The US Department of Justice (DOJ) Friday rejected a controversial South Carolina voter identification law . The DOJ has authority under the Voting Rights Act to screen new voter laws in states with a history of discriminatory voter practices. The South Carolina law, enacted to prevent voter fraud, would have required residents to present a [...]
Michigan Governor Rick Snyder Thursday signed into law a bill prohibiting public employers from providing medical or other fringe benefits to their employees’ domestic partners. Snyder provided a signing statement noting that a new definition of public employer in the bill excludes university employees. He said this is necessary based on various Michigan Supreme Court [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Virginia Keyder of the State University of New York at Binghamton and Sabanci University in Istanbul, Turkey, says that the recent decisions in EU case law shows a trend towards viewing intellectual property as a way to benefit society, rather than corporations, in contrast to the trends in the US seen in [...]
A US military court heard closing arguments Thursday at the pre-trial hearing for Pfc. Bradley Manning , which will determine whether he will face a court martial for his alleged role in the largest intelligence leak in US history. Manning, who served as an Army intelligence analyst in Iraq, faces 22 criminal charges and possible [...]
A Chinese court Friday sentenced human rights advocate Chen Wei to nine years in prison, the toughest ruling issued this year in the ongoing government crackdown on dissidents, rights activists and protest organizers. Chen, 42, was sentenced after a two hour hearing in which he pleaded not guilty to inciting subversion of state power. He [...]
A federal judge ruled Thursday that financier Allen Stanford is mentally competent to stand trial for orchestrating a $7 billion Ponzi scheme affecting investors in both the US and Latin America. The decision came after a three-day hearing in which U.S. District Judge David Hittner decided that Stanford was able to assist his lawyers in [...]
Victims of Thailand’s flood crisis filed a complaint Thursday with Thailand’s Central Administrative Court alleging that Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and state agencies caused further damage during one of the countries worst floods. The complaint was issued on behalf of 352 victims against the prime minister, Bangkok governor and five state agencies for mishandling the [...]
On Thursday, former Ukraine prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko announced that she will discontinue all appeals and that she will solely rely on the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to intervene in her conviction. Tymoshenko is under indefinite detention after being denied release last week. In her statement, Tymoshenko lambasted the Ukrainian judiciary, and stated [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the District of South Carolina on Thursday blocked portions of South Carolina’s controversial immigration law . The legislation requires police officers to check a suspect’s immigration status during a lawful stop, seizure, detention or arrest if they believe the person may be in the country illegally and [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit by a former Guantanamo Bay detainee alleging that he was subjected to torture. Abdul Rahim Abdul Razak Al Ginco, a Syrian national who prefers the surname Janko, filed the lawsuit in October 2010, claiming that US military officials [...]
