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Judge in Stanford swimmer case switching to civil court
Court and Trial |
2016/08/26 15:15
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A judge whose six-month sentence in the sexual assault case of a former Stanford swimmer has removed himself from handling criminal matters, but efforts to recall him remain.
Santa Clara County Judge Aaron Persky requested that he be assigned to civil court and that request was approved, the county's Presiding Judge Rise Pinchon said in a statement Thursday.
"While I firmly believe in Judge Persky's ability to serve in his current assignment, he has requested to be assigned to the civil division, in which he previously served," Pichon said. "Judge Persky believes the change will aid the public and the court by reducing the distractions that threaten to interfere with his ability to effectively discharge the duties of his current criminal assignment."
The move is not necessarily permanent. The assignment is subject to an annual review and takes effect Sept. 6.
Pichon said that another judge's desire to transfer to Palo Alto has made a quick swap with Persky possible. Normally such changes don't happen until a new year.
Persky ordered the six-month sentence for Brock Turner, a Dayton, Ohio, resident who had been attending Stanford on a swimming scholarship. The judge cited a probation department recommendation and the effect the conviction will have on Turner's life. |
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Mississippi jurors get oil spill fraud case against lawyer
Legal News Interview |
2016/08/23 15:14
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Texas lawyer Mikal Watts and six other people each had plenty of opportunity to know they had a fake client list and were pursuing bogus claims after 2010's Gulf of Mexico oil spill, prosecutors told Mississippi jurors Wednesday in closing arguments.
Watts himself and lawyers for the six others though said the government had failed to prove criminal intent to defraud, blaming fellow defendants or saying the government was misconstruing innocent actions.
U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. handed the case to jurors Wednesday, telling them to decide 66 felony counts of conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud, identity theft and aggravated identity theft.
It's one of the biggest fraud cases to result from the 2010 BP PLC oil spill, featuring a list of more than 40,000 clients that included dead people and a dog whose name was apparently lifted from a phone book. Prosecutors said most of those clients never agreed to be represented by Watts, and that at some point following the spill, all the defendants in the case knew the law firm's documents were riddled with errors, but kept pursuing claims anyway because of a potential multi-million dollar payoff.
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2 teens killed in Atlanta suburb: Man accused due in court
Law Firm Legal News |
2016/08/19 21:13
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A man accused of killing two teenagers near Atlanta is set to appear in court for a preliminary hearing.
Jeffrey Hazelwood is scheduled to appear Friday morning in Fulton County Magistrate Court.
The 20-year-old is charged with murder and theft in the killings of Carter Davis and Natalie Henderson in Roswell. The 17-year-olds were shot in the head. An autopsy report says their bodies were found behind a grocery store and had been placed in distinct poses.
Police have declined to discuss a possible motive for the slayings, or whether Hazelwood knew the teens.
Hazelwood's attorney, Lawrence Zimmerman, has said he'll provide a vigorous defense.
Henderson and Davis, who used to live in Rapid City, South Dakota, would have been seniors this year at their Georgia high schools.
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Polish prosecutors investigate court head for abuse of power
Top Attorney News |
2016/08/18 21:13
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Polish prosecutors have opened an investigation into the head of the country's Constitutional Tribunal to determine if he abused his power in not allowing judges appointed by the ruling party to take part in rulings.
The investigation into Andrzej Rzeplinski, which opened Thursday, is the latest development in an ongoing conflict between the Polish government and the constitutional court, whose role is similar to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The government's conflict with the court has raised international concerns about the state of democracy in Poland, and the political opposition and other critics have slammed the investigation into Rzeplinski as an attack on the separation of powers.
Amid the conflict, Rzeplinski has emerged as one of the key symbols of resistance against the right-wing government, which has moved to centralize power since winning elections last year. The investigation is seen by many as an attempt to discredit him since he enjoys, at least for now, immunity from prosecution. His term as head of the court also expires in December.
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'Whitey' Bulger asks US Supreme Court to hear his appeal
Top Attorney News |
2016/08/15 21:12
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James "Whitey" Bulger has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his appeal of his racketeering convictions for playing a role in 11 murders and committing a litany of other crimes.
It is unclear if the high court will take up the Boston gangster's case. The court generally agrees to hear only a small percentage of the thousands of cases it's asked to review each year. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Bulger's 2013 convictions in March.
A three-judge panel of the court found that Bulger had not shown that his right to a fair trial was violated when a judge barred him from testifying about his claim that a now-deceased federal prosecutor granted him immunity. The trial judge said Bulger had not offered any hard evidence that such an agreement existed.
Bulger, now 86, led a notoriously violent gang from the 1970s through the early 1990s. He fled Boston in 1994 after an FBI agent tipped him that he was about to be indicted. Bulger remained a fugitive until 2011, when he was captured in Santa Monica, California. He is now serving a life sentence.
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