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Guilty plea for Va. man in $318K Social Security fraud
Lawyer Blog News |
2011/09/09 11:29
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A Bristol man has pleaded guilty to stealing Social Security benefits and making false statements in an attempt to hide the thefts.
Seventy-one-year-old David Ross entered the plea Thursday in federal court in Abingdon.
Ross faces a sentence of up to 65 years in prison on all counts.
Federal prosecutors say Ross admitted stealing more than $318,000 in benefits that had been intended for his mother, who died in 1971. He told the Social Security Administration that his mother died in December 2010. |
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Court upholds conviction in Iowa coach's death
Court Feed News |
2011/09/08 16:17
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An appeals court has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of a mentally ill man who shot his former football coach in the school's weight room.
Mark Becker had argued that he was legally insane when he shot Aplington-Parkersburg High School Coach Ed Thomas in June 2009. A jury found Becker guilty and rejected his insanity defense.
Doctors testified at the trial that Becker is a paranoid schizophrenic but they disagreed over whether he knew right from wrong when he shot Thomas.
Becker's lawyers argued that jurors were given incorrect instructions about the legal definition of insanity.
The Iowa Court of Appeals on Thursday agreed one instruction was incorrect but said jurors were given another instruction that correctly defined insanity. Taken together, the court says jurors were properly instructed. |
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Congressional debt reduction panel kicks off work
U.S. Legal News |
2011/09/08 16:16
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Republicans and Democrats on the special supercommittee warned of a financial crisis threatening future generations as the congressional debt reduction panel kicked off its work Thursday with an imperative to slash the deficit and lift the sluggish economy.
In a series of speeches, the six Republicans and six Democrats stressed the importance of compromise, shrugging off the bitter rhetoric of the summer's partisan brawl over raising the federal debt limit. That fight ended with a hard-fought deal between President Barack Obama and lawmakers that created the supercommittee.
"I approach our task with a profound sense of urgency, high hopes and realistic expectations," said Rep. Jeb Hensarling, a panel co-chair. "Our task to achieve $1.5 trillion of bipartisan deficit reduction will not be easy but it is essential."
The Texas Republican said he will not "sit idly by and watch the American dream disappear for my 9-year-old daughter and my 7-year-old son."
Members of the committee insisted that all elements of the federal budget will be part of any final product. Democrats want a mix of spending cuts and revenue increases while Republicans say entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare should be in any deficit-cutting plan. |
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Hundreds in Fla. want out of Chinese drywall deal
Class Action News |
2011/09/08 13:17
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Hundreds of Floridians potentially want to opt out of a proposed $55 million federal settlement over faulty Chinese drywall in hopes of pursuing individual lawsuits in state courts, the attorney for two families said Wednesday.
The lawyer, David Durkee, said a key hearing Friday in Broward County could be a major step in determining whether people dissatisfied with the class-action settlement can take their cases before juries in Florida courts.
"They don't want any part of that settlement," Durkee said. "They have chosen state court. They want to proceed individually and they want their day in court."
The settlement, first announced in June, involves Banner Supply Co., a major distributor of Chinese drywall, and thousands of affected homeowners, builders, installers and others in Florida. U.S. District Judge Eldon Fallon in New Orleans - where lawsuits in several states were consolidated for pretrial purposes - gave the deal preliminary approval in July.
Thousands of homes mainly in the South were affected by installation of Chinese drywall that has a foul odor, can corrode wiring and metal in appliances and cause health problems. The Banner settlement involves mostly Floridians.
Fallon also ordered a temporary halt to drywall lawsuits filed against Banner in state court. The hearing Friday before Broward County Circuit Judge Charles Greene concerns whether cases filed by the families represented by Durkee can proceed despite the federal order and settlement. |
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Court tosses Sivak's death sentence
Court Feed News |
2011/09/08 12:05
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The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has reversed the death sentence of an Idaho man convicted of brutally slaying a former coworker because the state allowed a jailhouse informant to lie on the witness stand.
Lacey Mark Sivak was sentenced to death for the 1981 murder of Dixie Wilson at the Baird Oil gas station in Garden City. In a ruling handed down Wednesday, the appellate court said that while Sivak's murder conviction was appropriate, the outcome of his sentencing hearing might have been different if prosecutors hadn't knowingly presented the testimony of an inmate who lied on the stand.
Still, the appellate court said state attorneys may decide to hold a new sentencing hearing if they still want to seek the death penalty for Sivak's crimes. |
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US Space Scientist Pleads Guilty To Attempted Espionage
Court Feed News |
2011/09/07 14:51
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U.S. government space scientist Stewart David Nozette has pleaded guilty to one count of attempted espionage for trying to sell classified information to an FBI agent posing as an Israeli intelligence officer, the Associated Press reported Sept. 7.
The plea agreement includes a sentence of 13 years in prison, with credit for two years of time served, AP said. Nozette has been in jail since his arrest in 2009.
Nozette had high-level security clearances during decades of government work on science and space projects at NASA, the Energy Department and the National Space Council. He was known for his involvement with President Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative missile defense effort. |
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