Free Republic

The hit-and-run conviction of Ryan LeVin, a wealthy Florida man, is generating controversy due to what some say is an unusually lenient sentence. On Friday, LeVin pleaded guilty to killing two businessmen in 2009 with his Porsche 911 but received a sentence of house arrest after agreeing to pay an undisclosed amount to the widows of the victims, the Chicago Tribune reports. The son of a family that ran a direct-sales jewelry company, LeVin is on probation for a 2006 crash in which he drove into a police officer; court records show that he has more than 50 traffic violations...

A teenage girl who was dropped from her high school's cheerleading squad after refusing to chant the name of a basketball player who had sexually assaulted her must pay compensation of $45,000 (£27,300) after losing a legal challenge against the decision. The United States Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a review of the case brought by the woman, who is known only as HS. Lower courts had ruled that she was speaking for the school, rather than for herself, when serving on a cheerleading squad – meaning that she had no right to stay silent when coaches told...

Radical environmental groups have a power over President Obama and his administration that is truly astonishing. At a time when the economy is struggling and low and middle income earners - both in the United States and overseas -- are worried about their economic prospects, the administration continues to pursue policies that will unambiguously harm them. Consider the domestic front first, and the administration's energy policies. Since coming to office, Obama and his green allies have pursued a deeply unpopular cap-and-trade program. The program would raise energy costs, particularly burdening low-income Americans for whom energy costs constitute a sizable portion...

In a new book—Family of Freedom: Presidents and African Americans in the White House, by Newsweek reporter Kenneth Walsh—President Barack Obama is said to have characterized the so-called Tea Party movement as “racist.” At a White House dinner party for political supporters the President pointed out that “the preceding 43 white presidents never had to face the kind of opposition I’ve had to face with these tea baggers. I find it very telling that such a movement only came to life after the first Black man took control of the government.” “I mean, there have been some inept white men...

One unhappy night in 1992, 40-year-old Timothy Pigford, a fourth-generation black farmer having a terrible time of it trying to grow soybeans in North Carolina, sat in the living room of the house he was barely holding on to and drew up the outline of a lawsuit against the federal government. It was a decision more than 15 years in coming, ever since the first of the many times he’d been denied a USDA loan because — he was convinced — of the color of his skin. Before all was said and done, he would spend 20 years of his...

A man who fought for the Taliban in Afghanistan and was convicted of a violent attack when he returned to Britain has been moved to an open prison, the Standard can reveal. Anwar Khan, 34, is believed to be the first prisoner with a background in waging jihad -"holy war" - to be moved to a low security jail where inmates are allowed out into the local community and get part-time jobs. The disclosure will put pressure on Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke who faces accusations of "soft" policies with plans to reduce the prison population by 3,000. Shadow justice secretary...

A PERTH man who mercilessly bashed a Buddhist monk to death in a suburban park could be out of jail in under four years. Ian Samuel James McConkey, 38, of Coolbellup, was sentenced in the WA Supreme Court today to five and a half years in jail for the manslaughter of Buu "Paul'' Lieu , 48, on January 10 this year. McConkey, who could not explain why he attacked the defenseless monk, will be eligible for parole after three years and four months. Mr Lieu died in hospital two weeks after being bashed early in the morning at Bibra Lake...

Cold case detectives say a man who died seven years ago while awaiting execution at San Quentin for murdering a 10-year-old girl is tied to the strangulation of a 29-year-old developmentally disabled woman. FOLLOWING IS MY QUICK SUMMARY OF THE ARTICLE: Robert Edward Stansbury was an ice cream truck driver whose route took him through most of the San Gabriel Valley and unincorporated East L.A. He was convicted of abductions and sexual assaults dating as far back as 1959, but was always let out of prison for one stupid reason or another. He was on parole when he killed Barbara...

New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie commuted the sentence of Brian Aitken’s Monday, reducing his sentence from seven years in prison to time already served. According to Christie’s order, he will be released as soon as it’s “administratively possible.” As The Daily Caller previously reported, Aitken, 27, was arrested in New Jersey in 2009 after police found unloaded guns in the trunk of his car that had been purchased legally in Colorado. New Jersey law requires residents who want to transport firearms legally to request a permit from a local law enforcement office and produce a letter stating why it...

FORT MEADE, Md. -- A military court was set to hear the case Tuesday of an Army doctor charged with refusing to deploy to Afghanistan because he says he doubts whether President Barack Obama was born in the U.S. and therefore questions his eligibility to be commander in chief. Lt. Col. Terrence Lakin, an 18-year Army veteran from Greeley, disobeyed orders to report earlier this year to Fort Campbell in Kentucky to prepare for deployment, saying he believed the orders were illegal. In videos posted on YouTube, Lakin aligned himself with so-called "birthers" who question whether Obama is a natural-born...

The trial of Lt. Colonel Terry Lakin begins today at Fort Meade, Maryland. Lakin, a Flight Surgeon with a Bronze Star, is accused of failing to obey orders to deploy to Afghanistan – until Barack Obama proves his Constitutional eligibility to hold his office. You can watch an interview with Lakin’s attorney, Neal Puckett, that was posted on December 10, 2010 at Western Journalism’s website here: http://www.westernjournalism.com/video-of-the-day-lt-col-lakin%E2%80%99s-lawyer-on-obama%E2%80%99s-eligibility/ WorldNetDaily, led by Joseph Farah, has followed this story closely. Today WND reports that the defense strategy is now to minimize the punishment that will be meted out to the accused, as Mr....

Today is the day a terrible injustice will likely be done to one of our finest Americans. Today begins the court martial of Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Terry Lakin, a highly decorated Army doctor and flight surgeon, who, after repeatedly attempting to no avail to verify that Barack Obama is actually a legal commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces, decided to invite his own court martial, as he put it, and refused orders to deploy for a second time to Afghanistan. Last March, WorldNetDaily quoted Dr. Lakin as saying, "The Constitution matters. The truth matters."For the first time in all...

I came across this story a while back and have been looking into it and became enthralled because it's such a fascinating story on many levels. I've managed to piece together much of it and here is an overview of what I've found: It started with the murder of a girl named Meredith Kercher, a British college student attending school in Perugia, Italy, on the night November First, 2007. Amanda Knox and her new Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were at his place doing the naughty sorts of things college students sometimes do, basically enjoying hash and each other. The next...

<p>HURON TOWNSHIP, Mich.—Samantha Kelly endured merciless taunting from classmates after they learned that the high school freshman had accused a senior of rape.</p> <p>The weeks of harassment eventually became too much. Samantha went home from school Monday and hanged herself in this community southwest of Detroit.</p>

In my column on Tuesday (see here, with a Corner correction here), I suggested that candidates running for office should pledge to investigate the Obama Justice Department. Today, there is eye-popping new evidence to add to the already disturbing indications that the Department is engaged in racially discriminatory enforcement of the civil rights laws, and that high-ranking Department officials have both obstructed justice and provided intentionally false testimony in the Civil Rights Commission’s investigation of the New Black Panther Party voter-intimidation case. At the Standard’s blog, Daniel Halper has a must read post, relying on the tireless investigative work...

An Indian court has ruled that Gospel for Asia-supported missionary Samuel should be released from prison. Samuel, who has been held in a Jharkhand, India, prison since 2004, was accused of being a member of the Naxalite rebel group. After a series of trials, the court determined that there was insufficient evidence to charge Samuel with the crime for which he had been arrested and charged. The court declaration came in August, yet Pastor Samuel remains in prison. He is waiting for a final hearing, at which time the court will announce his release date. That hearing is not yet...

Thursday September 2, 2010 Obama Justice Dept Seeks Stay of Order Nixing NIH Embryonic Stem Cell Funding By Peter J. Smith   WASHINGTON, D.C., September 2, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The U.S. Justice Department is requesting a federal judge stay his order stopping the National Institute of Health’s embryo-destroying stem-cell research pending an appeal, saying that cutting off the money to scientists would harm their research efforts.   Chief Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled last week that embryonic stem cell research projects funded by the NIH violate the Dickey-Wicker amendment, which prohibits...

<p>Well, just as soon as we write that the controversial immigration law in Arizona is about to go in effect, the whole regime gets upended.</p> <p>That’s right. A federal judge in Phoenix put on hold the most controversial provisions of the state immigration law slated to take effect Thursday. Click here for the Associated Press story.</p>

<p>THE US government secretly advised Scottish ministers it would be "far preferable" to free the Lockerbie bomber than jail him in Libya.</p> <p>Correspondence obtained by The Sunday Times reveals the Obama administration considered compassionate release more palatable than locking up Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in a Libyan prison.</p>

Attorney General Eric Holder, just days after filing a federal lawsuit against Arizona's immigration law, on Sunday floated the possibility of filing another suit on racial profiling grounds. The lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Arizona claimed the state was infringing on federal immigration responsibilities and urged the judge to prevent the law from going into effect at the end of July. Despite some officials' claims that the law could lead to racial profiling, that co