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Court: Silence can be used against suspects
Court Watch |
2014/08/19 15:05
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The California Supreme Court has ruled that the silence of suspects can be used against them.
Wading into a legally tangled vehicular manslaughter case, a sharply divided high court on Thursday effectively reinstated the felony conviction of a man accused in a 2007 San Francisco Bay Area crash that left an 8-year-old girl dead and her sister and mother injured.
Richard Tom was sentenced to seven years in prison for manslaughter after authorities said he was speeding and slammed into another vehicle at a Redwood City intersection.
Prosecutors repeatedly told jurors during the trial that Tom's failure to ask about the victims immediately after the crash but before police read him his so-called Miranda rights showed his guilt.
Legal analysts said the ruling could affect future cases, allowing prosecutors to exploit a suspect's refusal to talk before invoking 5th Amendment rights against self-incrimination. |
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Court considers if executioners can be named
Court Watch |
2014/08/13 15:22
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A Tennessee appeals court is considering whether 10 death row inmates have the right to know about the drugs that will be used in their executions and whether their lawyers can get the names of the people who will kill them.
The Tennessean reports that the state Court of Appeals heard oral arguments Monday in the lawsuit brought by the inmates. They sued after the legislature passed a law that keeps details about lethal injection secret.
Lawyers for the state argued that a Nashville judge overstepped her authority when she ordered officials to turn over the names of the execution team to the attorneys for the condemned prisoners. The lower court ruled the names must be released but said neither the public nor the inmates could have them.
"We are here today because for the first time in the history of lethal injection in the state of Tennessee a court has ordered the state to disclose the identities of those people who are involved in the lethal injection process," said Special Assistant Attorney General Kyle Hixson said. "This is an abuse of discretion."
Assistant federal public defender Stephen Kissinger, who represents some of the inmates, argued that there's no "executioner's privilege" that would stop the state from releasing the identities of the execution team in a court case because they would be sealed.
He said a ruling that would allow the state to keep such information secret would have far-reaching implications. |
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Court revives EPA rule on cross-state pollution
Court Watch |
2014/04/30 12:02
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The Supreme Court has given the Environmental Protection Agency an important victory in its effort to reduce power plant pollution that contributes to unhealthy air in neighboring states.
The court's 6-2 decision Tuesday means that a rule adopted by EPA in 2011 to limit emissions from plants in more than two-dozen Midwestern and Southern states can take effect. The pollution drifts into the air above states along the Atlantic Coast and the EPA has struggled to devise a way to control it.
Power companies and several states sued to block the rule from taking effect, and a federal appeals court in Washington agreed with them in 2012.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote the court's majority opinion. Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented.
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Inmate pleads guilty in prison guard's stabbing
Court Watch |
2014/03/14 15:30
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An inmate has pleaded guilty to murder in the stabbing death of a guard at a federal prison in Central California.
The U.S Attorney's Office says 48-year-old James Ninete Leon Guerrero, of Guam, entered the plea on Tuesday.
Prosecutors say Guerrero held Officer Jose Rivera down at the U.S. Penitentiary in Atwater in 2008 as another inmate, Jose Cabrera Sablan, stabbed him more than 20 times with an eight-inch shank. The 22-year-old Rivera - a U.S. Navy veteran - was doing a daily headcount when he was attacked.
Guerrero was serving a life prison sentence at the time in connection with an armed bank robbery. Prosecutors say under a plea agreement, he will receive another life term. Sablan is scheduled to go on trial in April. |
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Man pleads guilty to sea cucumber smuggling charge
Court Watch |
2014/03/10 15:32
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Federal prosecutors in San Diego say a man has pleaded guilty to charges he smuggled 100 pounds of dried sea cucumber into the United States from Mexico.
Sea cucumbers are leathery-skinned marine animals used in some folk medicine practices.
United States Attorney Laura E. Duffy says Cheng Zhuo Liu (chuhng joo-oh lee-oo), a resident of Chula Vista, admitted to tucking the sea cucumbers into the spare tire area of his car before crossing the border last October.
According to the US attorney's office, their market value was between $5,000 and $10,000.
The particular species Liu had is protected under international trade rules, and requires a permit for import.
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