Category Archives: Legal News

San Francisco lawsuit latest legal assault on cash bail requirements for pre-trial release

Published December 26, 2015 Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO – A Washington D.C. legal aid center is seeking to abolish the country’s so-called cash bail system, saying requiring criminal suspects to post bail or stay in jail pending trial treats poor defendants unfairly.

The Equal Justice Under Law center has filed seven lawsuits across the country seeking to abolish the cash-bail system. It has succeeded in changing the bail policies in four, smaller Southern jurisdictions.

It filed its latest lawsuit in October, challenging San Francisco’s bail system. Center lawyer Phil Telfeyan says if a judge strikes down San Francisco’s bail system, similar policies in the state’s 57 other counties will also have to be changed.

A judge will decide in next month whether to temporary suspend San Francisco’s bail system until the lawsuit is resolved.

Read full article

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/12/26/san-francisco-lawsuit-latest-legal-assault-on-cash-bail-requirements-for-pre.html

Robert Downey Jr. gets holiday pardon from Gov. Jerry Brown for 1990s drug offenses

Actor Robert Downey Jr., who spent time behind bars in the late 1990s on drug convictions, received a Christmas Eve pardon from Gov. Jerry Brown, effectively removing a black mark from the movie star’s checkered past.

The actor was one of 91 people to whom the governor granted clemency for past crimes, most of them minor drug offenses that no longer are felonies under California law, as well as robbery and burglary. It has become an annual Christmas Eve tradition: official proclamations for men and women who previously served time for mostly nonviolent crimes.

Downey has a long history of problems with drugs and the law, including repeated arrests in 1996.

In June 1996, he was pulled over by police in Malibu for speeding. They found him under the influence, with a gun, cocaine and heroin in the truck.

Then in July, the then-31-year-old actor turned up in the house of a neighbor, passed out in a spare bedroom. At the time, he had just completed the film “One Night Stand,” portraying a character dying from AIDS.

“It’s like I’ve got a shotgun in my mouth, my finger on the trigger and I like the taste of gun metal,” Downey told a Los Angeles judge in 1999, as he was sentenced to three years in state prison. He was released one year later, and three months after that, was arrested in a Palm Springs hotel room where cocaine also was found.

He bounced between jail and rehabilitation clinics for several years, but then remarried and, in 2008, rekindled his acting career in the role of Tony Stark and “Iron Man” in a series of Marvel films.

In total, the actor served 15 months behind bars, and in 2002, he completed his parole.

Downey obtained an order on Oct. 20 from a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge, finding that he has since “lived an honest and upright life, exhibited good moral character, and conducted himself as a law-abiding citizen.”

On Oct. 28, Brown inducted Downey into the California Hall of Fame, alongside Charlie Brown cartoonist Charles M. Schulz and country music legend Buck Owens.

The Christmas Eve pardon reads, “By completion of his sentence and good conduct in the community of his residence since his release, Robert John Downey, Jr. has paid his debt to society and earned a full and unconditional pardon.”

Read Full Article – http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-jerry-brown-robert-downey-jr-pardon-20151224-story.html

 

EXCLUSIVE: Daniel Holtzclaw Victims Moving Forward With Civil Lawsuit

Ben Crump is teaming up with local attorneys to file a federal civil suit against the convicted ex-Oklahoma City police officer.

Written By Lynette Holloway

Ben Crump, prominent civil rights attorney and president of the National Bar Association, is teaming up with local attorneys to file a federal civil suit against former Oklahoma City, Okla. police officer Daniel Holtzclaw and the city, according toKOCO TV.

Damario Solomon-Simmons, a civil rights attorney in Tulsa, Oklahoma who was instrumental in drawing attention to the case, told NewsOne on Tuesday that the team is still working out logistics in the case.

Holtzclaw was found guilty on 18 of 36 sexual assault charges, and faces up to 263 years in prison.

“We’re still working out the final details,” Solomon-Simmons said. The team represents five of 13 women involved in the criminal suit, including Jannie Ligons, who spoke out over the weekend about the abuse after the jury’s verdict, writes the television news outlet.

From Gawker:

The women are seeking class-action status, the Associated Press reports. The suit, which claims that Holtzclaw violated the women’s civil rights, alleges that Oklahoma City was negligent in its hiring and supervision of Holtzclaw. 

According to the AP, the lawsuit, which names Holtzclaw and the city of Oklahoma City as defendants, has been transferred from Oklahoma County to U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City.

Holtzclaw, who has been on suicide watch in jail, is scheduled to head back to court next month for sentencing.

SOURCE: KOCO TVGawker | PHOTO CREDIT: Getty

Full Article – http://newsone.com/3296759/exclusive-daniel-holtzclaw-victims-moving-forward-with-civil-lawsuit/

Indictment says Berea pharmacist distributed drugs ‘outside scope of professional practice’

38-count indictment was unsealed on Friday

Five other co-defendants named in indictment

Alleged distribution of drugs began in 2010