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California appeals court rejects right-to-die lawsuit
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2015/11/01 09:10
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A California appeals court on Thursday rejected a lawsuit by three terminally ill patients that sought to clear the way for doctors to prescribe fatal medication to them and others like them who want the option of taking their lives.
A state law that makes helping someone commit suicide a crime clearly applies to physicians who provide patients lethal drugs, a division of the Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled.
"We believe prescribing a lethal dose of drugs to a terminally ill patient with the knowledge the patient may use it to end his or her life goes beyond the mere giving of advice and encouragement and falls under the category of direct aiding and abetting," Associate Justice Alex McDonald wrote.
The ruling affirmed a lower court decision that dismissed the lawsuit. The lawsuit was brought against the state by Christy O'Donnell and two other terminally ill California residents.
O'Donnell suffers from Stage IV cancer of the left lung and was given less than six months to live in May when the lawsuit was filed.
California has since approved right-to-die legislation, though it will not likely go into effect in time to benefit the three patients, the appeals court acknowledged.
John Kappos, an attorney for the patients, said they are considering all options, including an appeal to the California Supreme Court.
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Court records: Ohio man on electronic monitor raped teen
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2015/10/16 00:03
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While an Ohio man was on electronic monitoring in an abduction case, he had a 14-year-old girl dropped off at his home by taxi, held her captive for months and raped her, according to criminal charges and court records.
Cody Lee Jackson, 20, fled the state without the girl after pleading guilty this summer in the abduction case to a charge of interference with custody; charges of abduction and kidnapping were dismissed, state court records show.
He was arrested last week in Utah when he tried to run away after giving a fake name to drug task force officers conducting a routine stop at a bus station, according to Salt Lake City jail documents. He is to be brought back to Ohio for sentencing on the interference conviction and to face numerous federal and state charges stemming from his alleged crimes while on electronic monitoring.
Court records don't list an attorney for Jackson.
State court officials didn't provide further details Thursday on monitoring Jackson earlier this year. Triffon Callos, a spokesman for the Hamilton County prosecutor's office, confirmed the state charges against Jackson and his guilty plea but referred calls about the monitoring system to the county sheriff's electronic monitoring division.
Sheriff's spokesman Michael Robison Thursday confirmed that Jackson wore the monitoring device from January 22 until July 31 this year.
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Quaid expected in Vermont court to face charge
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2015/10/11 13:35
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Actor Randy Quaid is expected to be arraigned in Vermont in connection with a California vandalism case.
The 65-year-old Quaid was taken into custody Friday night while trying to cross into the United States from Canada. He was detained by troopers in Vermont after Canadian officials said he'd be deported.
Quaid and his wife, Evi, are wanted in Santa Barbara, California, to face felony vandalism charges filed in 2010 after they were found squatting in a guesthouse of a home they previously owned.
The pair skipped several court appearances and went to Canada, where Evi Quaid was granted citizenship. Randy Quaid's bid for permanent residency was denied.
Quaid is to appear in court Monday on a fugitive from justice charge. It wasn't immediately known if a hearing will be held for his wife.
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Familiar, divisive social issues on Supreme Court agenda
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2015/10/06 13:37
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The Supreme Court is starting a new term that promises a steady stream of divisive social issues, and also brighter prospects for conservatives who suffered more losses than usual in recent months.
The justices are meeting in public Monday for the first time since a number of high-profile decisions in June that displayed passionate, sometimes barbed disagreements and suggested some bruised feelings among the nine judges.
The first case before the court involves a California woman who lost her legs in a horrific accident after she fell while attempting to board a train in Innsbruck, Austria. The issue is whether she can sue the state-owned Austrian railway in U.S. courts.
Even before the justices took the bench Monday, they rejected hundreds of appeals that piled up over the summer, including San Jose, California's bid to lure the Athletics from Oakland over the objection of Major League Baseball.
Future cases will deal with abortion, religious objections to birth control, race in college admissions and the power of public-sector unions. Cases on immigration and state restrictions on voting also could make it to the court in the next nine months.
The term will play out against the backdrop of the presidential campaign, in which some candidates are talking pointedly about the justices and the prospect of replacing some of them in the next few years. Four justices are in their 80s or late 70s, led by 82-year-old Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Commentators on the left and right say the lineup of cases suggests that conservatives will win more often than they will lose over the next few months, in contrast to the liberal side's success last term in gay marriage, health care and housing discrimination, among others.
"This term, I'd expect a return to the norm, in which the right side of the court wins the majority, but by no means all of the cases," said Georgetown University law school's Irv Gornstein.
One reason for the confidence is that, as Supreme Court lawyer John Elwood said: "This is a term of sequels." Affirmative action and union fees have been at the court in recent terms and the justices' positions are more or less known.
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Religious clerks in Kentucky follow law, but see conflict
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2015/09/17 16:56
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Clerk Mike Johnston prays twice a day, once each morning and once each night, and asks the Lord to understand the decision he made to license same-sex marriage.
“It’s still on my heart,” said Johnston, whose rural Carter County sits just to the east of Rowan County, where clerk Kim Davis sparked a national furor by refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, a decision that landed her in jail.
Johnston is one of Kentucky’s 119 other clerks, many of them deeply religious, who watched the Kim Davis saga unfold on national television while trying to reconcile their own faith and their oath of office. Sixteen of them sent pleading letters to the governor noting their own religious objections. But when forced to make a decision, only two have taken a stand as dramatic as Davis and refused to issue licenses.
And others say they find the controversy now swirling around their job title humiliating.
“I wish (Davis) would just quit, because she’s embarrassing everybody,” said Fayette County Clerk Don Blevins, whose office serves the state’s second-largest city, Lexington.
After the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in June, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear ordered clerks across the state to issue licenses, launching them along markedly different paths. The clerk in Louisville, Bobbie Holsclaw, issued licenses that very day and the mayor greeted happy couples with bottles of champagne.
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Appeals court weighs Justice deal to settle Iran charges
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2015/09/13 17:28
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A federal appeals court on Friday considered whether a judge could reject as too lenient a deal to settle criminal charges against a Dutch company accused of illegally selling aircraft parts to Iran, Sudan and Myanmar.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia heard arguments in a case involving the Justice Department's decision not to prosecute Fokker Services BV under an agreement that called for $21 million in penalties.
A federal judge earlier this year refused to accept the deal, which he called "grossly disproportionate to the gravity of Fokker Services' conduct in a post-9/11 world."
The dispute comes as the Justice Department this week trumpeted its commitment to hold company executives more accountable for corporate fraud. The new guidance follows persistent criticism that the department has not been aggressive enough in prosecuting individuals for financial misconduct, including after the mortgage crisis that led to an economic meltdown.
The Justice Department says the judge is interfering with the discretion of prosecutors, but that argument faced resistance from the three-judge panel hearing the case. All three appellate judges agreed that courts have some authority to decide whether to accept settlements, though they disagreed over the extent of that authority.
"You have a very steep hill to climb," Judge David Sentelle told Justice Department lawyer Aditya Bamzai during arguments that took place on the 14th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
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