A new Washington, DC, law that prohibits employers from discriminating against workers on the basis of their reproductive decisions will take effect on Saturday despite a Thursday House vote to strike down the law. The late vote by the divided US House of Representatives this week marks the first time in almost 25 years the [...]
Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin on Friday signed into law a bill that creates new restrictions on who may own guns in the state of Vermont. Under the new law, which will go into effect July 1, people with certain criminal convictions will be prohibited from possessing a gun. Those who violate this restriction will be [...]
The State’s Attorney for Baltimore City on Friday charged six police officers with crimes including murder and manslaughter over the death of Baltimore resident Freddie Gray while he was in police custody. Baltimore state attorney Marilyn Mosby filed charges almost immediately upon receiving the medical examiner’s report that ruled Gray’s death a homicide. Gray’s arrest [...]
French aviation giant Airbus said Friday it is filing criminal complaints alleging that German intelligence helped the US carry out industrial espionage. The criminal complaint against persons unknown was filed following German media reports that the country’s spy agency BND was collecting data on European firms at the request of the US National Security Agency [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Harrison Thorne of UCLA School of Law discusses the role of bankruptcy courts in equity… Bankruptcy law, embodied in Title 11 of the United States Code (also known as “the Bankruptcy Code”), strives to balance the rights of creditors to receive payment for what they are owed with the rights of debtors [...]
The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on Thursday upheld a Santa Monica, California, city ordinance prohibiting unattended exhibits in Palisades Park, deciding against the Santa Monica Nativity Scenes Committee . The committee had been granted a “winter display” exception from the city’s 1994 law banning all unattended displays, but amidst religious controversy [...]
UN Women on Monday released Progress of the World’s Women 2015-2016: Transforming Economies, Realizing Rights , the gender-equality organization’s flagship report on the status of women around the world. The report “proposes a comprehensive agenda for key policy actors, including gender equality advocates, national governments and international agencies, to make human rights a lived reality [...]
A South African judge ruled Thursday that a terminally ill man has a right to assisted suicide with no legal or professional consequences for the participating doctor. Euthanasia is illegal in South Africa, and the decision is the first of its kind. With the support of DignitySA , Robin Stransham-Ford, a 65-year-old man with prostate [...]
North Carolina lawmakers on Wednesday approved a measure aimed at resuming executions after nine years. The law removes the requirement to have a doctor present at all lethal injections and instead would allow nurses, physician’s assistants or paramedics to oversee lethal injections in the state. North Carolina’s House of Representatives passed the legislation in an [...]
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has ordered the execution of 15 officials this year, the South Korean National Intelligence Service told a closed parliamentary meeting on Wednesday. These officials were allegedly executed by firing squad for spying. Four members of the Unhaso Orchestra are believed to be among the 15 executed . Two vice-ministers were [...]
