Tornados slam Arkansas, shredding rooftops and tossing cars

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A tornado raced through Little Rock and surrounding areas Friday, splintering homes, overturning vehicles and tossing trees and debris on roadways as people raced for shelter. There were early reports at least two dozen people hurt, some critically.

Another tornado hit the town of Wynne in the eastern part of the state near the Tennessee border, and officials reported widespread damage there including destroyed homes and downed trees.

There were more confirmed twisters in Iowa, damaging hail fell in Illinois and wind-whipped grass fires blazed in Oklahoma, part of a massive storm system threatening a broad swath of the country that is home to some 85 million people in the South and Midwest.

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The destructive weather came as President Joe Biden toured the aftermath of a deadly tornado that struck Mississippi a week ago and promised the government would help the area recover.

The Little Rock tornado tore first through neighborhoods in the western part of the city and shredded a small shopping center that included a Kroger grocery store. It then crossed the Arkansas River into North Little Rock and surrounding cities, where widespread damage was reported to homes, businesses and vehicles.

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences Medical Center in Little Rock was operating at a mass casualty level and preparing for up to 20 patients, spokesperson Leslie Taylor said. Baptist Health Medical Center-Little Rock officials told KATV in the afternoon that 21 people had checked in there with tornado-caused injuries, including five in critical condition.

Mayor Frank Scott Jr., who announced that he was requesting assistance from the National Guard, tweeted in the evening that officials were aware of 24 people who had been hospitalized in the city but no fatalities at the moment.

“Property damage is extensive and we are still responding,” he said.

Resident Niki Scott took cover in the bathroom after her husband called to say a tornado was headed her way. She could hear glass shattering as the tornado roared past, and emerged afterward to find that her house was one of the few on her street that didn’t have a tree fall on it.

“It’s just like everyone says. It got really quiet, then it got really loud,” Scott said afterward, as chainsaws roared and sirens blared in the area.

Outside a Little Rock Guitar Center, five people were captured on video aiming their phones at the swirling sky. “Uh, no, that’s an actual tornado, y’all. It’s coming this way,” Red Padilla, a singer and songwriter in the band Red and the Revelers, said in the video.

Padilla told The Associated Press that he and five bandmates sheltered inside the store for around 15 minutes with over a dozen others while the tornado passed. The power went out, and they used the flashlights on their phones to see.

“It was real tense,” Padilla said.

At Clinton National Airport, passengers and workers sheltered temporarily in bathrooms.

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders declared a state of emergency and said there was “significant damage” in the central part of the state.

“Praying for all those who were and remain in the path of this storm,” she tweeted. “Arkansans must continue to stay weather aware as storms are continuing to move through.”

Also hit was the town of Wynne, about 50 miles west of Memphis, Tennessee, which Sanders said saw “widespread damage” from a tornado.

City Councilmember Lisa Powell Carter told AP by phone that Wynne was without power and roads were full of debris.

“I’m in a panic trying to get home, but we can’t get home,” she said. “Wynne is so demolished. … There’s houses destroyed, trees down on streets.”

Police Chief Richard Dennis told WHBQ-TV that the city suffered “total destruction” and multiple people were trapped.

Nearly 70,000 customers in Arkansas lost power, according to poweroutage.us, which tracks outages.

About 32,000 were without electricity in neighboring Oklahoma, where wind gusts of up to 60 mph fueled fast-moving grass fires. People were urged to evacuate homes in far northeast Oklahoma City, and troopers shut down portions of Interstate 35 near the suburb of Edmond.

More outages were reported in Kansas, Missouri and Texas.

Multiple tornadoes were reported moving through parts of eastern Iowa, with sporadic damage to homes, barns and other buildings.

One tornado veered just west of Iowa City, home to the University of Iowa, which canceled a watch party at an on-campus arena for the women’s basketball Final Four game. Video from KCRG-TV showed toppled power poles and roofs ripped off an apartment building in the suburb of Coralville and significantly damaged homes in the city of Hills.

In Illinois, Ben Wagner, chief radar operator for the Woodford County Emergency Management Agency, said hail broke windows on cars and buildings in the area of Roanoke, northeast of Peoria.

Fire crews were battling several blazes near El Dorado, Kansas, and some residents were asked to evacuate, including about 250 elementary school children who were relocated to a high school.

Massive storms brewing over at least 15 states in the Midwest and southern U.S. on Friday had meteorologists urging people to brace for dangerous weather including tornadoes, saying the conditions are similar to those a week ago that unleashed a devastating twister that killed at least 21 people in Mississippi.

The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center forecast called for an unusually large outbreak of thunderstorms with the potential to cause hail, damaging wind gusts and strong tornadoes that could move for long distances over the ground.

Such “intense supercell thunderstorms ” are only expected to become more common, especially in Southern states, as temperatures rise around the world.

At Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, a traffic management program was put into effect that caused arriving planes to be delayed by nearly two hours on average, WFLD-TV reported.

Last Friday night, a vicious tornado in Mississippi killed at least 21 people, injured dozens and flattened entire blocks as it carved a path of destruction for more than an hour. About 2,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, according to the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.

The toll was especially steep in western Mississippi’s Sharkey County, where 13 people were killed in a county of 3,700 residents. Winds of up to 200 mph (322 kph) barreled through the rural farming town of Rolling Fork, reducing homes to piles of rubble, flipping cars and toppling the town’s water tower.

Gensini said Friday’s atmospheric setup is similar to the conditions that were present during Mississippi’s deadly storm.

The hazardous forecast is a result of strong southerly winds transporting copious amounts of moisture from the Gulf of Mexico north, where they will interact with the strengthening storm system.

The weather service is forecasting another batch of intense storms next Tuesday in the same general area as last week. At least the first 10 days of April will be rough, Accuweather meteorologist Brandon Buckingham said earlier this week.

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By ANDREW DeMILLO Associated Press

Associated Press writers Jill Bleed in Little Rock, Harm Venhuizenin in Madison, Wisconsin, Isabella O’Malley in Philadelphia, Lisa Baumann in Bellingham, Washington, and Michael Goldberg in Jackson, Mississippi, contributed to this report.

from Courthouse News

Why executions by firing squad may be coming back in the US

CHICAGO (AP) — The image of gunmen in a row firing in unison at a condemned prisoner may conjure up a bygone, less enlightened era.

But the idea of using firing squads is making a comeback. Idaho lawmakers passed a bill this week seeking to add the state to the list of those authorizing firing squads, which currently includes Mississippi, Utah, Oklahoma and South Carolina.

Fresh interest comes as states scramble for alternatives to lethal injections after pharmaceutical companies barred the use of their drugs.

Some, including a few Supreme Court justices, view firing squads as less cruel than lethal injections, despite the violence involved in riddling bodies with bullets. Others say it’s not so cut-and-dry, or that there are other factors to consider.

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A look at the status of firing squads in the United States:

WHEN WAS THE LAST EXECUTION BY FIRING SQUAD?

Ronnie Lee Gardner was executed at Utah State Prison on June 18, 2010, for killing an attorney during a courthouse escape attempt.

Gardner sat in a chair, sandbags around him and a target pinned over his heart. Five prison staffers drawn from a pool of volunteers fired from 25 feet (about 8 meters) away with .30-caliber rifles. Gardner was pronounced dead two minutes later.

A blank cartridge was loaded into one rifle without anyone knowing which. That’s partly done to enable those bothered later by their participation to believe they may not have fired a fatal bullet.

Utah is the only state to have used firing squads in the past 50 years, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Death Penalty Information Center.

WHAT HAS CAUSED THE LETHAL DRUG SCARCITY?

Under Idaho’s bill, firing squads would be used only if executioners can’t obtain the drugs required for lethal injections.

As lethal injection became the primary execution method in the 2000s, drug companies began barring use of their drugs, saying they were meant to save lives, not take them.

States have found it difficult to obtain the cocktail of drugs they long relied on, such as sodium thiopental, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride. Some have switched to more accessible drugs such as pentobarbital or midazolam, both of which, critics say, can cause excruciating pain.

Other states have reauthorized the use of electric chairs and gas chambers — or are at least considering doing so. That’s where firing squads come in.

ARE THEY MORE HUMANE?

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor is among those who say firing squads are a more humane method of execution.

That idea is based on expectations that bullets will strike the heart, rupturing it and causing immediate unconsciousness as the inmate quickly bleeds to death.

“In addition to being near instant, death by shooting may also be comparatively painless,” Sotomayor wrote in a 2017 dissent.

Her comments came in the case of an Alabama inmate who asked to be executed by firing squad. A Supreme Court majority refused to hear his appeal. In her dissent, Sotomayor said lethal drugs can mask intense pain by paralyzing inmates while they are still sentient.

“What cruel irony that the method that appears most humane may turn out to be our most cruel experiment yet,” she wrote.

BUT IS DEATH BY FIRING SQUAD REALLY PAINLESS?

In a 2019 federal case, prosecutors submitted statements from anesthesiologist Joseph Antognini, who said painless deaths by firing squads are not guaranteed.

Inmates could remain conscious for up to 10 seconds after being shot depending on where bullets strike, Antognini said, and those seconds could be “severely painful, especially related to shattering of bone and damage to the spinal cord.”

Others note that killings by firing squad are visibly violent and bloody compared with lethal injections, potentially traumatizing victims’ relatives and other witnesses as well as executioners and staffers who clean up afterward.

ARE FIRING SQUADS MORE RELIABLE?

If reliability means the condemned are more likely to die as intended, then one could make that argument.

An Amherst College political science and law professor, Austin Sarat, studied 8,776 executions in the U.S. between 1890 and 2010 and found that 276 of them were botched, or 3.15%.

The executions that went wrong included 7.12% of all lethal injections — in one notorious 2014 case in Oklahoma, Clayton Locket writhed and clenched his teeth after midazolam was administered — as well as 3.12% of hangings and 1.92% of electrocutions.

By contrast, not a single one of the 34 firing squad executions was found to have been botched, according to Sarat, who has called for an end to capital punishment.

The Death Penalty Information Center, however, has identified at least one firing squad execution that reportedly went awry: In 1879, in Utah territory, riflemen missed Wallace Wilkerson’s heart and it took 27 minutes for him to die.

WERE FIRING SQUADS EVER IN WIDE USE?

Firing squads have never been a predominant method of carrying out civilian death sentences and are more closely associated with the military, including the execution of Civil War deserters.

From colonial days through 2002, more than 15,000 people were put to death, according to data compiled by death penalty researchers M. Watt Espy and John Ortiz Smykla. Just 143 died by firing squad, compared with 9,322 by hanging and 4,426 by electrocution.

HAS THE SUPREME COURT WEIGHED IN?

High court rulings have required inmates who oppose an existing execution method to offer an alternative. They must prove both that the alternative is “significantly” less painful and that the infrastructure exists to implement the alternative method.

That has led to the spectacle of inmate attorneys bringing multiple cases in which they argue the merits of firing squads.

In 2019, the Supreme Court ruled in Bucklew v. Precythe that some pain does not automatically mean a method of execution constitutes “cruel and unusual” punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.

The Constitution “does not guarantee a prisoner a painless death — something that, of course, isn’t guaranteed to many people,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the 5-4 majority.

Key factors in deciding whether a method is “cruel and unusual” include whether it adds extra pain “beyond what’s needed to effectuate a death sentence,” Gorsuch said.

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By MICHAEL TARM AP Legal Affairs Writer

from Courthouse News

Law firm asks Texas high court to uphold anti-SLAPP dismissal of malpractice case

AUSTIN, Texas (CN) — The Texas Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday in the case of a financial services company that claims a Dallas-based law firm cost it $1.2 million by not asking for damages in a default judgment motion.

Winstead PC and its attorney James Ruiz represented USA Lending Group, a small Austin-based company that provides business and home loans, in a federal lawsuit it filed in 2017 against its former employee, Mike Ahmari.

Alleging breach of fiduciary duty, USA Lending said it had hired Ahmari to lead marketing for a new home mortgage program for which it asked him to acquire domain names and toll-free telephone numbers.

Ahmari abruptly resigned and USA Lending learned he had acquired the domain names and phone numbers for a competing business he had launched shortly before his resignation.

Ahmari did not answer the lawsuit, so Winstead’s Ruiz, in consultation with USA Lending’s CEO Jim Isaacs, prepared a motion for default judgment.

The federal judge signed the default judgment in October 2017 and Winstead helped USA Lending recover the intellectual property Ahmari had swiped.

But USA Lending was not completely happy with Winstead’s and Ruiz’s work.

It sued them for legal malpractice in January 2020, arguing their decision not to request damages from Ahmari in the default judgment motion cost it $1.2 million.

Winstead asked for dismissal per the Texas Citizens Participation Act, an anti-SLAPP bill meant to deter speech-chilling litigation. It allows for expedited dismissal of lawsuits based on a defendant exercising their First Amendment free speech rights.

The trial court refused to dismiss the lawsuit, but the 12th Texas Court of Appeals in Tyler sided with Winstead and tossed the case.

USA Lending appealed to the Texas Supreme Court, which heard arguments Tuesday.

Central to the dispute is the TCPA’s definition of communication, which includes “the making or submitting of a statement or document in any form or medium, including oral, visual, written, audiovisual, or electronic.”

Though the statute shields defendants from liability for communications made in judicial proceedings, USA Lending’s counsel, Dylan Russell with the Houston office of Hoover Slovacek, argued the company’s lawsuit is not about what Winstead communicated in the motion for default judgment.

“We’re not complaining about what was said in that motion, we’re complaining about what was not said,” Russell stated.

Justice Evan Young asked Russell if he believes USA Lending would also have a viable legal malpractice case if Winstead had not failed to request any damages from Ahmari but had asked for them “so poorly” the motion was denied.

Russell said if there was an actual communication it would be tougher for USA Lending to overcome Winstead’s TCPA defense, but he stressed that Winstead’s omission of a damages request was not a communication.

“If they forgot to add some zeros when we were hoping for $1 million,” Russell said, “and they only gave us $1,000, that would be a complaint about an actual communication made that was defective, because they didn’t ask for it with enough zeros.”

“But here there was no communication whatsoever that said to the district court judge, federal court, please give us money damages. Here is our proof. Here’s the legal reasons to support that,” he added.

Winstead’s counsel, Robin O’Neil with Fogler, Brar, O’Neil & Gray of Houston, opened her arguments with a disclaimer: “To be clear we are not contending the TCPA requires automatic dismissal of every claim against a lawyer.”

She said she believes Texas appeals courts have correctly held attorneys cannot use the TCPA as a defense when they totally fail to act – for instance, if their client’s case is dismissed because they missed a statute of limitations deadline.

“Here there is no way to interpret USA Lending’s claim other than that it is based on Winstead’s making and submission of a document,” O’Neil argued, “which is specifically referenced as a communication in the TCPA. It is essentially a criticism of Winstead’s communication with the court.”

Playing devil’s advocate of USA Lending’s position, Justice Jane Bland pressed O’Neil to explain why the TCPA shields Winstead.

“So if the document or statement doesn’t contain something, in other words there’s a failure to communicate, how does that trigger the definition of communication in the TCPA?” the judge asked.

O’Neil, circling back to the statute’s language, replied, “Because the claim itself is based on a document which the TCPA defines as a communication.”

The firm’s attorney also noted the Texas Legislature is considering an amendment that would bar attorneys and law firms from invoking the anti-SLAPP defense against legal malpractice allegations.

Laying out his House Bill 527 in a recent legislature committee hearing, Representative Gene Wu, a Houston Democrat and former prosecutor now in private practice, said, “Essentially we’re trying to stop people from doing something with the law that was never intended. And that was to use the anti-SLAPP laws that we passed as a sword to basically bat away legal malpractice claims.”

The Texas Supreme Court’s nine justices did not say when they would rule on the case.

As of April 2022, 32 U.S. states and the District of Columbia had anti-SLAPP laws, according to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

from Courthouse News

School library book bans are seen as targeting LGBTQ content

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Teri Patrick bristles at the idea she wants to ban books about LGBTQ issues in Iowa schools, arguing her only goal is ridding schools of sexually explicit material.

Sara Hayden Parris says that whatever you want to call it, it’s wrong for some parents to think a book shouldn’t be readily available to any child if it isn’t right for their own child.

The viewpoints of the two mothers from suburban Des Moines underscore a divide over LGBTQ content in books as Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds pushes an especially sweeping crackdown on content in Iowa school libraries. The bill she’s backing could result in the removal of books from school libraries in all of the state’s 327 districts if they’re successfully challenged in any one of them.

School boards and legislatures nationwide also are facing questions about books and considering making it easier to limit access.

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“We’re seeing these challenges arise in almost every state of the union,” said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. “It’s a national phenomenon.”

Longstanding disagreements about content in school libraries often focus this year on books with LGBTQ themes as policymakers nationwide also consider limiting or banning gender-affirming care and drag shows, allowing the deadnaming of transgender students or adults in the workplace, and other measures targeting LGBTQ people.

The trend troubles Kris Maul, a transgender man who is raising a 12-year-old with his lesbian partner in the Des Moines area and wants school library books to reflect all kinds of families and children. Maul argued that those seeking to remove books take passages out of context and unfairly focus on books about LGBTQ or racial justice issues.

LGBTQ people are more visible than even five years ago, Maul said, and he believes that has led to a backlash from some who hope limiting discussion will return American society to an era that didn’t acknowledge people with different sexualities.

“People are scared because they don’t think LGBTQ people should exist,” Maul said. “They don’t want their own children to be LGBTQ, and they feel if they can limit access to these books and materials, then their children won’t be that way, which is simply not true and is heartbreaking and disgusting.”

In Louisiana, activists fear a push by Republican Attorney General Jeff Landry to investigate sexually explicit materials in public libraries — and recently proposed legislation that could restrict children and teens’ access to those books — is being used to target and censor LGBTQ content.

Landry, who is running for governor, launched a statewide tip line in November to field complaints about librarians, teachers, and school and library personnel. Landry released a report in February that listed nine books his office considers “sexually explicit” or inappropriate for children. Seven have LGBTQ storylines.

In Florida, some schools have covered or removed books under a new law that requires an evaluation of reading materials and for districts to publish a searchable list of books where individuals can then challenge specific titles.

The reviews have drawn widespread attention, with images of empty bookshelves ricocheting across social media, and are often accompanied by criticism of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican expected to run for president.

The state’s training materials direct the reviews to target sexually explicit materials but also say that schools should “err on the side of caution” when selecting reading materials and that principals are responsible for compliance.

Florida’s largest teachers union is challenging the law, arguing its implementation is too broad and leading to unnecessary censorship. An education department spokesperson did not immediately comment.

DeSantis said the state has not instructed schools to empty libraries or cover books. He said 175 books have been removed from 23 school districts, with 87% of the books identified as pornographic, violent or inappropriate for their grade level.

The Iowa legislation comes amid efforts there to keep a closer eye on public school curriculums and make taxpayer money available to parents for private school tuition. Reynolds, the governor, has made such proposals the core of her legislative agenda, telling a conservative parents group that their work was essential to guarding against “indoctrination” by public school educators.

Under a bill backed by Reynolds, the titles and authors of all books available to students in classrooms and libraries would be posted online, and officials would need to specify how parents could request a book’s removal and how decisions to retain books could be appealed. When any district removes a book, the state Education Department would add it to a “removal list,” and all of Iowa’s 326 other districts would have to deny access to the book unless parents gave approval.

At a hearing on Reynolds’ bill, Republican lawmakers, who hold huge majorities in both legislative chambers, said they might change the proposal but were committed to seeing it approved. The bill has passed a Senate committee and is awaiting a floor vote.

“The parents are the governing authority in how their child is educated, period,” said Sen. Amy Sinclair. “Parents are responsible for their child’s upbringing, period.”

Patrick, a mother of two, expressed befuddlement about why anyone would want to make sexually explicit books available to children.

“I have to believe that there are books that cater to the LGBTQ community that don’t have to have such graphic sexual content in them,” said Patrick, a member of a local chapter of Moms for Liberty, a conservative group that has gained national influence for its efforts to influence school curriculum and classroom learning. “There are very few books that have ever been banned and what we’re saying is, in a public school setting, with taxpayer-funding money, should these books really be available to kids?”

Hayden Parris, a mom of two from a suburb only a few miles away, understands the argument but thinks it misses the point.

“A kindergartner is not wandering into the young adults section and picking out a book that is called like, “This Book is Gay,” said Hayden Parris, who is leading a parents group opposed to Iowa’s proposed law. “They’re not picking those books, and the fact that they can pick one out of several thousand books is not a reason to keep it away from everyone.”

Sam Helmick, president of the Iowa Library Association, said communities should decide what’s in their libraries and that it’s important for children to have access to books that address their lives and questions. Helmick didn’t have that ability as a child, and students shouldn’t return to that time, she said.

“Can we acknowledge that this will have a chilling effect?” Helmick asked. “And when you tell me that books about myself as an asexual, nonbinary person who didn’t have those books in libraries when I was a kid to pick up and flip through, but now publishing has caught up with me and I can see representation of me — those will be behind the desk and that’s not supposed to make me feel less welcome, less seen and less represented in my library?”

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By SCOTT McFETRIDGE, ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE and SARA CLINE Associated Press

Izaguirre reported from Tallahassee, Florida, and Cline from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

from Courthouse News

US courts saw drop in case filings, uptick in judge complaints in 2022

(CN) — While many courts returned to their usual pre-pandemic operations in 2022 as the Covid-19 crisis receded, most received fewer case filings than the year prior, according to a report released Tuesday by the U.S. judicial system.

The latest Judicial Business report from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts provides statistical data about federal caseloads by circuit, district and offense for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2022, compared with data for prior years.

Total case filings in U.S. district courts fell 18% last year to 343,253. Civil case filings declined 20% to 274,771, and criminal filings dropped by 8% to 68,482. 

The report also tracked the number of complaints filed against judges, which went up by 19%. Of the 1,520 complaints last year, 57% were made against district judges, 25% were against circuit judges, 14% against magistrate judges and 4% against bankruptcy judges.

The Fourth Circuit received the highest number of complaints (249) for a federal appeals court while the Ninth Circuit had the lowest (166). Most of the allegations made against judges in the circuit courts were related to the merits of a decision or ruling (1,319), followed by other misconduct (339); discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex or other factors (252); retaliation for participating in the complaint process (125); and delayed decision (118).

Chief judges dismissed 1,135 complaints in whole or in part, terminating 983 of them, due to the complaint being directly related to the merits of decisions or on the grounds that the allegations were frivolous or lacked sufficient evidence.

Civil case filings in the district courts have declined by 3%, or 8,165 cases, since 2018, with the largest decreases occurring in cases involving prisoner petitions, social security, labor laws, real property, civil rights, and environment cases. During that period, district courts have reported more filings related to tort actions, personal injuries, immigration, contract actions, securities, commodities and exchange, and banking.

The highest reductions in criminal cases occurred in filings for defendants charged with crimes related to marijuana, which went down 22% to 1,207 filings, and regulatory system offenses, which went down 16% to 1,201 filings. Filings for drug crimes in general fell by 31% from 2021.

Organized crime cases brought under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act rose 19%, up 111 cases to 685. The largest spike in such filings occurred in the Eastern District of New York, which reported an increase of 37%. 

Accounting for 28% of total criminal filings, accusations of immigration offenses remained relatively steady, declining less than 1%. The Southern District of Texas experienced the largest decrease in criminal immigration filings, with increases reported in the District of New Mexico, the Southern District of California and the Western District of Texas.  

Sixty percent of all federal judicial districts had lower caseloads. Districts with the largest decreases included the District of Guam, followed by the Eastern District of Arkansas and the Southern District of Indiana. The biggest increases were reported in the Eastern District of Louisiana, the Eastern District of Oklahoma and the Northern District of New York.

According to the report, the caseload in the Eastern District of Oklahoma “again exceeded historical norms” because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2020 decision in McGirt v. Oklahoma, which shifted the jurisdiction over many offenses involving Native Americans on reservation lands from state court to federal court.

Filings across the 12 regional courts of appeals also fell by 6% to 41,839 filings in 2022. Nearly half of all new appeals were filed by pro se litigants and were mostly prisoner petitions. 

There was a reduction in appeals filings involving drugs, immigration, general offenses and traffic offenses, and an increase in cases related to firearms and explosives, sex offenses, justice systems offenses, violent offenses, property offenses, fraud, regulatory offenses and unclassified offenses.

Appeals of district court decisions to the Federal Circuit – the only federal appellate bench with jurisdiction to hear patent case appeals – increased from 34 to 323, and appeals of decisions by the International Trade Commission also went up significantly from 13 to 27.

Bankruptcy appellate panels saw their lowest level of filings in the last 20 years. Nationwide, debtors filed 50,730 fewer bankruptcy petitions than in 2021, continuing a downward trend that began since the start of the pandemic. 

Magistrate judges handled fewer civil matters on referral from district judges last year, but did see a 17% increase in their own presiding civil cases. Since 2018, magistrates have handled more felony pretrial matters, but fewer felony preliminary proceedings, primarily because of the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Judge Roslynn R. Mauskopf, director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, released an additional annual report Tuesday detailing the agency’s efforts toward ensuring safety for the judges and staff in the courts and more secure and user-friendly information technology.

from Courthouse News

Is DeSantis darkening Florida’s sunny open-records laws?

(AP) — Florida has long been known for sunshine — not only the warm rays that brighten its beaches but also the light of public scrutiny afforded by some of the nation’s strongest meetings and records laws.

Although years of rollbacks have gradually clouded the impact, advocates are ringing alarms that this year presents the greatest threat to transparency yet in the state that coined the name “Sunshine Law” for its open-government rules.

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, weighing a presidential bid, is pursuing a home-state agenda that could make it harder for people to learn what public officials are doing or to speak out against them. In an unprecedented move for the Sunshine State, DeSantis has claimed an executive right to keep key government records secret. He’s also seeking to weaken a nearly 60-year-old national legal precedent protecting journalists and others who publish critical comments about public figures.

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Florida’s Republican-led Legislature appears eager to carry out his vision. As their annual session began last week, lawmakers filed dozens of bills that would add to the state’s lengthy list of open-government exceptions.

“The state of sunshine is in peril,” warned Barbara Petersen, executive director of the Florida Center for Government Accountability, who has been tracking the state’s public access laws for three decades.

DeSantis, who is expected to launch a presidential bid following the session, has thrilled conservative activists nationwide by leaning into fights against the GOP’s perceived political adversaries: public health officials, so-called “woke” leaders in business and public education — and the press.

Former President Donald Trump, a potential rival and fellow Floridian, also is well-known for lambasting the press — describing the U.S. media as “the enemy of the people.” Such criticism often plays well within the modern-day Republican Party, where mainstream media are perceived to side with the interests of Democrats and liberals.

But it runs contrary to Florida’s historic reputation as a place where reporters — and curious members of the public — can unearth government data and documents that shed light on the decisions made by elected officials.

Florida’s law making government records open to public inspection dates to 1909, long before similar measures emerged in many other states. It added a Sunshine Law requiring public meetings in 1967. Then, in 1992, Florida voters approved a constitutional amendment guaranteeing a public right to access records and meetings. A decade later, as lawmakers were adding exemptions, voters approved another a constitutional amendment making it harder for legislators to approve future exceptions.

Florida newspapers launched the first “Sunshine Sunday” in 2002 to highlight the importance of public access to government information. That one-day event has since grown to an annual Sunshine Week observed nationally by media and First Amendment advocates.

As this year’s Sunshine Week began Sunday, lawmakers in state capitols were pursuing a mixture of proposals — some excluding more government records from public inspection; others increasing the ability of people to keep an eye on their government. But nowhere, perhaps, have Sunshine Week issues garnered as much attention as in Florida — due largely to DeSantis’ powerful platform to voice his complaints about the media.

Last month, DeSantis hosted a livestreamed “panel discussion on defamation” while attempting to build support for his plan to make it easier to bring defamation lawsuits against the media or people who post things on the internet about public officials and employees.

“You smear somebody, it’s false, and you didn’t do your homework, you’re going to have to be held accountable for that,” DeSantis said while concluding the event. “Hopefully, you’ll see more and more of that across the country.”

DeSantis is seeking to undercut a 1964 U.S. Supreme Court decision that shielded news outlets from libel judgments unless proven that they were published with “actual malice” — knowing that something was false or acting with “reckless disregard” to whether it was true. Florida legislation to carry out DeSantis’ plan would make it unnecessary to prove “actual malice” when the allegedly defamatory statements don’t relate to the reason why someone is a public figure.

Other provisions of the legislation would presume anonymous statements in news stories are false for the purposes defamation lawsuits and would treat accusations of racial, sexual or gender discrimination as intrinsically defamatory.

Petersen said such provisions appear to be a first nationally and could have a freezing effect on free speech.

But Republican state Rep. Alex Andrade, who is sponsoring the bill, said it is “a sincere attempt to try and fix the problems that exist in this type of law.”

“This bill would make it easier for someone who’s actually been harmed by a defamatory statement to pursue justice in Florida courts,” Andrade said.

The defamation legislation is just one of several DeSantis administration policies prompting concern among media organizations.

Earlier this year, a Florida trial judge upheld DeSantis’ assertion of “executive privilege” in refusing to turn over information requested under the state’s public-records law about his screening of potential state Supreme Court nominees. That case is being watched by national media organizations as it’s being appealed.

The Florida Constitution contains no specific mention of “executive privilege.” Neither does the U.S. Constitution, though courts have upheld the president’s prerogative to withhold documents to protect the confidentiality of advice received in the decision-making process. Governors in Oklahoma, Tennessee and Washington also have previously asserted the privilege.

Another DeSantis administration policy has slowed access to some public records. Television station WKMG reported last month that public records requests to some state agencies were being routed for review to the governor’s office, sometimes delaying their release by weeks or months.

Public protests at the Capitol also have been limited. Under a DeSantis administration rule that took effect March 1, demonstrations at the Capitol Complex are only permitted outdoors. Requests to use space in the Capitol Complex must come from state agencies, the Legislature or judiciary, must be “consistent with the agency’s official purpose” and cannot include displays with “gratuitous violence or gore” that are “patently offensive to prevailing standards in the community.”

Florida’s open-government reputation already was fading before DeSantis took office in 2019, but that trend has gained steam. In his first year, lawmakers expanded the list of personal details forbidden to be disclosed about various public officials. Last year, DeSantis signed a law shielding information about candidates for college and university presidencies.

This year, roughly five-dozen bills already have been filed proposing more open-government exemptions, Petersen said. Some of those would prohibit the agency that provides security for DeSantis from disclosing the governor’s travel arrangements — even after the fact.

Though DeSantis said he doesn’t support it, another bill filed this year would require bloggers to file periodic reports with the state if they are paid for posts about the governor, lieutenant governor, cabinet members or legislative officials.

The cumulative effect is that “open government and public records laws are very much under the gun right now,” said Bobby Block, executive director of the First Amendment Foundation, a Florida nonprofit that advocates for the public’s right to open government.

“Every year, we’re seeing the vast sweep of the original intention chiseled away – sometimes bit by bit, other times chuck by chuck,” Block said, “and it’s definitely not the way it used to be.”

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By DAVID A. LIEB Associated Press

Associated Press writers Anthony Izaguirre and Steve Peoples contributed to this report.

from Courthouse News

Millions who rely on Medicaid may be booted from program

WASHINGTON (AP) — If you get health care coverage through Medicaid, you might be at risk of losing that coverage over the next year.

Roughly 84 million people are covered by the government-sponsored program, which has grown by 20 million people since January 2020, just before the Covid-19 pandemic hit.

But as states begin checking everyone’s eligibility for Medicaid for the first time in three years, as many as 14 million people could lose access to that health care coverage.

A look at why so many people may no longer qualify for the Medicaid program over the next year and what you need to know if you’re one of those people who relies on the program.

Courthouse News’ podcast Sidebar tackles the stories you need to know from the legal world. Join our hosts as they take you in and out of courtrooms in the U.S. and beyond.

WHAT’S HAPPENING TO MEDICAID?

At the beginning of the pandemic, the federal government prohibited states from kicking people off Medicaid, even if they were no longer eligible. Before the pandemic, people would regularly lose their Medicaid coverage if they started making too much money to qualify for the program, gained health care coverage through their employer or moved into a new state.

That all stopped once Covid-19 started spreading across the country.

Over the next year, states will be required to start checking the eligibility again of every person who is on Medicaid. People will have to fill out forms to verify their personal information, including address, income and household size.

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WHEN MIGHT I LOSE MY COVERAGE?

That will vary depending on which state you live in; some states are moving faster than others to check eligibility. Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Iowa, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oklahoma and West Virginia are among the states that will begin removing ineligible Medicaid recipients as early as April.

Other states will start taking that step in May, June or July.

Not everyone will be removed from the program all at once. States plan to verify all recipients’ eligibility over periods of nine months to one year.

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HOW WILL I BE NOTIFIED IF I’M LOSING COVERAGE?

If you rely on Medicaid for care, it’s important to update your contact information, including home address, phone number and email with the state from which you receive benefits.

States will mail a renewal form to your home. The federal government also requires states to contact you in another way -– by phone, text message or email –- to remind you to fill out the form.

Even if mailed notices reach the right address, they can be set aside and forgotten, said Kate McEvoy, executive director of the nonprofit National Association of Medicaid Directors.

“A text might just grab someone’s attention in a way that would be more accessible,” she said, noting that a quick message also may be less intimidating than a mailed notice.

Most states have already used texting for things such as reminding patients to get a Covid-19 vaccine or about upcoming doctor’s visits. But sending mass texts on Medicaid eligibility will be new, McEvoy said.

You will have at least 30 days to fill out the form. If you do not fill out the form, states will be able to remove you from Medicaid.

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WHAT ARE MY OPTIONS IF I’M KICKED OFF MEDICAID?

Many people who will no longer qualify for Medicaid coverage can turn to the Affordable Care Act’s marketplace for coverage, where they’ll find health care coverage options that may cost less than $10 a month.

But the coverage available on the marketplace will still be vastly different from what’s offered through Medicaid. Out-of-pocket expenses and co-pays are often higher. Also, people will need to check if the insurance plans offered through the marketplace will still cover their doctors.

A special enrollment period for people who are unenrolled from Medicaid will start March 31 and last through July 31, 2024. People who lose Medicaid coverage can submit an application at any time during that period after losing coverage and will have up to 60 days to select their plans, according to guidance the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services sent to states last month.

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MY CHILDREN ARE ENROLLED IN MEDICAID. WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THEIR COVERAGE?

More than half of U.S. children receive health care coverage through Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Even if you receive a notice that you’re no longer eligible for Medicaid, it’s likely that your child still qualifies for the program or for health care coverage through CHIP, which covers children whose families make too much money qualify for Medicaid but don’t earn enough to afford private health insurance.

Between 80% and 90% percent of children will still be eligible for those programs, according to estimates from the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute’s Center for Children and Families.

“When a parent receives a message that they aren’t eligible anymore, they often assume their child is no longer eligible either,” said Joan Alker, the center’s executive director. “It’s more common to find that the parent is no longer eligible for Medicaid, but the child still is.”

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By AMANDA SEITZ Associated Press

Associated Press writer Tom Murphy in Indianapolis contributed to this report.

from Courthouse News

Minnesota governor protects rights to gender-affirming care

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Gov. Tim Walz signed an executive order Wednesday protecting the rights of LGBTQ people from Minnesota and other states to receive gender-affirming health care, as he slammed the tide of other states rolling back transgender rights.

“We want every Minnesotan to grow up feeling safe, valued, protected, celebrated, and free to exist as their authentic versions of themselves,” Walz said. “Protecting and supporting access to gender-affirming health care is essential to being a welcoming and supportive state.”

Advocates for LGBTQ rights say Republican-led states across the country are trying to erase the legal existence of people who are trans and to restrict the expression of those who are nonbinary, gender-fluid or who perform in drag. According to the Human Rights Campaign, more than 150 bills targeting trans rights have been introduced in other states. Walz singled out neighboring South Dakota, where Gov. Kristi Noem signed a ban on gender-affirming care for minors last month.

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“I don’t know what a group of people in Pierre who decide to make life miserable and more dangerous for people are thinking, but it’s not going to happen in Minnesota,” Walz said to applause from a room full of LGBTQ activists and their supporters.

Walz’s executive order parallels legislation awaiting a floor vote in the state House to make Minnesota a “trans refuge state” by protecting trans people, families and care providers from a range of legal repercussions for traveling to Minnesota for gender-affirming care, which includes a wide range of social and medical interventions.

While sponsors said they’re optimistic about passage in the coming weeks, the governor said the accelerating trends against trans rights in other states made it urgent for him to impose protections immediately.

The bill is authored by Democratic Rep. Leigh Finke, of St. Paul, Minnesota’s first openly transgender legislator. It would prohibit the state from enforcing court orders or child protection laws from other states if they interfere with a person’s right to seek gender affirming care in Minnesota.

The importance of the governor’s order to LGBTQ people across the nation can’t be overstated, she said.

“The lives of trans and gender expansive people this nation are under attack,” Finke said. “There is a full-scale movement in this nation against trans, nonbinary, two-spirit and gender expansive adults and children that seeks to make our community disappear.”

A separate bill banning so-called conversion therapy for LGBTQ children and vulnerable adults won approval in the Minnesota House last month and is awaiting a floor vote in the Senate.

Conservatives said the governor’s order will hurt vulnerable children instead of helping them.

“People who struggle with their gender identity deserve compassionate care that will help them become comfortable in their bodies, not mutilate them,” John Helmberger, CEO of the Minnesota Family Council, said in a statement.

Elsewhere, recent efforts in Oklahoma to prohibit gender-affirming medical care for trans children and pass other anti-trans legislation have led to heated demonstrations. The Arkansas Senate on Tuesday gave initial approval to criminalizing transgender people who use restrooms that match their gender identity. Tennessee’s governor signed legislation last week that bans drag shows from taking place in public or in front of children.

“All children deserve to thrive, we can agree on that, but for transgender youth, that thriving and access to lifesaving gender affirming care is under threat in statehouses around the country,” Dr. Kelsey Leonardsmith said. “It is under threat from bullies who hide behind junk science, and bullies who abuse their positions of power to hurt these precious children.”

Leonardsmith runs clinics in Minneapolis and St. Paul that serve transgender youth, including families that have relocated from restrictive states. She said said they provide “evidence-based care in line with international guidelines” and work closely with families to ensure that children and adolescents receive appropriate care consistent with their stages of intellectual and physical development.

“And there is no one else who belongs in that room making those decisions,” she said.

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By STEVE KARNOWSKI Associated Press

from Courthouse News

Sixth Circuit OKs private rulemaking authority for horse racing

CINCINNATI (CN) — Amendments to the Horseracing Safety and Integrity Act that allow the Federal Trade Commission to repeal or amend rules passed by a private governing body for the horse racing industry render the legislation constitutional, according to a ruling from the Sixth Circuit.

Although the Fifth Circuit declared the law unconstitutional just last year, Friday’s ruling determined changes made in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 remedied any constitutional concerns and gave ultimate rulemaking authority to the federal government.

The states of Oklahoma, West Virginia and Louisiana, along with several racing commissions, sued the federal government, the FTC and its officers in federal court in 2021, claiming the creation of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority, or HISA,  was a blatant and unconstitutional delegation of power by the federal government.

They argued HISA’s final say on development of anti-doping and racetrack safety programs with limited oversight from the FTC gave a private entity unregulated control of the industry and violated the Constitution’s nondelegation provision.

A federal judge disagreed and determined the statute’s FTC approval requirement established a clear boundary on HISA’s rulemaking powers.

The states appealed to the Sixth Circuit and arguments were heard last December.

Shortly thereafter, the federal government passed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 and gave the FTC “sweeping power” to “abrogate, add to, and modify the rules of the Authority.”

At the outset of the appeals court’s decision, Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Jeffrey Sutton clarified the status of the case and emphasized the Appropriations Act did not moot the states’ constitutional challenge because it “changes very little about the [Horseracing Safety and Integrity] Act’s basic structure” and merely provides the FTC with additional oversight.

Sutton, an appointee of George W. Bush, highlighted the creation of “self regulatory organizations,” or SROs, by the Securities and Exchange Commission as a quintessential example of the federal government’s constitutional delegation of rulemaking authority to private entities.

While the SROs can propose and enforce rules, ultimate authority lies with the SEC, which can approve or change the rules as necessary, which Sutton said is an arrangement upheld by courts “in case after case.”

A similar arrangement is now espoused by the horse racing industry, the panel determined.

“The Horseracing Authority is subordinate to the agency,” Sutton wrote. “The Authority wields materially different power from the FTC, yields to FTC supervision, and lacks the final say over the content and enforcement of the law — all tried and true hallmarks of an inferior body.”

Under the amendments to the original setup, an “emergency” is no longer required for the FTC to overrule HISA or adopt interim rules, which Sutton called “true oversight authority.”

The states pushed back and claimed the amendments failed to address whether the FTC or HISA had the final say when “policy disagreements” arose between the governing bodies, and while Sutton agreed that was the case, he concluded it was ultimately inconsequential.

“Even if that is the case,” he said, “the FTC’s later authority to modify any rules for any reason at all, including policy disagreements, ensures that the FTC retains ultimate authority over the implementation of the Horseracing Act.” (Emphasis in original.)

Sutton pointed out the Fifth Circuit had emphasized this lack of “modification power” in its previous decision to rule the statute unconstitutional, but that the 2023 amendments put the current structure on par with that of the SEC and its subordinate organizations.

Senior U.S. Circuit Judge R. Guy Cole Jr., an appointee of Bill Clinton, and U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Griffin, a George W. Bush appointee, also sat on the panel.

Cole authored a separate, concurring opinion to offer his own analysis of the nondelegation doctrine and its historical implications.

“If we root the private nondelegation doctrine solely in separation of powers concerns,” he said, “we circumvent our own court’s private nondelegation doctrine cases — many of which focus on local regulations, not federal ones, and are grounded in due process rights, as opposed to separation of powers principles.”

Historical analysis aside, Cole agreed with the ultimate outcome of the case and said “HISA as a whole is facially constitutional because the Authority is subordinate to the FTC in several ways.”

Neither party immediately responded to requests for comment.

from Courthouse News