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Federal Judge in Oregon Rules Limiting Inmates' Mail to Postcards Unconstitutional

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Photo Credit: Tim Pearce, Los GatosA federal judge in Oregon has determined limiting inmates’ mail to only postcards is unconstitutional, throwing into question the legality of a practice used for years in jails across the country.

For two years, the Columbia County Jail north of Portland restricted inmates’ personal mail to the sending and receiving of postcards until U.S. District Court Judge Michael Simon issued an injunction that stopped the practice in May 2012.

In a ruling made public Thursday, Simon said the practice by the St. Helens jail is unconstitutional because it violates the First Amendment rights of inmates, the people who write to them, and the plaintiff, a monthly national law journal published by the Vermont-based Human Rights Defense Center.

It’s the first legal precedent opponents can use in their opposition to a policy that stretches from Florida to the Arizona desert, where Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is credited with first implementing it in 2007.

The primary reasons cited for the postcard-only mail policy are that it prevents contraband from entering the jail and it saves time for increasingly cash-strapped sheriff’s offices.

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Oregon Juror Jailed for Texting During Trial

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Photo Credit: Joi

A judge in Oregon noticed an unexpected glow on a juror’s chest while the courtroom lights were dimmed during video evidence in an armed-robbery trial.

The juror, it seemed, was texting.

Marion County Circuit Judge Dennis Graves cleared the courtroom and excused all jurors except 26-year-old Benjamin Kohler…

Graves held Kohler in contempt, and Kohler spent most of Tuesday and Wednesday in the county jail. He was released Wednesday night.

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Judge: Lesbians' Right to Sleep Together Trumps Bed and Breakfast Owner's Religious Rights

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Photo Credit: AP

The Hawaii First Circuit Court judge ruled in favor of a Southern California couple who sued Aloha Bed & Breakfast for discrimination in 2011, Lambda Legal announced Monday. In 2007, Diane Cervelli and Taeko Bufford tried to book a room at the bed and breakfast because it’s in Hawaii Kai, the same east Honolulu neighborhood where the friend they were visiting lived.

When Cervelli specified they would need one bed, the owner asked if they were lesbians. Cervelli responded truthfully and the owner said she was uncomfortable having lesbians in her house because of her religious views, the lawsuit said.

The bed and breakfast violated the state public accommodations law and is ordered to stop discriminating against same-sex couples, according to the ruling dated April 11.

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Federal Judge Orders that Morning After Pill Be Given to Young Girls Without a Prescription or Parental Consent

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A federal judge in Brooklyn, New York, has ordered the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to make the morning-after birth control pill available to people of any age without a prescription.

The order overturned a 2011 decision by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to require a prescription for girls under 17.

The FDA said it couldn’t comment on an ongoing legal matter. But the U.S. Justice Department indicated an appeal of the ruling was under consideration. “The Department of Justice is reviewing the appellate options and expects to act promptly,” department spokeswoman Allison Price said.

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommended last year that oral contraceptives be sold over the counter in an effort to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies in the United States. Opponents of prescription requirements say prescriptions can delay access to the drug.

In 2011, Teva Women’s Health Inc., maker of Plan B One-Step, had asked the FDA to make the drug available without prescription to all sexually active girls and women. Sebelius overruled the FDA’s recommendation, saying, “I do not believe enough data were presented to support the application.”

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Judge: Catholic Company Doesn’t Have to Follow Obama HHS Mandate

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Photo Credit: LifeNews

A federal judge in Minnesota has given a Catholic-owned and operated business a reprieve from the onerous provisions of the Obamacare HHS mandate. The mandate compels companies to pay for birth control and drugs for their employees that may cause abortions.

U.S. District Court Judge John R. Tunheim issued a ruling yesterday for an injunction against complying with the mandate for American Manufacturing Company. The attorney for the client, Thomas Mathews, told a news outlet, “He was conflicted with owning a company that would provide the types of insurance that he finds morally offensive and objectionable.”

More from the report:

In working with its current insurance company, Medica, American Manufacturing was able to cut the birth control coverage from an existing group health insurance plan…

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Man Who Pointed Laser At Aircraft Lands 30-Month Prison Sentence

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Photo Credit: Adnan Yahya

A judge in California has sent a strong message to anyone who thinks that pointing lasers at aircraft is just harmless fun ‘n’ games.

U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson sentenced a 19-year-old man on Monday to 30 months in federal prison for shining a laser pointer at a plane and police helicopter, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted the case.

Adam Gardenhire deliberately pointed the commercial grade green laser at a private Cessna Citation that was landing at the Burbank Bob Hope Airport in California on March 29, 2012.

Gardenhire, of North Hollywood, California, was arrested and pleaded guilty in the incident as part of an agreement with prosecutors in October.

The pilot of the corporate jet was hit in the eye multiple times and had vision problems through the next day, court documents say.

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Judge: Feds Can’t Make Domino’s Founder Offer Birth Control

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

A federal judge has blocked the Obama administration from requiring Domino’s Pizza founder Tom Monaghan to provide mandatory contraception coverage to his employees under the federal health care law.

The devout Roman Catholic says he considers contraception “gravely immoral” practice. His lawsuit also lists as a plaintiff his Domino’s Farms, an office park outside Ann Arbor.

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Zatkoff granted a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the law against Monaghan and Domino’s Farms.

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Colorado ‘Dark Knight Rises’ Shooting Rampage: Judge Approves ‘Truth Serum’

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truth serum

Photo Credit: Sky News

James Holmes, 25, who is accused of killing twelve people and injuring 70 others during a shooting rampage at a Batman movie premiere, is expected to enter a plea today.

Defence lawyers have indicated that the former neuroscience graduate might plead not guilty by reason of insanity. If he does, the judge has ruled, he might have to submit to a “narco analytic interview” – including the use of what some have dubbed a “truth serum” – as part of the evaluation of his mental state.

A narcoanalytic interview is a decades-old process in which patients are given drugs to lower their inhibition. The judge said Holmes could also be given a lie detector test as part of the evaluation.

Holmes will face 166 counts during an arraignment hearing in connection with the shooting spree at a cinema in Aurora, Colorado, last July. Last week that same judge rejected defence claims that the rules relating to an insanity plea were unconstitutional.

Holmes was arrested immediately after the shootings at a midnight showing of ‘The Dark Night Rises’. A preliminary hearing in January was presented with harrowing evidence of the scene inside the cinema in the aftermath of the shooting and the desperate attempts to save lives.

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Judge Halts New York City Ban on Large Sugary Drinks

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

New York City’s planned ban on the sale of large sugary drinks won’t go into effect Tuesday after a state judge blocked the restrictions, calling them “arbitrary and capricious.”

“The court finds that the regulation … is laden with exceptions based on economic and political concerns,” Justice Milton Tingling wrote. Mayor Michael Bloomberg quickly vowed to appeal the decision, countering that the city’s health department has the legal authority to use the ban to fight an obesity epidemic.

“We believe that the judge’s decision was clearly in error and that we will prevail on appeal,” Bloomberg told reporters.

Scheduled to begin at midnight, the law would have restricted the sale of sugary drinks to no more than 16 ounces in restaurants, fast-food eateries, movie theaters and stadiums. But the law would have exempted a variety of retailers, including 7-Eleven, seller of the iconic “Big Gulp” drinks, because it is regulated by the state, not the city.

“The effect would be a person is unable to buy a drink larger than 16 ounces at one establishment but may be able to buy it at another establishment that may be located right next door,” Tingling wrote.

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Perverse Judge Recieves 60-Day Suspension

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Will County Judge Joseph Polito, leaves the Will County Court House Wednesday afternoon, April11, 2012. | Scott Stewart~Sun-TimesA porn-addicted judge who used his courthouse computer to view hard-core sex websites has been suspended without pay for 60 days.

The Illinois Courts Commission ruled Friday that Will County Judge Joseph Polito must serve the two-month ban for what it called his “highly inappropriate behavior.”

The 69-year-old finally confessed a lifelong addiction to porn in November, seven months after the Chicago Sun-Times revealed he regularly looked at a variety of websites during work hours in 2010 and 2011.

In a written ruling, the commission accepted that Polito was addicted to porn, noting that “persons may become addicted to pornography as well as to alcohol or drugs.”

It found that Polito’s workplace porn habit hadn’t affected the quality of his work, but added “in an era of declining judicial resources, many judges carry heavy caseloads, and Judge Polito’s conduct was an inexcusable waste of judicial time that should have been spent on available judicial duties.”

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