Bail Bond Seminole County – Supreme Court rules for disabled girl, service dog

Source     : USA Today News
By             : Richard Wolf
Category :  Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Supreme Court rules for disabled girl, service dog

The proverb “every dog has its day” came true at the Supreme Court on Wednesday for the family of a 13-year-old girl with cerebral palsy and her goldendoodle, Wonder. In a case that was closely watched by the disability community, the high court ruled unanimously that Ehlena Fry’s family can pursue a lawsuit against her former public school district for denying access to her service dog.

Lower courts had ruled that the family first had to exhaust all administrative remedies under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act before seeking damages under the Americans with Disabilities Act. But the justices ruled that if the family did not pursue a solution under IDEA, it can sidestep that process in search of its real goal: providing Ehlena with greater physical and emotional independence. “Nothing in the nature of the Frys’ suit suggests any implicit focus on the adequacy of (Ehlena’s) education,” Justice Elena Kagan wrote. “The Frys could have filed essentially the same complaint if a public library or theater had refused admittance to Wonder.”

Even so, the 8-0 ruling leaves open the possibility that a lower federal court still could require exhaustion of the IDEA administrative process, depending on further fact-finding. As often happens as court proceedings drag on, Ehlena was moved to a different Michigan elementary school that welcomed Wonder — now 10 and retired as a service dog — and even put the pooch’s mug shot in its yearbook. Over the years, the lawsuit against the Napoleon Community Schools became more about principle than keeping the girl and her goldendoodle together.

A number of justices had seemed sympathetic to the Frys’ argument during oral arguments in October. Forcing them to negotiate with school officials over Ehlena’s educational program seemed unfair, they said, when her education wasn’t the problem. Rather, the Frys wanted Wonder — not a human aide — to perform such tasks as helping Ehlena in the bathroom and through doorways. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Stephen Breyer expressed concern that a decision in the Frys’ favor could allow families of children with disabilities to gain an advantage over school districts by threatening ADA lawsuits while negotiating their educational programs. But Roberts acknowledged that requiring the Frys to go through the IDEA process when their concerns were not about education was “a kind of charade.” The case was the first of two heard this term that could influence how schools handle children with disabilities. In January, the justices also appeared to side with the family of a Colorado student with autism seeking a more substantial education under the IDEA law. That case, likely to be decided this spring, could have a broader impact on thousands of students with disabilities.

Read more here: usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/02/22/supreme-court-disabled-girl-wonder-service-dog/98214948/

Bail Bond Seminole County – A despotic Supreme Court does not ensure national security

Source     : Israel National News
By            : Dr. Aviel Sheyin-Stevens
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

A despotic Supreme Court does not ensure national security

The security of a country is the first and most important duty of its government. In advanced democracies, public security is within the exclusive control of the political branches of the government: The legislature legislates on immigration, national defense, security matters, etc., and the executive executes the instructions of the legislature. In Israel, the legislature is not sovereign to legislate, and the executive lacks actual control to execute the instructions of the legislature. The Supreme Court has seized the government’s power to enforce border controls, and to determine policies on immigration, military matters, national defense, public security, etc. The dictum of Aharon Barak, President of the Supreme Court of Israel (1995-2006), that “everything is justiciable”, everything is liable to trial, makes nonsense of the rule of law, as well as Israel’s reputation as a democracy. It renders Israel a judicial despotism. The rules of law that Barak’s judicial opinions created have no counterpart in most democracies: that a court can countermand military orders; that a court can decide “whether to prevent the release of a terrorist within the framework of a political ‘package deal’” and direct the government to move the security wall that keeps suicide bombers from entering Israel; that judges can only be removed by other judges; etc. This is what passes for the rule of law in Israel: arbitrary decrees by unelected officials.

The U.S. is trending towards the Israeli model. Some U.S. district court judges ruled that they had the authority to contravene legally framed executive order issued by President Donald Trump, making themselves the supreme law of the land; judicial despotism. In January 2017, Trump issued an executive order calling for extra vetting of certain foreign nationals seeking entry into the U.S. The order temporarily suspends entry by the nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen (a reissued order excluded Iraq). It is to last for 90 days, while extra vetting procedures are developed. The judges ruled that the travel ban was not about national security, as the order stated, but “significant and unrebutted evidence of religious animus.” By vetoing the travel ban, the judges were orchestrating a judicial coup against the constitutional authority of the president; they should be impeached immediately. A U.S. immigration law states that the president can by proclamation “suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.” Yet the judges ruled against the travel ban based on their own subjective opinion of a president’s supposedly incorrect attitudes and past statements. Intent is neither an element nor a requirement of that law. The U.S. constitution vests all executive power in the president. Shortly after its adoption, Thomas Jefferson wrote that under the Constitution, “the transaction of business with foreign nations is Executive altogether. It belongs then to the head of that department, except as to such portions of it as are specifically submitted to the Senate. Exceptions are to be construed strictly.” The rare exceptions were such matters as the approval of treaties, which Article II expressly vests in the Senate. There are also Constitutional bases for a congressional role in foreign affairs, such as Congress’s power over international commerce, to declare war, and to establish the qualifications for the naturalization of citizens; however, when Congress legislates in this role, it must do so mindful of what the Supreme Court, in United States v. Curtiss-Wright (1936), described as “the very delicate, plenary and exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations – a power which does not require as a basis for its exercise an act of Congress.”

In international matters, if there is a conflict between a presidential policy and a congressional statute, the president’s policy will take precedence in the absence of some clear constitutional commitment of the subject matter to legislative resolution. In addition to the president’s presumptive supremacy in foreign affairs, there is also a settled doctrine of constitutional law: Where it is possible, congressional statutes should be construed in a manner that avoids constitutional conflicts. The national security distinction between Trump’s 2017 order and the objective of a 1965 immigration act makes it necessary not to construe them as contradictory, and principles of constitutional interpretation counsel against doing so. A section of that act, codified in Section 1152(a) of Title 8, U.S. Code, states that “no person shall receive any preference or priority or be discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth, or place of residence.” The purpose of the anti-discrimination provision was to end the racially and ethnically discriminatory “national origins” immigration practice that favored Western Europe. Trump’s executive order is not about the racial or ethnic composition of the nation or its incoming immigrants. It is an effort to protect national security from a terrorist threat, which Congress has found to have roots in specified Muslim-majority countries. Another issue is that the order is related to the conduct of foreign affairs – a matter of high importance since it involves foreign threats to national security. If there were conflicts here, the president’s clear constitutional authority to protect the U.S. would take precedence over Congress’s purported authority to limit the president’s denial of entry to foreign nationals; however, there is no conflict. The U.S. immigration law mentioned above states in full in Section 1182(f): “Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.” Section 1182(f) authorizes the president to issue temporary bans on the entry of classes of aliens for national security purposes, without revealing his state of mind, or proving that he does not have animus against them.

This is precisely what Trump did. He cited Section 1182(f), and his executive order mirrored the language of the statute, finding the entry of aliens from these countries at this time “would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.”Some people theorized that because Section 1182(f) was enacted in 1952, whereas the non-discrimination provision in Section 1152(a) was enacted in 1965, then the latter must be deemed to have amended the former – thus removing the president’s authority to impose class restrictions based on the foreigners’ country of origin. In 1980, despite the 1965 anti-discrimination statute, President Jimmy Carter barred entry by Iranian nationals after the Ayatollah Khomeini revolution led to the American hostage crisis. The discriminatory treatment of Iranians was rooted in anti-terrorism concerns, and was clearly proper. Trump, like Carter, is properly acting on national security concerns.  Trump’s executive order also relies on an Obama-era provision of immigration law, Section 1187(a)(12), which empowers the executive branch to waive the documentation requirements for certain aliens. In the statute, Congress expressly discriminates based on country of origin. Under this provision, Congress provides that an alien is eligible for the waiver only if he or she has not been present (a) in Iraq or Syria any time after March 1, 2011; (b) in any country whose government is designated by the State Department as “repeatedly provid[ing] support for acts of international terrorism;” or (c) in any country that has been designated by the Department of Homeland Security as a country “of concern.” So, Congress never repealed the president’s statutory power to exclude classes of aliens from entry on national security grounds. Moreover, decades after the 1965 anti-discrimination provision, Congress expressly authorized discrimination on the basis of national origin when concerns over international terrorism are involved. Consequently, by the spurious argument of those that theorized that the latter always amend the former, the 1965 statute must be deemed amended by the much more recent Obama-era statute.

The president has plenary power to decide who may and who may not travel to the U.S. The seven Muslim-majority countries (now six) Trump specified are hotbeds of radical Islam, and pose vetting challenges. The ban has to do with national security, not religion. If he wanted to institute a travel ban against Muslims, he would have included the countries in which more than 85 percent of Muslims live. The U.S. judges are carrying out a judicial coup, having decided that the judiciary, not the executive branch, is in charge of immigration, international relations, national security, etc. Beginning with the Chinese exclusion case of 1889, the Supreme Court has made it clear that “the power of exclusion of foreigners” belongs to the political branches of government: Congress and the president; not to the judiciary. Since then, the president’s authority to exclude foreigners in the public interest has been reaffirmed in various cases, including: INS. v. Aguirre-Aguirre (1999), “(J)udicial deference to the Executive Branch is especially appropriate in the immigration context where officials ‘exercise especially sensitive political functions that implicate questions of foreign relations;’” and United States v. Valenzuela-Bernal (1982), “The power to regulate immigration — an attribute of sovereignty essential to the preservation of any nation — has been entrusted by the Constitution to the political branches of the Federal Government.” Law should govern a nation, as opposed to arbitrary decisions of individual government officials. Since power tends to corrupt, democracies limit the powers of elected officials. The most important limit on their power is their need to stand for election on a regular basis. Voters can replace an elected official with another if an incumbent fails to meet their expectations. Power also corrupts appointed officials just as much as it corrupts elected ones; however, voters have no similar authority over unelected officials who fail them. The public did not appoint them, and they owe it no account for their behavior. The Knesset should determine the matters that courts are empowered to consider, and the disputes that they have the authority to resolve. They should not be policy upon vital matters affecting the nation, such that by their nature should be decided by the political (legislative and executive) branches of the government: defense matters, foreign policy, immigration, governmental spending, public security, the making of treaty, the making of war, etc. Congress should impeach the despotic judges that are appropriating the powers of the commander-in-chief, and overriding the decisions of Congress and the president pertaining to immigration, national defense and public security.

Read more here: israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/20375

Bail Bond Seminole County – Supreme Court Considers Why Patent Trolls Love Texas

Source     : NewYork Times News
By             : ADAM LIPTAK
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Supreme Court Considers Why Patent Trolls Love Texas

More than 40 percent of patent lawsuits are filed in a federal court in East Texas with a reputation for friendliness to plaintiffs. That curious fact was the backdrop for a Supreme Court argument on Monday over whether the court should halt what many big technology companies say is pernicious forum shopping in patent cases. In recent years, a single judge based in Marshall, Tex., oversaw about a quarter of all patent cases nationwide, more than the number handled by all federal judges in California, Florida and New York combined. The Texas court is a favorite venue of patent trolls, or companies that buy patents not to use them but to demand royalties and sue for damages. Many tech companies filed supporting briefs in Monday’s case, TC Heartland v. Kraft Foods Group Brands, No. 16-341, urging the Supreme Court to limit the places where defendants in patent cases may be sued. But a few companies urged the justices to retain the current rules, saying there was a value in letting cases be considered by courts that have developed expertise in patent matters. And some pharmaceutical companies said they should be able to sue the makers of generic drugs all at once in a single court.

The case heard Monday concerns low-calorie sweeteners made by TC Heartland, which is based in Indiana. Kraft sued it for patent infringement in Delaware, which also has a high concentration of patent suits. TC Heartland sought to move the case to Indiana, but lower courts refused, relying on a 1990 decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, a specialized court that handles patent appeals. That decision said defendants in patent cases, as in other cases, may be sued essentially anywhere they do business. On Monday, Justice Elena Kagan noted a curiosity about the 1990 decision: It was at odds with a 1957 Supreme Court precedent. She sounded surprisingly sanguine about this state of affairs. “For 30 years the Federal Circuit has been ignoring our decision, and the law has effectively been otherwise,” she said.

Justice Kagan also reflected on what the case had in common with one argued earlier on Monday about pension plans. “Sometimes we have accidental theme days at the Supreme Court,” she said. “So today’s accidental theme is: When 30 years of practice goes against you, what happens?” The 1957 decision interpreted a federal law about where patent suits may be filed. The law said that “any civil action for patent infringement may be brought in the judicial district where the defendant resides.” The court said that meant where the defendant was incorporated. The patent law has not changed, but a more general one on where suits may be brought has gone through amendments. Kraft argued that those changes effectively revised the law on patent cases.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the court’s 1957 decision was exceptionally narrow. Corporations are often incorporated in one place and have headquarters in another, she said, with both states counting for many purposes. But the 1957 decision focused only on the state of incorporation. The argument was almost over before the justices discussed the question of forum shopping at length. William M. Jay, a lawyer for Kraft, said any complaints about the court in East Texas should be addressed directly and not through a decision on where suits may be filed. “They tend to be complaints about how the cases are managed, how discovery takes place, how motions practice is handled, and so on,” he said. “And those complaints, if they are valid, would be valid even when venue is indisputably proper over a Texas defendant. They are problems that should be dealt with on their own terms.” That did not seem to satisfy Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. Do “generous jury verdicts enter into this, or is that something we shouldn’t think about?” he asked.

Mr. Jay said the data on verdicts and other matters was inconclusive. In any event, he added, Congress — not the Supreme Court — should address the issues. A court ruling, he said, would be precipitous. “If you adopt the rule that my friends on the other side are proposing,” he said, “you will shift more than half of all cases from the district where they now are into other districts.” That could lead to overcrowding in the federal court in Delaware, he said, given the large numbers of corporations incorporated in the state. Justice Stephen G. Breyer said he was inclined to ignore the controversy over forum shopping, focusing instead on what Congress had meant to achieve in the statutes before the court. The supporting briefs, he said, were “filled with this thing about a Texas district which they think has too many cases.”“As far as I can see,” he told James W. Dabney, a lawyer for TC Heartland, “if we’re supposed to decide what’s good or bad, maybe you’d lose. But I don’t know whether that’s good, bad or indifferent.”

Read more here: nytimes.com/2017/03/27/business/supreme-court-patent-trolls-tc-heartland-kraft.html

Bail Bond Seminole County – Arizona Supreme Court rejects minimum wage challenge

Source     : ABC 15 News
By             : Associated Press
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Arizona Supreme Court rejects minimum wage challenge

The Arizona Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a challenge brought by business groups to a minimum wage increase approved by voters in the November election. The brief order from the high court said the seven justices were turning away a challenge brought by the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry and other business groups. Chief Justice Scott Bales said a written ruling explaining the court’s thinking will come later. The groups argued that higher state costs for elderly and disabled care trigger a state constitutional provision requiring a new funding source. Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich’s office and the backers of Proposition 206 argued before the court last week that the increased costs were indirect and didn’t require new funding. An estimated 700,000 low-wage workers got an increase to a minimum $10 per hour from $8.05 on Jan. 1, and their wages will increase to $12 an hour in 2020. The measure also requires most employers to provide sick time to their workers.

Jim Barton, who represented the group backing the measure, said he was pleased but not surprised by the ruling. “The Arizona Supreme Court, they follow the law,” Barton said. “They’re not an activist court, they do not go outside the boundaries, and I think that’s what you had today.” Business groups opposed the measure from the start, filing a legal challenge to keep it off the ballot that was rejected. Fully 58 percent of voters approved the measure, a large margin for a voter initiative. The high court refused to keep the wage increase from going into effect, and held a full hearing on the challenge last week.

The Chamber’s attorney pointed to a minimum $21 million in additional state costs in the 2018 budget year to help contract providers cover higher wages for caring for the elderly and disabled. They said the law failed to require a constitutionally-mandated funding source to cover those costs. But justices sharply questioned attorney Brett Johnson about how they could overturn the measure and still leave intact citizens’ right to pass laws that’s been in place since statehood. They wondered how any measure could be legal if such indirect costs had to be measured and funded. Chamber President Glenn Hamer said in a statement that while disappointed, he respected the ruling and said it gives clarity to the state and employers. “Lawmakers and the governor can now craft a state budget that considers the law’s impact on state revenues, and employers can calibrate their operations with the understanding that the minimum wage and paid leave law will stand,” Hamer said. Brnovich issued a statement saying he did his job in defending the law and took a swipe at the efforts to have the law overturned.

“The constitution is designed to protect our rights,” Brnovich said. “It’s not a tool to be used to undermine the will of the people.” Disturbed by the minimum wage increase, the Chamber is now pushing for changes to the citizen’s initiative process at the Legislature, concerned that out-of-state groups are able to push through voter-approved laws that they oppose. Majority Republicans are on board, with proposals to change how qualifying signatures are gathered, and to repeal or diminish the scope of a law which limits their ability to change voter approved laws. The changes to the Voter Protection Act require voter approval. Democrats call the efforts cynical attempts to sidestep the rights of citizens to bypass the Legislature when it ignores policies with wide popular appeal.

Read More : abc15.com/news/state/arizona-supreme-court-rejects-minimum-wage-challenge

Bail Bond Seminole County – Kentucky Supreme Court strikes down Lexington’s anti-begging law

Source     : Courier Journal News
By             : William Theisen
Category :  Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Kentucky Supreme Court strikes down Lexington’s anti-begging law

The Kentucky Supreme Court struck down Lexington’s anti-panhandling law on Thursday saying the practice is constitutionally protected free speech. It’s a decision that likely kills similar ordinances across the state, including the one in Louisville Metro that imposes a $250 fine, 90 days in jail, or both for those who aggressively beg for money in public.“Despite the societal stigma associated with panhandling, this form of expression is widely considered to be constitutionally protected speech,” Chief Justice John D. Minton Jr. said in the decision.

The case was brought by attorneys for Dennis Champion, 58, who has been cited or arrested more than 550 times for begging, illegal solicitations and disorderly conduct since 2004 in Lexington and Louisville, according to court records. Defending the Lexington ordinance, which carried a maximum penalty of 30 days in jail, a $100 fine, or both, the Fayette County attorney’s office said the city had a compelling interest in “pedestrians not being struck by motorists” and in the “efficient flow of traffic.” But the 14-page ruling said Lexington officials failed to show that panhandlers were responsible for traffic delays or accidents. The landmark ruling also said it is unconstitutional for city officials to treat individuals who carry signs begging for money differently from others, such as those with religious messages such as “Jesus Loves You.”

“The only thing distinguishing these two people is the content of their messages,” Minton said. A decade ago, Louisville’s Metro Council enacted an anti-begging law saying that there was an increase in aggressive solicitation in downtown and throughout the city that had become “extremely disturbing and disruptive to residents and businesses.” The ordinance says certain types of panhandling has “contributed not only to the loss of access and enjoyment of public places, but also to an enhanced fear, intimidation and disorder.” “It was primarily a response to people who (were) getting up in folks’ faces, not leaving them alone and demanding money,” said Democratic caucus spokesman Tony Hyatt.

Louisville has defined aggressive solicitation as repetitively approaching or following pedestrians despite refusals, the use of abusive or profane language to cause fear and intimidation, unwanted physical contact, or the intentional blocking of vehicular and pedestrian traffic. It specifically forbids such behavior within 20 feet of an automated teller machine, an outdoor dining area or a bus stop. The high court’s ruling does provide a legal road map on how cities could regulate beggars that appears to favor Louisville’s ordinance. Minton wrote that Lexington “could prohibit all individuals from approaching stopped motorists,” which he said targets the behavior a city seeks to prohibit rather than why a person steps into traffic. Just before Champion’s case went before the Supreme Court last October, Jefferson District Judge Eric Haner ruled against Louisville’s “aggressive panhandling” ordinance saying that any crime that carries the penalty of incarceration must be crafted by the state legislature.

“We did not appeal that case knowing that the Lexington case was before the Supreme Court and that we would receive guidance from them,” said Josh Abner, a spokesman for Jefferson County Attorney Mike O’Connell. Abner said they are reviewing the Supreme Court’s decision to determine how it will affect Louisville’s ordinance before advising Mayor Greg Fischer or the council on next legal steps.

Read More : courier-journal.com/story/news/local/2017/02/16/kentucky-supreme-court-strikes-down-lexingtons-anti-begging-law/97992698/

Bail Bond Seminole County – If Supreme Court rejects Regulation Law, apply sovereignty

Source     : Israel National News
By             : Hezki Baruch
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

If Supreme Court rejects Regulation Law, apply sovereignty

Jewish Home party Chair MK Shuli Mualem-Refaeli, one of the Regulation Law cosponsors, told Arutz Sheva about the efforts that preceded the bill’s ratification yesterday in the Knesset, and expressed hope that the law will prevent uprooting Jews from Judea and Samaria.

Did you believe the regulation law would pass?
“To be honest, when Amona residents brought me the regulation bill, there were only two people in the Knesset who believed in it – MK Smotrich and myself. Even Minister Levin who introduced the law in the previous Knesset came to me yesterday after the vote and said, ‘I didn’t believe it, you were right.'” MK Mualem stressed that no one in the coalition contacted her requesting to delay the vote until after the Netanyahu-Trump meeting. “The drama took place mainly in the media and in statements made by the Prime Minister before his departure for London. At no point was I contacted, in my capacity of chairman of the Jewish Home faction, with a request to shelve the legislation and not proceed according to the schedule established by the Knesset committee. I spoke with the coalition chairman yesterday morning and asked if there was a question, and the statement I received was that we work according to schedule.”

Now that the law has been approved, how to pass the Supreme Court?
“Every issue central to the political field belongs in the Knesset which was elected by the people to lead the State of Israel. The entire question of Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria should not be a legal matter. I refer the Supreme Court Justices and court President Naor to their own rulings, where again and again Knesset members are called upon to act, and yesterday we acted to normalize settlement in Judea and Samaria”. MK Mualem explains what will happen should the judges decide nevertheless to disqualify the regulation law: “If the Supreme Court rejects the law we would have two options: Proceeding to apply Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria starting in Area C, and in parallel to proceed with the court limitation bill. We have now begun to recruit coalition cosponsors of the proposed law.”

Has the era of Judean and Samarian Jewish home destruction ended?
“The regulation law does not apply to homes that have a final court judgment. At present we are making efforts to enable the residents of the nine houses in Ofra to move straight into another house. I pray not only that Jews not be expelled from their homes and communities no longer be destroyed, but that there should be a clearer understanding of the importance of paving and building in Judea and Samaria after years of moratorium, to build like they build everywhere according to supply and demand – and there is a lot of demand in Judea and Samaria.”

Read More : israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/224582

Bail Bond Seminole County – New legal challenge to California bullet train is filed in Superior Court

Source     : LA Times News
By             : Ralph Vartabedian
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

New legal challenge to California bullet train is filed in Superior Court

Opponents of the California bullet train alleged in legal papers filed Tuesday that the California legislature violated the state constitution when it passed a law last year amending and modifying the $9-billion high speed rail bond act that voters approved in 2008. If the suit further delays access to the bond money, it could slow construction over coming years. But state officials say they do not anticipate any immediate problems as a result of this litigation, though lawsuits have effectively blocked the use of the bond money for years. The papers were an amendment to a suit filed by opponents in December, in Sacramento Superior Court,  which asserted that a funding plan to spend the bond dollars was illegal and should be stopped.

The suit was amended Tuesday to take aim squarely at the legislature’s approval of AB1889, a bill with the specific purpose of clarifying the intent of the bond act. Stuart Flashman, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, who oppose the train, said the bond act never gave the legislature the authority to alter it. The suit was brought by John Tos, a farmer; Kings County; the city of Atherton; and several opposition groups. After AB1889 was passed and signed by Gov. Jerry Brown, the rail authority quickly put together two funding plans to tap the bonds. One plan provided funding for $7.8 billion of rail construction from Merced to Shafter in the Central Valley. The other plan provided $819 million to electrify the Caltrain commuter rail line in the Bay Area, which will eventually be part of the Los Angeles to San Francisco high speed rail system. But neither of those plans is part of an operating high speed rail system, which is what the bond act is supposed to pay for. The legislature amended the bond act to permit the spending so long as the state has a plan to eventually operate high speed trains on the tracks once it finds more money. With the bond money held up by litigation, the California High Speed Rail Authority has been forced to rely on a $2.5-billion stimulus grant and separate revenue from the state’s greenhouse gas auctions.

This supplemental money source has worked so far, but in the final days of the Obama Administration, the Federal Railroad Administration set down new rules in the grant agreement that required the state to start paying a matching share of the stimulus grant money some time in coming months. The project has another nearly $1-billion federal grant, but the administration required that the first grant be covered by matching funds before the state can access the second grant. It may be difficult to fulfill the match requirement without the bond dollars, since the greenhouse gas fees have fallen below expectations in recent auctions. Rail authority spokeswoman Lisa Marie Alley said Wednesday afternoon that the rail authority had not been served with the amended complaint. She added that “it’s important to clarify that access to bond dollars, while important, is not an immediate concern, as the program also uses” greenhouse gas fees.

Read More : latimes.com/local/california/la-me-bullet-train-lawsuit-20170201-story.html

Bail Bond Seminole County – U.S. abortion rate at its lowest since 1973 Supreme Court ruling

Source    : Crux Now News
By            : Mark Pattison
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

U.S. abortion rate at its lowest since 1973 Supreme Court ruling

The U.S. abortion rate is down to its lowest level since the Supreme Court made abortion legal virtually on demand in 1973, and the rate is half of its early-1980s peak. According to a study issued on January 17 by the Guttmacher Institute, the abortion rate for U.S. women ages 15-44 is 14.6 per 1,000 in 2014, the last year for which statistics are available. The figure represents a 14 percent decline from the 2011 numbers, and less than half of the 1981 rate of 29.4 abortions per 1,000 women of child-bearing age.

The percentage of pregnancies ending in abortion is down to 18.8 percent, a decline of nearly two-fifths below its 1983 peak of 30.3 percent. A statement by the Guttmacher Institute, which supports legal abortion, said the study “did not directly investigate reasons behind the declining abortion rate,” but suggested “the wave of abortion restrictions passed at the state level over the last five years” could have contributed at least in part to the decline.

These come under the umbrella of TRAP laws, short for Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers. Examples of such laws in effect before the 2014 numbers were calculated to include Wisconsin’s 2013 statute requiring abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital; Oklahoma’s law banning the use of abortifacient drugs early in pregnancy; mandatory ultrasounds, which were on the books in 20 states; laws requiring a waiting period of at least one day after a pregnant woman’s first visit to an abortion provider – the South Dakota version requires a pregnant woman to visit a crisis pregnancy center during the waiting period; informed-consent scripts to be read by abortion doctors, including 12 states that instruct doctors to tell pregnant women about the unborn child’s ability to feel pain; and building code standards for abortion facilities. “When they see the child moving in the womb on an ultrasound, when they hear the heartbeat of the unborn child, when they know there are people and programs available to help them with a new baby and new circumstances, when they see what dismemberment abortion does to these precious children, the pain and agony that is involved in every chemical abortion, they look for life preserving solutions that are better for everyone involved,” said a January 17 statement from Carol Tobias, president of National Right to Life.

Results of a Marist poll released in July showed that even if they support keeping abortion legal, about eight in 10 Americans said they favored restrictions on abortion. More recent legislation at the national level has not met with the same success as state measures. Although the House approved the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Act in 2015, it secured only 55 of the necessary 60 votes in the Senate to override cloture that September. And the Dismemberment Abortion Ban Act was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2016, after Congress’s summer recess, and no action was taken afterward.

Read More : cruxnow.com/cns/2017/01/19/u-s-abortion-rate-lowest-since-1973-supreme-court-ruling/

Bail Bond Seminole County – California Supreme Court to Decide Whether Speed-Up in Executions is Legal

Source     : LA Times News
By             : Maura Dolan
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

California Supreme Court to Decide Whether Speed-Up in Executions is Legal

California voters in November legalized marijuana, approved a plan to reduce the prison population and enacted gun controls. But on one key issue — the death penalty — the liberal tide shifted. Voters rejected a measure to ban capital punishment and instead approved an initiative intended to hasten executions. That measure is now before the California Supreme Court. If the court allows it to go forward, executions are likely to resume this year, lawyers on both sides of the debate agreed. The court voted 5 to 0 in closed session last month to put a hold on Proposition 66, sponsored by prosecutors and passed by 51% of voters.

The measure established strict legal deadlines for death penalty appeals and shifted some capital punishment reviews from the state high court to county trial courts. Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye and Justice Ming W. Chin removed themselves from the case because they both serve on the Judicial Council, the policy-making body of the courts and a defendant in the lawsuit. Depending on which appellate justices are appointed to take their places, the recusal could be good news for opponents of the death penalty. Both Chin and Cantil-Sakauye are among the more conservative members of the court. Death penalty opponents argue the measure violates separation of powers requirements because the voters, acting as lawmakers, stripped authority from the judicial branch.

Government is divided into three equal branches — executive, legislative and judicial — and the Constitution says no branch may usurp the responsibilities of another. “The Legislature doesn’t get to tell the courts how to do their job,” said Christina Von der Ahe Rayburn, who is representing former Atty. Gen. John Van de Kamp and former El Dorado County Supervisor Ron Briggs in the lawsuit. The measure requires appeals to be decided within five years of sentencing. It can now take a decade or longer for a condemned inmate to have his or her automatic appeal decided by the California Supreme Court. In automatic appeals, condemned inmates challenge their convictions and sentences based on evidence in the trial record. Rulings by the judge and how the jury was picked may be closely examined in these appeals to the California Supreme Court.

Condemned inmates also are entitled to a habeas corpus challenge, which is based on evidence outside the trial record. Did the prosecutor withhold exonerating evidence? Was the defense lawyer incompetent? Did jurors engage in misconduct? Getting lawyers to take death penalty appeals, particularly habeas cases, has been a huge hurdle in California. Relatively low pay and the emotional toll the cases take on lawyers are only part of the problem. They say the $50,000 the state provides for a habeas investigation is much too low to hire the experts needed to investigate the crimes and the inmates’ lives.

In 2014, 352 inmates on death row had no habeas lawyer, said UC Berkeley law professor Elisabeth Semel. To resolve the lawyer shortage, Proposition 66 would require attorneys appointed to defend low-income criminal defendants also to represent condemned inmates in the automatic appeals. The California Supreme Court now decides both the automatic appeal and the habeas petitions and appoints the lawyers. Under Proposition 66, the sentencing judge would decide the habeas challenge and appoint a lawyer to represent the condemned. Kent Scheidegger, legal counsel for the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation and an author of Proposition 66, said trial judges will have better luck than the state high court in getting lawyers to take the cases.

Read More : latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-court-executions-20170108-story.html

Bail Bond Seminole County – Give judges a role in legal regulation, Society suggests

Source     : lawgazette News
By             : Michael Cross
Category : Bail Bond Seminole County , Bail Bondsman in Sanford

Give judges a role in legal regulation, Society suggests

Giving the judiciary a role in appointments to the Legal Services Board could help protect the independence of the legal profession, the Law Society has suggested. Responding to the government’s call for opinions on the future existence and shape of the legal super-regulator, Chancery Lane warns of the international perception that the LSB is an arm of the state.

‘Therefore it is critical that the LSB not only acts independently from governmental control, but is also seen to be independent from governmental control,’ the Society says. One way to do this would be to further remove the appointments process to the LSB from the state. ‘One way to achieve this would be to give more control over LSB appointments to senior judges,’ it suggests.

The proposal follows a call last month by the lord chief justice for judges to have a role in regulation to protect advocacy standards. Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd told the House of Commons justice committee that judges’ interests should be represented whenever changes are made to the legal regulatory framework. Consultation on the government’s ‘tailored review’ into the LSB and Office for Legal Complaints closed on 24 November. The Society said it had ‘a number of observations’ which cut across the questions raised in the consultation, so its response takes the form of a paper rather than specific answers. Among to topics it raises is the LSB exceeding its remit. ‘One example where, in the Society’s opinion, the LSB did go beyond the scope of its role was in the publication of a briefing paper on Alternatives to Handling Client Money,’ it states.

‘The briefing raised concerns around the risks of authorised persons holding client money without consideration of the significant benefits that this brings to the market. The briefing did not identify the risks inherent in any alternative proposal.’ Another example is the LSB’s research on the unregulated sector. ‘In the Society’s opinion, the LSB should not divert its limited resources away from its core role of overseeing the frontline regulators.’

However the Society notes examples where the LSB ‘has provided effective challenge to the frontline regulators’. For example it notes that in 2014 the LSB refused to approve an application from the Solicitors Regulation Authority to reduce the minimum level of professional indemnity insurance. ‘The Society also believes that the LSB has done a good job providing oversight and challenge to the Legal Ombudsman in respect of its operations.’It also describes the LSB’s approach to transparency as ‘very positive’.

Read more : lawgazette.co.uk/law/give-judges-a-role-in-legal-regulation-society-suggests/5059183.article