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Doctor with hundreds of fraud victims faces sentencing
Law Firm News |
2015/07/03 11:37
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A Harvard medical professor says patients of a Detroit-area cancer doctor were at high risk of infection because of excessive doses of powerful, expensive drugs.
Dr. Farid Fata will be sentenced in federal court for fraud. But a judge first is hearing from experts and patients this week. The hearing began Monday.
Testifying for the government, Dr. Dan Longo says some patients received a "stunning" number of injections of a drug called Rituximab. It's typically given eight times for aggressive lymphoma but one patient got it 94 times.
Fata pleaded guilty to committing millions of dollars in fraud against insurance companies and patients.
Prosecutors are seeking a 175-year prison sentence, while Fata is asking for no more than 25 years. Victims are in the courtroom.
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In Supreme Court loss, death penalty foes see an opening
Attorney News |
2015/07/02 11:37
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A strongly worded dissent in the U.S. Supreme Court's narrow decision this week upholding the use of an execution drug offered a glimmer of hope to death penalty opponents in what they considered otherwise a gloomy ruling. One advocate went so far Tuesday as to call it a blueprint for a fresh attack on the legality of capital punishment itself.
But even those who see Justice Stephen Breyer's dissent as a silver lining think it will take time to mount a viable challenge.
And Breyer's words don't change the fact that the Supreme Court has consistently upheld capital punishment for nearly four decades. The five justices forming the majority in Monday's decision made it clear they feel that states must somehow be able to carry out the death penalty.
In disagreeing with the 5-4 ruling that approved Oklahoma's use of an execution drug, Breyer, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, called it "highly likely that the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment," which protects against cruel and unusual punishment.
"It was a sweeping and powerful dissent that issues an invitation that we should accept, which is to make the case for why today the death penalty itself is no longer constitutional," said Cassandra Stubbs, director of the Capital Punishment Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. |
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Huguely files appeal request with U.S. Supreme Court
Legal Business |
2015/06/22 15:55
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A former University of Virginia lacrosse player is taking his last shot at overturning his conviction for the 2010 murder of his former girlfriend.
Counsel for George Huguely V has filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court seeking a judicial review of the case against their client. Huguely was convicted in 2012 of the second-degree murder of Yeardley Love, also a UVa student and member of the women’s lacrosse team, for which he was sentenced to 23 years in prison.
Huguely, now 27, has since appealed the conviction on the grounds that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated when one of his two attorneys fell ill and could not be present in the courtroom nine days into his trial. Though his other attorney said he would be able to continue, Huguely asked the judge to delay the case until both of his attorneys could be present, but that request was denied.
Counsel for Huguely has argued that their client’s right to competent assistance was violated when he could not have both lawyers present in the courtroom. The petition filed Friday asks the court to “reaffirm the core of the Sixth Amendment right of a criminal defendant to have his choice of counsel by his side throughout the trial proceedings.”
“[Huguely’s] distinct interest in receiving not just competent assistance, but assistance from both his counsels of choice was given no weight,” the petition states.
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Iowa court allows remote dispensing of abortion pill
Attorney News |
2015/06/21 15:56
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The Iowa Supreme Court has struck down a restriction that would have prevented doctors from administering abortion-inducing pills remotely via video teleconferencing, saying it would have placed an undue burden on a woman's right to get an abortion.
Iowa is one of only two states that offers so-called telemedicine abortions — Minnesota offers them on a smaller scale — and doctors at Iowa's urban clinics that perform abortions had been allowed to continue offering the remotely-administered abortions while the ruling was pending.
Planned Parenthood's local affiliate, Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, had sued the Iowa Board of Medicine over its 2013 decision that would have required a doctor to be in the room with a patient when dispensing abortion-inducing medication.
The board cited safety concerns when it passed the rule requiring a physical examination, but Planned Parenthood and other critics said it was just another attempt by abortion rights opponents to make it harder for women to get abortions. They said the Iowa board's restriction particularly would have made it harder for women in more rural areas who don't live near the few urban clinics where doctors who perform abortions are based.
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Illinois high court: Comcast must reveal anonymous commenter
Topics in Legal News |
2015/06/20 15:56
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The Illinois Supreme Court has affirmed a lower court opinion ordering Comcast Cable Communications to identify a subscriber who posted an anonymous message suggesting a political candidate molests children.
The court said Thursday that the internet service provider must identify the subscriber who commented on a 2011 article in the Freeport Journal Standard about Bill Hadley's candidacy for the Stephenson County board.
The commenter, who used the online name "Fuboy," wrote that "Hadley is a Sandusky waiting to be exposed" because he can see an elementary school from his home. The comment was an apparent reference to former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky who was convicted of child sex abuse in 2012.
Hadley filed a defamation lawsuit against the commenter and subpoenaed Comcast demanding that it identify the subscriber.
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