|
|
|
LA sheriff under fire after report slams jails
Industry News |
2011/09/29 10:36
|
Los Angeles County's longtime sheriff is facing one of the toughest attacks of his 13-year term, after a civil rights group demanded his resignation and claimed he looked the other way while his sprawling jail network became co-opted by violent and corrupt deputies who routinely abuse inmates.
Sheriff Lee Baca, whose deputies oversee about 15,000 inmates in the nation's busiest jail system, said he welcomed the criticism but disputed the claims made Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. He said he had no intention of stepping down.
The ACLU demanded the four-term sheriff's resignation, saying he and his top commanders are willfully indifferent to claims made by inmates and civilian jail visitors that deputies routinely viciously assault inmates.
In one case, an inmate at the downtown Men's Central Jail said deputies accused him of stealing mail then punched him, breaking an eye socket, and marched him naked to a cell occupied by two gang members.
Deputies repeatedly ignored the man's cries for help as the gang members raped him while another inmate flushed his head down a toilet to muffle his screams, the man, who had been jailed for making criminal threats, said in a sworn declaration. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Colombia court reinstates conviction in Galan hit
Industry News |
2011/09/01 09:47
|
The Supreme Court on Wednesday reinstated the murder conviction of a former justice minister for masterminding the 1989 assassination of presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan, a courageous foe of drug cartels.
The court also reinstated the 24-year prison sentence a lower court imposed in 2007 on Alberto Santofimio, who was widely considered the political godfather of the late cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar.
Hitmen employed by Escobar killed Galan, and a key witness in Santofimio's trial said he saw the defendant urge Escobar to order the murder.
Kill him, Pablo, testified John Jairo Velasquez, or Popeye, who was Escobar's chief henchman at the time and has confessed to organizing the assassination.
Santofimio, a senator who had been justice minister in the 1970s, was at the time a rival of Galan for the Liberal Party's presidential nomination.
The Aug. 18, 1989, assassination badly traumatized a nation already reeling from a terror campaign by Escobar's henchmen, who killed hundreds of judges, journalists and police. Escobar also targeted civilians with car bombs, even blowing up an airplane in midflight.
The drug kingpin was trying to pressure Colombia's leaders not to extradite drug lords to the United States. Nonetheless, Galan, the presidential frontrunner when he was killed, promised to battle the narcos with extradition. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
RI 'Survivor' winner won't get free lawyer
Industry News |
2011/08/25 10:16
|
A Rhode Island judge is refusing to grant free legal counsel to help the winner of the first season of the CBS reality show Survivor appeal a nine-month prison sentence.
Judge William Smith on Thursday rejected 50-year-old Richard Hatch's request for a court-appointed attorney to help him fight the sentence handed down in March for violating the terms of his supervised release by failing to settle his tax bill.
Hatch, of Newport, spent more than three years in prison for not paying taxes on his $1 million Survivor winnings. He was released in 2009 and ordered to refile his 2000 and 2001 taxes and pay what he owed. Smith ruled he never did and returned him to prison.
Hatch, who claims he is destitute, is scheduled to be released in December. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Drug company lawyer taped trying to foil lawsuit
Industry News |
2011/08/19 09:00
|
International business can be an ethical jungle, but it's rare to get details of bare-knuckle tactics on tape.
A lawyer in Mexico for a leading U.S. drug manufacturer offered to pay an opposing expert in a lawsuit if he would leave the country on a key court date to undermine the case.
The company, Baxter International Inc., promotes itself as a champion of global anticorruption efforts. Baxter said the lawyer was not authorized to make any offers, and it has severed all ties with him.
The recording and its disclosure offer an unusual glimpse of fishy maneuvers in the global marketplace and come as the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission crack down on misconduct by U.S. companies abroad, part of a multinational effort to clean up commerce.
Based near Chicago, Baxter is a major manufacturer of intravenous drugs and medical devices. Its medications are used to treat people with hemophilia, kidney disease, immune system problems, infectious diseases, serious burns and other conditions.
The lawyer was talking to accountant Rafael Aspuru Alvarez, an expert witness for Translog, a trucking company embroiled in a $25 million legal dispute with Baxter's subsidiary in Mexico. |
|
|
|
|
|
Legal News RSS Feed
