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Court: Spain can extradite Liberty Reserve founder
Headline News |
2014/02/24 23:12
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A Spanish court has ruled that a man accused of being behind one of the world’s biggest money laundering businesses can be extradited to the U.S. to face charges there.
Arthur Budovsky, who founded currency transfer and payment processing company Liberty Reserves, can appeal the ruling, the National Court said late Friday. Spain’s government must also approve the decision for an extradition to happen.
It wasn’t immediately clear if Budovsky would appeal. The 40-year-old Costa Rican, who was arrested at Madrid airport in May 2013, has acknowledged founding Liberty Reserve in 2006, but says he sold his share to stay on only as a consultant.
U.S. officials accuse Budovsky of using Liberty Reserve as a kind of underworld bank which handled about $6 billion worth of illicit transactions. |
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CA Supreme Court justice to retire
Headline News |
2014/02/13 23:53
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The longest-serving current justice of the California Supreme Court announced Tuesday that she is retiring.
Justice Joyce Kennard notified Gov. Jerry Brown that she intends to step down on April 5, ending her 24-year tenure as a member of the state's highest court.
"The state and its people have been very well served by Justice Kennard," Brown said in a statement on Tuesday. "Her independence and intellectual fortitude have left a lasting mark on the Court."
Former Gov. George Deukmejian appointed Kennard to the Supreme Court in 1989, The San Jose Mercury News reported. She previously was a Los Angeles trial judge and an appeals court justice for a brief time before being elevated to the State Supreme Court.
Kennard, 72, has a unique personal history, according to the Mercury News, because she is a native of Indonesia, moved to the Netherlands as a teenager and lost part of her right leg to a tumor, forcing her to walk with a prosthetic the rest of her life.
Kennard moved to the United States in 1961, settling in Southern California. She earned her law degree from the University of Southern California.
In her tenure on the court, she became famous for interjecting questions during oral arguments, often turning them into lengthy speeches before pointing her finger at a lawyer and demanding an answer. Despite being an appointee of the conservative Deukmejian, she was often unpredictable in her rulings and would come down on the more liberal side of social issues before the court.
Kennard was in the 4-3 majority that in 2008 struck down California's long-standing ban on gay marriage, a ruling that preceded voter approval of Proposition 8 — which restored the same-sex marriage ban until the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated it last year. |
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Teens charged in death of Australian due in court
Headline News |
2014/02/07 00:26
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Three teenagers accused of fatally shooting an Australian baseball player as he jogged down an Oklahoma street, allegedly because they were bored, are expected in court Tuesday for a hearing that could reveal details about the case.
Police allege that Chancey Allen Luna and James Francis Edwards Jr., who are both 16, and Michael Dewayne Jones, 18, randomly targeted and shot Chris Lane last summer. Each teenager is charged with first-degree murder.
Lane's death garnered heavy media coverage in both the U.S. and Australia, prompting the judge to issue a gag order barring anyone involved from talking about the case outside court. That means little information has been released since the 22-year-old Melbourne native was shot in the back and died in August.
But investigators have said Lane was shot while jogging down a tree-lined street near the home of his girlfriend's parents in Duncan, about 80 miles south of Oklahoma City. He and his girlfriend had just returned to Oklahoma after visiting Australia, and he was preparing for his senior season playing catcher at East Central University in Ada, about 90 miles east of Duncan.
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7 now guilty in Pendleton contractor bribery case
Headline News |
2014/02/04 00:00
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Two civilian defense contractors have pleaded guilty in a San Diego federal court, bringing to nine the number of defendants who have admitted guilt in recent days to their involvement in a scheme involving bribes and kickbacks at Camp Pendleton and other federal facilities.
Federal prosecutors say Paul Dana Kay of PK Excavation and Manuel Ramirez of MRN Construction, Inc., entered the pleas to violations of the Anti-Kickback Act on Friday.
Six former contractors and a former Defense Department employee have pleaded guilty in the past two weeks to involvement in the scheme.
They include Natividad Lara Cervantes, who referred to himself as "The Godfather of Camp Pendleton," and admitted accepting bribes.
Sentencing is scheduled for April. The defendants face maximums ranging from three years to 20 years in prison. |
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Court: Disgraced ex-journalist can't practice law
Headline News |
2014/01/30 23:32
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The California Supreme Court on Monday denied a law license to a disgraced former journalist who was caught fabricating dozens of stories for major national magazines.
The unanimous seven-judge court ruled that Stephen Glass had insufficiently rehabilitated himself in the years since his misdeeds, saying he "failed to carry his heavy burden of establishing his rehabilitation and current fitness."
Glass' misdeeds stunned the profession when they were uncovered in 1998. His widely publicized fall from grace earned the rising star a prominent place in the pantheon of journalistic cheats and scoundrels such as Janet Cooke and Jayson Blair — two prominent reporters caught fabricating quotes, sources and entire stories.
Glass' ethical missteps were turned into the Hollywood movie "Shattered Glass" and recounted in his novel "The Fabulist," for which he earned $190,000. |
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Lawmakers push back against Washington high court
Headline News |
2014/01/27 22:18
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Washington state's highest court has exercised an unusual amount of power on education funding, and it's prompted some lawmakers to raise constitutional concerns.
Before last year's legislative session, the court ruled that the state wasn't meeting its obligation to amply pay for basic education. In response, the Legislature added about $1 billion in school-related spending, and lawmakers widely agree they'll add more funding in coming years.
Earlier this month, the court went a step further, analyzing specific funding targets while telling lawmakers to come back with a new plan by the end of April.
Those specific demands have irked budget writers in the Legislature.
"They are way out of their lane," said Republican Sen. Michael Baumgartner.
Baumgartner expects lawmakers will continue adding "substantially new resources" to the state education system, but he said the court's position could erode the proper balance of power in Olympia. Baumgartner hopes lawmakers will ignore the court's latest demands, or he fears justices may exercise more power going forward. |
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Court: Bloggers have First Amendment protections
Headline News |
2014/01/20 22:20
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A federal appeals court ruled Friday that bloggers and the public have the same First Amendment protections as journalists when sued for defamation: If the issue is of public concern, plaintiffs have to prove negligence to win damages.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered a new trial in a defamation lawsuit brought by an Oregon bankruptcy trustee against a Montana blogger who wrote online that the court-appointed trustee criminally mishandled a bankruptcy case.
The appeals court ruled that the trustee was not a public figure, which could have invoked an even higher standard of showing the writer acted with malice, but the issue was of public concern, so the negligence standard applied.
Gregg Leslie of the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press said the ruling affirms what many have long argued: Standards set by a 1974 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Gertz v. Robert Welch Inc., apply to everyone, not just journalists. |
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