Black residents of Hamtramck, MI, are back in court for a second time. The plaintiffs were evicted from their homes a half-century ago, as the city pursued an aggressive campaign of urban renewal and revitalization. Finally allowed to return to newly-constructed homes in Hamtramck some forty years after an initial, victorious lawsuit, residents say they’re
Democratic Senators are urging Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to curb the practice of telemarketers using straight-to-voicemail technology to bypass consumers’ ringtones. The Hill reports that Senators Ed Markey and Richard Blumenthal, both of Connecticut, penned a letter together with Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and other legislators, requesting Pai not permit companies to ‘leave messages
A court in Pakistan sentenced a man to death over allegedly blasphemous materials posted on Facebook. Government prosecutors announced the verdict Sunday, the latest development in a social media crackdown spearheaded by Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. The conviction of 30-year old Taimoor Raza marks the first time in the history of the populous South
A human rights organization is filing a lawsuit against Georgia’s Worth County Sheriff’s Office after 900 students were searched by law enforcement officers in an unannounced and unprecedented drug sweep. The incident prompting the suit occurred midway through April. Several dozen police officers converged on the school without advance notice, ordering students into hallways and
The Michigan House of Representatives passed a bill that includes increased penalties for individuals found guilty of participating in female genital mutilation. The package of bills ups the punishment dictated by federal law. With bipartisan support behind the law, legislators made performing or coordinating female genital mutilation a state felony with a maximum sentence of
Donald Trump is livid at the 9th Circuit Court for refusing to lift an injunction against his travel ban. In the latest chapter of an epic struggle that’s hardly subsided since Trump was elected president, the court stood by earlier decision to block the controversial executive order. Frequently derided as a would-be blanket ban on
A federal appeals court ruling will lead to dozens of inmates at a Houston jail being released, after judges found the county’s bail system discriminated against the poor. Harris County, encompassing the city of Houston, asked the U.S. Supreme Court to deliver an emergency order blocking the original decision, upheld by the 5th Circuit Court
The Justice Department is fighting a legal attempt to obtain a campaign-trail document which may have served as the manuscript for Donald Trump’s executive orders on travel. Politico writes that at the center of the maelstrom is a policy memo former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani helped craft for Donald Trump when he was still
The Chicago suburb of Des Plaines settled a lawsuit to the tune of $580,000 after denying a Muslim organization the opportunity to convert a vacant building into a mosque. The Department of Justice announced the ruling on Tuesday after Des Plaines settled with the agency as well as The Society of American Bosnians and Herzegovinians.
The American Civil Liberties Union is launching a lawsuit against South Carolina’s Lexington County, accusing it of running a modern day debtors’ prison. The ACLU, along with Terrell Marshall Law Group, are targeting what they say is a rampant issue with a class-action suit filed in a U.S. District Court in Columbia, SC. According to