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Court to weigh cocaine cases, could alter sentencing in Ohio
Law Firm News |
2016/02/10 16:23
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Prosecutors across Ohio are concerned that a ruling under review by Ohio's top court could delay and shorten sentences for suspects caught with cocaine and force costly changes upon law enforcement.
The state Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday on whether to uphold an appeals court decision calling into question how prosecutors have handled cocaine cases for years. It all comes eastdown to weight.
A state appeals court in Toledo ruled last year prosecutors should have determined how much pure cocaine a suspect arrested in a drug sting had with him or her instead of sentencing him based on the weight of the entire amount.
The appeals court ruled that Ohio's drug laws say that what matters is the weight of the cocaine only not filler material such as baking soda that's often added by drug dealers to stretch out their supply and increase profits.
Prosecutors along with the state Attorney General's office argue that such a narrow interpretation creates a new distinction for cocaine that isn't applied to any other illegal drugs.
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Ruling gives Sandusky back $4,900-a-month Penn State pension
Law Firm News |
2015/11/17 22:23
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The state must restore the $4,900-a-month pension of former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky that was taken away three years ago when he was sentenced to decades in prison on child molestation convictions, a court ordered Friday.
A Commonwealth Court panel ruled unanimously that the State Employees' Retirement Board wrongly concluded Sandusky was a Penn State employee when he committed the crimes that were the basis for the pension forfeiture.
"The board conflated the requirements that Mr. Sandusky engage in 'work relating to' PSU and that he engage in that work 'for' PSU," wrote Judge Dan Pellegrini. "Mr. Sandusky's performance of services that benefited PSU does not render him a PSU
employee."
Sandusky, 71, collected a $148,000 lump sum payment upon retirement in 1999 and began receiving monthly payments of $4,900.
The board stopped those payments in October 2012 on the day he was sentenced to 30 to 60 years in prison for sexually abusing 10 children. A jury found him guilty of 45 counts for offenses that ranged from grooming and fondling to violent sexual attacks. Some of the encounters happened inside university facilities.
The basis for the pension board's decision was a provision in the state Pension Forfeiture Act that applies to "crimes related to public office or public employment," and he was convicted of indecent assault and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.
The judges said the board's characterization of Sandusky as a Penn State employee at the time those offenses occurred was erroneous because he did not maintain an employer-employee relationship with the university after 1999.
The judges ordered the board to pay back interest and reinstated the pension retroactively, granting him about three years of makeup payments. |
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Court reinstates lawsuit over NYPD surveillance of Muslims
Law Firm News |
2015/10/14 00:41
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A federal appeals court has reinstated a lawsuit challenging the New York Police Department's surveillance of Muslim groups following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Tuesday's 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals ruling reverses the decision of a New Jersey federal judge who dismissed the case last year.
The appellate panel found the Muslim plaintiffs had raised sufficient allegations of equal-protection violations to warrant the case going forward.
The judges compared the NYPD's alleged practices to blanket scrutiny of Japanese-Americans during World War II and blacks during the civil rights movement
The city blamed The Associated Press, whose reporting exposed the surveillance program, for any harm to the plaintiffs.
The lower court judge agreed with that argument, but the appeals panel said the city was the cause of any harm.
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Suspect in some Phoenix freeway shootings pleads not guilty
Law Firm News |
2015/10/06 16:25
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A man accused in some of the freeway shootings that put Phoenix drivers on edge for weeks pleaded not guilty Thursday as his defense lawyers questioned the strength of the evidence against him.
Attorneys for Leslie Allen Merritt Jr., 21, who was arraigned on 15 felony counts, including aggravated assault and carrying out a drive-by shooting, said outside court that the investigation by state police does not place him at the shooting scenes.
"We're going to work diligently to make sure that we investigate this fully, and we believe in his innocence," said Ulises Ferragut, one of Merritt's two attorneys.
Ferragut and attorney Jason Lamm also cited investigators' evolving timeline of the shootings. They plan to do their own investigation, looking into another person possibly admitting responsibility for any of the 11 shootings, Lamm said. They didn't identify that person or provide details.
"It's very, very early in the game to get hard confirmation on that," Lamm said.
Department of Public Safety investigators used ballistics tests to tie Merritt to four of the 11 shootings that occurred on Phoenix-area freeways between Aug. 22 and Sept. 10.
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