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Court takes up case on eyewitness identification
Court Feed News |
2011/11/03 15:09
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The Supreme Court appeared resistant Wednesday to increasing constitutional safeguards against the use of some eyewitness testimony at criminal trials, despite mounting evidence that eyewitness identification plays a crucial role in cases in which people were wrongly convicted.
The justices heard arguments in a case that deals with a narrow slice of the issue of eyewitness identification.
Judges already can bar testimony when the police do something to influence a witness to identify a suspect. In a case from New Hampshire, a man who was convicted of theft based on eyewitness testimony wants the court to extend the power of judges to exclude testimony when identifications are made under any suggestive circumstances, even when the police are not involved.
But taking the police out of the picture raised many questions among the justices across the bench.
Justice Antonin Scalia asked, "Why is unreliable eyewitness identification any different from unreliable anything else? So shouldn't we look at every instance of evidence introduced in criminal cases to see if it was reliable or not?"
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg peppered Richard Guerriero, the public defender representing Barion Perry at the Supreme Court, with questions about why the court should add to existing protections that include the ability to cross-examine a witness and ask the judge to tell jurors about problems with eyewitness identification. |
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High court considers Ga. suit over false testimony
Court Feed News |
2011/11/02 14:43
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The Supreme Court wrestled Tuesday with whether government officials are protected from civil lawsuits, even if they tell lies that lead a grand jury to vote for an indictment.
The justices heard arguments in an appeal from Charles Rehberg, an accountant who was indicted three times involving charges that he harassed doctors affiliated with a south Georgia hospital system.
After the third indictment was dismissed even before a trial, Rehberg sued local prosecutors and their investigator, James Paulk. Rehberg argues that he was placed under investigation because of the hospital's political connections and that Paulk's false grand jury testimony led to the indictments.
At issue in the high court is whether grand jury testimony could make a person liable in a civil lawsuit. A key question is whether the justices consider such testimony to be more like an affidavit or a trial. Witnesses are protected from civil lawsuits over what they say in trial testimony.
Paulk argues that the grand jury is part of the judicial process, and testimony there should be afforded the same protection it gets at trial. |
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Scandal-plagued former Bell official sues city
Court Feed News |
2011/11/01 17:00
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Public outrage — and changed locks — forced Robert Rizzo out of a job last year, but the former city manager says he's still owed his $1.5 million salary and benefits.
In a lawsuit against the city of Bell filed Monday, Rizzo claims he's owed his wages — with interest — because he hasn't been convicted of a felony and hasn't resigned his post.
According to prosecutors, Rizzo orchestrated a scheme to bilk the Los Angeles suburb out of more than $6 million by paying himself and other Bell city officials' exorbitant salaries. They face charges of fraud and misappropriation of public funds.
Rizzo has pleaded not guilty.
In the lawsuit he filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, Rizzo said he hasn't been paid since a public meeting in July 2010, when the small, blue-collar community of Bell learned of his outsized salary and benefits.
Protesters were outraged by compensation of $100,000 to City Council members that met once a month, but it was Rizzo's $787,637 salary, along with numerous perks that amounted to nearly $1.5 million a year, that made him the poster-child for corruption in government for furious Bell residents. |
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Court sidesteps Connecticut student speech case
Court Feed News |
2011/10/30 15:52
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The Supreme Court is refusing to disturb a court ruling that Connecticut school officials acted reasonably in disciplining a student for an Internet posting she wrote outside of school.
The justices on Monday turned down an appeal from Avery Doninger, who was a high school junior in Burlington, Conn., when she took to the Internet to criticize administrators for canceling a popular school activity.
Doninger sued school officials after they punished her by preventing her from serving as class secretary as a senior.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York sided with the school officials. |
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Man pleads guilty to Picasso theft at SF gallery
Court Feed News |
2011/10/28 16:44
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A New Jersey man who walked out of a San Francisco gallery with a pencil sketch by Pablo Picasso worth $275,000 pleaded guilty to grand theft Thursday.
Workers at the Weinstein Gallery said Mark Lugo brazenly snatched the drawing, called "Tete de Femme" (Head of a Woman), from a wall of their gallery on July 5. Lugo then walked down the street and got into a cab with the sketch under his arm.
But quick police work, video surveillance cameras and an alert taxi driver led to his arrest within 24 hours.
When investigators searched Lugo's apartment in Hoboken, N.J., they uncovered a treasure trove of stolen art worth some $430,000.
Lugo, 30, pleaded guilty to grand theft in the San Francisco case. Under terms of a plea deal, prosecutors agreed to drop other charges, including burglary. The deal calls allows for Lugo to be released on his sentencing date, Nov. 21, after getting credit for the time he has already served.
His attorney, Douglas Horngrad, said Lugo would then be extradited to New York to face similar charges in art heists there. |
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US defends gun sale reporting requirement in court
Court Feed News |
2011/10/26 15:35
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Gun store owners in southwestern border states argued in federal court Tuesday that the Obama administration cannot require them to report when customers buy multiple high-powered rifles. The Justice Department responded to a lawsuit seeking to block the two-month-old requirement by asking a judge to uphold its legality, arguing the measure could help stop the flow of guns to Mexican drug cartels. It requires sellers in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to give the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives information about purchasers who buy two or more semi-automatic rifles greater than .22 caliber within five days. Justice Department attorney Daniel Reiss said having a database of multiple purchasers gives ATF agents the power to trace gun sales within minutes, rather than a multi-day effort to trace the weapons back through the manufacturer, to the seller and eventually the buyer. He said two investigations have already been opened in the short time that the new reporting has been required. |
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