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NY lawyers: Affair with boss led to inside trades
Law Center |
2011/06/13 19:10
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Lawyers for a woman blamed by an insider trading co-defendant for using pillow talk to get inside secrets faulted her boss on Monday, saying he bullied her during a 20-year affair to make her get illegal secrets for him.
The lawyers, seeking leniency for Danielle Chiesi, wrote in a submission to a federal judge in Manhattan that Chiesi was manipulated by her boss, Mark Kurland, for nearly two decades as he carried on the affair, which began when he was 40 years old and she was 22.
Chiesi, now 45, pleaded guilty in January to conspiracy and securities fraud charges, and her voice was heard frequently on audio tapes played last month at the trial of her friend Raj Rajaratnam, a one-time billionaire hedge fund founder awaiting sentencing in what prosecutors say is the biggest case ever to result from hedge fund insider trading. The conviction of three more defendants by a jury Monday means all of more than two dozen people arrested in the case have been convicted.
Chiesi's lawyers asked a judge to reject the government's request that Chiesi be sentenced to three to four years in prison, saying she is less culpable than Kurland, who already has been sentenced to two years and three months behind bars. |
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Court orders reconsideration of parole judgment
Law Center |
2011/06/13 11:09
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The Supreme Court has ordered a lower court to reconsider its decision to release a criminal on parole.
The high court threw out a lower court decision ordering John Pirtle and other prisoners released from prison on parole.
Pirtle was convicted of killing his wife, and the parole board started denying him parole in 2002. Pirtle sued in federal court, saying his parole was denied without any proof that he posed a danger if he got out.
The lower courts agreed with him and ordered him and other prisoners in similar situations released on parole.
The high court threw out that decision in a summary judgment and ordered the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to reconsider it. |
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Senate confirms Obama lawyer as solicitor general
Law Center |
2011/06/07 09:15
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The Senate has confirmed White House lawyer Donald Verrilli Jr. to succeed Justice Elena Kagan as U.S. solicitor general.
With the 72-16 vote, Verrilli will fill a post that has been vacant since the Senate voted Kagan to her Supreme Court seat last August. The solicitor general represents the executive branch of government before the Supreme Court.
President Barack Obama named Verrilli as Kagan's successor last January. A month ago, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the nominee by a 17-1 vote.
Verilli has most recently served as a deputy counsel to Obama. He previously worked at the Justice Department as an associate deputy attorney general. |
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Ark. court upholds conviction in TV anchor slaying
Law Center |
2011/06/02 08:53
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The Arkansas Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by a man convicted of killing a Little Rock television anchorwoman.
Justices said Thursday that Curtis Vance's objections are without merit.
Vance had appealed his capital murder and rape convictions in the October 2008 death of KATV anchor Anne Pressly in her Little Rock home. Last month, the state's highest court granted Vance's request not to hold oral arguments in his appeal and instead relied on briefs that had already been filed.
Vance was sentenced to life in prison in 2009 for the rape, robbery and slaying of Pressly.
Pressly was a 26-year-old anchor on KATV's Daybreak program. She appeared briefly in W, Oliver Stone's biopic on President George W. Bush. |
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IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn to plead not guilty
Law Center |
2011/05/23 08:50
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Former International Monetary Fund (IMF) managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn will plead not guilty to sexual assault charges and will be acquitted, his lawyer says.
In an interview with Israel's Haaretz newspaper today, Benjamin Brafman said he was confident his client would be acquitted on charges of sexually assaulting a 32-year-old maid in a New York hotel.
He'll plead not guilty and in the end he'll be acquitted, Brafman told Haaretz during a brief visit to Israel.
Nothing is certain, but from what I've discerned in the investigation, he will be acquitted.
He has impressed me very much. Despite the circumstances, he's doing well. He's not happy to have been accused of actions he didn't take.
Mr Brafman is known in the US for having taken on several high-profile legal cases, including the defence of Michael Jackson and rapper Sean Combs. |
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Maine lawmaker due in court on gun-threat charges
Law Center |
2011/05/21 08:49
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A Maine lawmaker charged with pulling a gun in a parking lot confrontation is due in court as a legislative leader seeks to ban him from the State House.
Rep. Frederick Ladd Wintle, a Republican from Garland, has been in jail since being charged Saturday with criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon and carrying a concealed weapon. He is due in court Monday afternoon.
The confrontation happened outside a Dunkin' Donuts in Waterville. The victim told police that Wintle accused him of being a drug dealer and mentioned the death of a boy earlier in the week in a homeless shelter.
Lawmakers have expressed concern about Wintle's increasingly erratic behavior. House Speaker Robert Nutting asked that a judge make it a condition of bail that he's banned from the State House complex in Augusta. |
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