JURIST Guest Columnist B. Shaw Drake, Georgetown University Law Center, Class of 2015, discusses how the use of torture may be counterproductive to American military efforts…As a Case Management Coordinator at the Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture, I have seen first-hand the devastating impact of torture. My former clients from over 80 countries experienced [...]
JURIST Guest Columnist Victor Kattan of the National University of Singapore Law Faculty, discusses the reasons for and consequences of Palestine’s accession to the ICC and considers possible scenarios for developments around the Palestine question… Israel’s decision to delay transferring Palestinian customs and excise revenues to the Palestinian Authority (PA) in response to President Mahmoud [...]
The US Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that a habeas petitioner who receives a favorable ruling at the district court level does not have to take a cross-appeal or obtain a certificate of appealability to defend the judgment in his favor on appeal. In 1989 Robert Mitchell Jennings was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to [...]
UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Antonio Guterres on Wednesday appealed for an increase in funding to help Syrian refugees. The new UNHCR report entitled Living in the Shadows highlights the condition of these refugees and shows many of them falling into deeper poverty. The UNHCR reported that two-thirds of Syrian refugees in Jordan are [...]
A judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of New York on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit against Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, agreeing with the US State Department that he is entitled to immunity from lawsuits in US courts. The lawsuit, filed by the American Justice Center (AJC) , claimed that Modi [...]
The US Supreme Court ruled Wednesday on the ability of localities to deny permission to build cell phone towers. The case of T-Mobile South, LLC v. City of Roswell concerned what it means to satisfy the “in writing” requirement of the Telecommunications Act . The court’s holding provides that the denial of an application to [...]
EU Advocate General Cruz Villalon on Wednesday gave legal support to the European Central Bank (ECB) plan to purchase government bonds as an attempt to remedy the financial crisis in the Eurozone. The Outright Monetary Transactions program sets economic standards for selecting which states qualify for government bond purchases. The legal legitimacy of the program [...]
A Turkish court on Wednesday banned access to websites showing the new cover of the French magazine Charlie Hebdo , which features a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad. The court’s prohibition of access to the sites is reportedly in response to a petition filed by a lawyer who said that the sites posed a danger [...]
A group of US senators on Tuesday proposed legislation that would place a moratorium on the releases or transfer of prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. Republican Senators Kelly Ayotte, John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Richard Burr touted the new bill as the best course of action to protect US national security. The act, titled “The Detaining [...]
New York City officials announced Tuesday that they have agreed on a plan that will eliminate the use of solitary confinement for inmates 21 or younger at Rikers Island prison . The new plan comes on the heels of Mayor Bill de Blasio banning solitary confinement for 16- and 17-year-old inmates in December. Bryanne Hamill [...]
