Justices grant Georgia inmate’s request to delay execution

The Supreme Court has granted a condemned Georgia inmate’s request that his execution be delayed as he attempts to prove his innocence. The inmate, Troy Davis, has gained international support for his long-standing claim that he did not murder a Savannah police officer nearly two decades ago. Justice John Paul Stevens on Monday ordered a federal judge to “receive testimony and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could not have been obtained at trial clearly establishes petitioner’s innocence.” Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer supported the decision

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Alleged Nazi guard Demjanjuk charged in Germany

Alleged Nazi camp guard John Demjanjuk was formally charged Monday with being an accessory to about 27,900 murders during World War II. The Munich State Court ruled 10 days ago that the 89-year-old retired auto worker from Cleveland, Ohio, was fit to stand trial

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Immigration and Marriage: Will Congress End the ‘Widow Penalty’?

It was bad enough that Natalia Goukassian, then 21, had to spend her honeymoon in June 2006 in West Palm Beach, Fla., helping her husband Tigran find alternative treatments for connective tissue sarcoma, an aggressive cancer, or that six months later, the Air Force–enlisted man, 21, succumbed to the disease. But as it turned out, her painful ordeal had only just begun.

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Court gives would-be assassin John Hinckley more freedom

The man who tried to kill President Ronald Reagan is now allowed to visit his mother more, to get a driver’s license and spend more time away from the mental hospital where he lives, a federal judge ruled. The ruling, released Tuesday, expands the freedoms of John Hinckley Jr

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Key senator knows what it’s like to be called ‘racist’

When greeting Judge Sonia Sotomayor this week, Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama made sure to tell her something loud enough for the assembled reporters to hear. “You will get a fair hearing before this committee,” Sessions told President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee with emphatic gestures and tone.

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Judge’s ruling could reveal Gitmo secrets in late July

The U.S. government cannot collectively seal its records in more than 100 cases involving the indefinite detention of suspects held at the Guantanamo Bay facility in Cuba, a federal judge ruled Monday

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Bush v. Gore lawyers launch new same-sex marriage appeal

Opponents of California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriages launched a new court challenge Wednesday, led by lawyers who were on opposite sides of the case that settled the 2000 presidential race. Attorneys Ted Olson and David Boies have asked a federal judge to block California from enforcing the ban, known as Proposition 8. “We are two lawyers from opposite ends of the political spectrum who have come together to support one of the most important issues of our time,” Olson told reporters.

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