USLegal Reporter

The United States Supreme Court today ruled that evidence gathered after an invalid state arrest could still be used against a suspect at trial.

David Lee Moore had been pulled over by police for driving on a suspended license. Under Virginia law, police in such situations issue a citation and let the driver go. Instead, police searched Moore’s vehicle and found crack cocaine. He was convicted on a drug charge and sentenced to three and a half years in prison.

The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that Moore should not have had the drug evidence used against him and overturned his conviction. The Supreme Court unanimously disagreed.

Writing for the Court Justice Antonin Scalia said, “When officers have probable cause to believe that a person has committed a crime in their presence, the Fourth Amendment permits them to make an arrest, and to search the suspect in order to safeguard evidence and ensure their own safety.”

The case is Virginia v. Moore.

Sources: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/07pdf/06-1082.pdf

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/23/scotus.searches/

The U.S. Supreme Court, after ruling last Wednesday that the lethal injection procedure used in Kentucky does not violate the Constitution’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, denied appeals today from inmates in Alabama, Mississippi and Texas. The Supreme Court previously stayed the executions of Thomas Arthur from Alabama, Earl Wesley Berry from Mississippi and Carlton Turner from Texas while it considered the issue in Baze v. Rees.

Executions in other states across the country that were halted pending the Supreme Court’s decision are also likely to resume.

Source: http://news.findlaw.com/ap/a/w/1154//04-21-2008/20080421072002_16.html

The United State Supreme Court ruled today that a three-drug lethal injection procedure can be used as a form of capital punishment in Kentucky. This clears the way for 36 states including Kentucky to resume the practice to execute convicted felons who have been given the death sentence.

At issue what whether or not execution by the three drug method amounted to “cruel and unusual punishment” as prohibited by the 8th Amendment. Petitioners, who were death row inmates in Kentucky, filed suit to stop the practice in Kentucky arguing that if drugs were not properly administered according to protocol, they could result in significant unnecessary pain.

Writing for the Court, Chief Justice John Roberts said that “petitioners have not carried their burden of showing that the risk of pain from maladministration of a concededly humane lethal injection protocol, and the failure to adopt untried and untested alternatives, constitute cruel and unusual punishment.” 

The decision was 7-2. The case is Baze et al. v. Rees, Commissioner, Kentucky Department Corrections, et al.

Source: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/07pdf/07-5439.pdf

Abigail Noel Fisher, an 18-year old high school student from Richmond, Texas, has filed a lawsuit against the University of Texas at Austin. Fisher, who is white, alleges that the university unlawfully uses race and ethnicity in its admissions criteria.

Fisher will finish in the top 12 percent of her graduating class in May. She learned last month that she was not admitted to UT-Austin. Her lawsuit was filed on Monday.

UT’s minority enrollment is at an all time high. The university is required by law to guarantee admission to those who finish in the top 10 percent of a Texas high school graduating class. UT also considers “race and ethnicity” among other factors.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2003 that race and ethnicity may be a factor considered by colleges and universities in determining admissions because of the value created by diversity, but it can not be an overriding factor. 

 Source: http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/04/08/0408utsuit.html

The 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled on Thursday that Roommates.com can be sued for asking questions of its users which could violate fair housing laws. Roommates.com is a website designed to match people renting out rooms with those looking for places to live. In order to use the site, users are asked to create a profile in which they are asked questions about gender, sexual orientation, and children. This information is then used to screen potential matches.

Roommates.com contends it is immune from liability under a provision of The Communications Decency Act which protects site owners from content created by third parties. However in this case, the Court of Appeals ruled that the CDA, does not “grant immunity for inducing third parties to express illegal preferences.”

The Court said, “For example, a real estate broker may not inquire as to the race of a prospective buyer, and an employer may not inquire as to the religion of prospective employee. If such questions are unlawful when posed face-to-face or by telephone, they don’t magically become lawful when asked electronically online. The Communications Decency Act was not meant to create a lawless no man’s land on the Internet.”

Source: http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/ca9/newopinions.nsf/F71559D8162BA7EE8825741F00771BC1/$file/0456916.pdf?openelement

The United States Supreme Court this week heard arguments in a case which strikes at the heart of the Second Amendment and citizens right to be arms. At issue is a law in the District of Columbia which bans an individual’s right to carry private hand guns that were not registered as of 1976.

Dick Anthony Heller is a security guard who sued the District after he was not allowed to register and keep a hand gun in his home. DC’s law is the strictest in the nation. 

A federal appeals court has sided with Heller finding the law unconstitutional. A Supreme Court ruling on the matter is expected soon.

The last Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment was in May of 1939. 

Source: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1723821,00.html

 

A three judge panel for the 5th Circuit Court of appeals on Wednesday overturned a 35-year old Texas law which banned the sale of sex toys. The court ruled the law violated privacy protections under the 14th Amendment.

In reaching its decision, the panel wrote, “This case is not about public sex. It is not about controlling commerce in sex. It is about controlling what people do in the privacy of their own homes because the state is morally opposed to a certain type of of consensual private intimate conduct.” 

Alabama, Virginia, and Mississippi are the only remaining states still on the books with a similar law to Texas.

Source: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5540395.html

The Nebraska Supreme Court held Friday that the use of the electric chair constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the state’s constitution. The court found that prisoners may retain enough consciousness to suffer from the high voltage electric current during the electrocution process.

The case before the court involved an appeal by Raymond Mata, Jr. of his death sentence for a 1999 murder. The court stayed Mata’s execution as it had earlier the execution of Carey Dean Moore following a request by a state senator to review the constitutionality of electrocution by electric chair.

Nebraska was the only state that allowed execution by electric chair as its only method of execution.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/02/nebraska-supreme-court-rules-electric.php

U.S. District Judge Neil Wake Thursday upheld the Legal Arizona’s Workers Act, a law that forbids an employer from hiring an employee whom the employer knows to be an illegal immigrant. The new law, which was first enacted last year and became effective January 1, 2008, requires employers to use the E-verify system, a federal database, to verify the legal status of individuals before hiring. The legislation allows for the suspension or revocation of an employer’s license if he or she violates the law.

The court rejected a lawsuit by business groups that claimed the law is unconsitutional as only the federal government, not the state, can regulate immigration. According to the court, federal pre-emption applies to civil or criminal penalties other than licensing laws. The court previously dismissed a similar lawsuit filed by civil rights groups on the basis that the law had not yet gone into effect. Representatives of the 15 county attorneys earlier agreed not to prosecute employers who violate the law prior to March 1, 2008 until the case could be heard.

Source: http://www.azstarnet.com/metro/224165; http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/02/federal-judge-upholds-arizona.php

The United States Supreme Court today declined to review a lawsuit over a Bible monument. The monument, which featured a King James version of the Bible, was displayed outside the Harris County Courthouse in Houston. Kay Slanley sued to have the moment removed because she said it offended her. She also claimed it violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”

Earlier this year, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Stanley and ordered that the monument must be revoved. The Court also order Harris County to pay Stanley’s legal fees. 

The monument, which had been on display since 1956, was removed during recent renovations to the courthouse.

Source: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/5329279.html