Court: Sentencing System Wrongly Applied
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The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that federal judges have been improperly adding time to criminals' sentences, a decision that puts in doubt longtime sentencing rules.
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A state appeals court overturned a theft conviction against state Sen. Gary Siplin on Friday, saying a jury wrongly convicted him of having an employee do campaign work on state time.
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In initial versions of a July 3 story about President Bush's commutation of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's sentence, The Associated Press erroneously described the conviction. Libby was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice, not conspiracy.
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A federal appeals court Monday found that a new Federal Communications Commission policy penalizing accidentally aired expletives was invalid, saying it was "arbitrary and capricious" and might not survive First Amendment scrutiny.
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The Supreme Court returned for another term Monday and wasted no time getting down to business, appearing poised to alter the system used for sentencing 64,000 federal criminal defendants a year.
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A California judge was wrong to throw out a murder conviction against a San Francisco lawyer whose dogs mauled a neighbor to death, the state's Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.
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Maryland's highest court ruled today that the state's protocol for carrying out executions was adopted improperly, a defect that the court said must be addressed before any other condemned inmates may be put to death.
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In a major criminal law decision, a  closely divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that  federal judges no longer must follow the long-criticized  sentencing guidelines in effect since 1987.
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The Supreme Court on Wednesday considered whether a jury that sentenced a convicted killer to death had properly taken into account his religious conversion, which a prosecutor incorrectly contended was irrelevant.
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The Supreme Court dismissed a case Monday in which a defendant says his lawyers gave him bad advice by telling him to reject a plea deal that would have spared him a death sentence.
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FARGO, N.D. - A man who damaged a cell phone store after complaining of bad phone service has been sentenced to 60 days in jail. Jason Perala, 22, pleaded guilty on Monday to felony criminal mischief and misdemeanor assault in East Central District Court.
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Calling the crime one of the &quot;most deplorable I&#39;ve witnessed in 15 years on the bench,&quot; US District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez sentenced a local health-care worker yesterday to 16 months in prison for stealing the identity of a cancer patient and running
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BIG ISSUE: The Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on whether the system for sentencing federal defendants should be thrown out because it lets judges, rather than juries, decide factors that add years to prison time.
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A New Jersey man who pleaded guilty to murder after his lawyer and prosecutors mistakenly told him that he risked being executed if he didn't confess isn't entitled to a new trial, a federal appeals court ruled.
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Thomas Coughlin, who was sentenced to home detention after pleading guilty to five counts of wire fraud and one count of filing false tax returns, got off too light, an appeals court ruled.
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Why a Supreme Court ruling on sentencing guidelines puts more power back on the bench
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WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court appeared poised Monday to alter the system used for sentencing 64,000 federal criminal defendants a year, but justices clashed over whether changes would create greater inequity.    Judges, not juries, consider factors that can add years to defendants' prison sentences, under the government's 17-year-old system which has been challenged as unconstitutional...