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District court’s denial of defendant’s motion to dismiss mail fraud charges on the ground that the honest-services provision of 18 U.S.C. section 1346 is unconstitutionally vague is affirmed where the circuit court has soundly rejected the claim that the mail fraud statute, as applied to the intangible-rights theory, is void for vagueness. Read US v. Hargrove, No. 06-2883 Appellate Information Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division....

Defendant’s child pornography sentence is vacated in part, where a condition of defendant’s supervised release stating that he could not access via computer any material that related to minors was overly broad, imposing a far greater deprivation of liberty than reasonably necessary to achieve the legitimate goals of supervised release. Read US v. Riley, No. 08-50009 Appellate Information Argued and Submitted March 12, 2009 Filed August 13, 2009 Judges Opinion by Judge Berzon...

Convictions for armed bank robbery and other crimes are reversed and remanded where: 1) the district court abused its discretion in denying defendants’ motion for a continuance as the record shows no reason to deny a continuance and several compelling reasons to grant one, and the defendants suffered actual prejudice from the denial; and 2) any error in admitting certain expert evidence was harmless. Read US v. Williams, No. 08-1470...

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is no fan of Donald Trump and it does not seem that Trump has much love for one of the Court’s most high-profile liberals, either. But their feelings have erupted into an unprecedented political feud after Justice Ginsburg announced that she couldn’t even fathom a Trump presidency, and joked that she might need to move to New Zealand should he win. While it’s common for presidential candidates to criticize the Supreme Court, it’s almost unheard of for a sitting justice to weigh in on the candidates....

You’ve probably heard about it by now: Last week, the all-male Iowa Supreme Court ruled that an employer could fire an employee for being too attractive. According to the state court, such conduct “does not amount to unlawful sex discrimination” under the Iowa Civil Rights Act. What you may not realize is that the controversial decision is consistent with a 2006 employment law ruling from the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals....

Here it is again, for those who don’t follow our U.S. Supreme Court blog: Whoops. Many lawyers, or courts, after a 23-page bench-slapping from Justice Elena Kagan, would re-examine their path on a certain issue. For the Ninth Circuit, that issue is the incongruence between the elements of state statutes and federal sentencing and immigration policies. “[I]t should be clear that the Ninth Circuit’s new way of identifying ACCA predicates has no roots in our precedents....

Teng Jiao Zhou emigrated to America in 1985 and applied to become a naturalized citizen in 1993. On the surface, it looked he was doing everything right: he attended his naturalization interview, filled out the Form N-400 paperwork, and passed his naturalization exam. But behind the scenes, Zhou had been convicted for robbery soon after he emigrated. His story, as portrayed in the Ninth Circuit case United States of America v....

A federal appeals court turned back a New York agency’s attempt to slow down a controversial natural gas pipeline, which has been tied to a state government scandal in the same courthouse. In New York State Department of Environmental Conservation v. Federal Regulatory Commission, the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals said the department waited too long to challenge the pipeline over water issues. As a result, the 442-mile Millennium Pipeline will go forward....

It’s election year again and the timing is perfect for the Eighth Circuit’s recent decision on the solicitation of campaign funds. In a 7-5 en banc decision, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals held in favor of a Minnesota rule that would limit the ability of judicial candidates to personally solicit campaign funds, reports Thomson Reuters News & Insight. The Wersal v. Sexton case has been before the Eighth Circuit before, when a three-judge panel held that the Minnesota rules in question failed strict scrutiny....

Toll booth operators have pretty boring jobs, but they might get a jolt out of this federal court decision. In St. Pierre v. Retrieval-Masters Creditors Bureau, the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals said that unpaid tolls are not debts under federal debt collections law. If that sounds complicated, it comes down to this: If drivers don’t pay their tolls, debt collectors can chase them down with a vengeance. First Impression It’s a case of first impression – in all the circuits....

Exculpatory evidence held by prosecutors must, must, must be disclosed to defendants under Brady v. Maryland, a now 50-year-old case, under threat of having the whole trial thrown out. That’s exactly what happened in the Sixth Circuit’s decision on Thursday, which dealt with a Tennessee prosecutor who did not release to a drug convict, Abel Martinez Tavera, evidence of the prosecutor’s conversations with a co-defendant during plea negotiations. This exculpatory evidence caused the Sixth Circuit to remand the case for retrial, and smart prosecutors should take heed of their opinion....

A federal judge issued an injunction against publishing plans for 3D-printed guns – again. After the U.S. State Department said a company could publish the plans on the internet on Aug. 1, the judge issued a temporary restraining order at the request of 19 states and the District of Columbia. They said the plans could lead to felons and terrorists getting undetectable plastic guns. Judge Robert Lasnik then extended his emergency order, basically saying he had to protect law-abiding Americans....

Courts cannot apply the armed career criminal sentencing minimum based on juvenile offenses, the Second Circuit ruled on Monday. Just like your childhood paper route doesn’t make you a career journalist, neither can a juvenile offense be used to apply a career criminal enhancement. The case involved Jamell Sellers, who received a statutory mandatory minimum sentence of fifteen years under the Armed Career Criminal Act, in part based on his juvenile drug conviction....

This is cute. The Kansas Supreme Court actually thinks that it might have a say in gay marriage. That may seem harsh, but you probably already know about the Tenth Circuit’s holdings in the Utah and Oklahoma cases. And you probably already know that the U.S. Supreme Court declined to disturb those holdings. Gay marriage is legal in the Tenth Circuit. So why is the Kansas Supreme Court hearing oral arguments this week (which you can attend in person – arrive early!...

This was an intriguing case that received a surprisingly cursory and unanimous resolution. Cheever was chronic methamphetamine user. One day, back in 2005, he cooked and smoked meth. Coincidentally, the police showed up to handle an unrelated warrant. He shot and killed the sheriff of Greenwood County, Kansas, then fired at other officers until he was eventually detained. He was first charged with a capital offense in state court, but the charges were dropped when Kansas declared its death penalty to be unconstitutional....

The Seventh Circuit is known for delivering benchslaps, so much so that it’s acquired the nickname “Benchslappy” (hat tip to Above the Law). Well, they’re not the only slap happy bunch around, you can add us now. Let’s call it a blogslap. Why would we be handing out a blogslap? Because the Seventh Circuit website sucks leaves much to be desired, especially when compared with other circuit court websites. Poor Layout When was the last time you visited the website for the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit?...

At this point, we should all be familiar with the general proposition that citizens are well within their rights to casually flip the bird to whomever they please, whether the recipient is a police officer or fans at a sporting event. Police officers should especially be familiar with the gesture after a series of stories of citizens successfully suing after being arrested for their self-expression. John, and his wife were driving along when John was alerted to the presence of a police officer by his radar detector....

Last week, the New Jersey Supreme Court handed down a decision that could have wide ranging repercussions for employers. Faced with determining several issues surrounding a discrimination claim, and its retaliatory responses, the New Jersey Supreme Court offered some clarity to employers, and employees alike. Battaglia also complained about alleged misuse of company credit cards, and authored an anonymous letter to the HR department vaguely alleging improper conduct. Battaglia himself did not feel that the misconduct was fraudulent, but UPS investigated the claims anyway....

Office Depot has everything you need to supply your office, and that was the problem. The Federal Trade Commission announced that Office Depot and a software supplier will pay $35 million to settle claims they tricked customers into buying unneeded tech support. They offered personal computer scans that gave fake results, the FTC said. For customers, the bad news is the companies ran the scam for years. For Office Depot, getting away with it was not so easy after all....

We’ve all heard about State Sen. Wendy Davis’ filibuster to stop passage of a Texas abortion law that, among other things, required abortion-clinic doctors to have admitting privileges at a hospital less than 30 miles away. Well, Texas is not the only state to have such a statute; five other states have almost identical statutes: Mississippi, North Dakota, Tennessee, Missouri, and the one at issue in this case – Wisconsin. Other states that have similar statutes, with less stringent requirements, include Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, and Utah....