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Accused White House intruder to appear in court
Court News |
2014/09/22 16:27
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Following an embarrassing security breach at the White House, one of the most closely protected buildings in the world, the Secret Service is said to be considering establishing new checkpoints to screen tourists in public areas near the presidential mansion.
Meanwhile, the man accused of scaling a security fence and getting into the president's home carrying a knife is scheduled to have his initial appearance Monday in federal court.Omar J. Gonzalez, 42, of Copperas Cove, Texas, is facing charges of unlawfully entering a restricted building or grounds while carrying a deadly or dangerous weapon.
The Army says Gonzalez served from 1997 until his discharge in 2003, and again from 2005 to December 2012, when he retired due to disability.The Secret Service tightened its guard outside the White House after Friday's security breach. Gonzalez is accused of scaling the White House perimeter fence, sprinting across the lawn and entering the building before agents could stop him.
President Barack Obama and his family were away at the time. Obama says he still has confidence in the troubled agency's ability to protect him and his family.Secret Service Director Julia Pierson has ordered increased surveillance and more officer patrols, and has begun an investigation into what went wrong.
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Teen suspect in 6-year-old's death due in court
Court News |
2014/08/13 14:38
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A 17-year-old boy arrested in the death and sexual assault of a 6-year-old Washington state girl is due in court Monday.
Authorities still haven't released the name of the suspect, who was arrested Saturday in the Bremerton-area mobile home park from which Jenise Wright had disappeared a week earlier.
He was booked for investigation of second-degree murder, manslaughter and rape, and was scheduled to make an initial appearance at 3 p.m. in Kitsap County District Court.
Authorities said forensic evidence analyzed by the Washington state crime lab linked him to the crime. Earlier in the week, the sheriff's office collected DNA cheek swabs from dozens of nearby residents.
The Seattle Times reported Sunday that Kitsap County sheriff's detectives seized three vehicles from the suspect's home and completed final interviews of residents at the Steele Creek Mobile Home Park, the community where Wright went missing eight days earlier.
The statements and evidence collected Sunday will help authorities in "trying to put together a composite of the suspect for painting a picture for the court," Kitsap County Sheriff's spokesman Scott Wilson told the Times.
A growing memorial at the entrance to the neighborhood includes silver balloons, stuffed animals, lit candles and flowers.
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Canadian court: US can extradite terror suspect
Court News |
2014/08/13 14:37
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An appeals court ruled Monday an Iraqi-born man should be extradited to the United States to face charges that he helped coordinate Tunisian jihadists believed responsible for a suicide attack in Iraq in 2009 that killed five American soldiers outside a U.S. base.
Sayfildin Tahir Sharif, who holds dual Canadian-Iraqi citizenship, was arrested in 2011 on a U.S. warrant and has been fighting extradition to New York.
The prosecution alleges Sharif worked from Edmonton, Alberta, to help a Tunisian man enter Iraq in 2009 and detonate a truck filled with explosives at a military checkpoint, killing five U.S. soldiers. Prosecutors contend that evidence from intercepted Internet and phone conversations shows that Sharif was directly involved in supporting Tunisian terrorists. Sharif never left Canada as part of the alleged conspiracy.
The terror network is also accused of blowing up an Iraqi police station, killing seven Iraqi officers.
Canada's justice minister granted extradition last summer after receiving assurances from the U.S. that Sharif wouldn't face the death penalty. Defense lawyers also received a letter from U.S. authorities promising the man wouldn't be held indefinitely in pre-trial detention.
Sharif was appealing the justice minister's decision as well as a judge's original ruling in 2012 that there was enough evidence to extradite Sharif on two charges.
Sharif is an ethnic Kurd who was born in Iraq but moved to Toronto as a refugee in 1993. Four years later, he became a Canadian citizen. |
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Federal court: Virginia marriage is for all
Court News |
2014/07/29 13:43
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An appeals courts' decision to strike down Virginia's same-sex marriage ban adds to the growing list of decrees on a hot-button issue that will likely end up being decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, is the second federal appellate court to overturn gay marriage bans, after the Denver circuit, and is the first to affect the South, a region where the rising tide of rulings favoring marriage equality is testing concepts of states' rights and traditional, conservative moral values that have long held sway.
"I am proud that the Commonwealth of Virginia is leading on one of the most important civil rights issues of our day," said Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, who had refused to defend the state ban when he took office in January. "We are fighting for the right of loving, committed couples to enter the bonds of marriage."
Virginians voted 57 percent to 43 percent in 2006 to amend their constitution to ban gay marriage and state law prohibits recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other states, which the court said infringes on its citizens' fundamental right to marry. |
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2 ag-gag laws facing federal court challenges
Court News |
2014/07/22 13:28
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The years-long fight between farm organizations and animal rights activists over laws prohibiting secretly filmed documentation of animal abuse is moving from state legislatures to federal courts as laws in Utah and Idaho face constitutional challenges.
Half of U.S. states have attempted to pass so-called ag-gag laws, but only seven have been successful. Among them are Idaho, where this year's law says unauthorized recording is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $5,000 fine, and Utah, whose 2012 law makes it a crime to provide false information to gain access to a farm. Both states now face separate but similarly worded lawsuits that say the measures violate federal statutes offering whistleblower protections and free-speech guarantees.
Farm organizations and livestock producers say ag-gag laws are aimed at protecting their homes and businesses from intruders, and some plan to use social media to assure the public they have nothing to hide. But animal rights groups, free-speech activists and investigative journalists want to throw out the laws because they say the secrecy puts consumers at higher risk of food safety problems and animals at higher risk of abuse. |
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