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High court uphold WV congressional districts
Topics in Legal News |
2012/09/29 15:31
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld West Virginia's congressional redistricting plan against a challenge that small population variations among its three congressional districts violate the Constitution.
The justices, in an unsigned opinion, reversed a lower federal court ruling that struck down the plan because of the population differences.
The high court said the West Virginia plan easily passes muster and said the population variations are too small to trigger constitutional concerns about the principle of one person, one vote. In addition, the court said the plan adopted by the West Virginia legislature served other legitimate goals, including keeping counties intact and not pitting incumbents against each other.
"It is clear that West Virginia has carried its burden," the high court said.
The justices had previously blocked the ruling to allow the state to conduct elections under the map approved by state lawmakers.
The lower court still can consider challenges to the plan under the state Constitution.
Both the state House and Senate passed the map with bipartisan and nearly unanimous margins. The difference between the smallest and largest districts was about 4,900 people.
The Jefferson County Commission, encompassing Charles Town and Harpers Ferry, challenged the redrawing, which moved one county from one congressional district to another.
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Court grants appeals from 2 people without lawyers
Court Watch |
2012/09/27 15:27
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Well-heeled clients pay tens of thousands of dollars to hit the legal jackpot — Supreme Court review of their appeals. But on Tuesday, the court decided to hear cases filed by two people who couldn't afford or didn't bother to hire an attorney.
One was written in pencil and submitted by an inmate at a federal prison in Pennsylvania. The other was filed by a man with no telephone living on Guam.
Neither case seems destined to join the ranks of Gideon v. Wainwright, the landmark 1960s case filed by a prisoner with no lawyer that established a criminal defendant's right to a lawyer. Both show, however, that when the court is looking to resolve finicky legal issues and the right case shows up, it doesn't matter whether the author of the appeal wears a natty suit or prison garb.
Longtime Supreme Court practitioner Tom Goldstein called the granting of two such lawyerless cases at the same time "unheard of." But both cases chosen by the justices will help resolve the ability of civilians to sue the government over claims of improper actions of federal and military employees on the job.
Kim Lee Millbrook, a prisoner at the federal prison in Lewisburg, Pa., sued the government after accusing prison guards at the Special Management Unit of sexually assaulting him in May 2010. Prison officials said Millbrook's claim was unsubstantiated. |
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High court won't stop Texas voting map
Court News |
2012/09/22 15:59
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The Supreme Court is allowing Texas to use congressional districts that were drawn by a lower federal court for the November election.
The court declined without comment Wednesday a request from a Latino rights group to block use of those districts. The groups said the districts discriminate against minorities.
The court-drawn map is intended for use only in this year's election.
The League of United Latin American Citizens said the map has the same flaws identified by federal judges in Washington who last month rejected political boundaries drawn by Texas lawmakers as discriminatory.
The interim congressional map was used in Texas' primaries in May and was devised to let the state hold elections while courts considered challenges to redistricting plans adopted by the Legislature following the 2010 census. |
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Court dismisses investor lawsuits against Porsche
Court News |
2012/09/20 15:59
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Wednesday's ruling by Braunschweig state court in northern Germany appears to strengthen Porsche's position, which still faces other court battles in connection with the 2008 takeover bid, German news agency dapd reported.
Two investors in the Braunschweig case had sought $6.1 million in damages claiming that Porsche published misleading information while it was secretly trying to take control of the much-larger Volkswagen.
Porsche's bid failed amid an unsustainable debt burden and the collapse of financial markets following the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, eventually leading Volkswagen to take full control of Porsche.
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KC law firm owner faces murder, forgery charges
Law Firm News |
2012/09/14 11:17
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The owner of a Kansas City law firm was indicted Friday on first-degree murder and forgery charges, but authorities would not confirm whether it's related to the 2010 shooting death of the attorney's father.
The Jackson County Sheriff's Office said in a news release that Susan Elizabeth Van Note, 44, of the Kansas City suburb Lee's Summit, was arrested shortly after the indictment and that the charges are in connection to an investigation into a 2010 homicide in Camden County. The release does not name the homicide victim.
Van Note's father, 67-year-old accountant William Van Note, was shot in October 2010 along with his companion, Sharon Dickson, 59. Dickson died in the shooting at their Sunrise Beach home at the Lake of the Ozarks in Camden County. Van Note died four days later in a hospital in Boone County. |
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