In international law news Monday, the Australian government has indicated that a new UN resolution would not be necessary in order for their troops to remain in Iraq beyond June 30. A spokesman for Australia's Attorney-General has disagreed with a report that the Australian and British Prime Ministers had been given legal advice that a new resolution would be necessary to remain in Iraq, saying that UN Resolution 1511 allows international forces to remain until after the Iraqi elections next year. AAP has the full story.... US ratification of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea has stalled in the Senate after support for the treaty has waivered. If it fails to ratify the convention this year, the US "would forfeit [its] seat at the table of institutions that will make decisions about the use of the oceans, and we would increase the chance that such decisions would be contrary to [US] interests," according to Republican Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Richard Lugar, who still supports ratification. Lugar provides more information on US involvement in the Law of the Sea Convention here. The Chicago Tribune has the full story (via Duluth News Tribune).

click for previous international law news

In Monday's federal courts roundup, the US District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments in former Congressman Bob Barr's suit alleging a conspiracy between former President Bill Clinton, adviser James Carville, and pornographer Larry Flynt. Barr, one of the leaders in the impeachment hearings against Clinton, has alleged that the trio of defendants conspired to defame him. A lower court threw out the suit in March 2003. AP has more on this story.... The US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that US courts do not have jurisdiction to decide a wrongful death lawsuit resulting from the crash of a Garuda Indonesia Airlines flight in Indonesia. The suit was brought by the daughter of two Oregon residents who died in the 1997 crash. Reuters has the full story. Read the opinion here [PDF].... The US Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a group of furniture makers failed to demonstrate that they were significantly harmed when federal prison furniture factories increased their production. Federal Prison Industries, Inc., which is the mandatory provider of furniture for most government agencies, increased production from 1991 through 1995. The furniture makers claimed to have lost $450 million in sales because of FPI's actions. AP has the full story. Read the opinion here.... As reported earlier on JURIST's Paper Chase, Judge Joel Pisano of the US District Court for the District of New Jersey allowed an FDA ban on dietary products containing ephedra to go into effect, refusing to grant a temporary restraining order sought at the last minute by two ephedra manufacturers.

In Mondays tax law news, the number of IRS audits of small businesses decreased last year from 2.2 to 2.1 per 1,000 businesses, but the number of audits of individuals increased 14% last year, according to a study by Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Review the findings here. AP has more.... California’s Franchise Tax Board subpoenaed lists of clients from two of the state’s largest insurance companies today. The list contains clients who may have insured against auditing by the FTB for their role in illegal tax shelters. This most recent action is part of the FTB’s retrieval of over $1 Billion still owed the state of California. The Sacramento Business Journal has more.

Dean Ronald Cass of the Boston University School of Law announced Friday that he will step down at the end of the academic year after 14 years as BU dean. In a letter addressed to the BUSL community, Cass cites the school's 20-place increase in US News rankings during his tenure as an indication of marked improvement, but he expresses frustration with the lack of funding for a new facility. A Boston Globe piece in early March revealed that Cass had overstated the funding that existed by relying on a liberal approach to booking gifts. He tells the university's Daily Free Press, however, that fundraising concerns did not motivate his decision.

In other law school news, four law professors have been named 2004 Fellows by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. They are Stuart Banner of UCLA, Lucian Bebchuk of Harvard, Timur Kuran of USC, and Rebecca Scott of the University of Michigan. According to the foundation's press release, "Guggenheim Fellows are appointed on the basis of distinguished achievement in the past and exceptional promise for future accomplishment."

Finally, a law professor at the University of Dayton School of Law has compiled a controversial ranking of American law schools by just one factor: whiteness. Vernellia Randall's methodology gives cause for concern, however. Most troublingly, she calculates whiteness "by adding percent of white students to the percent of unknown, that is students whose race is not known" [emphasis added]. In the report's introduction, she characterizes law schools as a "sea of whiteness" and "dangerous...to our society." Find her full 2004 Whitest Law School Report here.

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said Monday that it had received a letter from Justice Antonin Scalia saying that the the US Marshals Service seizure and erasure of two reporters' audio recorders during a Scalia speech last week at a Mississippi high school was not done at his direction, and that he had written a note of apology to the reporters concerned. "I was as upset as you were", he wrote to the Committee, adding that he was undertaking to revise his policy on media reporting of his speeches so as to allow for recording by print reporters. RCFP has issued a press release. View Justice Scalia's letter here [PDF].

The trial of Matthew Hale, charged with solicitation to commit the murder of a federal judge, began Monday with the defense claiming the existence of secret tapes which show that FBI informant Tony Evola was the one who suggested the killing. Hale is a white supremacist leader, whose organization preached holy war. Prosecutors said that Hale became furious at Judge Joan Lefkow when she ruled against him in a 2002 trademark dispute over the name "World Church of the Creator." Hale's defense commented that the case shows "how dangerous it is when the government, even with good motives, infiltrates an organization and goes after people for what it thinks they might have done." AP has the story here.

Counsel for the governor's office questioned Monday whether the House Select Committee of Inquiry can privately depose witnesses without the governor's lawyers or the media present. This is the latest development in the possible impeachment of Connecticut governor John Rowland. Rowland is under scrutiny for accepting gifts and and free construction work on his vacation home, and lying about receiving those gifts. Both parties have called for his resignation. The bi-partisan Inquiry Committee will make a recommendation on whether impeachment proceedings should be instituted against Rowland. The Committe plans to interview witnesses later this week. Rowland's lawyers also questioned whether transcripts of the depositions can be kept secret and if the panel has the authority to require witnesses to appear before them. A response from the committee is expected by noon on Tuesday. In addition to the state proceedings, Rowland is also the subject of a federal investigation. WTNH has the story here.

Xinhua, the official Chinese news agency, is reporting that the seven Chinese hostages held captive in Iraq since Sunday have been released.

UPDATE: A late report on Aljazeera says that despite the release of the Chinese, hostage-taking in Iraq has continued, with 11 Russian oil company workers being taken hostage in Baghdad.

In Monday's corporations and securities law news, the SEC has begun a formal investigation into Quovadx Inc. focusing on the software company's dealings with Infotech Network Group, a consortium of software companies in India. Also, CEO, Lorine Sweeney, and CFO, Gary Scherping, both resigned from the company. Read the Quovadx press release announcing the investigation here. Read the Quovadx press release announcing the resignations of its CEO and CFO here. The Denver Business Journal has more.... As previously reported on JURIST's Paper Chase, Microsoft Corp. will pay InterTrust Technologies Corp. $440 million to end a patent infringement dispute and to license programs that fight illegal copying of digital movies and music. Read the Microsoft press release announcing the deal here. Read the InterTrust press release here. Click to learn more about the agreement here. Bloomberg.com has more.... Coca-Cola chief counsel Deval Patrick, who steered the company through continuing federal probes into alleged fraud, has resigned. The Financial Times has more.

In international corporations and securities law news, Bechtel Group and GE Capital Corp. have bought Enron's 65% stake of Dabhol Power Co. in India for $22 million through a US bankruptcy court as part of a plan to recoup part of the $1.2 billion they invested in the failed $3 billion venture. Read more about the Dabhol project here[PDF]. Bloomberg.com has more.... The SEC has declared French drugmaker Sanofi-Synthelabo's $55.3 billion bid to acquire Aventis effective to go to shareholders. Aventis has been resisting Sanofi while looking at Novartis as a possible bidder. Reuters has more.... Canada's Gulf International Minerals Ltd. announced it has been in talks with the British Columbia Securities Commission regarding transactions between Gulf and current and former directors, officers, shareholders and employees. Reuters has more.... As previously reported on JURIST's Paper Chase, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former chief of the Yukos oil company, will plead not guilty to all charges against him, ranging from fraud and tax evasion to leading an organized crime group. AP has more.

click for previous corporations and securities law news

The Michigan Board of State Canvassers Monday rescinded its approval of petitions seeking to amend the state constitution to forbid affirmative action. The board, in reversing its approval of the petition in December, responded to a court order issued last month. Judge Paula Manderfield held that the petition being circulated by the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative was misleading in that the proposal was "in direct conflict with" the equal protection clause of the Michigan constitution. Michigan election law states that if a proposal would change the constitution, the petition must explicitly say so. The Michigan Attorney General plans to appeal that ruling, so that the proposal may appear on the November ballot. The Detroit Free Press has the story here. The petitions come in response to the landmark Supreme Court decision of Grutter v. Bollinger, decided last June. The US Supreme Court held that public universities may consider race for the purpose of admissions, but found that the University of Michigan's policy was too rigid.

AP is reporting that US District Judge Joel Pisano has allowed an FDA ban on dietary products containing ephedra to go into effect, refusing to grant a temporary restraining order sought at the last minute by two ephedra manufacturers. Read the FDA's original December 2003 advisory against taking dietary supplements containing ephedra here. An accompanying FDA consumer alert noted that a study "showed little evidence of ephedra's effectiveness except for short-term weight loss, while confirming that the substance raises blood pressure and otherwise stresses the circulatory system. These reactions have been conclusively linked to significant adverse health outcomes, including heart ailments and strokes."

The hostage situation in Iraq changed almost by the minute in Iraq Monday. China called on Iraq's new Interior Minister to rescue seven of its citizens detained Sunday in Fallujah. Read a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement and see a Reuters article here. Militants continued to hold three Japanese hostages as the original deadline for their threatened execution approached without any concession by the Japanese government. From Toyko, the Kyodo news agency has more. Iraq's Islamic Clerics Committee won the release of nine hostages of various nationalities, according to AP. A member of the Iraqi Governing Council who had been involved in negotiations said the clerics had issued a fatwa against hostage-taking on Sunday and that other hostages held would be released by the end of the day. A Palestinian and a Canadian are still known to be held. Reuters has more. Two missing Germans were feared dead (see a Deutsche Welle report), and the German government has warned its citizens to leave Iraq. BBC News has more. The commander of US forces in Iraq meanwhile said at a Monday news conference that seven US contractors, employees of Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root, were missing after an ambush outside Baghdad. Two US soldiers were also reported missing. Reuters has more.

A lawyer for jailed Russian billionaire oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former head of Yukos Oil who was arrested last October in a police raid on his private plane, said Monday that his client will plead not guilty to the various charges of fraud, tax evasion and participation in organized crime that have been made against him. Supporters of Khodorkovsky says his arrest and imprisonment is an effort by Russian President Vladimir Putin to punish him for opposing Putin, making him in effect a political prisoner; Putin supporters say that Khodorkovsky is being sanctioned for improper business practices and mafia links all-too-typical of Russian commerce in the post-Soviet era. No official trial date has been set, but lawyers expect the case to go forward in June or July. Bloomberg has more. From Moscow, Mosnews.com has local coverage in English.

Colombia's Prosecutor General is playing down reports that 1 in 5 staff members of the state Prosecutor's Office, part of the in the country's Interior and Justice Ministry, failed a recent series of FBI lie-detector tests administered as part of crackdown on corruption. Employees were asked about taking bribes and involvement in drug related criminal activities. A number of employees objected to the tests, calling them intrusive and disrespectful. BBC News has more. From Bogota, the El Tiempo newspaper has local coverage in Spanish.

When the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States resumes its public hearings this week beginning Tuesday (see an agenda here), much of its attention is expected to focus on the "legal wall" purportedly established by Attorney General Janet Reno in 1995 that prevented FBI intelligence investigators from sharing data and information with their criminal counterparts. The wall was effectively taken down by the USA Patriot Act and subsequent court rulings, the last of which (by the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review in November 2002) held that due to errors in legal interpretation, the "wall" never existed as a matter of law. The ruling and a new FBI information-sharing policy has alarmed civil libertarians and defense lawyers who are concerned about potential abuse and overreaching by federal law enforcement authorities. AP has more.

UPDATE: In a Monday op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, former FBI Director Louis Freeh insisted that although the agency attempted to counter terrorism before September 11, 2001, and he had discussed al Qaeda and the terrorist threat previously with President Bush, the government was not ready to commit major resources to combating terrorism until after the attacks. Read his op-ed here (registration required). AP has more.

Spanish court officials announced Monday that as many as seven more suspects were taken into custody over the weekend as police continued their investigation of last month's Madrid train bombings which killed some two hundred people. Authorities have taken the position that the leaders of the plot now all either dead (having blown themselves up in a recent police operation) or in detention. AP has more. From Madrid, El Mundo has local coverage in Spanish.

An Amnesty International-sponsored conference in Yemen bringing together for the first time lawyers, activists and family members of terror detainees held by the US at Guantanamo Bay Cuba has ended with a plea for their release or trial. Some 100 of the 600 Guantanamo detainees are thought to be from Yemen; the conference drew more than 60 Yememi families. BBC News has more. AP has a background report on the conference.

Microsoft and digital rights management company InterTrust Technologies announced Monday a $440 million settlement of a patent infringment lawsuit brought by InterTrust against Microsoft in 2001 after anti-piracy protection technology it had demonstrated to Microsoft during licensing negotiations began to appear in Microsoft products. The settlement with InterTrust comes two weeks after Microsoft settled a major antitrust suit against it by Sun Microsystems. Read an InterTrust press release on the settlement; Microsoft offers a Q&A on the settlement with the senior Microsoft VP for Windows client business. The New York Times has more.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, in other Microsoft-related legal news, South Korea's top Internet portal-owner Daum Communications Corp. today launched an antitrust action against Microsoft alleging that it breached South Korean antitrust rules by bundling its instant messanger system with Windows XP. AFP has more.

In Monday's US law and business press, the Legal Times reports that judges and attorneys will testify in Washington, DC Tuesday about proposed Rule 32.1 of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure, which would forbid all appellate courts from placing restrictions on citation of unpublished opinions.... The New York Law Journal reports on the latest charges against Lynne Stewart, the attorney representing Islamic Group spiritual leader Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman.... According to the Fulton County Daily Report, the entire Eleventh US Circuit Court of Appeals will rehear a case in which a three-judge panel sided with a GA police officer accused of conducting a humiliating and unconstitutional strip search of two motorists.... The Texas Lawyer reports on the potential fallout from Enron Corp. defendant Lea Fastow's failed plea agreement.... FindLaw's Writ features human rights attorney Joanne Mariner's column on justice and accountability in Haiti.

click for the previous US law and business press review

Here are some of the legal stories running in Monday's foreign press... In Bahrain, the Gulf Daily News covers drafting of a new law intended to raise the nation's health standards. In reaction to the lack of faith in the medical profession, the law will govern ethical standards, licensing requirements, and standards of care.... India's New Kerala reports the Nepalese government has invoked the Terrorist and Destructive Activities (Control and Punishment) Act. The action, following attacks by Maoist rebels and opposition groups, allows security forces to use special powers, such as abrogation of due process.... In China, Xinhua follows extreme precautions in the murder trial of an HIV-positive defendant. The defendant was forced to wear a surgical mask and rubber gloves. The precautions drew criticism from human rights and AIDS activists who demanded the judiciary establish uniform standards for handling AIDS suspects and for damages related to AIDS.

click for the previous foreign press review

On April 12, 1999, US District Judge Susan Webber Wright found President Bill Clinton in contempt of court in the Paula Jones case, concluding that the President had provided "intentionally false" evidence in that case about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Read a contemporary CNN report here.