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Court again considers fate of seized gold coins worth $80M
Court Line |
2015/10/15 06:22
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A federal appeals court is again considering the fate of 10 rare gold coins possibly worth $80 million or more that the government says were illegally taken from a Philadelphia mint and wound up in a jeweler's hands.
A lawyer for jeweler Israel Switt's heirs told the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday that authorities erred by seizing the coins without filing a required civil forfeiture action.
A jury found the seizure legal because the coins hadn't been circulated and must therefore have been stolen, but a three-judge appellate court reversed that decision in April. Federal prosecutors then asked for Wednesday's hearing before the full appeals court.
They say returning the rare $20 Double Eagles to Joan Langbord and her two sons would reward the family of a thief. |
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Quaid expected in Vermont court to face charge
Attorney News |
2015/10/12 20:30
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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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Georgia man accused in hot car death to appear in court
Legal PR |
2015/10/12 20:29
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A Georgia man accused of killing his toddler son by leaving him in a vehicle on a hot day is set to appear in court for a hearing.
Cobb County Superior Court Judge Mary Staley is set to hear arguments on pretrial motions Monday in the case of Justin Ross Harris.
Police have said Harris left 22-month-old Cooper in an SUV for about seven hours on a day when temperatures reached at least the high 80s in the Atlanta area. He faces multiple charges, including malice murder, felony murder and cruelty to children.
Harris has been in custody since June 18, 2014, the day his son died. He was indicted in September 2014 and has pleaded not guilty. His attorneys have said the child's death was a tragic accident.
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Connecticut court stands by decision eliminating execution
Court Line |
2015/10/11 20:30
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The Connecticut Supreme Court on Thursday stood by its decision to eliminate the state's death penalty, but the fate of capital punishment in the Constitution State technically remains unsettled.
The state's highest court rejected a request by prosecutors to reconsider its landmark August ruling, but prosecutors have filed a motion in another case to make the arguments they would have made if the court had granted the reconsideration motion.
Lawyers who have argued before the court say it would be highly unusual and surprising for the court to reverse itself on such an important issue in a short period of time, but they say it is possible because the makeup of the court is different. Justice Flemming Norcott Jr., who was in the 4-3 majority to abolish the death penalty, reached the mandatory retirement age of 70 and was succeeded by Justice Richard Robinson.
In the August decision, the court ruled that a 2012 state law abolishing capital punishment for future crimes must be applied to the 11 men who still faced execution for killings committed before the law took effect. The decision came in the case of Eduardo Santiago, who was facing the possibility of lethal injection for a 2000 murder-for-hire killing in West Hartford.
The 2012 ban had been passed prospectively because many lawmakers refused to vote for a bill that would spare the death penalty for Joshua Komisarjevsky and Steven Hayes, who were convicted of killing a mother and her two daughters in a highly publicized 2007 home invasion in Cheshire.
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Arkansas court tosses conviction in woman's meth case
Legal News |
2015/10/10 20:30
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The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday overturned the conviction of a woman who was sentenced to 20 years in prison after giving birth to a baby with methamphetamine in his system.
Melissa McCann-Arms, 39, was convicted by a jury in Polk County after she and her son tested positive for meth when she gave birth at a Mena hospital in November 2012. She was convicted of a felony crime called introduction of controlled substance into body of another person.
In January, the Arkansas Court of Appeals upheld the conviction, ruling that even if the statute doesn't apply to unborn children, McCann-Arms still transferred the drug to her child in the moments between his birth and when hospital staff cut the umbilical cord.
But Arkansas' highest court reversed the conviction and dismissed the case, ruling there is no evidence McCann-Arms directly introduced methamphetamine into her baby's system by causing the child to ingest or inhale it. Likewise, there is no evidence of an ongoing transfer of methamphetamine in McCann-Arms' system after the child was born, the court ruled.
"The jury would thus have been forced to speculate that Arms was 'otherwise introducing' the drug into the child at that point," the ruling states. "When a jury reaches its conclusion by resorting to speculation or conjecture, the verdict is not supported by substantial evidence."
The court also ruled state law does not criminalize the passive bodily processes that result in a mother's use of a drug entering her unborn child's system.
"Our construction of criminal statutes is strict, and we resolve any doubts in favor of the defendant," the decision states. "The courts cannot, through construction of a statute, create a criminal offense that is not in express terms created by the Legislature."
Farah Diaz-Tello, a staff attorney with the New York-based National Advocates for Pregnant Women, had urged the court to reverse McCann-Arms' conviction and said the decision sends a message to state prosecutors about expanding the law beyond what was intended by state lawmakers.
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