A former high-ranking state department official has come forward with the explosive report that then Vice President Dick Cheney called for the torture of an Iraqi prisoner to establish a link between al Qaeda and Iraq in the midst of the political controversy over the misrepresentations that led to the Iraq invasion. Cheney was one of the main figures pushing this justification, which was found based on false intelligence. Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff for then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, adds yet another piece of evidence that the torture program was not based on a “ticking bomb” justification and was not based on the faux legal opinions of lawyers like Judge Jay Bybee and Professor John Yoo.
Category: Courts
In a major ruling, the New York Court of Appeals has held that the police cannot use a GPS device on a suspect’s car without a warrant — ordering a new trial for Scott Weaver, 41, a burglary suspect. In the meantime, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals came to the opposite conclusion: finding no need for a warrant in the use of GPS devices against citizens for any reason by the police.
After 22 years on death row, Paul House has now been cleared of murder charges with Tennessee state prosecutors asking for all charges to be dropped against him. He had been sentenced to die in 1986 and his case is already being used by opponents of the death penalty as an example why states should move to life without parole as the ultimate punishment in this country.
Continue reading “Inmate Paul House Cleared of Murder After 22 Years on Death Row”
Justice Antonin Scalia has once again earned himself the ire of law students. Not long ago, Scalia was clearly out-of-line in slapping down a law student for a perfectly reasonable question. Now, he is being quoted in telling students out of the top schools that, no matter how hard they work, they will probably never have a chance for a Supreme Court clerkship based entirely on their school. He basically threw the student a quarter and told her to call her mama and tell her that she was never going to be a Supreme Court clerk.
Continue reading “Supreme Monopoly: Justice Scalia Tells American Student That She Has Little Chance For Clerkship Because She Is At Wrong School”
A panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has voted 2-1 to dismiss a lawsuit against Glock Inc. by victims of a 1999 shooting rampage by Buford Furrow, a white supremacist.
Continue reading “Ninth Circuit Dismisses Lawsuit By Shooting Victims Against Glock”
Federal judge Samuel Kent has been sentenced to 33 months for obstruction of justice for lying to a judicial committee investigating allegations that he sexually harassed an employee. Kent, who was viewed as a harsh sentencer for criminal defendants, avoided a maximum sentence of 20 years. One of the alleged victims referred to him as a “drunken giant.”
Continue reading “Judge Samuel Kent Sentenced to 33 Months in Federal Prison”
In sympathy with Majority Leader (and GW Grad) Harry Reid’s effort to deny that there is sufficient evidence to investigate torture, I give you this picture of a similar effort by a canine representative.
Daniel Hauser, 13, is dying of cancer and needs chemotherapy. However, his mother, Colleen Hauser of Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, is in court this week fighting the treatment on religious grounds. Hauser has Hodgkin’s lymphoma, but the family is against modern treatment on religious grounds and believes in healing cancer with herbs and vitamins . . . and prayer. Continue reading “Dying Boy in Sleepy Eye: Parents Withholds Needed Chemotherapy From Boy on Religious Grounds”
Christiane Brown has released an amazing audio interview with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid where he admits that waterboarding is torture and we did torture people. However, he suggests that it was “the right” thing to do and should not be punished. The audio tape is worth listening to. It is a brilliant interview by Brown.
Continue reading “Reid: Torture Might Have Been Illegal But Still “Right” Thing To Do”
Below is today’s column in the U.S. News and World Report on the case for prosecuting torture and responding to the dwindling number of defenders of the Bush torture program:
Continue reading “Three Legal Truths: The Case for The Prosecution of War Crimes By the Bush Administration”
Our annual Moot Court for elementary kids has made the ABA Journal! We hosted 150 6th grades from Kent Gardens Elementary School in McLean, Virginia this year. They sat through a trial of the three little pigs and a class on forensics led by a detective. The trial was a double murder and attempted murder case based on the Three Little Pigs. B.B. Wolf was acquitted.
Continue reading “George Washington Moot Court Makes The ABA Journal”
While Judge Jay Bybee has declined to speak before the Senate Judiciary Committee to explain his role in the Bush torture program, he is reportedly reaching out to Nevada delegation members to find an alternative forum “to tell his side of the story.” I discussed the story on this segment of Rachel Maddow’s show.
Continue reading “Bybee Reportedly Seeking Forum to Explain His Role in the Torture Memos”
Macon City Councilman and Internet blogger Erick Erickson has been listed as one of the 100 most influential conservatives in America (69 to be precise). He is also the editor-in-chief of the site redstate.com. Erickson is unapologetic for his postings on the retirement of Supreme Court Justice David Souter, where he called the jurist a child molester and bestiality deviate.
Continue reading “Republican Politician Calls Justice Souter a Child Molester and Goat Lover”
There is a trend in the United States to treat fetuses as persons for the purpose of criminal charges. That trend was taken to an extraordinary degree in Dubai where a pregnant woman was involved in a traffic accident and had a miscarriage. Finding that she was following to closely and applying Sharia law, the court convicted her of manslaughter and also ordered her to pay “blood money” for the loss of the baby.
Continue reading “Dubai Court Convicts Woman of Manslaughter and Orders Payment of Blood Money for Death of Her Own Fetus in Traffic Accident”
Leading Pakistani cleric chief Sufi Muhammad of Tehreek-e- Nifaz-e- Shariat-e- Muhammadi has declared democracy, communism, socialism, and fascism to be un-Islamic. Hmmm, that leaves what? Of yes, Islamic rule. He has also reaffirmed that it is unIslamic to be photographed.