For once, Megan's Law has accomplished something positive in the area of civil liberties for sex offenders. The New Jersey Supreme Court has thrown out two muncipal ordinances restricting where sex offenders can live. The opinion is available here (pdf). Shorter version: Megan's Law trumps the local ordinances.

Under Megan's Law, convicted sex offenders may only live in a residence approved by a parole officer, and must notify authorities when they change addresses and employment. The law forbids anyone from using an offender's criminal record to deny housing.

Both New Jersey towns have ordinances that prohibit sex offenders convicted of offenses against minors from living within 2,500 feet of schools, parks, playgrounds and day care centers.

118 other NJ towns have similar laws, and I presume those are invalid as well. [More...]

I'll be offline for the next several hours so here's an open thread for you.

All topics welcome.

Don't miss this article in the Washington Times about an upset juror. Here's his letter to the Court (pdf) which is causing quite a stir.

The jury had acquitted the defendants of all but some small drug sales. Juror #6 learned from a press release the defendants could still get 40 years.

I write because I recently saw a press release from the US Attorney’s Office which states that Gregory Bell and Joseph Jones were sentenced to 16 years and 15 years, respectively, “for their roles in this case”. It also states that Antwuan Ball, Desmond Thurston, and David Wilson “each face up to 40 years imprisonment for the narcotics crimes for which they were convicted.”

Can this be true? We as a jury found these individuals guilty of somewhere around 20 instances of selling drugs, but as I remember it, most of these were very small amounts. And this was over a period of nearly 10 years. Now
I’m not a lawyer, but after 30 years of living in the District, I believe people selling small amounts of crack on the street usually end up with probation or only a year or two in prison if they have a previous offense.

[More...]

Looks like the medical pot raids under Obama and AG Eric Holder are continuing. The latest victim is the Green Cross in Bakersfield. It was raided yesterday as a search warrant was executed and there are reports of three arrests.

On the last day of the legislative session, the Colorado Senate passed a bill banning adults from texting while driving. The original proposal also prohibited talking on a cell phone without a head set, but that was dropped.

For drivers 18 and under, all cell phone use while driving is prohibited. The law goes into effect December 1.

I wonder how a cop is going to be able to tell if you are texting or checking your voicemail or using the internet to say, check a google map. Sounds to me like a lot of people will be stopped for investigation of texting and then show what they were doing or looking at on their phone to convince the cop they weren't texting.

This sounds like a law that will do nothing but increase traffic stops and decrease privacy rights.

Norman Hsu, infamous bundler of 2008 campaign contributions, pleaded guilty today to running a fraudulent investment scheme -- but not to making fraudulent campaign contributions.

Hsu, 58 years old, pleaded guilty to five counts of mail fraud and five counts of wire fraud at a hearing before U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero in Manhattan.

He described his ponzi scheme:

"I would use later investments to pay off earlier investments, so as to create the impression that my investment strategy was operating properly when, in fact, it was not," Hsu said. "I knew what I was doing was illegal,"

Trial starts Monday on the campaign counts. His guilty pleas today were without a plea bargain.

Update: Not so fast. Sen. Patrick Leahy is objecting.

The Democrats today handed Sen. Arlen Specter the chairmanship of the judicairy Committee's Crime and Drugs subcommittee.

The Crime and Drugs panel is Judiciary's busiest subcommittee, responsible for oversight of the Justice Department, federal prosecutors, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and drug control policy.

Dick Durbin, who currently holds the position, with switch to being Chair of the Human Rights subcommittee. To accomplish the deal, the Dems restored the human rights subcommittee, which was dissolved in January.

Apologies for the long silence but I've been taking in all the confusing and confusing, bad-news-is-good-news framing of the leaks regarding the results of the stress tests.

Bank of America, Wells Fargo and GMAC LLC all need need more capital.

MetLife, however, does not need more capital.[More...]

By a vote of 18 to 17, the Colorado Senate today rejected a bill to end the death penalty and use the savings to investigate cold cases.

Four Democrats, Mary Hodge of Brighton, Jim Isgar of Hesperus, John Morse of Colorado Springs, and Lois Tochtrop of Thornton, voted with the Republicans to defeat the bill.

Gov. Bill Ritter would not state his position on the bill before the vote. Afterwards, he said "he thought the death penalty should not have been tied to funding cold cases."

Today was the last day for the Senate to act. Hopefully, a similar bill will come up again next year.

In 2004, American Lori Berenson lost her last appeal of her 20 year sentence (earlier reduced from life) in Peru.

This week she had a baby boy. The father is Anibal Apari, a lawyer in Lima who also served time as a member of the Tupac Amaru Revelutionary Movement. They met in jail and have been married since 2003.

Lori is now 39. As horrible as conditions must be in a Peruvian jail, at least they allow her to keep and raise her baby until he's 3 years old.

She'll be eligible for parole in 2010, and if she is granted release, she'll be deported to the U.S. where her father is looking forward to helping raise the baby.

"I'm just ecstatic. This child will likely be my only grandchild, and I'm going to spoil him if I can," her father, Mark Berenson, a former college professor, told The Associated Press.

Via Raw Story, a human rights researcher says 98 detainees died in U.S. custody. Of them, he says 34 deaths were labeled homicides, and between 8 and 12 were tortured to death.

The researcher, John Sifton, worked for five years for Human Rights Watch. In a posting Tuesday, he documents myriad cases of detainees who died at the hands of their US interrogators. Some of the instances he cites are graphic.

Sifton's article on his report is at Daily Beast. It's based on a 2006 Human Rights First report and follow-up investigations. Sifton says: [More...]

I have a very busy 3 days ahead. So I won't be around much during the day. But the victorious legal warrior J walks again amongst us mere mortals so I am sure she, with TChris and Ethan, will have plenty of interesting things to say.

This is an Open Thread.