Civil Rights

Canada to Review Polygamy Ban?

In a case that could have an effect on United States law enforcement, a prominent Canadian criminal attorney serving as a special prosecutor has recommended that his country reconsider its ban on polygamy. Appointed in a British Columbia case involving a U.S.-based splinter Mormon group that has reportedly openly practiced…

Aug 1, 2007 11:47 PM CDT

City Code Cases Over Front-Yard Food

Corn. Tomatoes. Sunflowers. All are mainstays in many backyard gardens throughout the country. But now that so-called edible estates are replacing front lawns in urban areas, some neighboring residents are up in arms over the otherwise innocuous veggies. An increasing movement toward replacing the lawns in front of houses with…

Jul 31, 2007 10:19 PM CDT

Gitmo Inmate: Please Don’t Release Me

An inmate who spends 22 hours daily in a windowless steel isolation cell at the Guantanamo Bay prison is pleading with U.S. authorities not to release him. That’s because Ahmed Belbacha, 38, fears he will be treated even worse if he is returned to his native Algeria, reports the London…

Jul 31, 2007 4:44 PM CDT

1st Native American Lawyer in SD Dies

Corrected: Ramon Roubideaux, a well-known American Indian lawyer who represented activists involved in the 71-day standoff at Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1973, has died. He was 82. Reportedly the first Native American to go into private practice in the state, Roubideaux worked…

Jul 30, 2007 7:40 PM CDT

Mexico City Jails OK Gay Conjugal Visits

Accepting the recommendation of a human rights commission, Mexico City has begun to allow conjugal visits between gay inmates. Such visits are commonly allowed for opposite-sex couples, even when they are not married, and a 2003 Mexico law bans discrimination on the basis of sexual preference, reports the British Broadcasting…

Jul 30, 2007 7:10 PM CDT

Raids Dividing Immigrant Families

As federal authorities amp up their efforts to enforce immigration laws, some immigrant families are facing a tough choice. Children born in this country are U.S. citizens and have a right to live here. But if their non-citizen parents are here illegally, the adults have to decide whether to leave…

Jul 30, 2007 6:17 PM CDT

8 Targets in Prison Masturbation Cases

Updated: A Florida inmate convicted this week of masturbating while alone in his jail cell is reportedly only one of eight targets—along with state taxpayers—of what a Miami Herald columnist describes as “a spectacular case of selective prosecution.” Given the likely prevalence of such commonplace behavior in state prisons (not…

Jul 27, 2007 8:09 PM CDT

Judge Voids Hazleton Immigration Law

In a ruling with national implications, a federal judge in Pennsylvania today struck down a controversial Hazleton municipal ordinance that would have imposed hefty fines on businesses for hiring illegal immigrants and landlords for renting to them. The ordinance was unconstitutional, ruled U.S. District Judge James M. Munley, because it…

Jul 26, 2007 9:38 PM CDT

Record $100 Million for Unjust Conviction

A federal judge in Boston has awarded $100 million to four men unjustly convicted of murder in Massachusetts state court in 1968, reportedly the largest such judgment ever made. Ruling today, U.S. Dist. Judge Nancy Gertner found that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had suppressed evidence that four men convicted…

Jul 26, 2007 8:06 PM CDT

Mortgage Bias Investigated

The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether several mortgage lenders charged minorities higher rates than whites. Grace Chung Becker, a deputy assistant attorney general, told a House Financial Services subcommittee yesterday that the department opened the bias investigations based on lending data and referrals, Reuters reports. Federal Reserve data for…

Jul 26, 2007 6:33 PM CDT

29,000 Sex Offenders Using MySpace

The estimated number of registered sex offenders among some 180 million people using the social networking site MySpace to post personal profiles has quadrupled. Several months ago, operators of the site said they thought some 7,000 registered sex offenders had posted on MySpace. But now they have upped that estimate…

Jul 25, 2007 11:54 PM CDT

Hamdan Lawyer to Head Emory U Clinic

A prominent U.S. Navy lawyer will serve as a visiting professor at Emory University School of Law this fall after retiring from the military, and he will help establish a new international humanitarian law clinic. In addition to teaching courses on international humanitarian law, criminal law, evidence, and military law,…

Jul 25, 2007 10:46 PM CDT

FBI Wants Telecom Database

The FBI is asking Congress for $5 million to pay telecom companies to retain phone and Internet information for two years as a resource in terrorism investigations. Officials told the Washington Post that the FBI would still need to obtain a subpoena or administrative warrant before accessing the information. Mark…

Jul 25, 2007 8:55 PM CDT

NY Panhandler Case Now a Class Action

A federal judge in New York City has certified as a class action a case brought on behalf of some 5,000 to 10,000 panhandlers allegedly arrested or forced off the streets for begging. Despite a 1992 federal court decision that the state loitering law being applied was unconstitutional–and an appeals…

Jul 25, 2007 7:57 PM CDT

Woman Sues Fidel Castro in Dad’s Death

It isn’t every day that a U.S. court has to figure out how to serve a complaint on Fidel Castro–not to mention his brother, Raul, the Republic of Cuba and the Cuban army. So Justice Nancy Mills, who sits in Waldo County Superior Court in Maine, took a little time…

Jul 24, 2007 7:47 PM CDT