On May 20, 2017, 2nd Lieutenant Richard Collins III, three days away from his graduation from Bowie State University, was stabbed fatally in the chest as he waited for his rideshare after visiting with friends at the University of Maryland. The assailant, Sean Urbanski, 25, approached the group but targeted... Read More »
President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration takes place on January 20, 2021. All federal prisons in the U.S., more than 120, have been put on lockdown as of midnight on Saturday, January 16, in response to “current events,” according to a statement by the Bureau of Prisons (BOP). The BOP says this... Read More »
The Keystone XL pipeline project was rejected by the Obama administration because it went against its efforts to fight climate change. Trump made building the pipeline a central platform in his presidential campaign. Biden, who was vice president under Obama, plans to cancel the permit for the project as one... Read More »
In 2020, the federal government executed 10 prisoners. That’s more prisoners than all the states together put to death last year. With this statistic in hand, and noting the three inmates scheduled for execution in January, Democrats revealed legislation that would end federal capital punishment. A total of 13 federal... Read More »
Did the EPA exceed its authority by exempting refineries from statutory obligations? The Renewable Fuel Standard requires “refiners, blenders, and importers of transportation fuel to blend increasing amounts of renewable fuels into their products each year.” The requirement is for refiners to blend billions of gallons of corn-based ethanol and... Read More »
Minerva Surgical, Inc., filed a petition for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court asking the court to clarify questions around the doctrine of assignor estoppel. Their petition asks “Whether a defendant in a patent infringement action who assigned the patent, or is in privity with an assignor of the patent,... Read More »
California has a requirement that tax-exempt charities disclose the identity of their top financial donors to the state. On Friday, January 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to that requirement. (The Attorney General of California, Xavier Becerra, has been nominated to run the Department of... Read More »
In December, Trump vetoed a $740.5 billion defense spending bill after it passed Congress. His objections did not relate to the disgorgement provisions included regarding the SEC’s work. On December 28, 2020, the House overrode Trump’s veto. On January 1, the Senate voted to override the president’s veto as well... Read More »
In August 2017, iLife Technologies, Inc., a Los Angeles hardware and software maker, won a ruling against Nintendo, which was accused of infringing a patent for motion-sensing technologies used in its Wii products. In January 2020, a Northern District of Texas judge found that under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision... Read More »
One of the busiest felony courthouses in the nation will be led for the first time by a woman judge. Judge Erica Reddick was appointed as acting presiding judge over the Cook County Circuit Court’s Criminal Division. Her appointment was announced by Chief Judge Timothy Evans’ office on Monday, January... Read More »
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit heard an appeal on December 3, 2020. The appeal was to determine whether a 2007 non-prosecution agreement (NPA) that shielded Jeffrey Epstein from child sex charges would stand. To nullify the NPA would impact Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal case. Maxwell was accused... Read More »
After the horrifying events of Wednesday, January 6, 2021, the 25th Amendment is getting lots of air time. The 25th Amendment, enacted in 1965 and ratified in 1967, provides in Section 4 that when the Vice President and a majority of the principal officers of the executive Cabinet or a... Read More »
In 2018, President Trump signed the First Step Act. This bipartisan criminal justice legislation reduced mandatory sentences formerly required by federal firearms law 18 U.S.C. Section 924(c). The First Step Act also prevented the sentences issued under 924(c) from being mandatorily “stacked” to run consecutively. Prior to The First Step... Read More »
On Wednesday, December 2, 2020, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) engaged in a teleconference hearing to untangle the aftermath of a ruling they made last April in Ramos v. Louisiana. In that ruling, SCOTUS determined that federal and state court juries are required to be unanimous to... Read More »
The US Department of Energy (DOE) issued a final rule on December 4, 2020, that revises its responsibilities under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Previously, under NEPA, liquefied natural gas (LNG) transport license applications required an environmental review, but only sometimes. If the shipments were going to countries with... Read More »
