Recent Updates
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Court won't hear gay dads' birth certificate case
Legal News Center 10/12/2011The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from a gay couple who want both of their names to appear on the Louisiana birth certificate of the child they adopted.The court said Tuesday it won't review a federal appeals court ruling against the adoptive ...
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High court to decide double jeopardy question
Legal News Center 10/11/2011The Supreme Court will decide whether a jury forewoman's offhand comment that the jury was unable to make a decision on a murder charge means the suspect can't be retried on that charge. The high court on Tuesday agreed to hear an appeal from Alex Bl...
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Hogan to be new courts administrative officer
Legal News Center 10/06/2011Senior U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan is the new director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.Hogan, a former chief U.S. District Court judge in Washington, will serve a one-year term as the chief administrative officer for the federal ...
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High court appears to favor Ala. death row inmate
Legal News Center 10/04/2011The Supreme Court appeared likely Tuesday to order a new court hearing for an Alabama death row inmate who lost the chance to appeal his death sentence because of a mailroom mix-up at a venerable New York law firm. Both conservative and liberal justi...
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Court turns away lawsuit over Obama eligibility
Legal News Center 10/03/2011The Supreme Court has turned away another challenge to President Barack Obama's eligibility to be president. The high court on Monday refused without comment to hear a challenge brought by conservative activist Alan Keyes and other members of the Ame...
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Court-martial wrap up in Iraq contractor's death
Legal News Center 09/30/2011A court-martial was expected to wrap up Friday for a U.S. soldier accused of killing a civilian contractor in Iraq, and a military judge will then decide whether Pfc. Carl T. Stovall was mentally competent when prosecutors say he shot the Hungarian l...
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Obama appeals health care setback to high court
Legal News Center 09/29/2011Raising prospects for a major election-year ruling, the Obama administration launched its Supreme Court defense of its landmark health care overhaul Wednesday, appealing what it called a "fundamentally flawed" appeals court decision that declared the...
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Ex-workers at Fla. foreclose firm get class action
Legal News Center 09/28/2011Hundreds of former employees at a shuttered South Florida foreclosure law firm have been permitted by a judge to pursue a class action lawsuit involving labor law violations. A Miami federal judge this week approved class action status for the case a...
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High court to decide lawyer immunity question
Legal News Center 09/27/2011The Supreme Court will decide whether private lawyers hired as outside counsels for governments can be sued. The high court on Tuesday agreed to hear lawyer Steve Filarsky's appeal. He was hired by the city of Rialto, Calif., to investigate the possi...
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Lawyers seek to stop Loughner's forced medication
Legal News Center 09/26/2011Lawyers for the Tucson shooting rampage suspect asked a federal court again Friday to stop his forced medication at a medical facility in a Missouri prison. Jared Lee Loughner's lead attorney, Judy Clarke, wrote in an emergency motion that the ongoin...
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Appeals court in Va. tosses 2 Abu Ghraib lawsuits
Legal News Center 09/22/2011A federal appeals court in Virginia has dismissed two lawsuits by former Iraqi detainees who claimed they were tortured at the Abu Ghraib prison. A divided three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed Wednesday with two contracto...
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Idaho inmates settle lawsuit over prison violence
Legal News Center 09/21/2011A potential class-action lawsuit against the nation's largest private prison company over allegations of violence at the Idaho Correctional Center has been settled in federal court. The agreement between the inmates and Nashville, Tenn.-based Correct...