Bates' comments echoed similar sentiments expressed by the Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive] last year when it upheld [opinion, PDF; JURIST report] a controversial provision of the VRA in Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District Number One v. Holder [Cornell LII backgrounder]. In that most recent challenge to the VRA, the court voted 8-1 in favor of permitting the appellant municipality to "bail out" from the Section 5 pre-clearance requirement if it can establish a history of compliance with the VRA, but declined to rule on the constitutionality of the 25-year extension of the act. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice Roberts opined that "things have changed in the South," observing that "[b]latantly discriminatory evasions of federal decrees are rare." The plaintiff was a municipal utility district in Texas that wanted to be exempted from the requirement and was challenging the most recent extension generally. At their enactment in 1965, the requirements were only supposed to be in place for five years. Section 5 has since been extended several times.

[I]t is my view and advice that abandoning the control orders system now would have a damaging effect on national security. Of course, on their own control orders are not a failsafe or foolproof mechanism for full disruption of suspected terrorists. Further, because they are a resource-intensive tool for all involved in their management, self-evidently they cannot be used to manage the risk posed by all non-prosecutable suspected terrorists against whom there is robust intelligence.

In January, UK Home Secretary Theresa May [official profile] announced proposed changes [press release; JURIST report] to Britain's anti-terrorism policies, including the controversial use of control orders. Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] issued a report [text, PDF; JURIST report] in August calling for an end to the use of control orders against terrorism suspects, characterizing the orders as legal sanctions without trial. A month prior, the UK Court of Appeal [official website] ruled [judgment, text; JURIST report] that two terrorism suspects could sue the government for damages over wrongfully imposed control orders. In June, the UK Supreme Court ruled [JURIST report] that a control order requiring an anonymous appellant to live 150 miles from his family and operate under a 16-hour curfew violated his rights under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) [text]. In September 2009, then-Home Secretary Alan Johnson [BBC profile] said the government would undertake a review [JURIST report] of the system. The UK Law Lords ruled in October 2007 that the government may continue to impose control orders [JURIST report] on terror suspects in lieu of detention, but said that some elements of the orders violate human rights. Control orders allow the British government to conduct surveillance and impose house arrest on suspects where there does not exist enough evidence to prosecute. The orders can also be used to forbid the use of mobile phones and the Internet.

Kenya ratified its new constitution [JURIST report] in August, as part of a reform movement aimed at curbing vast presidential powers. Kenya's new constitution includes numerous checks on presidential authority, among which are the creation of a supreme court and senate. The new constitution was approved by popular referendum, which took place amid concerns that high turnout and heated debate over the referendum could cause a repeat of the violence seen during the country's presidential election [JURIST reports] in 2007. The government is now expected to start implementing the new constitution, which could take as long as five years. This document has been received as one of the most significant events in Kenya since its independence.

At its discretion, the Office of the Attorney General may use the Fund to cover expenses it incurs in the course of investigating and prosecuting misconduct relating to mortgage origination, mortgage servicing, and foreclosures, and for consumer education regarding mortgage issues...The Office of the Attorney General, at its discretion, may also use these funds to develop and implement programs to help neighborhoods impacted by foreclosure or mortgage default rates.

The decision is among several lawsuits relating to the sub-prime mortgage crisis. Last month, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court [official website] issued a decision [text, PDF; JURIST report] against banks in two foreclosure cases that could have important implications on similar cases both inside and outside of the state. In December Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard [official profile] filed a lawsuit [JURIST report] against Bank of America (BOA) [corporate website] for misleading customers in mortgage modification and foreclosure practices. Specifically, the complaint [complaint, PDF] alleged that BOA violated a 2009 consent agreement, in which it agreed to develop and implement loan modification programs, by continuing to engage in widespread consumer fraud by misrepresenting to Arizona customers whether they were eligible for modifications of their mortgage loans. Additionally, in July 2010, The US Securities and Exchange Commission [government website] announced [JURIST report] that it charged Citigroup Inc. [official website] with misleading investors about the company's exposure to sub-prime mortgage-related assets and settled with the company [press release] for $75 million.

The Sixth Circuit in June upheld an injunction against similar displays [JURIST report] in two Kentucky courthouses, finding that they represented simply another strategy "in a long line of attempts" to comply with the Constitution for litigation purposes and did not "minimize the residue of religious purpose." A month earlier, the same court denied an en banc rehearing in another case [opinion, PDF] involving the display of the Ten Commandments in a Grayson County, Kentucky, courthouse. The court found the display to be constitutional because it presented a valid secular purpose from the outset. In a 2005 decision, the Sixth Circuit ruled in favor of a Ten Commandments display [JURIST report] in a Mercer County, Kentucky, courthouse. A 2005 Supreme Court decision [JURIST report] prohibiting an earlier attempt at a similar display in Kentucky prompted lawmakers to propose a constitutional amendment [JURIST report] to overturn it. On the same day it issued that ruling, the Supreme Court ruled that a six-foot-tall display of the Ten Commandments [JURIST report] on the grounds of the Texas state capitol was constitutionally acceptable because it had a secular purpose.

[JURIST] Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II [official profile] announced [press release] Thursday that he will file a petition for certiorari before judgment with the US Supreme Court [official website; JURIST news archive], asking the court to hear an appeal in the case of Commonwealth v. Sebelius [materials], the Commonwealth of Virginia's challenge to the recently enacted health care reform law [HR 3590 text; JURIST news archive]. In December, a judge for the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia [official website] ruled [opinion, PDF; JURIST report] that the minimum coverage mandate provision of the law is unconstitutional. He left the rest of the law intact, holding that the coverage mandate was severable. Surpeme Court Rule 11 [text] allows the court to exercise direct discretionary appellate jurisdiction over cases with exceptionally far-reaching or urgent public policy implications. According to Cuccinelli, "a case cannot have public policy implications that are more important" than those at stake in the case:

Given the uncertainty caused by the divergent rulings of the various district courts on the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act [PPACA], we feel that it is necessary to seek resolution of this issue as quickly as possible. Currently, state governments and private businesses are being forced to expend enormous amounts of resources to prepare to implement a law that, in the end, may be declared unconstitutional. ... We did not make this decision lightly. Given his unique responsibilities to fund and implement PPACA as Governor of Virginia, Governor McDonnell is particularly concerned about the possibility of wasting precious and strained taxpayer dollars preparing for a law that may well be struck down.

There are currently cases in 28 states challenging the provisions of the PPACA. Earlier this week, a judge for the US District Court for the Northern District of Florida [official website] struck down [opinion, PDF; JURIST report] the law as an unconstitutional overreaching of Congress' Commerce Clause [Cornell II backgrounder] power. The entire law was voided in that case, as the judge there found the mandate to be unserverable. That decision is expected to be appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit [official website]. Earlier in January, a judge for the US District Court for the Western District of Virginia [official website] dismissed [JURIST report] a lawsuit challenging a provision of the health care reform law. In October, a federal judge in Michigan ruled [JURIST report] that the law is constitutional under the Commerce Clause as it addresses the economic effects of health care decisions, and that it does not represent an unconstitutional direct tax.

On Tuesday, Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood [official website] asked the same court to order the GCCF to fulfill its legal obligations to aid victims of the spill and to remedy inadequate claims mechanisms [JURIST report]. The GCCF began processing claims in August following the completion of negotiations [JURIST reports] between BP and the US Department of Justice [official website]. Alabama Attorney General Troy King [official website] filed a lawsuit [JURIST report] in August against BP for damages to the state's coast and economy, claiming that the oil giant has failed in its efforts to accept responsibility for the oil spill. In July, a class action lawsuit [JURIST report] was filed against the company in a Louisiana state court alleging that its negligent actions led to the spill and that BP was further negligent in its oversight of the cleanup effort, resulting in volunteers falling ill due to inadequate protective equipment. In June, two lawsuits were filed against BP [JURIST report] alleging violations of the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) [18 USC § 1961 et seq.] statute. The lawsuits allege that BP purposefully defrauded the American public in order to increase company profits.

The Council plans to submit to you expert legal analysis in connection with specific cases causing public outcry or defining trend of judicial practice. ... [M]aterials will be presented to Council shortly in connection with the case of well-known business lawyer Magnitsky. A similar expert analysis is being prepared by the Council on the relatively recent verdict in the case of Khodorkovsky and Lebedev. It is clear that expert legal analysis of such processes may not have direct legal consequences. But it's is certainly intended that the state authorities take necessary response action, if the legal review of these processes are inconsistent with the law.

In January, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev's lawyers filed an appeal [JURIST report] challenging their six-year extended sentences for embezzlement and fraud. Unless the appeal succeeds, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev are expected to remain imprisoned through 2017 after being convicted in December and sentenced [JURIST reports] in the Khamovinchesky District Court [official website, in Russian] on charges connected with his embezzlement of more than $27 billion from Yukos oil. Prior to this conviction, Khodorkovsky and Lebedev were already serving eight-year prison sentences for fraud and tax evasion [JURIST report]. Magnitsky was arrested after implicating Russian police [WP report] in a multimillion-dollar embezzlement scandal, while working as outside counsel for the London-based investment fund Hermitage Capital Management [corporate website]. Prior to his death, Magnitsky was held in prison for 358 days with little to no access to legal representation, his family or medical professionals. It is suspected that torture played a part in his death. In January, Magnitsky's former colleague William Browder announced that a group of independent UN human rights experts will investigate [JURIST report] the well-known lawyer's 2009 prison death [JURIST report].

The DOJ's HRSP handles cases, including Kalymon's, aimed at denaturalizing or deporting former Nazis and other human rights violators who participated in wartime persecutions. Last May, the Philadelphia Immigration Court [official website] ordered the deportation [JURIST report] of former SS guard Anton Geiser to Austria for serving as an armed guard at the Sachsenhausen and the Buchenwald concentration camps during World War II. The court found that Geiser is removable under the 1978 Holtzman Amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Act [text] because a visa may not be granted to anyone who was involved in persecutions based on race, religion, or national origin. In 2008, the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit revoked [JURIST report] Geiser's US citizenship because he had obtained it illegally. In May 2009, the DOJ succeeding in deporting [JURIST report] accused Nazi war criminal John Demjanjuk [NNDB profile; JURIST news archive] to Germany to face trial. Earlier that year, German prosecutors charged Demjanjuk with 27,900 accessory counts stemming from his alleged involvement as a guard at the Sobibor [Death Camps backgrounder] concentration camp where more than 260,000 people were executed in gas chambers.