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Court won't consider giving man new trial
Topics in Legal News |
2012/05/18 21:42
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The Supreme Court won't consider giving a man convicted in the death of a Texas toddler a new trial because the medical examiner changed her opinion on the cause of death.
The high court on Monday refused to hear an appeal from Neil Hampton Robbins, convicted in the death of 17-month-old Tristen Skye Rivet, who died on May 12, 1998.
At the trial, Dr. Patricia Moore testified that Tristen's death was a homicide caused by asphyxia. But Moore later changed her opinion and said the cause of death was undetermined. Robbins asked for a new trial but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeal refused, saying there is no conclusive evidence of Robbins' innocence and that it wasn't proven that the state purposefully used false testimony.
Some patients' fate could hinge on Supreme Court
If the Supreme Court strikes down President Barack Obama's health care law, it wouldn't just be politicians dealing with the fallout.
Nearly 62,000 patients with serious medical conditions would be out of luck.
They're the "uninsurables," people turned away by insurance companies because of medical problems but covered through a little-known program in the law called the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan. The plan would have to shut down if the entire law is invalidated.
Cancer patient Kathy Thomas is worried she'll be uninsured again without the program. The Florida small businesswoman credits the coverage for saving her life this year when she had to be hospitalized with a serious respiratory infection.
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Md. highest court recognizes same-sex divorce
Top Court Watch |
2012/05/18 11:43
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Maryland's highest court ruled Friday that same-sex couples can divorce in the state even though Maryland does not yet permit same-sex marriages.
The Court of Appeals ruled 7-0 that couples who have a valid marriage from another state can divorce in Maryland. The case involved two women who were married in California and denied a divorce in 2010 by a Maryland judge.
The ruling may have limited effect because same-sex weddings, and by extension divorces, are set to start in the state in January. However, opponents of the law passed this year are seeking to overturn it in a potential voter referendum in November.
"A valid out-of-state same-sex marriage should be treated by Maryland courts as worthy of divorce, according to the applicable statues, reported cases, and court rules of this state," the court concluded in a 21-page ruling.
It said Maryland courts should withhold recognition of a valid foreign marriage only if that marriage is "repugnant" to state public policy. The court says the threshold is a high bar that has not been met in the case that it ruled on.
Lawyers for the women told the Court of Appeals that is would be unprecedented for the state not to recognize gay marriages performed elsewhere.
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Court rules NY town's prayer violated Constitution
Top Court Watch |
2012/05/16 21:43
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An upstate New York town violated the constitutional ban against favoring one religion over another by opening nearly every meeting over an 11-year span with prayers that stressed Christianity, a federal court of appeals ruled Thursday.
In what it said was its first case testing the constitutionally mandated separation of church and state, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled the town of Greece, a suburb of Rochester, should have made a greater effort to invite people from other faiths to open monthly meetings. The town's lawyer says it will appeal.
From 1999 through 2007, and again from January 2009 through June 2010, every meeting was opened with a Christian-oriented invocation. In 2008, after residents Susan Galloway and Linda Stephens complained, four of 12 meetings were opened by non-Christians, including a Jewish layman, a Wiccan priestess and the chairman of the local Baha'i congregation.
Galloway and Stephens sued and, in 2010, a lower court ruled there was no evidence the town had intentionally excluded other faiths.
A town employee each month selected clerics or lay people by using a local published guide of churches. The guide did not include non-Christian denominations, however. The court found that religious institutions in the town of just under 100,000 people are primarily Christian, and even Galloway and Stephens testified they knew of no non-Christian places of worship there.
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Court won't hear appeals from Bulger victim family
Law & Court News |
2012/05/14 13:49
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The Supreme Court won't hear an appeal over whether the family of a man allegedly killed by former Boston mob boss and FBI informant James "Whitey" Bulger should get millions of dollars from the government.
The high court on Monday refused to hear an appeal from Edward Halloran's estate, which wants more than $2 million in damages from the FBI.
Bulger and another gang member are alleged to have shot Halloran on the waterfront in 1982. Bulger was an FBI informant at the time, and two judges ordered the FBI to pay damages to the families.
But the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the families did not file their claims within the statute of limitations.
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Court turns away PR congressional vote lawsuit
Topics in Legal News |
2012/05/13 13:50
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The Supreme Court won't hear an appeal from residents of Puerto Rico seeking to gain a voting representative in Congress.
The high court turned away the appeal from Gregorio Igartua and other Puerto Ricans on Monday.
Territorial status grants residents of Puerto Rico U.S. citizenship, but they pay no federal income taxes and cannot vote in presidential elections. Their congressional representative also cannot vote in Congress.
A federal judge threw out the lawsuit, and the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision, saying that since Puerto Rico was not a state, it could not have a voting member of Congress.
The high court refused to hear the appeal.
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