This was originally published on the Guardian America site.

Georgia judge jails Muslim woman for wearing headscarf to court
• Two women barred from entering courtroom in recent days
• Sabreen Abdulrahmaan sentenced to 10 days in jail

by Daniel Nasaw in Washington
Wednesday 17 December 2008 21.15 GMT

Lisa Valentine was arrested after a Georgia judge charged her with contempt of court after refusing to take off her headscarf. Photograph: John Amis/AP

A city judge in Georgia has in the past eight days barred two Muslim women wearing Islamic headscarves from entering his courtroom, jailing one, and prompting an inquiry from the civil rights office at the US department of justice.

Judge Keith Rollins of Douglasville, Georgia, yesterday ordered Lisa Valentine, 41, to jail after she refused to remove her scarf before entering the courtroom, citing rules governing appropriate dress. Last week, Sabreen Abdulrahmaan was forced to leave Rollins's court before her son's probation hearing because she would not remove her scarf.

"It's a religious right," Valentine said. "It's our constitutional right that we can have our religious practices, no matter if it's a courtroom or not. He's supposed to be handing out justice, not taking away civil rights."

Valentine said she sought to accompany her nephew to a traffic hearing yesterday but was told by a court security officer that she could not enter the courtroom with her headscarf on. She said she refused to remove it and turned to leave, saying, "This is bullshit".

Security officers handcuffed her and brought her before Rollins, who sentenced her to 10 days in jail when she declined to defend her actions at the security checkpoint, her husband Omar Hall said. Valentine, an insurance underwriter, was forced to take off the scarf and don an orange jumpsuit, chained and put aboard a jail bus with men and women.

"It felt like I was naked, because that's how I feel without my hijab," Valentine said. "You could have taken off my clothes and it would have felt the same way."

Her husband phoned an Islamic civil rights organisation and sought an attorney, and she was released without explanation after about seven hours.

"Judge Keith Rollins has inexplicably, blatantly usurped our innate human rights as American citizens," Hall said.

Douglasville police told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that Valentine was jailed for violating a policy barring headgear in the court. Neither court officials nor the police department returned calls seeking comment. Reached by the Associated Press, Rollins declined to comment on Valentine's case.

"It's an issue of religious freedom, it's an issue of access to the American legal system," said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Washington-based Islamic civil rights advocacy group, which advised Valentine and Hall on the case. "There are all kinds of implications that you can take form this troubling incident."

The US department of justice is reviewing the matter, according to spokesman Jamie Hais. Hooper said that Eric Treene, special council for religious discrimination at the justice department's civil rights division, was examining the case.

Valentine's case was Rollins's second dispute with a hijab-clad woman in a week. Last week, Abdulrahmaan, a 55-year-old community organiser, went to Douglasville municipal court to observe her son's probation hearing. Security officers outside the courtroom initially denied her entry, saying Rollins does not allow scarves in the courtroom. She made it into the courtroom, but once inside a bailiff motioned for her to remove her scarf. She told him she was a Muslim, but then left when he started to approach her.

"There are a lot of prejudices here," Abdulrahmaan said. News of Valentine's case, "just sent my blood pressure all the way up".

Hooper of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said the matter does not merely affect Muslims.

"What if you're a Jewish man wearing a skull cap? What if you're a Catholic nun wearing a habit?" Hooper asked. "All would be denied access to this judge's courtroom. We need to know what's going here and why this has apparently been going on for so long."

How Scores of Black Men Were Tortured Into Giving False Confessions by Chicago Police

By Jessica Pupovac, AlterNet
Posted on July 23, 2008, Printed on July 24, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/92374/

Michael Tillman was 20, with a 3-year-old daughter and an infant son, when he was brought into the Area 2 police station on Chicago's South Side for questioning. His mother, Jean Tillman, says that although he had gotten into some trouble with the law as a youngster, he had been on the straight-and-narrow, working as a janitor and paying his bills, since he and his girlfriend had their first child. That was July 22, 1986.

He hasn't been home since.

Tillman is one of at least 24 African-American men that the People's Law Office in Chicago claims are still serving sentences for crimes they say they confessed to only after enduring hours of torture at the hands of Chicago police officers under Commander Jon Burge between 1972 and 1992. Although 10 of Burge's victims have been pardoned or given new trials after their illegally obtained confessions were exposed, the vast majority of the 100-plus cases have yet to be reviewed by the state of Illinois. Those men have either served out their sentences, died in custody or, like Tillman, continue to live their lives behind bars, hoping that one day they will have a fair trial.

According to Tillman's 1986 trial testimony, when he arrived at the Area 2 police station in the predawn hours of July 21, 1986, Detectives Ronald Boffo and Peter Dignan took him to a second-floor interrogation room and pressed him for information about the murder of 42-year-old Betty Howard, whose body was found the day prior in the apartment building Tillman oversaw. When he told the detectives that he knew nothing about the murder, he says that Boffo and Dignan, along with three other officers, became abusive. Without ever reading him his Miranda rights, he says they handcuffed him to the wall, hit him in the face and punched him in the stomach until he vomited blood. During the course of what appeared to be three days, rotating pairs of officers brought him to the railroad tracks behind the station and held a gun to his head, suffocated him repeatedly with thick plastic bags, poured soda up his nose and forced him into Dumpsters outside of the apartment building, ordering him to search through the rubbish for a murder weapon until, according to Detective John Yucaitis, Tillman confessed to the crime.

According to Tillman's mother, she, her husband and an attorney they called for counsel were all denied access to her son during his three days of interrogation.

A Brutal Crime and a Corrupt Investigation

According to the police investigation, Howard and her 2-year-old son were on their way to meet relatives for a birthday celebration when they were forced into a vacant apartment on the seventh floor of the South Side building. The boy was locked in the bathroom while his mother was bound to a radiator, raped, stabbed and killed with one bullet to the head. Her car and other valuables were stolen. Her son was found days later by detectives. He was still in the bathroom.

Three weeks after Tillman's arrest, police found two men driving Howard's stolen car, with the knife used to stab her still in the vehicle. Those men led the officers to 27-year-old Clarence Trotter, who had Howard's camera and stereo in his apartment. His fingerprints were found on a soda can at the murder scene, and evidence linked him to the gun used in her murder.

Police found no physical evidence tying Tillman to the scene, or to Trotter. Years later, in 1999, Trotter wrote a letter to People's Law Office attorney Flint Taylor. While he did not admit guilt in that letter, he did write that Tillman was "beat … into confessing a crime (he) did not commit."

Tillman's mother says that, given the evidence found linking Trotter to the crime, and the lack of physical evidence implicating her son, she thought for sure the judge would let him go. "We thought he was going to get out," she said. "Even his lawyer said that would probably happen. … But it wasn't that way."

Michael Tillman's lawyer presented physical evidence of abuse in court, including the blue jeans that Tillman wore during his interrogation, which hadn't been washed since and were still stained with blood. He also showed scars on his wrists from where the handcuffs pulled while he was being beaten. Despite this, and despite the fact that there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime scene, the jury did not believe him. On Dec. 18, 1986, Michael Tillman was found guilty of murder, aggravated criminal sexual assault, and aggravated kidnapping. He was sentenced to life in prison. The Chicago Tribune wrote the next day that "Tillman, 20, put his hand over his face and shook his head when he was found guilty."

Weeks later, after Tillman's case file was sealed, Trotter was also given a life sentence in a separate trial.

Tillman appealed the decision in 1999 and lost. The judge wrote in his decision that "a nexus was never established between defendant and either Trotter or the two individuals apprehended in possession of the victim's car." He also wrote that, even though the corroborating evidence may only be circumstantial, it "need only tend to confirm and inspire belief in the confession." "The accused's identity need not be corroborated by evidence apart from his own extrajudicial statements," he wrote. "(His) self-described involvement to police is sufficient to establish his participation in the victim's attack."

His mother says that they had a series of public defenders and lawyers they couldn't afford, and that he no longer has legal representation.

A Conspiracy of Silence

Tillman's story is not unique, nor is it particularly shocking.

By 1999, it was "common knowledge," according to U.S. District Judge Milton Shadur, "that in the early to mid-1980s, (Jon Burge) and many officers working under him regularly engaged in the physical abuse and torture of prisoners to extract confessions. Both internal police accounts and numerous lawsuits and appeals brought by suspects alleging such abuse substantiate that those beatings and other means of torture occurred as an established practice, not just on an isolated basis."

The massive scandal began to unravel in 1989, when convicted cop killer Andrew Wilson launched a very public federal civil rights suit against the Chicago Police Department. Seven years before, Wilson had been beaten, shocked in the testicles and burned on the face, chest and thigh by Area 2 detectives working under Burge. What caught the eye of Chief Medical Examiner of Cermak Medical Services John Raba, however, were the small markings on his ears that he couldn't explain away. Wilson told him the markings were from alligator clips used to electrocute him, and Raba believed him. He notified then-Superintendent of Police Richard Brzeczek, who wrote a letter to then-State's Attorney Richard M. Daley, "seeking direction" on how to proceed. Daley, who is now Chicago's mayor, never responded.

Wilson was later granted a new trial and sentenced to natural life, without his illegally obtained confession. His case, however, set off a chain of events that would eventually expose the widespread, systematic use of torture within certain South Side units of the Chicago Police Department.

In 1990, a CPD Office of Professional Standards investigation, prompted by Wilson's story and the physical evidence backing it up, found that abuse at Areas 2 and 3 "was not limited to the usual beatings, but went into such esoteric areas as psychological techniques and planned torture." "Particular command members were aware of the systematic abuse and perpetuated it, either by actively participating in some or failing to take any action to bring it to an end," the report concluded. Subsequent OPS investigations found Detectives John Byrne, Peter Dignan and John Yucaitis, all involved in Michael Tillman's interrogation, to be "players" repeatedly named as abusers in Area 2 and 3 torture allegations.

During Wilson's civil trial, his attorneys at the People's Law Office began receiving anonymous letters tipping them off to other victims of police torture. Eventually, PLO lawyers compiled testimony in 107 Burge-connected torture cases, Tillman's among them.

Nevertheless, almost 20 years later, not a single police officer has been made to face charges in the massive scandal. They were all let off the hook, first by a succession of judges and legal professionals who looked the other way, and later by a statute of limitations that expired before the Illinois state attorney considered filing charges. According to Taylor, there is no state or federal law criminalizing torture by law enforcement officers. While possible offenses for torture can include attempted murder, aggravated battery, battery, assault, assault with a dangerous weapon or hate crimes, the statute on these crimes is generally five years for federal prosecution and three years in the state of Illinois.

In fact, the only officer who has thus far suffered any consequence for his actions has been Burge himself -- and his could hardly be called punishment. In 1993, the Police Board removed him from his command and forced him into early retirement. He currently lives in Apollo Beach, Fla., on a $3,400-a-month pension, where he is known to enjoy rides on his boat, the Vigilante. Other officers involved have since advanced in the ranks, as have the assistant state's attorneys who prosecuted the cases, at times burying or ignoring clear evidence of how the confessions were obtained.

Many of the co-conspirators who helped conceal the abuse are today Chicago's political elite. They include prominent Cook County and Illinois Appellate Court judges (including one of the prosecutors in Tillman's case), Illinois State's Attorney Richard Devine and Mayor Richard M. Daley, who was the state's attorney when many of the cases were tried and would have been responsible for bringing official charges against the abusive officers, but chose instead to look the other way. Devine was Daley's first assistant when he served as a "tough-on-crime" state's attorney from 1980 to 1989, a period that saw 55 allegations of confessions elicited through torture. He later went into private practice (before assuming his current role of state's attorney), where he was paid more than $1 million by the City of Chicago for defending Burge and the other officers involved in Wilson's civil suit. He then represented Burge in proceedings before the Police Board. Later, as state's attorney of Cook County, Devine discouraged investigations of Area 2 torture and continued to uphold confessions obtained by that means. Because of this conflict of interest, in 2002, at the request of a coalition of civil rights attorneys and activists, Circuit Judge Paul Biebel transferred jurisdiction over all torture-related cases to Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan. They have sat idle on her desk ever since.

The 10 cases that have been resolved have been done in spite of, rather than with the help of, Madigan or Devine.

Gov. George Ryan: "The Category of Horrors Was Hard to Believe"

In 2003, after years of campaigning by Chicago-area police accountability activists, then-Gov. George Ryan pardoned four Burge victims -- Madison Hobley, Aaron Patterson, Stanley Howard and Leroy Orange -- who at the time were on death row. "The category of horrors was hard to believe," Ryan said. "If I hadn't reviewed the cases myself, I wouldn't believe it. We have evidence from four men, who did not know each other, all getting beaten and tortured and convicted on the basis of the confessions they allegedly provided. They are perfect examples of what is so terribly broken about our system."

Because of the mounting criticism of the Cook County justice system, because the four men were on death row, and because their attorneys had filed for clemency, Hobley, Patterson, Howard and Orange were pardoned. But dozens of others stayed behind, out of the limelight. "These weren't death penalty cases, so they're not nearly as sexy," explained attorney Scott Schutte, who recently represented another Burge torture victim, James Andrews, in a civil suit. "These are run-of-the-mill homicides."

Andrews is one of the few additional torture victims granted new trials or evidentiary hearings. Schutte filed a post-conviction petition in Andrews' case last year, claiming that new evidence had arisen in his case. In October, Cook County Circuit Judge Thomas Sumner vacated his 1984 conviction and in February of this year, the attorney general's office declined to file new charges. His case, then, became the first to be thrown out in Cook County on the basis of torture. Andrews was set free, after spending 24 years in jail for a murder he insisted he didn't commit. "All along, he knew he was going to ultimately prevail," said Schutte.

However, he added that while the attorney general's office did not prohibit Andrews from going free, it didn't help. The attorney general requested bail, which Sumner set at $300,000. "In the larger scheme of things, it's inconsequential," said Schutte. "But the family had to ... bail him out. They cashed out 401(k)s, savings, everything. They did everything they could collectively."

Only one other Burge-related case has moved on the basis of torture and still awaits conclusion: that of Cortez Brown, who has been in jail since 1990. Earlier this year, an appeals court ordered evidentiary hearing in his case after reconsidering his torture allegations. In all, of the 100-plus identified victims of police torture in Chicago, few have been acknowledged and dealt with accordingly. According to Julien Ball of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, that's because of a lack of "political will" in Chicago to try these cases. "We have people at the highest levels of public office who have built their careers on torture," said Ball. "The state of Illinois doesn't care about you if you're black and you're poor. That's what these cases show."

Joey Mogul, an attorney with the People's Law Office, says some of the lawyers are also to blame. "I think it's an accumulation of racism and classism, as well as a massive cover-up that has led many people to not get fair hearings," she said. "Their lawyers didn't believe them and didn't even request hearings."

Schutte took on Andrews' case pro bono, but Tillman hasn't been so lucky. He currently lacks representation, and despite two appeals, remains in jail for life. "It's just pretty outrageous because all of the physical evidence points to someone else," said Catherine Crawford, a Northwestern University professor and attorney who was on a team of lawyers representing Leroy Orange and has researched Tillman's case and attempted to find him legal counsel. "But they had gotten a confession out of him before they found the stolen car. I think it's just one of those situations where the police said, 'Well, we don't want to throw out this confession so we're just going to pursue this case based on our original theory.'"

Robyn Ziegler, spokesperson for the attorney general's office, told AlterNet that all Burge-related cases are "in various stages of the post-conviction process," and that, "Ethically, the attorney general is obligated to handle each case individually based on the facts and history of the case. No two cases are the same."

But advocates for victims of police torture contend that it shouldn't matter. "In each case, the same thing needs to happen," said Ball. "Madigan needs to order evidentiary hearings so torture victims can present evidence of torture on the way to winning new trials. Regardless of the differences in individual cases, every single torture victim deserves a new trial where 'confessions' that were electroshocked, beaten and suffocated out of them are not used against them." Zeigler claimed that the attorney general does not have the authority or power to initiate new hearings.

But on July 10, 2007, the Cook County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution urging Madigan to do just that.

On July 18 of this year, members of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, lawyers from the People's Law Office, religious and community leaders and relatives of the wrongfully imprisoned rallied in front of Madigan's office.

"Every day Lisa Madigan sits and does nothing is a day she is furthering a cover-up," said Marlene Martin, national director of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty. "We're here to ask her to have guts."

The group, which had been there twice already this year, delivered a letter with more than 400 signatures from organizations, religious institutions and concerned citizens, asking Madigan to take action on the cases of the Burge victims who remain behind bars. They are also seeking reparations, in the form of psychological treatment and financial compensation, particularly since the vast majority of the Burge victims and their families have little if any financial resources to assist them in their legal battles and recovery process.

Michael Tillman is currently being held at Menard Correctional Center in southern Illinois, about a six-hour drive from Chicago. His mother, Jean, says she used to go down and visit him twice a month, but "with gas prices the way it is, I haven't been able to get down there." Since Tillman went to jail 24 years ago, his girlfriend, Princess, left Chicago with their two children and stopped keeping in touch with the family. "After all of this happened we stayed together for a while and then we all separated," she said. "I can't tell you why." She says the kids, who are grown now, haven't been to visit him for "about ten years."

"He's missed out on everything -- his kids, his family, just life," she said. "He was just snatched away from us. It's a dreadful experience to go through."

Jessica Pupovac is an adult educator and independent journalist living in Chicago.

The Progressive States Network sends out weekly reports on issues in state legislatures and state politics. They come from a, well, a progressive angle. Below is there report on Supreme Court decisions this last term. You can see the full report on their site.

Supreme Court and the States: Business Wins, Voting Rights Lose, and a Mixed Bag on Criminal Justice

As the Supreme Court marches to the Right, corporate interests continue to thrive at the expense of state regulatory powers. “This has been a very successful year for the business community,” said Miguel Estrada, a Washington appellate lawyer who represents many key corporate interests before courts in Washington, D.C." This session at the U.S. Supreme Court, as this Dispatch will highlight, had an almost uniform tilt towards business versus state regulatory authority. In other areas like election law, the tilt was against poor voters who faced restrictions on their right to vote, though the term was a more mixed bag on criminal justice and other issues before the Court.

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Business Interests Win Big Against State Regulation

In almost every Supreme Court decision decided this term, state regulation lost out against business claims of federal preemption of state powers.
Consumers Lose in Medical Device Liability Case: As we highlighted in February, Riegel v. Medtronic is potentially one of the most dangerous decisions undercutting state consumer protection laws in decades. Essentially, the court declared that once the Federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves a medical device, however careless or politicized the decision, the companies are then immune to lawsuits under state consumer protection laws authorized by the 1976 Medical Device Amendments. What made this decision especially appalling is that sponsors of that federal law, such as Sen. Edward Kennedy, point out that no such preemption of state law was ever intended, so the Supreme Court created this attack on state powers completely on its own authority. Legislation to reverse this decision has already been introduced into Congress.

Making the decision especially dangerous is its likely expansion to consumer suits over defective prescription drugs. A decision on that exact issue, Warner-Lambert v. Kent, deadlocked 4-4 only because Chief Justice Roberts recused himself because of substantial stock holdings in the drug company involved in the suit. There is the likelihood, though, of Roberts be a deciding vote next term in a similar case about state consumer laws.

Court Compels States to Fund Union Busting by Government Contractors: In one of the most anti-labor decisions in decades, and one of the most bizarre ones, the Supreme Court in Chamber of Commerce v. Brown struck down a California law that prevented government contractors from diverting money meant for health care or other public services to paying union-busting lawyers. Many federal laws, including Head Start and the Workforce Investment Act, prohibit use of federal money for anti-union activities, so it is especially odd that states are helpless to stop public money from being misused for anti-union purposes when the federal government reserves the right to prevent such misuse of its own funds. Despite claims that federal labor law preempts the California law, as Justice Breyer wrote in dissent, legislatures have "broad authority to decide how to spend the People's money." If Californians do not want their tax money used to block unionization, "why should they be conscripted into paying?"
Beyond these two blockbuster decisions, corporate interests won in a series of other cases:

• States Can't Stop Mail Order Cigarette Sales to Minors: In Rowe v. NH Motor Transport Association, the Court found that the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act of 1994 preempts a Maine statute requiring tobacco shippers to use delivery companies that verify the age of the customer.
• Arbitration Clauses Void Right to State Administrative Appeals: In its ongoing gutting of state labor laws, the Court declared in Preston v. Ferrer that a California state law requiring an administrative hearing in talent agency disputes was overridden by the Federal Arbitration Act if an arbitration clause had been signed.
• Corporations Win Tax Rulings Against States: In both CSX v. GA Board of Equalization and Meadwestvaco v. Illinois Department of Revenue, state methodologies for taxing the corporation plaintiffs were struck down as preempted by federal law or constitutional rules, in each case likely handing the plaintiff companies a large tax decrease.
  
• Punitive Damages Owed by Corporations Slashed: While focusing on federal maritime law in its details, numerous legal experts expect the Court's Exxon v. Baker decision - which slashed punitive damages owed to the Alaskan victims of Exxon's Valdez oil spill to no more than actual damages - will spill over into state courts, the primary venue for punitive damages against companies.
  

The one major corporate case involving state regulation that had even a mixed result was Morgan Stanley Capital Group, Inc. v. Public Utility District No. 1, which made a strongly pro-corporate legal argument that predatory utility contracts will generally be upheld no matter how unreasonable the rates for consumers, but that in the narrow case of unlawful manipulation of the power market, there might be cause for overturning the power contract.

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Election Law Decisions: Burdening Voting Rights, Upholding Voting Systems and Opposing Campaign Finance Fairness

If the Court was eager to override state laws for the benefit of corporate interests, it bent over backwards in deference to state law when the issue was Indiana's photo ID law gutting the rights of our nation's poorest voters in Crawford v. Marion City Election Board. As we detailed when the decision came down in May, the Court ignored clear evidence that a large majority of voters without ID who came to the polls would be prevented from having their votes counted-- and that the financial and time costs of obtaining a photo ID for many of them would be prohibitive, far more than poll taxes previously struck down as unconstitutional, as Justice Breyer noted in dissent.

Upholding Primary Systems: In two other decisions, the Court deferred to unusual state primary systems:

• In Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party et al., the Court upheld Washington's new ballot system that allows candidates from all parties to compete in a single primary together, with the top two vote-getters going on to a runoff. The court ignored concerns that it violated the parties' associational rights that candidates could identify themselves with a party on the ballot and even advance to the runoff, despite the possibility of that candidate not being the choice of voting members of that party.
• In NY Board of Elections v. Lopez Torre, the Court approved New York state's system of nominating lower court judges at party conventions, rather than through direct elections.

Implications of Davis for State Public Financing Laws? While not directly effecting a state law, the majority in Davis v. Federal Election Commission, struck down the federal "Millionaire's Amendment" which allowed candidates facing self-funding candidates exceeding a certain level of spending to receiving larger campaign contributions to level the playing field. Given clear legal differences, state public financing laws in states like Arizona which increase state funding for candidates facing high-spending opponents should survive challenge, but the animosity by the Court majority to the goal of levelling the electoral playing field between those with and without wealth in our democracy is a general threat to such state campaign finance laws.

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A Mixed Term on Criminal Justice Issues

In terms of both justice and protection of state authority on criminal justice issues, the term was an extremely mixed bag.

• In Baze v. Rees, the Court upheld Kentucky's use of lethal injection for its death penalty.
• In Danforth v. Minnesota, the Court upheld Minnesota's decision to extend stronger retroactive relief for violations of Federal Constitutional rights than even federal courts might grant themselves, since "[f]ederal law sets certain minimal requirements that states must meet but may exceed in providing appropriate relief."
• In Kennedy v. Louisiana, the Court struck down Louisiana's law imposing the death penalty for the rape of a child as violating the Eighth Amendment.
• In Snyder v. Louisiana, the Court tightened scrutiny of state courts that allow government prosecutors to use preemptory strikes against black jurors in a discriminatory manner.
• In Indiana v. Edwards, the Court said that states may require defendants found competent enough to stand trial, but whose mental illnesses may prevent them from representing themselves, to be represented by counsel.
• In Medellin v. Texas, the Court ruled that the President does not have the authority to order a state to follow a World Court decision finding a state had violating an international treaty, in this case Texas denying an immigrant defendant access to his embassy council as required under a treaty signed by the United States. The court essentially made international law and U.S. treaties irrelevant for state governments unless Congress passes a separate law implementing them.
  

Implications of Heller for State Gun Laws: While the District of Columbia v. Heller decision creating a personal right to own a gun under the Second Amendment could have major implications for striking down state and local gun control laws, it is worth noting that the decision, written by Justice Scalia, stated that many existing gun law restrictions are still valid, including those limiting the kinds of weapons people may own, limiting ownership by felons and the mentally ill, limiting possession in schools and government buildings, and regulations on commercial sales. And it's not even clear, since this case was about a District of Columbia law and thus implicates only 2nd Amendment rights versus federal authority, that state gun laws will be restricted at all under the doctrine, a point Justice Scalia made in a footnote where he noted that a number of past Supreme Court cases had "reaffirmed that the Second Amendment applies only to the Federal Government."

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Other Miscellaneous Cases Upholding State Powers

A few other decisions had important implications for state authority:

• State leaders breathed a sigh of relief when the Court in Department of Revenue of KY v. Davis upheld the right of states to offer tax free gains under state law as an incentive for investments in municipal bond funding state and locally-authorized projects without running afoul of the federal Commerce Clause.
• In Kentucky Retirement System v. EEOC, the Court ruled that Kentucky’s pension system, which treats more generously some retired workers who became disabled before rather than after retirement agent, does not violate the Age Discrimination in Employment Act.

The Court's Hostility to Public Employee Rights: Engquist v. Oregon Department of Agriculture was a notable case in emphasizing the double standard of the Court in regards to public employees' constitutional rights. Having in past cases allowed property owners and others effected by state government actions to bring equal protection claims, under the doctrine of a "class-of-one," against arbitrary, vindictive, and malicious treatment, the Court in Engquist denied state employees the right to bring the same kind of constitutional claims when facing similar treatment. In dissent, Justice Stevens noted that this case was following the recent trend of the Court systematically excluding public employees from First Amendment and civil rights protections.

Published today at the AJC. Steve is right on again.

A grave injustice to the disadvantaged: Proposals on indigent defense untenable

By Stephen B. Bright
For the Journal-Constitution
Published on: 03/24/08

Imagine that a terrible mistake was made and you were arrested, charged with a crime and thrown in jail. How long would you wait to get a lawyer?

People who can afford lawyers get them right away —- usually within hours of their arrest. They want lawyers to get them out on bond as soon as possible so that they can go home to the love and support of their families and to work before they lose their jobs. They want lawyers to explain the charges and the legal procedures. And they want lawyers to find out, right away, why they are being charged and to start preparing defenses.

People who cannot afford lawyers are not so fortunate. It may be two or three days before they see a lawyer and another day or two before they are released on bond. Jail can be a dangerous, terrifying place for anyone, but it is particularly so for the many people arrested who are mentally ill or vulnerable in other ways. For people who are working and barely making their rent payments, a few extra days in jail may result in the loss of their jobs and may leave them and their families homeless.

Nevertheless, the Georgia legislature is considering proposals that would leave people languishing in jails even longer before seeing lawyers and would completely deny lawyers to some people who cannot afford them.

Georgia law now provides that a person who cannot afford a lawyer must be provided one within three days of arrest. Weekends are included. A person arrested on Friday is entitled to see a public defender or court-appointed lawyer no later than the following Monday. However, the Senate passed an amendment to HB 1245 last week that would make public defenders available within five business days from when a person makes a request for a lawyer.

The Senate's amendment is based on the assumption that people who are arrested will know to ask for a lawyer, but this is unrealistic for those who are mentally ill, addicted, illiterate or limited in other ways. The proposed legislation does not specify how or when requests are to be made or how they will be transmitted.

People could be in jail a week or two before making requests and then wait another week before seeing lawyers. This includes people who may be completely innocent.

It includes people charged with petty offenses such as loitering who may spend more time in jail before seeing a lawyer than they would receive as a sentence for the offenses. (This occurred routinely in Fulton County until a few years ago.)

And it includes people who will lose their jobs and their homes because of the delay in seeing lawyers and obtaining release on bond.

The proposal will produce substantial increases in the populations of jails throughout Georgia. Counties will pay the cost of feeding, housing and providing medical care for people who would have been released on bond within a few days of arrest had lawyers been provided to them promptly upon their arrest.

A Senate-House conference committee will consider the amendment this week in an effort to reconcile the different versions of HB 1245. The version passed by the House does not disturb current law providing a lawyer in three days.

The conference committee should also strike a provision in both versions of HB 1245 that would deny public defenders to many people charged with misdemeanors —- offenses punishable by a year or less in jail. This proposal would change eligibility for public defenders from 125 percent of the federal poverty guidelines to 100 percent or less of the guidelines. One hundred percent of the guidelines is an annual income of $20,650 for a family of four.

The federal poverty guidelines identify people so destitute that they cannot afford basic necessities like food and shelter, but one's ability to subsist is not the ability to afford a lawyer.

A member of a family of four with an annual income of $20,650 —- about $1,700 a month —- is unable to pay from $2,500 to $5,000 to retain a lawyer. (Most lawyers require the full amount at the time of accepting the case.)

This proposal, if adopted, will leave people unrepresented and create havoc in Georgia's courts. Both the state and federal courts have long held that people facing the loss of their liberty must be provided lawyers if they cannot afford them. This is a basic component of fairness in our legal system today. But people making $1,700 a month will be unable to afford lawyers. Yet the legislation would make them ineligible for a public defender.

As long as they are unrepresented, the courts will not be able to try their cases or accept their guilty pleas because they do not have lawyers. And no matter how hard they try, people living on a bare subsistence income will not be able to hire private attorneys. Eventually, if their cases are to proceed, lawyers must be appointed to represent them.

The proposals before the legislature are unjust and unworkable. The existing system of providing lawyers within three days to those who are least able to afford them contributes to a process that is reasonably fair and efficient. The legislature should heed the adage not to fix what is not broken.

> Stephen B. Bright is president of the Southern Center for Human Rights.

This is reprinted in full from the AJC. Thanks to Sara for sending it out.

This reported in the Associated Press. Makes for a good week.

Below is an article from the L.A. Times about the Nichols case. In it, House Speaker Rep. Glenn Richardson goes off about the cost of the defense. Those who follow state politics may recognize Richardson as a complete dumb ass. Of course, they would be right. Richardson is getting his butt kicked because he's promoting a stupid idea that will raise taxes.

In this case, however, Richardson is just jumping on the bandwagon. The fact is, there are two reasons this case is costing so much. One, it's a freakin' complicated case involving multiple jurisdictions, the federal government, and a huge media spotlight. Never mind that many of the folks who would usually be involved in the defense or prosecution in Fulton County could end up being called as witnesses. The second reason is the D.A.'s office. I firmly believe almost all problems with the criminal justice system are caused by either the legislature or the district attorneys. This case proves my point. The L.A. Times article has a paragraph (down towards the bottom of course) detailing how the D.A.'s office challenged one of the original lawyers, one who was on staff with the Public Defenders Standards Council. I don't believe the Council has even one backbone in the entire office, so they substituted all the lawyers with private (and costly) ones.

This is only one incident. Fulton County D.A. Howard, who never met a media frenzy he didn't like, has FIVE prosecutors on the case. Maybe he needs them, maybe not. But why isn't Richardson up in arms about those costs? Could it be because this case actually highlights what a dismal failure the legislature has done in funding public defense? That's not a problem with D.A.'s since they get a piece of almost all the action in the state, possibly including playground toughs taking milk money.

If the D.A. takes the death penalty off the table, the costs go way down. If he won't, then he should be blamed for the costs. If politicians want the ability to tramp human rights at will, they shouldn't complain that it costs a lot.

Costly trial puts heat on Georgia judge
By Richard Fausset, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

ATLANTA -- Angered by the soaring cost of defending Georgia's most notorious murder suspect, state lawmakers said Thursday they would explore the possibility of impeaching the judge presiding over the case of Brian Nichols, the rape suspect who escaped from a courthouse in 2005 and allegedly killed a judge and three others.

Critics say DeKalb County Senior Judge Hilton Fuller has mismanaged the high-profile death penalty case. They are particularly incensed that he has allowed attorneys hired by the state's public defender program to rack up more than $1.2 million in pretrial expenses and fees.

The case has come to a halt because of disputes about those payments.

"How many more millions will be spent giving Brian Nichols a defense that no one, including the taxpayers, could afford for themselves?" said Republican House Speaker Glenn Richardson in a statement. "There are serious questions about the poor handling of public funds that need to be addressed. The law provides the House that authority, and we intend to investigate the matter."

Richardson said he planned to appoint a special committee, headed by attorney and Republican state House Majority Whip Barry A. Fleming, to investigate Fuller's handling of the trial and whether there was an "abuse of the system."

It was a rare move for a state legislature, and one that could raise thorny separation-of-powers issues. But Republican state Sen. Preston W. Smith said he feared other death-penalty defendants would take Nichols' lead and find a way to run up costs, making it difficult -- if not impossible -- for the state to prosecute capital cases.

"I'm concerned that the judge's behavior is going to lead to the system, as we know it, being dismantled," he said.

Fuller, a veteran judge known for his attention to detail, could not be reached for comment Thursday. He volunteered to preside over the Nichols trial in neighboring Fulton County because the county's entire Superior Court bench had recused itself from the case.

Nichols escaped from a deputy at his rape trial in a Fulton County courtroom. He then allegedly fatally shot the judge presiding over a case, a court reporter, a sheriff's deputy and a U.S. customs agent. Nichols' alleged crimes, and the manhunt that followed, shocked Atlantans and was covered by international news outlets.

Soon after Nichols' arrest, the Georgia Public Defender Standards Council assigned a team of salaried defense lawyers to the case, but prosecutors raised issues about the standing of one of the attorneys with the State Bar of Georgia, and moved to disqualify the entire public defender's program from the case.

The council withdrew the original lawyers, and in an abundance of caution, assembled a new team that included three outside lawyers who billed by the hour. Fuller approved those rates, which are as high as $175 per hour, in July 2005. By last August, according to court documents, they had billed for more than $700,000 in attorneys fees and $200,000 in expert fees.

Two of the defense attorneys contacted by The Times declined to discuss the case. But their colleague, North Carolina-based Henderson Hill, has argued that the prosecutors are to blame for the trial's high cost.

Fulton County Dist. Atty. Paul Howard's office has assigned five assistant prosecutors to the Nichols case. They filed a 54-count indictment and submitted the names of 300 potential witnesses. Defense attorneys argue that they need a budget that allows them to mount a sufficiently vigorous defense.

Howard declined to comment for this story. But in court filings, prosecutors argued that the defense was trying to give the impression that the case was "too expensive to try and the State should just take a plea."

The case is taking a toll on Georgia's public defender system. The Legislature cut the system's budget for the public defender's council about 20% this year. It owes the three outside attorneys more than $160,000, and has declined to pay, despite an order from Fuller.

On Oct. 17, Fuller halted the case after two days of jury selection after the defense attorneys asked that the funding issues be resolved. Fuller ordered the council's director, Mack Crawford, to a hearing to determine whether he was in contempt of court. The hearing was postponed, and a new date had not yet been set.

richard.fausset@latimes.com

I just saw someone on CNN referring to Wilson ordered released. I don't know if this is true yet, or what the details are. One can only hope that this tragedy has finally come to an end.

More details on Wilson case available at www.wilsonappeal.com.

The Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials (GALEO) is reporting that Cobb County law enforcement is targeting immigrant families, specifically Latin@s. There is a documentation campaign being coordinated by GALEO, MALDEF (Mexican American Legal Defense Fund), and GLAHR (Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights).

GALEO sent out an email. Here's the text:

------------

Greetings,

It has come to our attention by several sources and several independent accounts that Cobb County law enforcement appears to have stepped up their efforts to target Latino and immigrant families.

Here is what we do know. Several jurisdictions have been involved in the following. There have been some cases of individuals that were victims of crime or in an auto accident. In the process of contacting police, their immigration status was questioned and they were detained.

Additionally, there are reported cases of people not being given appropriate due process in their detention. Family members are not being allowed to visit people that have been arrested for minor traffic violations. Family members are afraid.

Cobb County jail officials have allegedly told people visiting these arrestees that because they are "illegal" they have no rights.

Everyone, regardless of immigration status, is entitled to due process under the laws and our U.S. Constitution.

We are urging anyone in Cobb County that has experienced any type of discriminatory practice/encounter or possibly illegal abuse should contact any organization or faith community that they trust. These cases need to be documented and relayed to MALDEF ( 678.559.1071), GLAHR or GALEO. We need your help to rein in the "wild west" mentality that appears to be occurring in Cobb County.

We are encouraging people NOT to drive if they do not have a driver's license. This minor traffic violation has lead to several detentions, deportations and separation of families. Do not drive without a license, especially in Cobb County.

If anyone experiences any discriminatory practices by any state or local agencies, or if anyone experiences discriminatory issues with any law enforcement agency, please contact MALDEF at 678.559.1071.

Please report any problems you may experience in order for these issues to be documented. Don't let it happen to more people within our communities.

Step up and help us by filling out the INTAKE forms and then faxing these over to MALDEF. We need to stop some of the alleged discriminatory and possible unconstitutional treatment that people are currently facing. Help us document these cases and we need our community to come forward.

--------

Links

Documentation intake form. - http://www.galeo.org/resource.php

Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights Contact Page - http://www.glahr.org/index.php?option=com_contact&Itemid=3

MALDEF Atlanta Contact Page - http://www.maldef.org/about/offices.cfm?LocationID=10

The title is a bit provocative, isn't it? Unless, of course, law enforcement does stand in the way. That answer depends on what happens this year with eyewitness ID reform legislation. Frankly, I believe criminal justice law has been taken out of the hands of the public, even out of the hands of legislators, and is now determined by district attorney's and, to a lesser degree, law enforcement. If the DA's want it, they get it. If they don't want it, it doesn't happen. What do the DA's want? Easier convictions.

The only true thing I've seen on Law & Order is a quote by a judge saying the court is not a search for truth, but for admissable evidence. Easier convictions happen when evidence is easier to admit. A coerced confession for example. Or bad eyewitness testimony. How bad is eyewitness testimony? The Innocence Project has worked on the exoneration of more than 200 people nationwide and 75% were convicted based on bad eyewitness testimony. Six people have left Georgia prisons when eyewitness testimony has proved to be bad. Think about how hard it is to prove a witness was wrong, especially years after the fact. Without something like DNA evidence, getting a conviction reversed is like climbing Mt. Everest without oxygen. Or climbing equipment. Yet 6 Georgians have reached that summit. How many are at the base waiting for their turn?

There's a decent solution. Record all confessions on video/audio and institute guidelines for eyewitnesses. If a cop violates the guidelines, at least the impact on the case can be argued. Of course, law enforcement hates the idea. Police accountability doesn't usually go over well with the police. Rep. Stephanie Stucky Benfield is sponsoring legislation on eyewitness ID reform. It hasn't gone anywhere for the last two years, but momentum seems to be building. There are a series of committee meetings, the last one was this last Monday. Spokes people from both the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police (GACP) and the Georgia Sheriffs Association (GSA) were there to say reform is a bad idea. The GACP said this was a problem with university studies not accurately reflecting what happens. Also, that while there may have been a problem in the past things are better now.

The GSA rep, Sheriff Mike Jolley, laid out a doozy. Jolley said a state law would impede law enforcement's efforts to have better procedures. One law would mean an agency couldn't update their polices when new information came out. This would be almost believable if 83% of law enforcement agencies in Georgia had no policy at all. According to Jolly though, freedom is equal to lack of accountability. Or standards. Or even knowing what they hell you're doing.

The next meeting of the committee is November 13. At that meeting they will determine whether or not to put forward a bill and what it will look out. Check it out if you're free.

Good Links on Eyewitness Reform:

The Innocence Blog: By The Innocence Project, good info on stuff happening across the country.

Georgia Innocence Project: A state version of the national project. Great work there.

Eyewitness Identification Reform Blog: A whole blog devoted to pushing this reform. Focusing a lot on Georgia right now.

Savannah Morning News Article: This has details on the GACP and GSA testimony at Monday's committee meeting.

Online Athens Story on Committee Meeting: A different take on Monday's meeting.

by Xochitl Bervera
Families and Friends of Louisiana's Incarcerated Children (FFLIC)

Resources:

New York Collective of Radical Educators (NYCoRE) and Network of Teacher Activist Groups (TAG) have developed: Revealing Racist Roots: The 3 R's for Teaching About the Jena 6, a curriculum guide for teachers to address what's happening in Jena. Download the resource guide in PDF Version or Word Version for free at: www.nycore.org OR www.t4sj.org.

Donate to support the legal defense fund:
Jena 6 Defense Committee
PO BOX 2798
Jena, LA 71342

Sign the petitions at: http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/

For more information or to offer concrete support, email:
jena6defense(at)gmail.com

The Jena Six and the School To Prison Pipeline: http://naacpldf.org/content.aspx?article=1208

If you are in nyc and want to get involved Jena Six Support, email: da_bla2@yahoo.com.
In New Orleans, email: neworleans@leftturn.org.

Support Organizations:
http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/
http://www.colorofchange.org
http://www.millionsmoremovement.com
http://www.laaclu.org/
http://www.fflic.org


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