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NYT Ignores Two-Year House Arrest Of Lawyer Who Took On Big Oil

July 5, 2021 James Baratta, Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting , , ,
Steven R. Donziger—the human rights attorney who in 2011 won a $9.5 billion legal victory in Ecuador over the Chevron Corporation for the dumping of roughly 16 billion gallons of toxic waste in the Ecuadorian Amazon—has been under house arrest for 696 days. This unprecedented legal situation is happening in New York City, the hometown of the New York Times—but the paper of record has yet to report on Donziger’s arrest.

Supreme Court Allows Gavin Grimm’s Victory To Stand

June 28, 2021 ACLU. , , ,
Washington — The Supreme Court today declined to hear Grimm v. Gloucester County School Board, allowing lower court decisions in support of transgender students to stand. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit have both ruled that the school board violated Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause by prohibiting Grimm from using the same restrooms as other boys and forcing him to use separate restrooms. The Supreme Court was scheduled to hear Grimm’s case at an earlier stage of the litigation in 2017, but the case was sent back to the lower courts after the Trump administration withdrew the government’s support for Grimm’s claims.

Key Witness In Assange Case Admits To Lies In Indictment

June 26, 2021 Bjartmar Oddur Þeyr Alexandersson and Gunnar Hrafn Jónsson, Stundin. , , ,
A major witness in the United States’ Department of Justice case against Julian Assange has admitted to fabricating key accusations in the indictment against the Wikileaks founder. The witness, who has a documented history with sociopathy and has received several convictions for sexual abuse of minors and wide-ranging financial fraud, made the admission in a newly published interview in Stundin where he also confessed to having continued his crime spree whilst working with the Department of Justice and FBI and receiving a promise of immunity from prosecution. The man in question, Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, was recruited by US authorities to build a case against Assange after misleading them to believe he was previously a close associate of his.

Honoring The Movement To End Discrimination Against LGBTQ People

June 25, 2021 Scott McCoy, Southern Poverty Law Center. , , , ,
June is Pride Month – a time set aside to honor the Stonewall uprising, which launched the movement to end discriminatory laws against LGBTQ people – and to remember the many important cultural and legislative victories since that pivotal summer in 1969. This year, the celebration occurs under the cloud of more than 125 anti-LGBTQ bills that have been introduced in state legislatures, many targeting children who identify as transgender by denying them access to lifesaving medical treatment, banning them from participating in sports or using the restroom. This is up markedly from last year when more than 40 such bills were introduced. In fact, 2021 has set a record for the number of anti-trans legislative efforts.

Nonviolent Protest Over Voting Rights Ends With Arrests In DC

June 25, 2021 Jake Johnson, Common Dreams. , , ,
Activists with the national Poor People's Campaign were arrested Wednesday after blocking a street in front of the Hart Senate building in Washington, D.C. to demand passage of the For the People Act, a popular voting rights expansion bill that Republicans successfully filibustered just 24 hours earlier. After rallying in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, hundreds of low-wage workers, faith leaders, and advocates—including residents of West Virginia, Kentucky, and several other states—marched to the nearby Senate building to demand meetings with Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), two key opponents of the For the People Act.

Class Action Alleging RCMP Abuse Of Indigenous People In Northern Canada

June 24, 2021 The Canadian Press, Peace Arch News. , , ,
A lawsuit alleging RCMP systematically brutalized Indigenous people in Northern Canada can proceed as a class action despite objections from the government, Federal Court ruled on Wednesday. In her decision, Judge Glennys McVeigh rejected the government’s arguments that the proposed suit failed to meet the legal grounds for certification although individuals could sue on their own, and that the claim had no prospect of success. “I disagree with Canada’s characterization of these claims as individual,” McVeigh wrote. “The claims do not ask if an RCMP officer illegally assaulted a class member, but rather whether the operations of the RCMP create a system where illegal assaults happen.” The untested claim, initially filed in 2018, seeks $600 million in various damages.

Community Control Of Public Safety: A Transitional Program For Power

June 22, 2021 Netfa Freeman, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
That Community Control Over Police campaigns (CCOP) are essentially neocolonialism is a rather wild claim that avowed abolitionist activists, like Dubian Ade applies to the articulation of CCOP by advocate Max Rameau, an organizer in Pan-African Community Action (PACA) to which this author also belongs. Understandably Ade avoids the rabbit hole of condemning the Black Panther Party as neocolonialist, the progenitors of CCOP. While the Democratic Party claims championship over congressional approval of police reform in the name of George Floyd, now awaiting a Senate vote, some Black circles are still debating the virtues or lack thereof in CCOP. Corporate media theater aids and abets the lopsided focus by blitzing the public with coverage of a partisan struggle over the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021 .

Over 100 Anti-Protest Bills Have Been Introduced Since George Floyd Rebellion

June 22, 2021 Ella Fassler, Truthout. , , ,
This June, a dangerously low-flying helicopter operated by the Department of Homeland Security descended on the largest civil disobedience action yet against the Line 3 pipeline in Minnesota. In an attempt to disperse the crowd, hundreds of demonstrators were pummeled with debris — and misdemeanor trespassing charges. If Minnesota Republican House Members Shane Mekeland and Eric Lucero had their way, demonstrators and anyone involved in the organizing process would have been hit with serious felony charges, a $5,000 fine, and liability for any damages incurred by the multibillion-dollar company Enbridge. Mekeland and Lucero, who introduced these measures in a bill in late February, aren’t alone in their repressive ambitions.

Switzerland Adopts Draconian Police Law

June 21, 2021 Marianne Arens, World Socialist Website. , , ,
The new anti-terror law adopted by Switzerland last weekend is one of the harshest police laws in all of Europe. Its adoption in a referendum highlights the urgency of building a genuine workers’ party in Switzerland that defends as a matter of principle the democratic rights of working people. The “Federal Law on Police Measures to Combat Terrorism” (PMT) blatantly disregards the principles of the so-called “democratic rule of law.” For example, it flouts the civil-democratic separation of powers because it allows the federal police to intervene against so-called “dangerous persons” even without sufficient evidence for criminal proceedings and without an order from a judge. The law also disregards the principle of personal data protection, allowing police officers to retrieve and exchange “particularly sensitive personal data” amongst themselves.

Activists Push For Charges To Be Dropped Against Demonstrators For Black Lives

May 18, 2021 Ella Fassler, Truthout. ,
At a press conference last month, members of the coalition stood in front of Travis County District Court in Austin with banners highlighting her case and calling for the dropping of charges against defendants criminalized during the uprisings across the country. The coalition formally presented a petition with over 2,000 signatures demanding that Travis County District Attorney José Garza drop the charges against people who protested for Black lives in Austin last year.
Containers of Roundup are displayed on a store shelf in San Francisco. (AP Photo/Haven Daley, File)

$25 Million Verdict Against Monsanto Over Roundup Upheld by Federal Court

May 17, 2021 Tribune News Service. , , ,
A federal appeals court has upheld a $25 million verdict against the maker of Roundup, a weed killer that thousands of litigants blame for causing their cancers. The three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an appeal by Monsanto Co., the manufacturer of the herbicide, ruling 2-1 that $20 million in punitive damages, “while close to the outer limits,” was constitutional.

U.S. Using ‘Lawfare’ To Silence The Truth

November 12, 2019 Philip Giraldi, Americanfreepress.net , ,
The United States prides itself on its rule of law, a legacy from British colonial times, but there is increasing evidence that equal justice under law has been replaced by something that is sometimes called “lawfare,” an Israeli invention which consists of using the legal system to punish dissent and silence critics. Three examples, all quite different, illustrate exactly how a quasi-legal process has been used against individuals that are perceived to be, rightly or wrongly, critics of America’s so-called “global war on terror,” which is still being conducted worldwide even though no one uses the expression any more.

Lawyers Worldwide Urge International Court: Investigate Israeli Crimes

April 1, 2019 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout.org , ,
On the eve of the first anniversary of the “Great March of Return” at the Gaza border, lawyers and jurists around the world are calling on the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate and prosecute Israeli crimes against the Palestinians. Today, the International Association of Democratic Lawyers presented a petition from the International Lawyers Campaign for the Investigation and Prosecution of Crimes Committed Against the Palestinian People to Fatou Bensouda, chief prosecutor of the ICC.

What If Governments Obeyed Laws?

September 19, 2018 Staff, Davidswanson.org , ,
The United States has an ancient Constitution. It doesn’t ban slavery as punishment. It doesn’t ban bribery as campaign funding. It doesn’t protect the natural world. It doesn’t guarantee basic human rights to food, shelter, education, healthcare. Its system of “representative” government doesn’t fairly represent. New laws are needed. On the other hand, the United States has numerous laws on the books that just aren’t enforced. Antitrust laws are treated more as suggestions. Laws against torture are routinely erased from memory by re-banning torture again and again. Perjury by someone powerful is a crime if sex-related. (Clinton.) Otherwise it’s a factoid for use in arguments over any allegation that is sex-related.

How Solar Panels On A Church Rooftop Broke The Law In N.C.

May 15, 2018 Dan Gearino, Insideclimatenews.org , ,
A North Carolina environmental group that tried to challenge the state's utility monopoly by installing solar panels on the roof of a predominantly African-American church and selling the church cheap, clean power has lost its appeal to the state's highest court. Advocates say they are disappointed in the ruling, but they aren't giving up the fight to lift restrictions on clean energy. The case involved an attempt to bust through restrictions that solar advocates face in much of the Southeast. The region has a history of maintaining strong utility monopolies while other states have opened their markets to competition. The result, advocates say, limits rooftop solar in a region with some of the strongest solar power potential.
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