U.S. Courts News Reporter
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to block the execution of Marcellus Williams, who in 2001 was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1998 stabbing murder of Felicia Gayle. None of the forensic evidence found in Gayle’s house tied Williams to the scene and his lawyers argued there was reason to believe he was innocent. The lawyer who prosecuted Williams also testified that he excluded at least one potential juror because of that juror’s race.
Williams was executed … Read the rest
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The court handed a win to a former-city council member in Texas on Thursday, clearing the way for her federal civil rights claim to move forward. Sylvia Gonzalez contends that her 2019 arrest on charges that she had tampered with government records came in retaliation for her criticism of the city manager in Castle Hills, Tex. In a brief unsigned opinion, the justices reinstated Gonzalez’s claim after a federal appeals court had thrown it out, holding that the lower … Read the rest
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The Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for Idaho to temporarily enforce a state law criminalizing gender-transition care for minors against anyone who is not part of a lawsuit currently challenging that ban. In a brief order, the justices granted the state’s request to limit the scope of an earlier order entered by a federal district court in Idaho, which had barred the state from enforcing the law at all while a challenge to its constitutionality continues.
The … Read the rest
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday left in place a federal appeals court ruling that bars the city of Tulsa from enforcing municipal ordinances against Native Americans. In a brief unsigned order without any public dissents, the justices rejected the city’s request to put a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit on hold to give the city time to appeal.
The order came in a case arising from a nearly five-year-old traffic ticket and … Read the rest
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The Supreme Court on Friday night granted a request from the Biden administration and a drug manufacturer to put on hold a ruling by a federal judge in Texas that suspended the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of mifepristone, part of a two-drug protocol used to end pregnancies in their early stages. The battle over medication abortions, which account for over half of all abortions performed in the United States each year, now returns to the U.S. Court of … Read the rest
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The Supreme Court on Monday cleared the way for a cellphone provider to turn over call records for Dr. Kelli Ward, the chair of the Arizona Republican Party, to the committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Ward had asked the justices to block a subpoena addressed to T-Mobile, arguing that there “could hardly be a starker example of seeking to punish people for having ties to political views regarding the outcome of the 2020 … Read the rest