Free Republic

DUNDEE - Dundee Middle-schooler Richard Cornwell is off the hook now in the case of the injured garden snake. But for more than a month, he faced a Class C felony charge carrying a potential fine of $5,000. And his family had to hire a criminal defense attorney to get the 13-year-old off. McMinnville lawyer Eric Hanson tells the story this way: On May 4, Richard found a badly injured garden snake lying on the asphalt at his mobile home park. From the blood and wounds, it looked as if it had been run over. He took it in for...

Mass. Justice Sorry for 'Red State' Remark By DENISE LAVOIE, Associated Press Writer 38 minutes ago Massachusetts' chief justice has apologized for a remark she made about "red states" during a commencement speech last spring after a citizen complaint was filed with the state's Commission on Judicial Conduct. In greeting the audience at the Brandeis University commencement last May, Chief Justice Margaret Marshall commented on the hundreds of blue and white balloons held in nets tied to the rafters. "No red states here," Marshall told the crowd, using a term used to describe Republican-leaning states. In her apology Friday, the...

December 3, 2005 — A Honduran man claims in a federal lawsuit that U.S. Border Patrol agents beat him up to the point that he was hospitalized for two weeks in 2003. Court records show that Santos Roque Ramirez Carias, an undocumented immigrant, swam across the Rio Grande near El Calaboz, upriver from Brownsville, on Dec. 23, 2003. Ramirez, 41, fled from Border Patrol agents after being spotted in a field, according to a federal lawsuit filed Monday. Ramirez claims that he surrendered with his arms raised but was tackled by agents John South and Ruben Torres. The two agents...

STUDIO CITY, Calif. -- Residents of a Studio City neighborhood say coyotes have been boldly hunting pets in broad daylight in the past week. Michael Knab, of the 11500 block of Sunshine Terrace, said he watched from his office window Monday morning as three coyotes walked up the street, grabbed his neighbor's cat, and ran up into the hills behind his home. "The lead coyote had this big orange cat in his mouth," Knab said. Knab, who moved to the area from Chicago just last summer, said a coyote grabbed his own cat out of his back yard in the...

NEW YORK - The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al-Qaida captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement, the Washington Post reported. The secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand, Afghanistan and several democracies in Eastern Europe, as well as a small center at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, according to current and former intelligence officials and diplomats from three...

SAN DIEGO, Calif. — Swimmers off the coast of La Jolla, California are being fined while swimming at public beaches. The reason: harassment of harbor seals that colonize the beach. Authorities are worried that actions that cause the seals to flee to the surf endanger the seal population, and that can generate fines up to $1000. "One of the common responses for seals and sea lions to stimulus that startles them is to run into the water, if you do that during the pupping season there's opportunities for trampling of pups, there's opportunities for separating mothers from young," said Jim...

Two years after a harrowing encounter between illegal immigrants and members of Ranch Rescue, the two immigrants are legal and two of the alleged vigilantes are behind bars. Although neither side claimed total victory in a Jim Hogg County civil lawsuit over the incident, the 229th District Court handed down a $1.35 million default judgement in April against two former members of Ranch Rescue who were already in prison. "We believe the suit has gone a long way in keeping these vigilantes out of South Texas," said Ricardo de Anda, an attorney for the plaintiffs. A Texas chapter of Ranch...

Former Wildlife Official to Pay Fine Tue Feb 22, 5:00 PM ET Science - AP TUCSON, Ariz. - A former federal wildlife manager who says he moved about 400 protected tadpoles from a backyard pond to a refuge for their own safety has agreed to pay a $3,500 fine to avoid a criminal charge, his lawyer said. Wayne Shifflett, the longtime manager of Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge, said he was afraid the tadpoles would be eaten by frogs. The tadpoles were young speckled frogs, which have been listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act since 2002. Permits are...

Agents from the Yuma sector of the U.S. Border Patrol have apprehended more illegal aliens in the month of July than in any other July in the sector's history. In one of the hottest months of the year, agents from the Yuma, Wellton and Blythe stations arrested and processed 10,773 aliens in the 31-day month, said Joe Brigman, spokesman for the Border Patrol's Yuma sector. In recent years, apprehensions normally taper down when the hotter part of the summer arrives, Brigman said, but that has not been the case this year. In fact, the patrol has seen no signs that...