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Legal News Archive For
July, 2010

16 Arrests Made In Colorado In Connection With Gangs, Drugs

Added: 2010-07-30 09:17:25

Sixteen people have been arrested in Greeley, Colorado on various drug and gun charges, after a 30-month investigation by the FBI and a raid conducted jointly by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the FBI, the Greeley Police Department and the Weld County Sheriff's Department. Those wh...

Man Who Beat Teenagers To Death With Bat Claims Insanity

Added: 2010-07-29 16:22:43

A man who is standing trial for having savagely, and fatally, beaten his cousin and another teenager with a baseball bat claims that he was suffering from borderline personality disorder. Jonathan Nodal, now 23, is facing life in prison for the murders of his cousin, Justin Morejon, 18; and More...

Dallas Man Convicted In Cold-Case Rape, Murder of Student

Added: 2010-07-28 10:12:00

A jury in Dallas County weighed in this week on the rape and murder of a Southern Methodist University Student that occurred over two decades ago. After deliberating for only about an hour, the jury returned a verdict of guilty for Donald Andrew Bess, who killed 20-year-old sorority girl Angela ...

Pakistani Officials Detain American Allegedly Hunting Osama bin Laden

Added: 2010-07-27 08:21:06

An American man who allegedly wanted to capture and kill Osama bin Laden in order to avenge the 9/11 terrorism attacked is being detained in northern Pakistan, say authorities. Gary Brooks Faulkner, 51, was armed with a pistol and a 40-inch sword as he tried to cross the Pakistan-Afghanistan bor...

Jury Finds Man Guilty, Not Insane, In Mother-Daughter Stabbing Case

Added: 2010-07-26 13:20:21

A man who stabbed a woman to death and wounded her mother, then claimed insanity, has been found guilty by a Cincinnati jury. Sean Noakes, 41, has been diagnosed with severe depression and antisocial personality disorder, and has also told doctors that he heard voices and had hallucinations. He ...

U.S. Supreme Court Will Hear California Prison Overcrowding Case

Added: 2010-07-23 10:09:42

The United States Supreme Court said recently that it will review California's appeal of a court order that would move or release nearly 40,000 inmates from that state's 33 prisons, after a special federal court panel ruled last year that overcrowding in the prison system has led to inadequate heal...

Alleged Iraq War Criminal Released From Confinement Pending Appeal

Added: 2010-07-22 09:18:58

A Marine Corps sergeant who is accused in one of the Iraq war's biggest war crimes cases has been released from custody. Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III is accused of having led a squad of seven troops who killed an unarmed, 52-year-old Iraqi man after dragging him out of his home in the village of H...

Officer Faces First-Degree Murder After Shooting Man Outside Club

Added: 2010-07-21 11:48:09

A Baltimore police officer has been charged with first-degree murder in the shooting of an unarmed man outside of a nightclub. Officer Gahiji A. Tshamba, 36, was off-duty when Tyrone Brown, a former Marine from East Baltimore, approached Tshamba's female companion and began touching her inapprop...

NBA's Walker Will Go To District Court for Gambling Debts

Added: 2010-07-20 13:07:28

A former NBA player will appear in Clark County (NV) District Court later this month, after failing to repay $900,000 in gambling debts. Antoine Walker was charged in July 2009 with three felony counts of writing bad checks, related to gambling debts he had incurred at Caesars Palace, Planet Hol...

Cop Gets 15 Years for Conspiring with Crack Dealer

Added: 2010-07-19 09:26:36

A police officer who protected a crack dealer has been sentenced to 15 years in prison on charges of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, bank fraud and obstruction of justice. Luis Batista, 37, was hired by the New York Police Department in 1997, working first as an undercover officer in Manhatt...

Hundreds of Lawsuits Filed In Wake Of Gulf Oil Spill; More To Come

Added: 2010-07-16 14:33:55

Two hundred lawsuits have already been filed against embattled petroleum giant BP in the wake of that company's massive oil spill, and many more are yet to come, say legal experts. The explosion at BP's Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which killed 11 workers and spurred the environmental and eco...

Former Massey Miner Files Whistle-Blower Complaint

Added: 2010-07-15 08:33:14

A former coal miner who worked for Massey Energy has filed a federal whistle-blower complaint, alleging that he was suspended and then fired after talking to a newspaper reporter about unsafe conditions at two of Massey's mines. Ricky Lee Campbell, 24, worked as a roof bolter and shuttle car dri...

Possible Hate Crime In Case of Black Man Shot, Dragged

Added: 2010-07-14 13:27:57

Authorities have arrested a South Carolina man who is suspected of shooting a black coworker, then roped his body to a pickup truck and dragged it more than 10 miles. Gregory Collins, 19, has been arrested for the murder of Anthony Hill, 30; the two worked together at a poultry processing plant,...

After 15 Years in Prison, Murder Suspect is Freed

Added: 2010-07-13 11:51:23

A man who was incarcerated for 15 years for the murder of his landlord has been freed by the Brooklyn D.A.'s office because of prosecutorial misconduct. Jabbar Collins had been convicted in 1995 of shooting his landlord, Rabbi Abraham Pollack, as he collected rent money in his Williamsburg apart...

Judge Exceeds Prosecutor's Request in Sentencing Ponzi Perpetrator

Added: 2010-07-12 09:30:30

A Fort Lauderdale lawyer who sold investors shares in phony court settlements, earning him the nickname “the Bernie Madoff of South Florida,” has been sentenced to 50 years in federal prison—more time behind bars than prosecutors had requested. Scott Rothstein, 47, had connections througho...

Teenager Charged With Felony Conspiracy In Second Plot to Attack School

Added: 2010-07-09 12:09:41

A Long Island teenager who was planning a violent attack on his former high school has entered a not guilty plea to felony conspiracy. Christopher Franko, 18, and his friend Dana Saltzman, 16, were originally arrested in May after the boy's social worker alerted authorities that he might be plan...

Smuggler Sentenced For Role in Deadly Tractor-Trailer Case

Added: 2010-07-08 16:28:51

The last member of a human smuggling ring that was implicated in the 2003 deaths of over a dozen illegal immigrants has been sentenced to 14 years in prison for his role in the incident. Octavio Torres-Ortega admitted his guilt, and apologized for having participated in the attempted transport o...

Detroit Hit Man Pleads Guilty To Eight Murders Over Two Years

Added: 2010-07-07 11:18:05

A Detroit hit man who specialized in drug-related murders has pleaded guilty to eight counts of second-degree murder and one gun charge. Vincent Smothers made the plea deal in exchange for a minimum sentence of 50 years in prison. Smothers, 27, will receive credit for time served in prison since...

Transient Pleads Guilty, Gets Life For Lily Burk Murder

Added: 2010-07-06 11:27:23

A transient has pleaded guilty to the kidnapping and murder of a 17-year-old girl, and has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for his crimes. Charlie Samuel, 50, avoided the death sentence by reaching a plea deal with prosecutors in the murder of Lily Burk, whom h...

American Men Arrested En Route to Join Somali Terrorist Group

Added: 2010-07-05 10:26:29

After a lengthy investigation, dubbed Operation Arabian Knight by federal agents, two American men have been arrested on suspicion of terrorist activities. Mohamed Mahmood Alessa, 20, and Carlos Eduardo Almonte, 24, were apprehended at New York's Kennedy Airport as they attempted to travel first...

Death of Convicted Murderer Marks 12th Execution in Texas

Added: 2010-07-02 14:17:56

Texas—the state which leads the nation in carrying out the death penalty—has executed convicted killer George Jones. Jones, who shot and killed a Dallas man in 1993, was executed by lethal injection on Wednesday. He had exhausted all of his court appeals, and he and his attorney agreed not t...

Obama Staffers Subpoenaed in Blagojevich Trial

Added: 2010-07-01 11:55:19

According to a senior Obama administration official, two White House staffers have been subpoenaed in the federal corruption trial of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Blagojevich, a two-term Democrat, is facing allegations of racketeering and fraud, as well as other charges. He is most ...

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