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High court to hear environmental case from Idaho
Court Line News |
2012/01/02 15:19
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Mike Sackett remembers what he thought when he saw the eye-popping fines of more than $30,000 a day that the Environmental Protection Agency was threatening to impose on him over a piece of Idaho property worth less than one day's penalty.
If they do this to us, we're going to lose everything we have, Sackett said.
The EPA said that Sackett and his wife, Chantell, illegally filled in most of their 0.63-acre lot with dirt and rocks in preparation for building a home. The agency said the property is a wetlands that cannot be disturbed without a permit. The Sacketts had none.
They say they considered walking away from the property, near scenic Priest Lake, and a difficult fight with the federal government. Instead, they went to court and now the Supreme Court is hearing their case, with implications well beyond their property.
The justices are considering how and when people can challenge the kind of order the Sacketts got. The EPA issues nearly 3,000 administrative compliance orders a year that call on alleged violators of environmental laws to stop what they're doing and repair the harm they've caused.
Major business groups, homebuilders, road builders and agricultural interests all have joined the Sacketts in urging the court to make it easier to contest EPA compliance orders issued under several environmental laws. |
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Pa.'s rhyming justice pens insurance fraud opinion
Court Line News |
2011/12/22 11:05
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A state Supreme Court justice known for opinions written in rhyme has done it again, producing six pages of verse Thursday in the case of whether the maker of a forged check also had committed insurance fraud.
Justice J. Michael Eakin, writing for a 4-2 majority, concluded in six-line stanzas that a man's attempt to deposit a forged check appearing to be from State Farm didn't constitute insurance fraud.
Sentenced on the other crimes, he surely won't go free, but we find he can't be guilty of this final felony, Eakin wrote. Convictions for the forgery and theft are approbated -- the sentence for insurance fraud, however, is vacated. The case must be remanded for resentencing, we find, so the trial judge may impose the result he originally had in mind.
A dissenting three-page opinion by Justice Thomas G. Saylor didn't rhyme.
Eakin was first elected to the high court in 2001 after earning a reputation as the rhyming judge by issuing some opinions entirely in verse while sitting on an intermediate state appellate court in the late 1990s. Two former state Supreme Court justices, Stephen A. Zappala and the late Ralph J. Cappy, had expressed concern in the past that the practice could reflect poorly on the court. |
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Court rejects appeal in girlfriend burning case
Court Line News |
2011/12/15 11:36
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The Mississippi Court of Appeals has rejected an appeal from a man sentenced to life in prison for dousing his girlfriend with gasoline and setting her on fire.
The woman was injured, but survived. Clyde Campbell was convicted of aggravated assault and sentenced on July 20, 1990. He was sentenced as a habitual offender. Campbell had pleaded guilty in 1974 to assault and battery after shooting a Natchez police officer. Court records said the officer lost an eye and later died as an indirect result of the injuries.
Campbell served one-year of a five years sentence. He was later convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm.
The Appeals Court ruled Tuesday that the Supreme Court in1998 rejected Campbell's motion for post-conviction relief and rejected his new appeal. |
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Appeals court allows Albany hospital merger
Court Line News |
2011/12/10 11:11
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A federal appeals court has ruled that Albany's Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital can buy Palmyra Medical Center.
The Albany Herald reports that the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court decision that said the sale was not subject to federal antitrust oversight.
The Federal Trade Commission had appealed the lower court ruling. The commission argued that Phoebe Putney and Hospital Corporation of America, Palmyra's parent company, were using the Hospital Authority of Albany-Dougherty County to conceal their actions from federal scrutiny.
Phoebe Putney CEO Joel Wernick said Friday he's eager to move forward with the consolidation of the two hospitals.
The FTC said in a statement Friday that it is concerned the deal will raise health care costs in Albany and said it is considering its options. |
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Appeals court blocks cement plant pollution rule
Court Line News |
2011/12/08 13:17
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A federal appeals court is blocking an Environmental Protection Agency rule designed to reduce pollution at cement plants.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington agreed with cement makers that the EPA did not properly draft the rule governing storage of material used in the manufacturing process. The judges ordered the agency to rewrite the 2010 regulation and urged them to do so quickly.
Other rules affecting pollutants in the cement making process were left in place by the judges.
Congress also had been considering a challenge to the rule. More than 100 lawmakers with plants in their districts pushed the House to pass a bill Oct. 6 that would have forced the EPA to rewrite the measure and give manufacturers years to comply. |
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Political aide to former Md. governor found guilty
Court Line News |
2011/12/06 09:21
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A political aide to former Maryland Gov. Robert Ehrlich was convicted Tuesday of conspiring to use election-day robocalls in an effort to suppress black voter turnout during the 2010 gubernatorial election.
Paul Schurick was found guilty of all four counts he faced, including conspiracy to influence or attempt to influence a voter's decision whether to go to the polls through the use of fraud and conspiracy to publish campaign material without an authority line. A stoic Schurick comforted his wife in the courtroom after the Baltimore jury's verdict was read, but declined to comment.
His attorney, A. Dwight Pettit, said they will appeal.
Prosecutors argued the calls that went out on the evening of Election Day to about 110,000 voters in Baltimore city and Prince George's County — two jurisdictions with high percentages of black voters — were an effort by the Republican campaign to reduce the number of black Democrats voting in heavily Democratic Maryland. |
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