Three convicted murders were executed in Iraq Thursday, marking the first time the death penalty has been used since Saddam Hussein lost power in 2003. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani opposes the death penalty and refused to sign the men's death sentences after they were convicted of murder, rape and kidnapping, but Talabani's deputy signed on [...]
Martha Stewart will hand over her electronic ankle bracelet to federal authorities Thursday, ending the five-month house arrest portion of her sentence . Stewart was convicted in 2004 for conspiracy, making false statements and obstruction of justice. She has already served five months in jail and will be on probation until March 2007. Newsday has [...]
Changes to Military Commission Procedures, US Department of Defense Fact Sheet, August 31, 2005 . Read the full list of changes here . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.
Report of the American Civil Liberties Union on the Nomination of District of Columbia Circuit Court Judge John Roberts Jr., to be Associate Justice on the United States Supreme Court, August 2005; American Civil Liberties Union, August 31, 2005. Excerpt: "Roberts has relied on notions of "judicial restraint" and "states' rights" throughout his career to [...]
Furious at a rising tide of lawlessness in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin Wednesday evening reassigned 1,500 New Orleans police from search-and-rescue missions to halt widespread looting in the battered and flooded city. Declaring "martial law" in a dramatic invocation of his civic emergency powers, he directed officers to do [...]
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has cut short a vacation and returned to New York in an attempt to break an impasse reached by negotiators discussing an overhaul of the UN and a related series of intrenational initiatives. A 33-member panel has been negotiating a set of reforms for consideration at a Sept. 14-16 summit [...]
The American Civil Liberties Union argued Wednesday that a federal judge should lift a gag order on a library from which the FBI has demanded circulation records under the USA Patriot Act . Prosecutors in the case said lifting the gag order would release the library's identity and jeopardize an ongoing investigation. The ACLU and [...]
The US Environmental Protection Agency Wednesday temporarily waived certain regulatory fuel standards required under the Clean Air Act in an attempt to head off any shortages and rising prices caused by Hurricane Katrina. EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson initially waived the standards for four states directly impacted by the hurricane, but then extended it to the [...]
EU diplomats said Wednesday that the European Union may hold off on calls for sanctions against Iran if the country is referred to the UN over its continued nuclear activity. The UN has set a deadline for Saturday by which Iran must halt its atomic fuel production, but Iran has given no indications that it [...]
A California state prison inmate who led a radical Islamist group and three others were indicted Wednesday on charges that they were plotting terror attacks on several sites in Los Angeles. The indictment charges Levar Haley Washington, Gregory Vernon Patterson, Hammad Riaz Samana and Kevin James with conspiring to wage war against the US government [...]
