A New Jersey man is in custody on a bizarre case of practicing medicine without a license. Daniel C. Tyce, 26, was arrested for allegedly claiming to be Danielle Smith – a real licensed veterinarian. Tyce, an ex-convict, is accused of committing the fraud to pay for estrogen treatments and a sex change operation.
Continue reading “Faux Veterinarian Arrested in Bizarre Cross-Dressing Case of Fraud”
Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. began on a high note this afternoon by acknowledging that waterboarding is torture — an admission that Mukasey refused to make. However, he did not commit to the obvious implication of that statement: he will enforce federal law and international law that makes torture both a crime and a war crime. I discussed the testimony on this segment of Rachel Maddow’s show. Continue reading “Holder Calls Waterboarding Torture — But Falls Short of Committing to Enforce the Law”
The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article on the abuse of civil contempt in this country including the story of H. Beatty Chadwick, a former Philadelphia-area lawyer, who has been behind bars for nearly 14 years without being charged. I have handled civil contempt defenses and it is one of the most abused areas by prosecutors and courts. This article shows how this power can be used to punish rather than its purpose to coerce cooperation.
Continue reading “Former Lawyer Held 14 Years Without Charge on Civil Contempt”
Former Bay Area Rapid Transit Officer Johannes Mehserle, 27, has been arrested and charged with murder in the such publicized shooting of Oscar Grant III at an Oakland, California transit stop. It is another case where YouTube appears to have driven the official response as outrage grew with the playing of videos of the shooting like the clip below. Mehserle who resigned from the force is now facing murder charges.
Continue reading “Mehserle Arrested and Charged With Murder in BART Transit Shooting”
With congressional Democrats and the Obama campaign struggling to avoid the investigation and prosecution of torture, a Bush official just made it a bit more difficult. Susan J. Crawford has publicly admitted that they did engage in clear torture at Guantanamo Bay. With the hearings for Eric Holder on Thursday, the admission by Crawford could make the torture question hard to avoid. I will be discussing the Holder hearing on Countdown tonight.
Continue reading “Bush Official Admits That Administration Tortured Detainees”
Prosecutors have discovered another hotbed of child pornographers: Greensburg Salem High School. Prosecutors have charged teenagers with child pornography for sharing nude and seminude pictures of themselves over cell phones. The girls are 14 or 15 and the boys are 16 or 17. Pornographers all.
Continue reading “Pornotots: Teens Charged With Pornography For Sharing Photos Of Themselves”
The Riverside District Attorney’s Office has announced that it will not criminally charge Costa Mesa Police Department officer Scott Dibble after the officer shot and killed Shaun Vilan upset with his grabbing his friend.
A federal investigation has found that Bradley Schlozman, the former acting head of the civil rights division, made false statements to Congress and violated federal law in overseeing the agency’s civil rights division. However, he will not face charges in a continuation of the Bush Administration’s record of barring prosecution of its own officials.
Continue reading “Report: Bush Official Violated Federal Law in Overseeing Civil Rights Division and Lied To Congress — But Will Not Be Charged”
Grant County in Washington has settled an exceptionally disturbing case involving false allegations of child abuse, allegedly ineffective representation by a public defender (later disbarred), and the holding of an innocent man for seven months after allegations were disproved. The $250,000 with Felipe Vargas seems quite modest given the abuse that he encountered in Grant County, which seems to maintain a criminal justice system on a model from the Thirteenth Century.
If researchers are looking for evidence of nature over nurture to rebut Skinner, they need to look no further than the father and son team of Edward R. Pluhar Sr., 61, and Edward R. Pluhar Jr. 26. Junior reportedly did not want to wait in line at Wal-Mart in Muncie, Delaware, so he went to the front of the line. When a guy objected, he and his father became abusive and threatened him. It turned out to be off-duty police officer Chris Kirby. The confrontation would end up in the parking lot with Kirby injured by the Pluhar’s van and the Pluhars ultimately in the Delaware County Jail.
Continue reading “Big Box; Small Brain: Father and Son Arrested For Allegedly Butting in Line — and Then Assaulting an Officer”
Iran has continued its medieval legal practice with two additional stonings. It was supposed to be three stonings, but one of the men named Mahmoud accused of adultery was able to dig himself out of the hole and run free. The stonings occurred in the city of Mashhad in late December.
Continue reading “Two Men Stoned to Death and One Escapes After Iranian Sentence of Adultery”
Tim Kay is close to becoming a legal system unto himself. In the town of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, Tim Kay defended Robert John “R.J.” Manders, a businessman, on his third drunken-driving conviction. One week later, he was prosecuting Manders for trespass. That’s right, Kay is both a defense counsel and prosecutor in the town.
The world has another honor killing. This time the family of Naile Erdas, 16, decided that the family honor demanded that she be killed after she was raped and impregnated. This case, however, has a positive element: a Turkish court has handed down an appropriately harsh series of sentences of the father, mother, brother and two uncles. It is a great credit to the Turkish legal system and should be a model for other Islamic countries in the region.
Continue reading “Sixteen-Year-Old Pregnant Rape Victim Murdered by Family in Honor Killing”
Police in Greenfield, California are dealing with a considerable cultural disconnect. Macelino de Jesus Martinez, 36, was arrested after he arranged for a marriage of his daughter, 14, into a marriage for beer and cash. When his son-in-law, Margarito de Jesus Galindo, 18, stopped paying, he went to police to try to get his daughter back. Both are reportedly illegal immigrants from Mexico and now face criminal charges and possible deportation.
President-elect Barack Obama appears to be signaling that he is not inclined to investigate crimes committed by the Bush Administration. In an interview with ABC News program “This Week With George Stephanopoulos”, he picked up on the recent Democratic spin that we should all “look to the future and not the past” even if the past happens to contain war crimes committed by his predecessor. I just finished an interview on Talk of the Nation on which I debated the issue with Harvard Professor and former solicitor general Charles Fried. I also discussed the issue on MSNBC Countdown.
Continue reading “Obama Indicates That He Will Not Investigate Bush Crimes”