USLegal Reporter

Rifle Associations and other gun advocacy organizations filed lawsuits in Chicago and San Francisco on Thursday and Friday of last week asking courts to strike down city handgun bans following the US Supreme Court decision on Thursday, which overturned the District of Columbia’s ban.

At issue in the Chicago case is a city-wide ban on the possession and sale of handguns, while the San Francisco case addresses a ban in place only in public housing.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/06/lawsuits-seek-to-overturn-gun-bans.php

The US Supreme Court today rejected the District of Columbia’s hand-gun ban and the requirements of the law that shotguns and rifles be kept unloaded and either be equipped with trigger locks or disassembled as unconstitutional under the Second Amendment. The Court ruled that the US Constitution does not limit the right of individuals to own guns to participation in state militia service, but extends such rights for hunting and self-defense purposes as well.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia previously ruled in favor of an armed security guard, Dick Anthony Heller, who filed suit against the District after his handgun application was rejected. 

Justice Scalia wrote the majority opinion stating that the District could still regulate handguns without a total prohibition and that the decision did not do away with ”long-standing prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons or the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings.”

The 5-4 decision came in the case of District of Columbia v. Heller.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080626/ap_on_go_su_co/scotus_guns

The $2.5 billion damages award in the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster has been reduced to $500 million. The original verdict of $5 billion had already been cut in half by an appeals court. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the punitive damages paid by Exxon Mobil Corp. could not be greater than what the company has already paid to victims.

During the 20 years of litigation since the accident, Exxon claims to have spent $3.4 billion on compensatory payments, cleanup costs, settlements, penalties, and fines. The 1989 accident, in which Exxon’s oil tanker spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil, is one of the worst environmental disasters in history, spoiling 1,200 miles of Alaskan coastline.

Source: http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/ticker/article.aspx?Feed=ACBJ&Date=20080626&ID=8830945&Symbol=XOM

The US Supreme Court rejected a Louisiana law Wednesday that allowed persons convicted of child rape to be executed. Louisiana passed state legislation that allowed executions for rape of children under 12 years of age years after capital punishment was banned by the Court for rape in 1976 and 1977. The decision was issued in an appeal by Patrick Kennedy who was sentenced to the death penalty in 2003 for the rape of his eight-year old stepdaugher. The Louisiana State Supreme Court distinguished the state law by claiming that the earlier decisions applied only to adult rape.

According to the Court, capital punishment is appropriate only in cases involving murder. The Court held that “[d]ifficulties in administering the penalty to ensure its arbitrary and capricious application require adherence to a rule reserving its use, at this stage of evolving standards and in cases of crimes against individuals, for crimes that take the life of the victim.”

The decision was 5-4 in the case of Kennedy v. Louisiana.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/25/scotus.child.rape/; http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gvFhjUc6MV97U-QbYuuM2VMimB8w

Going against longstanding tradition, the Kansas Supreme Court held that juveniles have a constitutional right to a jury trial. The ruling focused on the Kansas Constitution’s requirement that a jury by available to defendants “in all prosecutions”. Less than half of the states allow jury trials for juveniles - 10 states allow the right and another 11 provide limited rights to a jury to juveniles.

In McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528 (1971), the U.S. Supreme Court held that juveniles don’t have an automatic right to a jury trial. The Kansas case is expected to impact all pending juvenile cases, as well as all those filed in the future, and may possibly influence courts in other states.

Source: http://www.lexisone.com/news/ap/ap062308h.html

A lawsuit which is part of four coordinated class action lawsuits against cell phone providers, involving early termination fees, has begun arguments in a California court today. At issue is a California law covering liquidated damages. California Civil Code §1671(d), governing how to collect liquidated damages when someone breaks a contract, requires cell phone companies to prove that the fee reasonably reflects the money they lost by losing the customer. If the FCC decides to regulate early termination fees, it is possible that the fees would become part of the cell phone companies’ rate structure, which federal law pre-empts from state regulation.The first case, against Sprint, resulted in a pro-Sprint verdict. Sprint’s vice president of marketing testified that the company set its early termination fees by comparing the rates competitors used to keep more customers from leaving. The current case being heard is against Verizon.

Source: http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202422467192&pos=ataglance

The U.S. House of Representatives today passed a bill which will overhaul US wiretapping and surveillance laws. 

Most notably, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act of 2008 contains two key provisions. One would give the government ongoing authority to eavesdrop on the communications of suspected terrorists without first obtaining a court order. Also, the bill would give retroactive immunity to telecom companies from invasion of privacy lawsuits brought by individuals concerned over the industry’s participation in warrantless surveillance under the Bush Administration.  

The Senate is expected to take up the measure next week.

 Source: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c110:H.R.6304:

Two former Bear Stearns investment managers were indicted today on charges stemming from the collapse of hedge funds last year which cost investors more than $1 billion dollars.

Ralph R. Cioffi and Matthew M. Tannin were charged with nine counts including conspiracy, securities fraud, wire fraud, and allegedly misleading investors.

Both men have entered pleas of not guilty in a Brooklyn federal court.

Sources:

http://www.reuters.com/article/governmentFilingsNews/idUSN1935034820080619

http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/djf500/200806191412DOWJONESDJONLINE000875_FORTUNE5.htm

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ruled that the Freedom of Information Act doesn’t apply to the Office of Administration. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and the National Security Archive have sued the Executive Office of the President (EOP), claiming that the EOP has failed to comply with legal obligations by not taking proper measures to ensure the preservation of electronic records.

Since the Office of Administration was created in 1978 it has responded to FOIA requests. CREW claims that the Bush administration reversed that policy in August 2007. While the White House has acknowledged problems with the email system, it claimed that any missing records were available on tape backups.

Source: http://www.lexisone.com/news/ap/ap061708g.html