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Court: Ariz. citizenship proof law illegal
Legal News |
2013/06/20 23:02
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The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states cannot require would-be voters to prove they are U.S. citizens before using a federal registration system designed to make signing up easier.
The justices voted 7-2 to throw out Arizona's voter-approved requirement that prospective voters document their U.S. citizenship in order to use a registration form produced under the federal "Motor Voter" voter registration law.
Federal law "precludes Arizona from requiring a federal form applicant to submit information beyond that required by the form itself," Justice Antonia Scalia wrote for the court's majority.
The court was considering the legality of Arizona's requirement that prospective voters document their U.S. citizenship in order to use a registration form produced under the federal "motor voter" registration law. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which doesn't require such documentation, trumps Arizona's Proposition 200 passed in 2004.
Arizona appealed that decision to the Supreme Court.
The case focuses on Arizona, which has tangled frequently with the federal government over immigration issues involving the Mexican border. But it has broader implications because four other states — Alabama, Georgia, Kansas and Tennessee — have similar requirements, and 12 other states are contemplating such legislation. |
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Court: Ex-Im Bank needs to explain Air India loan
Legal News |
2013/06/19 17:49
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A federal bank that backed a huge airplane loan for Air India will have to explain that the loan didn't hurt U.S. airlines.
A lawsuit by Delta Air Lines Inc. had accused the Export-Import Bank of failing to follow a requirement that it makes sure its loans to foreign companies won't hurt U.S. competitors. The Ex-Im bank guaranteed $3.4 billion in loans in 2011 so that Air India could buy planes from Boeing Co. But Delta competes with Air India on some routes.
The Court of Appeals in Washington did not force the bank to reverse the loan guarantee, as Delta had asked. But the ruling says the bank needs to follow the law and provide more justification for the loan. |
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Battle between SC Episcopalians back state court
Court Line |
2013/06/15 01:38
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The legal fight between two factions of South Carolina Episcopalians will be decided in state court.
U.S. District Judge C. Weston Houck has issued an order saying the federal court has no jurisdiction and hearing the case would disrupt the balance between state and federal courts. Houck heard arguments in the dispute last week.
The conservative Diocese of South Carolina last year separated from the more liberal national Episcopal Church. The break-away churches then sued in state court to protect the use of the name and a half billion dollars' worth of property.
Parishes remaining with the national church then sued in federal court saying the case raised First Amendment and other federal issues.
But Houck disagreed and late Monday sent the case back to state court. |
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Court says human genes cannot be patented
Attorney News |
2013/06/13 16:25
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The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that companies cannot patent parts of naturally-occurring human genes, a decision with the potential to profoundly affect the emerging and lucrative medical and biotechnology industries.
The high court's unanimous judgment reverses three decades of patent awards by government officials. It throws out patents held by Salt Lake City-based Myriad Genetics Inc. on an increasingly popular breast cancer test brought into the public eye recently by actress Angelina Jolie's revelation that she had a double mastectomy because of one of the genes involved in this case.
Justice Clarence Thomas, who wrote the court's decision, said that Myriad's assertion — that the DNA it isolated from the body for its proprietary breast and ovarian cancer tests were patentable — had to be dismissed because it violates patent rules. The court has said that laws of nature, natural phenomena and abstract ideas are not patentable.
"We hold that a naturally occurring DNA segment is a product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated," Thomas said.
Patents are the legal protection that gives inventors the right to prevent others from making, using or selling a novel device, process or application. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has been awarding patents on human genes for almost 30 years, but opponents of Myriad Genetics Inc.'s patents on the two genes linked to increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer say such protection should not be given to something that can be found inside the human body. |
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Somali torture victim: Ohio court hearing a relief
Court Watch |
2013/06/10 17:05
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Torture victim Abukar Hassan Ahmed was living in London when he decided several years ago to search again for the man he says crippled him during interrogations in Somalia in the 1980s.
It took just a half-hour Internet search in 2005 to locate the former government official then living in Ohio. Ahmed finally got the chance to tell his story in court last week after a federal judge ruled in his favor in a lawsuit against the official, Abdi Aden Magan.
"Justice is universal," Ahmed told The Associated Press after the hearing. Those "who try to torture a human being will be brought to justice anywhere he is. That is my message."
Ahmed, a former human rights advocate in Somalia, alleged in a 2010 lawsuit that the beatings he endured at Magan's direction make it painful for him to sit and injured his bladder to the point that he is incontinent. He is seeking more than $12 million in damages, though he's unlikely to ever see the money. Magan is believed to be living in Kenya, where even if he had the funds, he would be out of reach of U.S. courts.
Ahmed says the torture occurred when Magan served as investigations chief of the National Security Service of Somalia, a force dubbed the "Black SS" or the "Gestapo of Somalia" because of techniques used to gain confessions from detainees. |
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