You left your driver’s license at home. Or maybe it was in a wallet or purse that was stolen. Or maybe your dog ate it… Driving without a license can happen to the best of us. (Even DMX. Twice!) So what happens if you get pulled over and you don’t have your driver’s license with you? Well, like all legal questions, it depends: What If You Drive Without a Valid License?...
California employees don’t have to take their meal breaks – but employers still have to pay them if they do work. The California Supreme Court has answered an important question in the area of meal break and wage law. Brinker Restaurant Corp. v. Superior Court of San Diego, also known as the lunch break lawsuit, left the court to consider whether employers must ensure that an employee does absolutely no work during his legally-mandated lunch break....
Police have arrested and charged a man accused of shooting and injuring two police officers during a protest in Ferguson, Missouri, last week. Jeffrey Williams, 20, allegedly shot one officer in the shoulder and another in the face during a protest Thursday night. Tips from the public led officers to Williams’ home, where they found a handgun that matched the shell casings at the scene of the crime, CNN reports. Williams was charged with two counts of first-degree assault, one count of firing a weapon from a vehicle, and three counts of armed criminal action....
Rapper Flo Rida must fork over more than $80,000 to an Australian concert promoter – crikey! – or risk having his assets frozen “Down Under.” A judge in the Australian state of New South Wales ordered Flo Rida, whose real name is Tramar Dillard, to pay for damages after he allegedly cancelled a concert with just two hours’ notice last fall, the New York Post reports. Concert promoters had paid Flo Rida an upfront appearance fee of $50,000....
Alonzo Knowles has unreleased movie scripts and audio tracks for sale, as well as celebrity sex tapes, and some of their personal emails. If you are looking to buy, you’re too late. The feds already got him, according to Ars Technica. Knowles, 23, is from the Bahamas. He was lured to the US by federal agents claiming interest in his stolen goods, specifically movie scripts and 6 episodes of a TV series....
Law enforcement is always looking for better tools for analyzing criminal evidence in the hopes of achieving more accurate convictions. And, as technology advances, there are more tools at the police’s disposal. One of the newest is facial recognition software and facial examination experts. The new software has already been used to catch, and convict, alleged criminals. But how comprehensive is the technology, and how accurate are its results? In 2014, the FBI launched the billion-dollar Next Generation Identification system, claiming at the time to house 51 million photographs and would grow exponentially over the coming years....
Celebrities lobbying the White House is nothing new, but it feels a little different when it’s a reality t.v. star who originally became famous thanks to a sex tape. In any case, Kim Kardashian headed to Washington D.C. last week to lobby President Trump on behalf of a 63-year-old woman serving a life sentence for a nonviolent drug conviction. This week, it appears Kardashian’s efforts paid off, as Trump granted clemency to Alice Marie Johnson....
The key to any testimony in court is credibility: is the person telling the truth, and is there any reason why they would lie? Often times, members of law enforcement are given the benefit of the doubt when they testify in criminal cases, despite direction from judges that officer testimony should be given the same weight and skepticism as any other witness. That credibility may have taken a serious hit, at least when it comes to sheriff’s deputies in Los Angeles County testifying in court....
For the first time ever, the FBI’s definition of rape now includes male rape. The change could affect the prosecution of sexual assaults nationwide. Attorney General Eric Holder announced the expanded FBI rape definition Friday, The Washington Post reports. It’s expected to cause a rise in reported rapes across the country. While most state laws already define rape in broad terms, the FBI’s rape definition hadn’t been changed since 1929, the Post reports....
A court has ordered Catherine Kieu Becker to get a mental evaluation. The facts in Becker’s case are violent: the woman cut her husband’s penis off. Then she put the severed organ down the garbage disposal and turned it on. The facts are both painful and grisly. And, they are probably what spurred a court to order Catherine Kieu Becker’s mental health evaluation. Generally, mental health evaluations are standard for accused criminals like Becker, given the nature of the crimes she is accused of committing, says Orange County sheriff’s spokesman Jim Amormino to the Los Angeles Times....
Nebraska became the 18th state to ban capital punishment, overcoming a veto by Governor Pete Ricketts. Known as a conservative state with a Republican governor who lobbied against the ban, the legislature voted 30-to-19 to repeal the state’s death penalty law. Nebraska hadn’t executed a prisoner since 1997, and was one of many states having trouble procuring lethal injection drugs. It’s the first time in 40 years that a Republican-controlled state has abolished the death penalty....
Will this be the one that got away? Chicago has just missed being on the hook for a sizable hit to its waterway economy thanks to a Supreme Court decision, announced today. The High Court has refused the request by Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox to close the locks leading from the Mississippi to the Great Lakes to prevent an invasion of Asian Carp. The Supreme Court did not find that the requirement of an “imminent threat” had been met and so refused to require the locks to be closed at this time....
Some of us just don’t learn a lesson the first 143 times around. Such are the likes of everyone’s favorite heiress, Paris Hilton, who was reportedly detained after flying in to the island of Corsica on a vacation from her demanding work life. According to various reports, officers at the airport in Figari found about one gram’s worth of marijuana in her posession. She was allegedly detained and released. According to a report by the AP citing French newspapers, when Paris headed to the French Mediterranean island via a private jet last Friday, July 16, the tourista was carrying a very small amount of ganja in her handbag....
Guess which diva is being sued for her diva-like behavior? Patti LaBelle is accused of throwing water and shouting obscenities at Roseanna Monk and her 18-month-old toddler. The incident allegedly occurred last November in the New York building where Monk lives. LaBelle was allegedly staying there when she was performing on Broadway. Monk says that LaBelle became irritated when she let her toddler wander around the lobby. Monk was busy sorting her luggage at the time....
Thursday morning, actor and artist Shia Labeouf was arrested outside his art installation at the Museum of Moving Image in New York City after he barely assaulted an apparent Hitler supporter. This incident coincides with the vehement social media debate currently underway regarding whether it is okay to assault Nazis. Shia was standing near his interactive exhibit, when the Hitler supporter called him over seemingly to take a selfie. When Shia went over to him, the Hitler support says to Shia: “Hitler did nothing wrong....
Monthly Social Security and Supplemental Security Income benefits for more than 54 million Americans will increase 2.3 percent in 2008, according to an announcement from the Social Security Administration. The Associated Press reports that “the new cost-of-living figure means the typical retired worker’s benefit check will go from $1,055 per month to $1,079,” and calls the increase “the smallest since a 2.1 percent boost in 2004.” The SSA also announced that the maximum amount of earnings that will be subject to the Social Security tax (called the “taxable maximum”) will increase to $102,000 from $97,500, beginning in January 2008....
T.I.’s halfway house stint has come to an end – a rather boring, uneventful end. And that seems fine with T.I. The rapper was released from the Atlanta facility early Thursday with little fanfare. Maybe the lack of celebratory excitement is something that T.I. has learned from his past mistakes. Remember the last time T.I. was released from jail? He got a luxury bus and entourage to pick him up from the prison facility....
Police have arrested Theresa Jefferson, 33, in connection with a Walmart bleach fight over the weekend. Jefferson reportedly targeted her intended victim, and followed her into a Baltimore-area Walmart. Once inside, she attacked the woman with bleach, Pine-Sol and ammonia. The chemicals mixed, creating a toxic gas. Hazmat crews were called, and nineteen people were sent to the hospital for eye and respiratory injuries. It appears as though the Walmart bleach fight was part of an ongoing dispute between the two women....
Criminal mischief is an offense that covers a range of trouble, from playful misbehavior to malicious property destruction. Recently, for example, two teens in Alaska were charged with criminal mischief after negligently burning a love letter and starting a fire on school property. Meanwhile, in Michigan painting or sticking things on someone’s property will get you arrested – and the same goes for Texas. Charged as either a misdemeanor or as a felony offense punishable with prison, depending on the state statute and extent of damage, criminal mischief involves the defacing and destruction of property....
Which states have the highest car theft rates? According to a recent Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) report, the FBI collected data from all 50 states (and Puerto Rico) through the Uniform Crime Reporting Program to determine specific crime statistics by state. Those statistics were calculated for the 2012 year, and include the rate of car theft in each state. Based on this new data, what are the 10 states with the highest car theft rates?...
