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Spanish court seeks arrest of Putin-linked Russians
Legal News Feed |
2016/05/09 13:05
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A Spanish judge wants two senior Russian officials with links to the Kremlin arrested so they can be questioned in court about suspected money laundering and criminal association.
National court judge Jose de la Mata Amaya has issued international arrest warrants for Nikolai Aulov, deputy director of Russia's federal drug control agency, and Vladislav Reznik, who is a member of parliament's lower house for the main Kremlin party and deputy chairman of its financial markets committee. Both men are viewed as allies of President Vladimir Putin.
They are among 15 suspects in a years long investigation into alleged Russian mafia activities in Spain, according to court documents released this week. The court said their whereabouts are not known.
The judge handed down his ruling in January. A national court spokesman said the case was never placed under judicial secrecy after the arrest orders were issued on Jan. 22 but it only became publicly known after Spain's El Mundo on Tuesday published a story based on documents outlining the judge's order.
The spokesman said he did not know whether those named in the document had Spanish lawyers. He spoke on condition of anonymity, in keeping with court policy.
The Russian federal drug control agency said the Spanish judge's decision to seek Aulov's arrest was "legally unprofessional, a political hit job and perhaps connected with drug mafia revenge," the state RIA Novosti news agency reported.
A lawyer for Reznik, Alexander Gofshtein, also has described the case as being politically driven.
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Florida's high court urged to throw out death sentences
Legal News Feed |
2016/05/06 13:06
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Former judges and top legal officials are calling on the Florida Supreme Court to impose life sentences on nearly 400 people now awaiting execution on death row.
The group, which includes three former state Supreme Court justices and two former presidents of the American Bar Association, filed a legal brief Tuesday in a case that could determine the fate of Florida's death penalty.
In January, the U.S. Supreme Court declared Florida's death penalty sentencing law unconstitutional, prompting the state Supreme Court to halt two executions. The Florida Legislature responded by overhauling the law.
But the Florida Supreme Court still hasn't decided what should happen to those sentenced to death under the previous sentencing scheme. The court will hear arguments from lawyers this week on what should be done.
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Ole Miss ex-student pleads guilty to tying noose on statue
Legal News Feed |
2016/03/24 17:02
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A former University of Mississippi student could face up to a year in prison after pleading guilty Thursday to placing a noose on the school's statue of its first black student.
Austin Reed Edenfield waived indictment and pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge before U.S. District Judge Michael Mills in Oxford. The charge says Edenfield helped others to intimidate African-American students and employees at the university.
Mills will sentence Edenfield July 21, and he faces up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine. Prosecutors have recommended probation for Edenfield, who cooperated in the early prosecution of another former student, Graeme Phillip Harris. However, Mills warned Edenfield he might not stick to that agreement.
"The court remains free to impose whatever sentence it deems appropriate," Mills said.
A 21-year-old resident of Kennesaw, Georgia, Edenfield remains free pending sentencing. He declined comment after the hearing.
Edenfield admitted that he tied the noose that ended up around the neck of the Ole Miss statue of James Meredith in February 2014. He, Harris and a third person also draped a former Georgia state flag with a Confederate battle emblem on the statue of Meredith, who integrated Ole Miss in 1962 amid rioting that was suppressed by federal troops. |
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Court rejects AG Kane's request to reinstate law license
Legal News Feed |
2016/02/09 16:23
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Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane's law license will remain suspended after the state's highest court on Friday denied her request to have it reinstated while she fights criminal charges of leaking secret grand jury material and lying about it.
The court's unanimous rejection could pave the way to an unprecedented vote in the state Senate on whether to remove her from office.
A Kane spokesman said the first-term Democrat was disappointed, but not surprised.
A Senate vote could happen in the coming weeks after a special committee spent about three months exploring the question of whether Kane could run the 800-employee law enforcement office without a law license. Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, R-Centre, said senators will discuss the matter when they reconvene in the Capitol next week.
"It's an important issue," Corman said. "It's really unprecedented, so I think it deserves to be addressed."
In seeking to have her license reinstated, Kane argued that Justice Michael Eakin should not have participated in the suspension vote because of his involvement in a salacious email scandal.
In its one-page order, the Democrat-controlled court said Kane did not seek the recusal of Eakin "at the earliest possible time." As a result, the justices said, Kane gave up her ability to object on that basis to the court's unanimous decision in September to suspend her license.
Kane has released hundreds of emails, including some that Eakin sent and received through a private email account in the name of John Smith. Eakin, a Republican, has been suspended with pay by his fellow justices while he awaits trial before an ethics court that could result in his being kicked off the bench.
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