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High court won't step into Mich. dispute over harness racing
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2016/05/04 22:50
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The Supreme Court won't step into a dispute between Michigan gaming officials and a group of harness racing drivers over allegations of race-fixing.
The drivers had refused to speak to state investigators without a grant of immunity from prosecution. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last year that they had a constitutional right to remain silent.
Michigan officials argued that gaming officials did not have to grant immunity before taking action against the drivers. The drivers were never charged with any crimes.
The justices on Monday left in place the appeals court ruling. Harness racing is a form of horse racing.
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Court in Russia-annexed Crimea bans Tatar assembly
Headline Topics |
2016/04/26 10:15
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The Supreme Court in the Russia-annexed peninsula Crimea on Tuesday banned a Crimean Tatar group in the latest step to marginalize the minority.
Crimea's prosecutor Natalya Poklonskaya who personally lodged the lawsuit welcomed the ruling against the Mejlis, an assembly of Tatar community leaders.
"This decision aims to ensure stability, peace and order in the Russian Federation," she told Russian news agencies after the hearing.
Crimean Tatars, who suffered a mass deportation at the hands of Soviet authorities in 1944, seemed to be the only organized force within Crimea to oppose Russia's annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014. Tuesday's ban follows months of persecution, expulsions and jailing of prominent Tatar leaders as well as rank-and-file protesters.
Six people are now on trial in the city Simferopol on charges of rioting dating back to fist fights between rival rallies of a pro-Russian party and Crimean Tatars on Feb. 26, 2014 which preceded the hastily called referendum to secede from Ukraine. Not a single pro-Russian protester has faced charges.
Russia's Justice Ministry earlier this month ruled the Mejlis was an extremist group, paving the way for the outright ban of the group that represents up to 15 percent of the Crimean population.
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Court sides with Argentina, speeding along bond settlements
Headline Topics |
2016/04/16 00:47
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A federal appeals court cleared the way Wednesday for Argentina to settle its debts and strengthen its ability to maneuver in worldwide markets.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals turned away creditors who wanted to keep in place court-ordered protections, though Circuit Judge Christopher Droney said a lower-court judge should take steps to determine whether Argentina has met conditions he required be fulfilled before court orders against the republic are permanently lifted. The conditions include completing settlement payments.
A three-judge panel announced its decision after hearing oral arguments for more than an hour. It found a judge was within his rights to conclude that circumstances surrounding the decadelong court battle changed dramatically when Argentina's new president, Mauricio Macri, decided to let the nation negotiate deals with bondholders after he took office Dec. 10.
Since January, Argentina has reached agreements to pay more than $8 billion to creditors, mainly U.S. hedge funds.
Argentine Economy Minister Alfonso Prat-Gay, who is in New York ahead of Argentina's first international bond sale in more than a decade, said, "This is a step toward achieving normality and the kind of development that Argentina deserves."
His country is expected to sell up to $15 billion in bonds, and he said the holdout funds will be paid on April 22.
The creditors went to court in New York after Argentina in 2001 defaulted on $100 billion in bonds. Argentina invited all its bondholders to swap their bonds at steep discounts for new bonds in 2005 and 2010.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Griesa had issued orders banning Argentina from paying interest through U.S. banks to 93 percent of its bondholders, who agreed to exchange their bonds for new bonds worth 25 percent to 29 percent of their original value. |
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Appeals court rules Mississippi can resume Google inquiry
Headline Topics |
2016/04/12 00:48
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Mississippi's attorney general can resume an investigation into whether Google facilitates illegal behavior, an appeals court ruled.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday overturned a district judge who had sided with Google. U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate ruled last year that the unit of Alphabet Inc. didn't have to answer a subpoena by Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood.
Hood began complaining in 2012 that Google wasn't doing enough to prevent people from breaking the law. In October 2014, he sent a 79-page subpoena demanding Google produce information about a wide range of subjects, including whether Google helps criminals by allowing its search engine to lead to pirated music, having its autocomplete function suggest illegal activities and sharing YouTube ad revenue with the makers of videos promoting illegal drug sales. Instead of complying, Google sued.
The appeals court also dissolved the lower judge's injunction that had barred Hood from bringing any civil or criminal lawsuits against the Mountain View, California-based company, saying that a mere subpoena wasn't enough to rule that Hood was acting in bad faith.
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Judge begins to deliver verdict in Ukrainian pilot trial
Headline Topics |
2016/03/21 21:53
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A Russian court has begun reading a verdict for Ukrainian pilot Nadezhda Savchenko, who is charged with complicity to murder two Russian journalists in war-torn eastern Ukraine.
The judge began reading the verdict Monday morning. He quoted arguments by prosecutors who said Savchenko, who served in a volunteer Ukrainian battalion at the time, called in the coordinates for shelling that killed the two journalists and several civilians in July 2014. He also quoted them as saying she was driven by "political hatred" toward residents of Ukraine's Luhansk region.
The judge in the trial quoted the prosecution saying that Savchenko was part of a "criminal group" and aimed to kill an "unlimited number of people."
Prosecutors have asked for a 23-year prison sentence for Savchenko. Sentencing is expected on Tuesday.
This story has been corrected to show that Savchenko has not been found guilty. The judge, quoting prosecutors, said Savchenko was complicit in the killing, but stopped short of pronouncing her guilty. A verdict will come at the end of the verdict-reading process, which is expected to take two days.
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White S.C. trooper pleads guilty in shooting of unarmed black man
Headline Topics |
2016/03/20 21:53
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A white South Carolina trooper pleaded guilty Monday to assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature in the 2014 shooting an unarmed black driver seconds after a traffic stop.
Trooper Sean Groubert, 32, faces up to 20 years in prison. The shooting captured on dash-cam video from the trooper's patrol car shocked the country, coming during a wave of questionable police shootings.
Levar Jones was walking into a convenience store in September 2014 when Groubert got out of his patrol car and demanded Jones' driver's license.
Jones turned back to reach into his car and Groubert fired four shots. Jones' wallet is seen flying out of his hands.
Groubert's boss, state Public Safety Director Leroy Smith, fired Groubert after seeing the video.
Jones was shot in the hip and survived. He walked into the courtroom Monday with a noticeable limp and played with a Rubik's Cube before the hearing started.
Video of the encounter was played in the courtroom and showed Groubert pulling up to Jones without his siren on, and the trooper asking Jones for his license after he also was out of his car.
As Jones turns and reaches back into his car, Groubert shouts, "Get outta the car, get outta the car." He begins firing and unloads a third shot as Jones staggers away, backing up with his hands raised, and then a fourth.
From the first shot to the fourth, the video clicks off three seconds.
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Lawyer: US citizen charged in UN case to plead guilty
Headline Topics |
2016/03/18 21:53
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A defense lawyer says a U.S. citizen charged in the United Nations bribery case will plead guilty Wednesday to charges.
Attorney Brian Bieber said Monday that Francis Lorenzo will plead guilty to three charges. Lorenzo is a suspended ambassador from the Dominican Republic who was arrested in the fall.
The plea comes in a case that resulted in the arrest of a former president of the U.N. General Assembly and a billionaire Chinese businessman.
Bieber says Lorenzo will plead guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery, conspiracy to commit money laundering and filing a false tax return.
Bieber says his client decided to plead guilty after reviewing the government's evidence. He says it led him to "accept responsibility for his role in the criminal conspiracies committed by him and his co-defendants."
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