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NJ mom accused of starving child pleads not guilty
Court Watch |
2011/06/02 09:06
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Two women pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges of child endangerment a week after an 8-year-old was found dead in their apartment from severe malnutrition and an untreated broken leg and her injured and emaciated siblings were removed alive.
The children's 30-year-old mother, Venette Ovilde, stared blankly and answered a judge's questions in a barely audible whisper as she entered her plea through a court-appointed attorney. She remains held on $500,000 bail on aggravated manslaughter and child endangerment charges.
Her 23-year-old roommate, Myriam Janvier, also pleaded not guilty through a court-appointed attorney to child endangerment charges. Her bail was continued at $100,000.
Christiana Glenn died May 22 from severe malnutrition and a fractured femur that authorities said had never been treated. Her 7-year-old sister and 6-year-old brother remained hospitalized for treatment of malnutrition and other injuries after being removed from Ovilde's Irvington apartment.
The children were discovered after the police were called to the home on a report of a child not breathing.
The women, who were both born in Haiti but came to the U.S. at a young age, radically altered their lifestyles about two years ago when they came under the sway of a man they described as their religious leader, according to friends and acquaintances. |
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Bauer leaving, Ruemmler in as White House counsel
Topics in Legal News |
2011/06/02 09:06
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President Barack Obama's top lawyer at the White House is resigning to return to private practice and represent Obama as his personal attorney and as general counsel to Obama's re-election campaign.
Bob Bauer will be replaced by his top deputy, Kathy Ruemmler, a former assistant U.S. attorney best known as lead prosecutor in the Enron fraud case.
The move means that Bauer, 59, will still play a central but outside role in advising a president who is seeking re-election in a time of divided government.
Meanwhile, the 40-year-old Ruemmler will take over the job as Obama's top in-house counsel and manager of a White House law office charged with juggling the domestic, national security and congressional oversight challenges confronting the president.
In a statement, Obama praised Bauer as a friend with exceptional judgment who will remain a close advisor. As to his new White House-based counsel, Obama said: "Kathy is an outstanding lawyer with impeccable judgment. Together, Bob and Kathy have led the White House Counsel's office, and Kathy will assure that it continues to successfully manage its wide variety of responsibilities."
Bauer has been part of Obama's circle since Obama was a freshmen senator in Washington, and now returns to the campaign counsel role he had when Obama ran in 2008. He has long been a go-to lawyer for Democrats on matters of political law and is married to Anita Dunn, a Democratic communications operative who formerly worked in Obama's White House.
Bauer will leave his White House post at the end of June. In a style typifying the low-key nature of transitions in the counsel's office, the news came in the form of a press release.
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Ark. court upholds conviction in TV anchor slaying
Legal Business |
2011/06/02 09:05
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The Arkansas Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by a man convicted of killing a Little Rock television anchorwoman.
Justices said Thursday that Curtis Vance's objections are without merit.
Vance had appealed his capital murder and rape convictions in the October 2008 death of KATV anchor Anne Pressly in her Little Rock home. Last month, the state's highest court granted Vance's request not to hold oral arguments in his appeal and instead relied on briefs that had already been filed.
Vance was sentenced to life in prison in 2009 for the rape, robbery and slaying of Pressly.
Pressly was a 26-year-old anchor on KATV's "Daybreak" program. She appeared briefly in "W," Oliver Stone's biopic on President George W. Bush.
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Wis. DOJ asks court to lift ban on union law
Legal Business |
2011/05/30 13:45
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State attorneys asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Friday to immediately vacate a Madison judge's decision striking down Republican Gov. Scott Walker's contentious collective bargaining law.
Judge Maryann Sumi invalidated the law on Thursday after finding Republican legislators violated Wisconsin's open records law during the run-up to passage in March. The decision came in a lawsuit Democratic Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne filed challenging the law.
The state Justice Department is representing the Republicans. The agency's attorneys asked the state Supreme Court to take the case and the court set oral arguments on whether it should make a move for June 6. Deputy Attorney General Kevin St. John said in a letter to the justices late Friday they need to act now.
St. John said the issues have been fully briefed so the court can immediately vacate Sumi's decision without hearing any further argument.
He argued Sumi issued the decision on her own, even though no one involved in the case had asked for such a ruling. She didn't give any of the parties a chance to be heard on the final disposition.
He also reiterated the Justice Department's argument that the Republicans can't be sued because they enjoy legislative immunity and Sumi can't invalidate the law due to an open meetings violation. |
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Appeals court reinstates charges against Worley
Court Watch |
2011/05/30 13:44
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A state appeals court has reinstated five felony charges against former Secretary of State Nancy Worley for a second time.
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals issued a 4-0 ruling Friday. The charges accuse the former Democratic officeholder of violating election laws during her unsuccessful campaign for re-election in 2006. Her attorney, James Anderson, says he will ask the court to reconsider.
The charges resulted from an investigation by the attorney general. They were originally thrown out by a Montgomery judge. Then the Court of Criminal Appeals reinstated them. The Alabama Supreme Court reversed that ruling in September and told the appeals court to take another look.
The appeals court ruled Friday that prosecutors presented sufficient evidence to support the felony charges. |
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