Prostitute charged in executive’s death
A high-end prostitute is charged with the death of Google executive, Timothy Hayes. Video taken on November 23, 2013 aboard Hayes’ yacht shows Alix Catherine Tichleman injecting Hayes with heroin and then leaving the yacht. The police statement reads:
Rather than provide first aid or call 911, Ms. Tichleman proceeds to gather her belongings including the heroin and needles.
Police say Tichleman stepped over Hayes’ body several times while preparing to leave the yacht, including stepping over him to finish a glass of wine. Hayes had an “ongoing prostitution relationship” with Tichleman.
Pleads ‘no contest’ to misdemeanor vandalism
Bieber pleads “no contest” to one count of misdemeanor vandalism. Bieber had egged his neighbor Jeffrey Schwartz’s Calabasas home earlier this year; he will have to pay $80,900 in damages and will remain on probation for two years, requiring him to take twelve separate weekly angry management classes and serve five days of community service. He has been ordered to not come within one hundred yards of Schwartz and his family. A source close to Bieber says:
Justin is glad to get this matter resolved and behind him. He will continue to move forward focusing on his career and his music.
Defiant testimony at trial
At the trial, Sterling, challenges the sale of the Clippers, says he’s mentally sound. He claims the doctors that are declaring he has Alzheimer’s disease are “hired guns.” He claims a bad memory about some of the controversial remarks that he is accused of, and he also says he can top the $2 billion dollar offer for the team by $10 billion by selling the TV rights to Fox and winning the antitrust suit filed against the NBA. As Sterling’s outbursts and comments continued, the judge tries to regain control of the situation:
Go back to answering questions rather than making somewhat entertaining comments.
His lawyers challenge the authority of Shelly Sterling, under a family trust, to cut a deal for the team with former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer.
Sentence: Eight years
U.S. District Court Judge Charles A. Pannell, Jr. sentences Nida to eight years of jail on charges of conspiring to commit mail, wire and bank fraud. The sentence will be followed by five years of supervised release. Nida is also ordered to pay restitution to the victims of his offenses. The U.S. Attorney’s office says:
Nida’s sentence should be an eye opener for other like-minded criminals who scheme to steal victims’ identities, defraud them and ignore the consequences of their actions
$5 million for victims’ families
A civil court judge allows the families of murder victims Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado to freeze up to $5 million of Hernandez’s mansion’s worth. He denied their bid for a court order that would block the Patriots from paying their former tight end a $3.3 million signing bonus. The attorneys for the family say:
That’s one skirmish. We’re going to go forward. All we can do is pursue money. There’s no way $3.3 million will bring back these two men, so this is what the system leaves us with.
DWI arrest
The wide receiver is arrested for DWI in Raleigh, North Carolina. He is currently out on $500 bond and is already facing a potential 1 year suspension from the Cleveland Browns. Browns general manager Ray Farmer comments
We are aware of the matter and are disappointed to learn of this situation. We will comment further at the appropriate time.
Public Intoxication Arrest
The actor is arrested for public intoxication after becoming disorderly and yelling at security at a local Dallas bar named Katy Trail Ice Bar. According to witnesses he was at the bar for four hours drinking. After appearing to try to leave without paying the tab he was confronted by security and a fight ensued. Short was then arrested by off duty police who work at the bar.
He was like a dog with a bone who wouldn’t let it go.
Texas man pleads guilty to terror support
University of Texas student Rahatul Ashikim Khan, 23, of Round Rock, Tx., pleads guilty to charges of supporting terrorism after investigators say he had been recruiting jihadi fighters through an online chat room under the user name AuthenticTauheed19. He faces up to 15 years in prison. No sentencing date has been set. A statement by U.S. Attorney Robert Pitman:
Rahatul Khan’s admissions during this morning’s guilty plea should serve as a sobering reminder that we need to remain vigilant in our efforts to detect and root out terrorism, even in our own back yard
California man arrested
Authorities arrest 20-year-old Orange County native Adam Dandach, also known as Fadi Fadi Dandach, as he is about to board a flight bound for Istanbul. A detention order shows that under questioning, he says that he planned to travel to Syria:
[…] that he would assist ISIS with anything the ISIS asked him to do, and that he believed the killings of U.S. soldiers are justified killings.
He is detained as a flight risk and a danger to his community, and indited on two felonies relating to his replacement passport, after authorities discover that his mother hid his original passport to prevent him flying overseas. The detention order:
Dandach stated that he was more disappointed that he did not get to go to Syria than in getting in trouble with law enforcement
Khatallah ordered held until trial
During a brief detention hearing yesterday, a federal court magistrate rules that Abu Khatallah will remain in jail until his trial. Court documents released before the hearing allege he “conspired to participate and then participated” in the September 11, 2012, attack on the American outpost in eastern Libya that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. In the document, prosecutors allege:
The defendant’s participation in the attack was motivated by his extremist ideology.
They also allege that Khatallah “voiced concern and opposition to the presence of an American facility in Benghazi” days prior to the attack.
Judge says no to gag order
Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Locke refuses to issue a gag order in the matter of the alleged murder of two people by Hernandez in 2012. The judge said he sees no sign that Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley’s office had violated ethical rules for prosecutors by leaking information .
The Court is satisfied that the Suffolk County District Attorney’s office is aware of and operates consistent with the restrictions imposed by the Massachusetts Rules of Professional Conduct, rendering a detailed order regarding extrajudicial statements unnecessary at this time.
Workers cannot be forced to pay union dues
The courts rules that home healthcare workers in Illinois can not be forced to pay union dues. The 5-4 ruling mostly applies to a group of Illinois home care providers challenged that a state decision to classify them as public employees, which would have meant they would have to pay union dues. Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the conservative majority, says the practice was a clear violation of the First Amendment:
If we accepted Illinois’ argument, we would approve an unprecedented violation of the bedrock principle that, except perhaps in the rarest of circumstances, no person in this country may be compelled to subsidize speech by a third party that he or she does not wish to support.
Allows corporate contraceptive religious objection
The court rules 5-4 in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby to allow corporations to hold religious objections and opt out of the new health law requirement that say they must cover contraceptives for women. Contraception is among a range of preventive services that must be provided at no extra charge under the health care law that President Barack Obama signed in 2010 and the Supreme Court upheld two years later. Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority opinion:
Under the standard that [the Religious Freedom Restoration Act] prescribes, the HHS contraceptive mandate is unlawful…Our decision should not be understood to hold that an insurance-coverage mandate must necessarily fall if it conflicts with an employer’s religious beliefs.
The court’s four liberal justices called it a decision of “startling breadth” and said that it allows companies to
opt out of any law (saving only tax laws) they judge incompatible with their sincerely held religious beliefs.
Must pay Canadian workers
The Supreme Court of Canada rules that the workers at the Jonquiere, Quebec store must be compensated. The workers lost their jobs at the store when it was suddenly shut down months after its employees unionized. The court ruled in a five-to-two decision that the the store modified working conditions for the employees without a valid reason when it shut down the store in February, 2005. A spokesman for Wal-Mart Canada says the company will consider its options:
We are disappointed by the decision. This was an appeal of a unanimous decision by the Quebec Court of Appeal to reject the UFCW’s claim, which in our view was a legally correct decision. We will review the decision carefully in order to determine what our next steps will be.
‘Right to be forgotten’ begins
Google begins processing requests for search result removals because of a European Union court ruling that people have a “right to be forgotten” on the internet. They have over 41,000 requests to remove individually:
This week, we’re starting to take action on the removals requests that we’ve received. This is a new process for us. Each request has to be assessed individually, and we’re working as quickly as possible to get through the queue.
‘Cabaret’ arrest
During a performance of Cabaret at a New York City theater, the actor is arrested for criminal trespass and misconduct. LeBeouf was smoking in the theater and slapping strangers on the rear end in addition to yelling loudly at the actors on stage during Act 1. According to the complaint, he was asked to leave and refused, yelling obscenities at the security guard. He was removed from the theater in handcuffs and charged with five counts of disorderly conduct, criminal trespass, and harassment.
Strikes down abortion clinic buffer zone
With a 9-0 vote, the Court rules the 2007 Massachusetts’ law requiring a 35-foot buffer zone around abortion clinics violated the freedom of speech rights of anti-abortion protesters under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution because it prevents them from standing on the sidewalk and speaking to people entering the clinics. Justice John Roberts says that the state has:
too readily foregone options that could serve its interests just as well, without substantially burdening the kind of speech in which petitioners wish to engage.
Rules against Obama recess appointments
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court rules that President Obama went too far when he made recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). This is the first time the Supreme Court has ruled on a matter involving the long-standing practice of presidents naming appointees when the Senate is on break. Obama had argued that the Senate was on an extended holiday break when he filled slots at the NLRB in 2012. Justice Stephen Breyer stated that a congressional break has to last at least 10 days to be considered a recess under the Constitution. Breyer wrote:
Three days is too short a time to bring a recess within the scope of the Clause. Thus we conclude that the President lacked the power to make the recess appointments here at issue.
Cell phone search warrant required
The Court rules that cell phones cannot be searched without a warrant. Chief Justice John Roberts believes that cell phones contain so much information that a warrant must be required before they are searched. Both the Obama Administration and the State of California defend cell phone searches and claim they should have no special protection from other items found on a person. Roberts says:
Modern cellphones are not just another technological convenience. With all they contain and all they may reveal, they hold for many Americans the privacies of life.
U.S. bankruptcy approved
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Stacey G. Jernigan accepts Mt. Gox’s U.S. filing and recognizes Mt. Gox’s Japanese bankruptcy as the foreign main proceeding. The ruling empowers the company’s Japanese trustee to examine witnesses, gather and review evidence, and oversee assets in the U.S. She says
This is really going to be all about the customers, who make up almost all of the creditors, and trying to get them a recovery