreme Court won't reinstate an award against a racy magazine in a dispute over nude pictures of a model published after she was killed by her professional wrestler husband. The court turned away a request by the family of Nancy Toffoloni Benoit...
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High Court to decide how logging roads regulated
Court Alerts 12/03/2012The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether to switch gears on more than 30 years of regulating the muddy water running off logging roads into rivers. At issue: Should the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency keep considering it the same as water runn...