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Brown appoints legal affairs aide to appeals court
Attorney News |
2014/07/28 20:12
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Gov. Jerry Brown has named a senior aide to become an associate justice on the Sacramento-based Third District Court of Appeal.
Brown announced the appointment of Jonathan Renner on Friday.
The 44-year-old Democrat from Sacramento has been Brown's legal affairs secretary since 2011.
He was senior assistant attorney general at the California Department of Justice from 2009 to 2010, when Brown was the state's attorney general. Renner previously held other high-ranking positions within the attorney general's office.
The appointment requires confirmation by the Commission on Judicial Appointments. It includes the current attorney general, Kamala Harris, and Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye ("TAWNY canTILL SOCK-a-OO-ay").
If confirmed, Renner will begin his term Jan. 5. He would fill the vacancy created when Cantil-Sakauye moved to the California Supreme Court. |
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German court receives suit against EU bank union
Legal News |
2014/07/28 20:09
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A group of German professors has filed a complaint to the country's highest court against the European Union's plans to create a so-called banking union, a central part of the effort to make the continent's financial system more resilient.
The Federal Constitutional Court said Monday it had received the complaint. It wasn't clear when the court might rule; verdicts on previous attempts to block measures meant to stem Europe's debt crisis took at least several months.
The group behind the complaint says the banking union "has no legal basis in the European treaties."
It objects to handing the European Central Bank direct supervision of the eurozone's biggest lenders with binding powers over national authorities, and opposes plans for a separate authority with the power to dissolve or restructure failing banks. |
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2 ag-gag laws facing federal court challenges
Court Line |
2014/07/21 22:44
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The years-long fight between farm organizations and animal rights activists over laws prohibiting secretly filmed documentation of animal abuse is moving from state legislatures to federal courts as laws in Utah and Idaho face constitutional challenges.
Half of U.S. states have attempted to pass so-called ag-gag laws, but only seven have been successful. Among them are Idaho, where this year's law says unauthorized recording is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $5,000 fine, and Utah, whose 2012 law makes it a crime to provide false information to gain access to a farm. Both states now face separate but similarly worded lawsuits that say the measures violate federal statutes offering whistleblower protections and free-speech guarantees.
Farm organizations and livestock producers say ag-gag laws are aimed at protecting their homes and businesses from intruders, and some plan to use social media to assure the public they have nothing to hide. But animal rights groups, free-speech activists and investigative journalists want to throw out the laws because they say the secrecy puts consumers at higher risk of food safety problems and animals at higher risk of abuse. |
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Montana court sends wind farm clash to California
Court Line |
2014/07/21 22:43
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A dispute over a Montana wind farm's potential to harm nearby nesting eagles and other birds should be heard in California, the Montana Supreme Court said Friday, in an opinion that deals a legal setback to the project's developers.
The legal row over the Rim Rock wind farm near Cut Bank began last year, when San Diego Gas & Electric accused developer NaturEner of concealing the possibility that eagles and other birds could be harmed by the 126-turbine project.
NaturEner, whose parent company is based in Spain, filed a competing lawsuit in Montana. Its attorneys alleged SDG&E was trying to get out of an unfavorable contract and using the eagle issue as an excuse.
The Rim Rock wind farm is near an area with seven golden eagle nests and Montana's densest concentration of ferruginous hawks. Under federal law, a take permit is required for activities that could injure, kill or otherwise harm protected birds such as eagles.
SDG&E alleges federal officials recommended to NaturEner that the wind farm needed such a permit. NaturEner has denied the claim.
Montana District Judge Brenda Gilbert ruled in May that the case should be heard in Montana because of Rim Rock's importance to the economies of Glacier and Toole counties. She also issued an injunction requiring the utility to pay NaturEner nearly $2 million a month. |
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Appeals court to take up Missouri execution case
Court Line |
2014/07/17 19:01
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A last-minute stay from a federal judge has put a Missouri inmate's execution temporarily on hold.
John Middleton was scheduled to die one minute after midnight Wednesday for killing three people in rural northern Missouri in 1995. With less than two hours to go before the execution, U.S. District Judge Catherine Perry granted a stay, ruling there was enough evidence of mental illness that a new hearing should be held.
Courts have established that executing the mentally ill is unconstitutional.
Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster appealed to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, but that court adjourned for the night without a ruling.
It was a confusing end to a day that saw a flurry of court actions. Perry first granted a stay early Tuesday, but that was overturned by the appeals court. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to overturn the appeals court ruling and declined to halt the execution on several other grounds, including the contention by Middleton's attorneys that he was innocent of the crimes.
Middleton's attorneys then went back to Perry, who once again granted a stay.
However the appeals court eventually rules, the case is likely to end up again in the U.S. Supreme Court.
If the stay is lifted, the state could execute Middleton at any time Wednesday. The death warrant expires at midnight Thursday and if Middleton is not executed by then, the Missouri Supreme Court would have to set a new date. State witnesses and media were told to report back to the prison by 10:30 a.m.
Middleton, 54, would be the sixth man put to death in Missouri this year — only Florida and Texas have performed more executions in 2014 with seven each. |
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