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Ga. banker accused of losing millions due in court
Court News |
2014/01/02 13:50
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A south Georgia bank director accused of losing millions of investor dollars before vanishing is set to appear in court.
The U.S. attorney's office in Savannah says 47-year-old Aubrey Lee Price is due to appear before a federal judge in Brunswick on Thursday. Price was arrested Tuesday during a traffic stop on Interstate 95 in Brunswick.
Price had disappeared in June 2012 after sending a rambling letter to his family and acquaintances saying he had lost millions of investment dollars and planned to kill himself.
A Florida judge declared him dead about a year ago. But the FBI had said it didn't believe Price was dead and continued to search for him.
Prosecutors say Price raised $40 million from his bank and 115 investors, and lost much of the money. |
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Serial rapist Coe appeals confinement in US court
Legal Center |
2014/01/02 13:48
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Kevin Coe, who was arrested in 1981 after dozens of women were raped in Spokane, is appealing his confinement as a sexually violent predator to federal court.
Coe was suspected in the rapes, attributed to the "South Hill Rapist," but only one conviction stood against him. He served 25 years in prison, and was confined at the state's Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island in 2008, following a monthlong civil trial.
Coe argues that the jurors at his civil trial should not have been asked to determine that he suffered from a "personality disorder" without having that term defined for them. He also says the jury should not have heard evidence of the other cases linked to the South Hill rapist because he was never convicted of them and because he was not allowed to challenge some of the victims through cross-examination.
The state Supreme Court rejected those arguments in 2012.
On Monday, a federal magistrate judge recommended that Coe's request to proceed as an indigent plaintiff be rejected. The judge found that Coe can afford to pay the fee required to file the case.
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Tenino man pleads guilty to child pornography
Court Watch |
2013/12/30 14:07
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The U.S. attorney's office says a Tenino man pleaded guilty Friday in federal court in Tacoma to possession of child pornography.
As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors are recommending a four-year prison term when 47-year-old James Donald Mobley is sentenced in March.
The U.S. attorney's office says the former teacher at Tenino Elementary School is one of 348 people arrested worldwide as part of the "Project Spade" investigation into a Toronto-based website.
Investigators found Mobley purchased child pornography from the company. He was arrested last January. A search of his computer found 650 photos and 45 videos of child pornography. |
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Minnesota Supreme Court Agrees To Hear Assisted Suicide Case
Legal Center |
2013/12/30 14:07
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The Minnesota Supreme Court will consider the case of a national right-to-die group accused of playing a role in the 2007 suicide of an Apple Valley woman.
The high court agreed to hear Dakota County prosecutors' appeal of a Minnesota Court of Appeals ruling in September that a state law prohibiting advising or encouraging suicide was unconstitutional on free speech grounds, the Star Tribune reported Friday (http://strib.mn/JhC7zY ). The Appeals Court, however, sent charges of aiding and abetting suicide against the Florida-based group Final Exit Network and two members back to a district court for trial.
The Supreme Court also agreed in an order dated Dec. 17 to hear the cross-appeal of Final Exit Network, which says all of the charges are unconstitutional. The high court did not set a date for oral arguments.
The high court also stayed all proceedings in the Final Exit case pending its ruling in the separate case of William Melchert-Dinkel, of Faribault, an ex-nurse who was convicted in 2011 of "advising and encouraging" the suicides of a man in England and a teenager in Canada. The Court of Appeals upheld his conviction last year. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in May.
Robert Rivas, an attorney for Final Exit, said the group believes the Appeals Court decision was correct. |
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Gay couples wed in Utah after judge overturns ban
Legal Center |
2013/12/23 12:09
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Elisa Noel rushed to the county clerk's office with her partner immediately after learning that a federal judge overturned Utah's ban on gay marriage. They waited in line for a wedding license and were married in an impromptu ceremony punctuated with Noel giving the officiant a high-five.
"I can't believe this is Utah," Noel said moments after a ceremony that took place about 3 miles from the headquarters of the Mormon church.
Others had a similar reaction after a ruling by U.S. District Judge Robert J. Shelby that declared Utah's voter-approved ban on gay marriage unconstitutional. The recent appointee by President Obama said the ban violates the constitutional rights of gay couples and ruled Utah failed to show that allowing same-sex marriages would affect opposite-sex marriages in any way.
The ruling prompted a frenzy of activity by lawyers and gay couples. The Republican governor blasted the ruling as going against the will of the people. Gay couples rushed to the Salt Lake County Clerk's office en masse to secure marriage licenses, waiting in line by the dozens and getting married on the spot by the mayor and ministers. |
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Canadian court strikes down anti-prostitution laws
Court News |
2013/12/23 12:09
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Canada's highest court struck down the country's anti-prostitution laws Friday, a victory for sex workers who had argued that a ban on brothels and other measures made their profession more dangerous. The ruling drew criticism from the conservative government and religious leaders.
The court, ruling in a case brought by three women in the sex trade, struck down all three of Canada's prostitution-related laws: bans on keeping a brothel, making a living from prostitution, and street soliciting. The ruling won't take effect immediately, however, because the court gave Parliament a year to respond with new legislation, and said the existing laws would remain in place until then.
The decision threw the door open for a wide and complex debate on how Canada should regulate prostitution, which isn't in itself illegal in the country.
Robert Leckey, a law professor at McGill University, said the court found that the law did nothing to increase safety, but suggested in its ruling that more finely tailored rules might pass constitutional scrutiny in the future. |
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