Recent Updates
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Court: Sex offender can challenge internet restrictions
Criminal Law 03/21/2017A convicted sex offender challenging restrictions on internet use will get a new hearing before New Jersey's parole board. The state Supreme Court ruled Tuesday in the case of a man identified only by the initials J.I. who had claimed the restriction...
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Immigration courts: record number of cases, many problems
Criminal Law 03/06/2017Everyone was in place for the hearing in Atlanta immigration court: the Guinean man hoping to stay in the U.S., his attorney, a prosecutor, a translator and the judge. But because of some missing paperwork, it was all for nothing. When the government...
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Court officer investigated for photographing lawyer's notes
Criminal Law 03/03/2017A court security officer in Maine has been placed on leave while under investigation for sending a cellphone photo of a defense attorney's notes to a prosecutor. The Kennebec Journal reports that court officials are calling the incident a serious eth...
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Lawmakers want Supreme Court review of voting law continued
Criminal Law 03/01/2017North Carolina Republican legislative leaders want the U.S. Supreme Court to reject the new Democratic state attorney general's bid to dismiss their appeal of a lower court ruling that struck down a voting law based on racial bias. Lawyers the Genera...
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Top court reviews free speech case of man's anti-police rap
Criminal Law 01/29/2017Pennsylvania's highest court is reviewing the conviction of a Pittsburgh man for making threats against police in a rap song after he was charged with drug offenses. The Supreme Court on Monday said it would take up an appeal by Jamal Knox, who argue...
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Supreme Court to hear case about party in vacant DC house
Criminal Law 01/21/2017The Supreme Court will hear a case in which people arrested for having a party in a vacant house sued police for violating their constitutional rights and won. The justices said Thursday they will review lower court rulings in favor of 16 people who ...
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Court ponders mass murderer Breivik's prison conditions
Criminal Law 01/19/2017An appeals court in Norway is considering whether the prison conditions under which mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik is being held amount to a violation of his human rights. The six-day trial ended Wednesday in a makeshift courtroom inside Skien ...
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Supreme Court considers suit over 2001 detention of Muslims
Criminal Law 01/13/2017Ahmer Abbasi speaks softly as he describes the strip searches, the extra shoves, the curses that he endured in a federal jail in Brooklyn following the Sept. 11 attacks. "I don't think I deserved it," Abbasi said during a telephone interview with The...
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Circus operator agrees to plea deal in tent collapse
Criminal Law 01/05/2017Court records show a Florida-based circus operator has agreed to a plea deal following a tent collapse in New Hampshire in 2015 that killed two people and injured dozens. The Caledonian-Record in Vermont reports details of the plea deal involving Sar...
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Appeals court: Minnesota sex offender program constitutional
Criminal Law 01/01/2017Minnesota's program for keeping sex offenders confined after they complete their prison sentences is constitutional, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday, reversing a lower-court judge who said it violates offenders' rights because hardly anyone is ...
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Kenya president: International Criminal Court not impartial
Criminal Law 12/21/2016Kenya's president on Monday criticized the International Criminal Court as "not impartial," saying his government "will give serious thought" to its membership of the court. In a speech during celebrations marking 53 years since Kenya became independ...
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Court: Asylum not automatic for former gang members
Criminal Law 12/02/2016Immigrants in the United States illegally are not automatically eligible for asylum on the basis that they are former gang members who risk persecution if they return home, a federal appeals court panel ruled Wednesday. Three judges from the 9th U.S....