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Supreme Court rejects Hessler appeal
Industry News |
2011/12/26 16:33
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The Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday rejected a death-row inmate’s claim that his lawyer failed to properly represent the convicted kidnapper, rapist and murderer at his sentencing.
Jeffrey Hessler had argued that his trial-court lawyer should have demanded a competency hearing when Hessler moved to represent himself at his sentencing. The state Supreme Court rejected that argument, saying allowing someone to serve as their own attorney did not constitute ineffective counsel and Hessler failed to show he couldn’t adequately represent himself at sentencing.
Hessler was convicted of first-degree murder, kidnapping, first-degree sexual assault of a child and use of a firearm to commit a felony in December 2004. He was sentenced to die for the 2003 kidnapping, rape and shooting death of 15-year-old Heather Guerrero. She was delivering newspapers on her morning route just blocks from her home when Hessler grabbed her and forced her into his car.
A jury found that Hessler took her to an abandoned house at nearby Lake Minatare, raped her and then shot her in the head on Feb. 11, 2003. Guerrero’s body was found the next day at the house, about 12 miles from where she disappeared. |
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Supreme Court says Manchester property tax data private
Headline Topics |
2011/12/24 16:33
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The Vermont Supreme Court says information used by towns to calculate adjustments to residents' property taxes should remain private.
In an entry order published Friday, the court reversed a Bennington County Superior Court ruling that said the town of Manchester should provide the tax information to someone who requested it.
The issue involves the amount Vermont property tax payers may have deducted from their bills based on their income, school property tax burden and if they to use a portion of their tax refund to reduce property taxes.
The state Department of Taxes calculates that amount and sends it to towns to reduce a property owner's taxes.
The Supreme Court says the law governing the deductions is covered by the state's privacy laws. Property tax bills are, however, public.
The court decision is posted on the town website, http://www.manchester-vt.gov/ |
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France ponders removing risky breast implants
Industry News |
2011/12/22 11:04
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Emmanuelle Maria's breasts were burning and globules of silicone gel were protruding into her armpits. Her implants had exploded inside her. Yet her doctors, she says, told her nothing was wrong.
Now, she wants the French government to tell 30,000 women to get their implants removed — at the state's expense — to call attention to their risks and save others from potential pain and indignity.
Prompted by calls from implant wearers and leading doctors, French health authorities are considering a drastic and unprecedented move: recommending mass surgery to rid the country of a type of breast implant that investigators say was secretly made with cheap industrial silicone whose medical dangers remain unclear.
Governments around Europe are hanging on France's decision Friday. Tens of thousands more women in Britain, Italy, Spain and other European nations are walking around with the same pre-filled implants, made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP.
Health officials from several European countries held a conference call Wednesday to discuss the implants, Portugal's Director-General of Health, Dr. Francisco Jorge, told The Associated Press. European Commission spokesman Frederic Vincent said no decisions were made, but France informed the others of the situation. |
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Pa.'s rhyming justice pens insurance fraud opinion
Industry News |
2011/12/21 11:05
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A state Supreme Court justice known for opinions written in rhyme has done it again, producing six pages of verse Thursday in the case of whether the maker of a forged check also had committed insurance fraud.
Justice J. Michael Eakin, writing for a 4-2 majority, concluded in six-line stanzas that a man's attempt to deposit a forged check appearing to be from State Farm didn't constitute insurance fraud.
Sentenced on the other crimes, he surely won't go free, but we find he can't be guilty of this final felony, Eakin wrote. Convictions for the forgery and theft are approbated -- the sentence for insurance fraud, however, is vacated. The case must be remanded for resentencing, we find, so the trial judge may impose the result he originally had in mind.
A dissenting three-page opinion by Justice Thomas G. Saylor didn't rhyme.
Eakin was first elected to the high court in 2001 after earning a reputation as the rhyming judge by issuing some opinions entirely in verse while sitting on an intermediate state appellate court in the late 1990s. Two former state Supreme Court justices, Stephen A. Zappala and the late Ralph J. Cappy, had expressed concern in the past that the practice could reflect poorly on the court. |
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Gingrich assails judges as he courts conservatives
Headline Court News |
2011/12/20 10:25
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As he works to rev up his conservative base in Iowa with just two weeks to go until the state's caucuses, Newt Gingrich is launching a full-throated assault on a reliable GOP target: judges.
There is little love for the judicial branch among the Republicans seeking the White House. But Gingrich's ridicule has been, by far, the sharpest and the loudest. And it's taken a central role as his campaign struggles to stay atop polls in Iowa, a state where irate social conservatives ousted three judges who legalized same-sex marriage.
I commend the people of Iowa for sending a strong signal that when judges overreach that they can find a new job, Gingrich told about 200 supporters who turned out to hear him speak in Davenport, Iowa, on Monday.
Gingrich has suggested that judges who issue what he termed radical rulings out of step with mainstream American values should be subpoenaed before Congress to explain themselves before facing possible impeachment. As president, he said, he'd consider dispatching U.S. marshals to round up judges who refuse to show voluntarily. In extreme cases, whole courts could be eliminated.
In the final debate before voters weigh in at the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, Gingrich called the courts grotesquely dictatorial. He cast the fight in stark religious terms reminiscent of the culture wars, in which a secular, legal elite was encroaching on religious liberties.
The targets of Gingrich's strongest derision: the West Coast's 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a perennial punching bag for the right, and a federal judge in Texas who banned prayer in a public school. |
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NY top court allows private securities claims
Headline Topics |
2011/12/20 10:25
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Enforcement by the state attorney general against securities fraud doesn't pre-empt private common-law claims of negligence against investment companies, New York's top court ruled Tuesday.
The Court of Appeals rejected J.P. Morgan Investment Management's argument that New York's Martin Act gives the attorney general exclusive authority over fraudulent securities and investment practices. The court said Assured Guaranty (UK) Ltd. can sue J.P. Morgan.
We agree with the attorney general that the purpose of the Martin Act is not impaired by private common-law actions that have a legal basis independent of the statute because proceedings by the attorney general and private action have the same goal — combating fraud and deception in securities transactions, Judge Victoria Graffeo wrote.
Assured claimed breach of fiduciary duty and gross negligence, alleging J.P. Morgan invested heavily in risky mortgage-backed securities while committing to a conservative investment policy for reinsurance company Orkney RE II PLC, whose obligations Assured guaranteed. After the market crashed, Assured had to cover Orkney losses.
Here, the plain text of the Martin Act, while granting the attorney general investigatory and enforcement powers and prescribing various penalties, does not expressly mention or otherwise contemplate the elimination of common-law claims, Graffeo wrote. The unanimous ruling upheld a midlevel court, which had reversed a judge. |
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Calif. company due in court for Colo. fire deaths
Topics |
2011/12/19 11:29
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A California specialty painting company is expected to plead guilty in the 2007 deaths of five workers at a Colorado power plant, in the rare prosecution of a company.
RPI Coatings Inc. of Santa Fe Springs, Calif., is expected to plead guilty Monday to five misdemeanor counts of workplace safety violations resulting in death.
During a court hearing earlier this month, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jaime Pena said the company likely would pay a substantial compensation to the victims' survivors as part of a plea deal.
The workers died after a fire broke out inside a pipeline at Xcel Energy's Cabin Creek hydroelectric plant near Georgetown, Colo., about 40 miles west of Denver.
A jury in June acquitted Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy Inc., which owns the power plant, of all criminal charges. The company has paid millions in compensation to the families. |
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