Telecommunications executives told the US Senate Commerce Committee Thursday that their companies would refrain from using certain surveillance technology without users' permission but stopped short of endorsing legislation to outlaw the practice. The committee hearing to investigate the privacy practices of American Internet service providers (ISPs) focused on deep packet inspection (DPI) , a technique [...]
The Pre-Trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Friday authorized the Office of the Prosecutor to proceed with the prosecution of Congolese rebel militia leaders Germain Katanga and Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui , confirming that there is sufficient evidence to establish that Katanga and Ngudjolo Chui jointly committed the crimes against humanity of murder, [...]
The Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law this week released a guide addressing the legal rights of students seeking help for mental illness or emotional distress. The report, Campus Mental Health: Know Your Rights!, provides guidance to students on privacy, academic and disciplinary issues associated with mental health treatment at American colleges [...]
The US Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday voted in favor of the Deaths in Custody Reporting Act , which as passed by the House reauthorizes a program requiring states receiving criminal justice assistance grants to report to the US Department of Justice (DOJ) information about people who die while incarcerated or in police custody. The [...]
A former US Marine filed a lawsuit Thursday alleging that US Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) defamed him and violated his constitutional rights by suggesting that he had participated in killing innocent Iraqi civilians. In a complaint filed in the US District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania , former Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt accused [...]
A judge of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice on Thursday convicted one of the "Toronto 18" terrorism suspects for participating in a group which allegedly plotted to behead Prime Minister Stephen Harper while attacking parliament. Justice John Sproat rejected arguments that the defendant had known nothing of the plot even though he had attended [...]
The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) declared Thursday that leaving a child at a hospital does not constitute per se termination of parents' legal rights. Nebraska's safe haven law (LB 157) , which went into effect in July, prohibits prosecution when a child is left in a licensed hospital. LB 157 was [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Thursday affirmed a district court's grant of judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) to Microsoft Corp. in a suit involving alleged infringement of digital music patents held by Alcatel-Lucent . The court ruled that of the two patents, Microsoft had not infringed one and [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Wednesday upheld as constitutional a former National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS) program which required non-immigrant adult males from 25 predominantly Muslim nations and North Korea to register with immigration authorities and re-register annually or face deportation. Four men who have since been deported filed [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the District of Minnesota Wednesday ordered a new trial for a woman who had been ordered to pay $222,000 to record companies for illegally posting copyrighted music on the file-sharing network Kazaa . Jammie Thomas had sought the new trial on the grounds that the court erred [...]
