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Feds: Fmr. Mass. speaker's lawyer has conflict
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/10 10:33
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Prosecutors have asked a judge to disqualify the lawyer representing former Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi in his federal corruption case, because the lawyer also gave advice to a prosecution witness.
Court documents unsealed this week show that Steven Topazio, DiMasi's former law associate, testified that he consulted DiMasi's lawyer, Thomas Kiley, as soon as questions surfaced about Topazio's relationship with the software company whose multimillion dollar state contracts are at the center of the case against the former speaker. Prosecutors say Topazio was the conduit for monthly $4,000 payments from the company to DiMasi. Topazio is now a government witness. The Boston Globe reports that prosecutors argue that Kiley has a conflict of interest by representing "two adversely positioned clients." |
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Reputed drug kingpin Montoya to plead guilty
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/09 10:32
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Prosecutors say one of Colombia's most notorious reputed cocaine kingpins is set to plead guilty next week to U.S. drug charges.
A Miami federal judge on Friday set a change of plea hearing for Tuesday for "Don" Diego Montoya, the alleged chief of Colombia's North Valley Cartel. Montoya was extradited to face U.S. charges in December and initially pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors say in court papers that Montoya will plead guilty to charges from two separate cases: one in Miami and one in Washington, D.C. Both accuse Montoya of drug racketeering and conspiracy charges. Montoya's attorney did not immediately return a telephone call seeking comment. |
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NY court: US govt can withhold Spitzer documents
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/07 10:29
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An appeals court says the federal government does not have to release information about wiretaps from the investigation that brought down former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer.
The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals found Friday that The New York Times had not shown it has a First Amendment right to the material. A lower court had ordered the release of the FBI documents, which could reveal details about the origins and scope of the investigation. The Times said it is disappointed and is reviewing the decision. It said public access to such records would provide "a valuable check on law enforcement agencies and on the courts." The documents named other clients of the Emperor's Club VIP prostitution service. David Paterson became governor in March 2008 after Spitzer resigned in disgrace. |
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Ex-Edwards mistress at court amid campaign probe
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/06 08:31
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The former mistress of John Edwards arrived at a federal courthouse in Raleigh where a grand jury was meeting Thursday — an appearance that comes as federal investigators examine the two-time presidential candidate's finances. Rielle Hunter walked into the building through a back entrance and holding a young child. Edwards adamantly denied during his confessional interview with ABC News last summer that he had fathered a child with Hunter, and he welcomed a paternity test. His wife, Elizabeth, has said while promoting her book that she doesn't know if her husband is the father. Former Edwards aide Andrew Young, who made a similar appearance while the grand jury was sitting last month, has claimed to be the child's father. Edwards has admitted to an affair with Hunter that he says ended in 2006. That year, Edwards' political action committee paid Hunter's video production firm $100,000 for work. Then the committee paid another $14,086 on April 1, 2007. Edwards, a North Carolina senator from 1998 until his vice presidential bid in 2004, acknowledged in May that federal investigators are looking into how he used campaign funds. Grand jury proceedings are secret, and the U.S. attorney's office in Raleigh has declined to confirm or deny an investigation. Young hasn't spoken publicly since saying he was the father in 2007 and has repeatedly ignored reporter requests for interviews. |
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Va. conviction overturned in Ga. woman's death
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/05 08:32
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An ex-Navy SEAL trainee had his murder and abduction convictions overturned Tuesday after spending 13 years in prison for killing a Georgia college student who was vacationing in Virginia. A divided Virginia Court of Appeals panel granted Dustin Turner's request for a writ of actual innocence, vacating his conviction of murder and abduction with intent to defile in the 1995 death of 21-year-old Emory University student Jennifer Evans. Turner is the first person in Virginia to get a murder conviction overturned under a 2004 law that allows nonbiological evidence of innocence to be considered more than 21 days after sentencing. Turner, 34, of Bloomington, Ind., is serving an 82-year sentence for killing Evans in his parked car outside a Virginia Beach nightclub in 1995. Another trainee, Billy Joe Brown, changed his story to say that he alone killed Evans. "While Turner's conduct creates a suspicion of guilt, the evidence, viewed in the context of Brown's recantation, cannot support findings of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt," the ruling stated. The Attorney General's Office has two weeks to ask for the full court to make a decision or a month to appeal the ruling to the Virginia Supreme Court. If the attorney general does not protest the ruling, Turner would be released from Powhatan Correctional Center. Turner's attorney and mother said they were cautiously optimistic about Tuesday's ruling. "We're very pleased, and we like our chances moving forward, but at this point we're not exactly sure what forward will be," Turner's attorney David Hargett said. David Clementson, a spokesman for the attorney general's office, said only that officials there are reviewing the opinion. |
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Nevada Supreme Court to weigh OJ release on appeal
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/03 08:18
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Lawyers for O.J. Simpson and a former golfing buddy hope to persuade a Nevada Supreme Court panel to spring the two men from prison while the justices review their convictions in a gunpoint hotel room heist. Simpson and convicted co-defendant Clarence "C.J." Stewart won't be in a Las Vegas courtroom Monday for the 30-minute sessions allotted to their lawyers before a trio of justices from the state's only appellate court. Clark County District Attorney David Roger, who prosecuted the pair, will argue against release. The justices won't make an immediate decision, but it is rare for the state high court to hear oral arguments on bond and even more rare to grant release. Simpson, 62, is serving nine to 33 years for kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon in the September 2007 confrontation with two sports memorabilia dealers in a Las Vegas casino hotel room. Stewart, 55, is serving 7 1/2 to 27 years. Simpson lawyer Yale Galanter has said Simpson won't flee if he's released, poses no danger to the community and will comply with any conditions the high court sets. "C.J. is hopeful the court will take a look at the record and see that there are multiple issues on appeal that should get him a new trial," said Stewart's lawyer, Brent Bryson. Bryson argues that Stewart, a former mortgage broker from North Las Vegas, should have been tried separately from Simpson, an NFL Hall-of-Famer, television star and celebrity criminal defendant acquitted in the 1994 slaying of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman, in Los Angeles. Galanter and Bryson said a favorable ruling from the court would signal how justices feel about their overall appeals, which are unlikely to be decided for at least a year. |
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Judge declines to delay trial in Chandra Levy case
Breaking Legal News |
2009/08/03 01:24
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A judge has refused to push back the trial for the man accused of sexually assaulting and killing a Washington intern. At a hearing Friday, prosecutors told D.C. Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Alprin that they have provided more than 5,000 pages of evidence to attorneys for Ingmar Guandique (gwan-DEE'-kay.) Chandra Levy had just completed a U.S. Bureau of Prisons internship when she disappeared in 2001 after leaving her apartment in jogging clothes. Her remains were found a year later in a Washington park. Defense attorneys say they need to interview at least 10 other possible suspects. They asked to push back the January trial date, but Alprin refused. Guandique's lawyers have said the case against him is flawed. He was charged in the killing earlier this year. |
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