Breaking Legal News

Court denies second hearing on Medi-Cal rate cut

(Breaking Legal News) — Sat, 25 May 2013 09:08:58 -0700

A federal appeals court on Friday denied a second request by California doctors, pharmacists and hospitals seeking to undo the state's 10 percent provider rate cut for treating the poor.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied an appeal from medical providers to rehear their case, which allows Gov. Jerry Brown to begin implementing the cuts retroactively. A three-judge panel had ruled against them in December on the grounds that trial courts cannot block the state from making cuts that were approved by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Health providers vowed they will continue to press lawmakers to restore the 10 percent reimbursement rate cut to the state's Medicaid program, known as Medi-Cal.

"While we are not surprised by the 9th Circuit Court ruling, we are certainly disappointed, as the 10 percent cut to Medi-Cal will have devastating effects on California's poorest and most vulnerable patients," said Paul Phinney, president of the California Medical Association, in a statement.

Phinney said the state needs competitive Medi-Cal payments as the state prepares to get millions of Californians health coverage under the Affordable Care Act. The association, which represents 35,000 doctors, says ongoing cuts have left doctors with little option but to stop taking qualified patients because the reimbursements do not meet the cost of overhead and supplies to treat them.

Oil leasing dispute heads to federal court

(Breaking Legal News) — Sat, 25 May 2013 09:00:00 -0700

Attorneys for the government and the oil industry will square off against environmental groups Friday in federal court in Montana in a dispute over greenhouse-gas emissions from oil and gas drilling.

The Montana Environmental Information Center and two other groups want U.S. District Judge Sam Haddon to cancel Bureau of Land Management oil and gas leases covering almost 80,000 acres in Montana.

They argue the agency did not fairly consider that greenhouse gas emissions from drilling activities could make climate change worse.

The BLM counters that the emissions from machinery and the venting of excess natural gas are insignificant.

Several industry groups have intervened in the case. They say the environmentalists behind the 2011 lawsuit cannot prove they suffered any specific harm from the lease sales.

WikiLeaks case file fight moves to federal court

(Breaking Legal News) — Fri, 24 May 2013 08:59:57 -0700

The WikiLeaks organization and a handful of journalists asked a federal judge Wednesday to order greater transparency in the court-martial of an Army private who has acknowledged sending reams of classified document to the WikiLeaks website.

The Center for Constitutional Rights, representing WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange, filed the petition in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. It seeks an order requiring public access to all documents in the court-martial of Pfc. Bradley Manning.

It also seeks to have the lawyers and military judge "reconstitute" in open court certain conferences they have held out of public view.

Shaunteh Kelly, a spokeswoman for the Military District of Washington, where Manning is being court-martialed, said the Army has a policy of not commenting on pending litigation.

Manning's 3-year-old espionage case is headed for trial next month at Fort Meade, near Baltimore. Many records of the pretrial proceedings remain secret because the military contends the First Amendment doesn't require it to provide prompt public access to court-martial documents.

Unlike civilian courts, where case files are readily available for public inspection in a clerk's office, there is no central repository for court-martial records. The military initially required reporters covering the Manning case to file federal Freedom of Information Act requests for documents, including the military judge's rulings. In February, it began releasing redacted versions of some court-martial records on a public website. In April, the judge, Army Col. Denise Lind, started releasing some of her written rulings to reporters the same day.

Still, the petition says, the public is being denied its First Amendment right to scrutinize the Manning case as it proceeds.

IMF head Lagarde in court in fraud probe

(Breaking Legal News) — Thu, 23 May 2013 08:36:15 -0700

International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde is facing questions at a special Paris court Thursday over her role in the 400 million euro ($520 million) pay-off to a controversial businessman when she was France's finance minister.

The court hearing threatens to sully the reputations of both Lagarde and France. The payment was made to well-connected entrepreneur Bernard Tapie as part of a private arbitration process to settle a dispute with state-owned bank Credit Lyonnais over the botched sale of Adidas in the 1990s. It is seen by many in France as an example of the cozy relationship between big money and big power in France.

Lagarde has earned praise for her negotiating skills as managing director of the IMF through Europe's debt crisis and is seen as a trailblazer for women leaders. Her decision to let the Adidas dispute go to private arbitration rather than be settled in the courts has drawn criticism, and French lawmakers asked magistrates to investigate.

Lagarde, smiling at reporters, left her Paris apartment Thursday morning and appeared at a special court that handles cases involving government ministers. She has denied wrongdoing.

At the time of the payment, Tapie was close to then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was Lagarde's boss. Critics have said the deal was too generous to Tapie at the expense of the French state, and that the case shouldn't have gone to a private arbitration authority because it involved a state-owned bank.

Court strikes down Arizona 20-week abortion ban

(Breaking Legal News) — Thu, 23 May 2013 08:35:32 -0700

A federal court in San Francisco Tuesday struck down Arizona's ban on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the law violates a string of U.S. Supreme Court rulings starting with Roe v. Wade that guarantees a woman's right to an abortion before a fetus is able to survive outside the womb. That's generally considered to be about 24 weeks. Normal pregnancies run about 40 weeks

Several states have enacted similar bans starting at 20 weeks. But the 9th Circuit's ruling is binding only in the nine Western states under the court's jurisdiction. Idaho is the only other state in the region covered by the 9th Circuit with a similar ban.

A trial judge had ruled that the ban could take effect. U.S. District Judge James Teilborg ruled it was constitutional, partly because of concerns about the health of women and possible pain for fetuses.

But abortion-rights groups appealed that decision, saying the 20-week ban would not give some women time to carefully decide whether to abort problem pregnancies.