JURIST - Paper Chase: U. Chicago law clinic settles suit with city in housing authority case

In Friday's civil rights news, the Chicago Maroon reports that the Mandel Legal Aid Clinic of the University of Chicago Law School and the city of Chicago have reached a settlement in the case of Williams v. Brown. Lawyers for the clinic alleged that Chicago police officers violated the civil rights of community members residing near the Chicago Housing Authority's Stateway Gardens complex when they raided a popular basketball event. The city claimed the police entered the Stateway Roundball Classic to protect those who attended from gang violence. The city settled for $500,000 for violating the residents' Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable search and seizures.... US Newswire reports that Planned Parenthood Federation of America is condemning President Bush's recess appointment of Charles Pickering to the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (as previously reported on JURIST's Paper Chase). Federation president Gloria Feldt says Pickering's appointment is "one step closer to undoing the gains that Martin Luther King Jr. and all of our civil rights heroes worked so hard to ensure."

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