Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev signed legislation Wednesday amending Kyrgyzstan's criminal codes and abolishing the death penalty . According to the law, death penalty sentences will be replaced with life sentences. The legislation also mandates that arrest warrants be issued by courts and that prison sentences for some crimes be reduced. The Kyrgyzstan constitution was amended [...]
The US Senate Wednesday voted down two proposed amendments to the comprehensive immigration reform bill formally revived Tuesday. Both proposals were part of Amendment 1934 , sponsored by Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA). A proposal by Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) to limit permanent legal residency status only to immigrants who have been in the country at [...]
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Wednesday ruled 5-4 against reinstating a conspiracy charge against former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and two of his former associates. The holding affirmed a lower court decision that the charge of conspiring to violate the state's election code could not be applied to the code as it was [...]
The State of Texas v. John Dominick Colyandro, James Wlater Ellis, and Thomas Dale Delay, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, June 27, 2007 . Read the full text of the opinion. Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
The US Senate Judiciary Committee issued formal subpoenas to the White House, the Vice President's Office, the Department of Justice, and the National Security Council Wednesday, seeking documents related to the warrantless domestic surveillance program . Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) said the subpoenas were necessary because: Over the past 18 months, [...]
The Louisiana State Legislature Tuesday approved a ban on dilation and extraction (D&X) abortions , establishing fines between $10,000 and $100,000 and a jail term from one to ten years for any physician who performs the procedure when it is not necessary to save the life of the mother. The D&X abortion procedure is often [...]
Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2006, US Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics, June 27, 2007 . Read the full text of the report . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
The Council of Europe (COE) Wednesday called on member states to act with greater transparency and exercise greater oversight of military and foreign intelligence services, giving support to a report delivered earlier this month that accused Poland and Romania of assisting the US Central Intelligence Agency in operating secret prisons for terror suspects. The report, [...]
The US Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics announced Wednesday that the US prison and jail population, already the largest in the world, increased by 2.8 percent to reach over 2.2 million prisoners in 2006 . The findings, released in the DOJ's annual Prison and Jail Inmates report , represent the largest increase in [...]
Adelphia Communications founder John Rigas and his son Timothy were ordered Wednesday to begin serving their prison sentences on August 13th; the two men have been free on bail since their 2004 convictions as they appealed their case. Judge Leonard Sand of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York said that [...]
