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TennCare reform delay could prove costly to state  Barger Brian, Producer   Last Updated: 2/7/2005 9:02:15 AM A six month delay in reforming TennCare could cost the state nearly half of the $575 million officials have said they expect to save and balance next year's budget. That's according to an affidavit filed with a federal appeals court last week. The filing came after a judge in Nashville ruled the state cannot implement the planned reforms to the government-subsidized health care program without his approval. The judge said hearings will be set for March to work through that issue. In...

At first blush, one might not expect lawyers representing the 323,000 adults who stand to lose TennCare coverage under Gov. Phil Bredesen's latest cutback plan to ally with the governor. But that clearly seems to be the situation after last week's meeting of the Legislature's TennCare Oversight Committee. And that is surely bad news for Gordon Bonnyman and his colleagues at the Tennessee Justice Center in their underdog quest to turn the TennCare tide. The lawyers are George Barrett, an aging attorney who has been opposing the state in court for one thing or another since the 1960s, and Ted...

NASHVILLE -- A judge Friday blocked Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen from removing 323,000 adults from the state's expanded Medicaid program, cuts the governor says are necessary to keep the roughly $8 billion program from bankrupting the state. The state said it was immediately appealing U.S. District Court Judge William J. Haynes' decision to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "The federal courts do not have the right nor the power to dictate the fiscal policy of the state of Tennessee," Dave Goetz, state finance and administration commissioner, said in a news release. "This is an emotional and difficult enough...

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) -- Connecticut prosecutors asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to override a judge's decision that allowed an admitted serial killer's execution to be delayed. The high court did not plan on issuing a decision on the matter Wednesday night, the court's clerk told the state public defenders' office. The prosecutors said U.S. District Judge Robert Chatigny of Hartford was wrong to postpone Michael Ross' execution in order to schedule a competency hearing that would determine if his mental capacity had diminished from nearly two decades on death row. If prosecutors succeed, Ross will become the first...

BOSTON (AP) -- A Boston Herald reporter being sued for libel for reporting that a judge made a callous remark about a 14-year-old rape victim testified Tuesday: "I'm certain that quote was correct." David Wedge acknowledged that he never spoke with Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy before the story ran. But he said he tried to contact the judge to verify the accuracy of the remark and was not allowed to see Murphy. "It's preferable to have that person speak to you, but if they don't speak to you, you rely on the best information you have," Wedge said under...

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- Since 2002, Dr. Kenneth Miller has been upset that biology textbooks he has written are slapped with a warning sticker by the time they appear in suburban Atlanta schools. Evolution, the stickers say, is "a theory, not a fact."

Virginia Court Strikes Down Law Against Sex By Singles POSTED: 4:20 pm EST January 14, 2005 RICHMOND, Va. -- The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday struck down an archaic and rarely enforced state law prohibiting sex between unmarried people. The unanimous ruling strongly suggests that a separate anti-sodomy law in Virginia also is unconstitutional, although that statute is not directly affected. The justices based their ruling on a U.S. Supreme Court decision voiding an anti-sodomy law in Texas. "This case directly affects only the fornication law but makes it absolutely clear how the court would rule were the sodomy law...

ATLANTA (AP) -- Federal judge rules the evolution disclaimer stickers placed inside Cobb County science textbooks are unconsitutional.

Gay Homosexual 'marriage' opponents aim to recall judgeSACRAMENTO – Acknowledging that they hope to pressure the judiciary statewide, opponents of same-sex marriage are trying to recall a Sacramento Superior Court judge who upheld domestic partner laws this fall. California's attorney general, jurists across the state and gay rights activists have rushed to Judge Loren McMaster's defense. They are painting the campaign as an attack on an independent judiciary by disgruntled activists who have failed to slow the state trend toward expanding gay rights. The recall effort in Sacramento County comes as many California lawmakers attempt to gingerly balance public opposition...

NEW YORK - Indiana Pacers (news) forward Jermaine O'Neal (news) will not have to finish serving the remaining 10 games of his suspension, a federal judge ruled Thursday. O'Neal was suspended 25 games for his role in a November 19 brawl during a game with the Detroit Pistons (news) at the Palace. But a temporary decision made last week by a U.S. District Judge allowed him to return to the court after his suspension was reduced 10 games by an arbitrator. This latest ruling enforces that decision. The NBA had contended that the arbitrator, Roger Kaplan, had no authority to...

LOS ANGELES -- A federal judge said Monday that she will extend her order prohibiting the city of Redondo Beach from arresting day laborers for violating a local ordinance against soliciting work in public. U.S. District Judge Consuelo Marshall, who last week issued a temporary restraining order prohibiting enforcement, said she would issue a preliminary injunction against Redondo Beach, saying there are "serious questions" about whether the city's day laborer ordinance is constitutional. Her ruling means the city will no longer be able to arrest laborers until a lawsuit challenging the law is resolved. Redondo Beach City Attorney Jerry Goddard...

WASHINGTON -- In a victory for the government in a long-running dispute with American Indians, a federal appeals court threw out on Friday most of a judge's plan for making the Interior Department account for billions of dollars the Indians say they are owed. The appeals court told the judge he could no longer "micromanage" how the system gets fixed. The ruling means Interior can propose its own plan rather than create a recipe based on ingredients preordered from the bench. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth then would assess the result. "Yet the court may not micromanage court-ordered reform efforts...

A woman who gave birth to a child months before entering a same-sex civil union in Vermont is appealing a court ruling that granted parental standing to her former partner. Cheryl Barlow, who says she no longer is a lesbian, was united with Keri Jones, both residents of Utah, five months after Barlow became pregnant by artificial insemination in 2001. But the relationship ended in 2003 after Barlow discovered Jones was seeing another woman. Jones then sued for parental visitation rights to Barlow's child and was granted favor by Judge Timothy Hanson in Utah's 3rd District Court in Salt Lake...

PORTLAND, Ore. (Reuters) - After Oregonians voted to ban same-sex marriages earlier this month, a gay rights advocate has given up its fight to take its case to the state's supreme court, activists said on Friday. The American Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites) (ACLU) will instead argue for a legal civil unions between same-sex couples giving them the same rights and benefits as married couples. "This changes our case in only one way. We are no longer seeking marriage," said Ken Choe, a New York attorney with the ACLU who will argue the Oregon case. "But we do...

John Morganelli, District Attorney for Northampton County, Pa., probably had no idea what he was in for last week when his office appeared before Judge Leonard Zito for the conviction and sentencing of 27 individuals accused of using false and stolen social security numbers. Morganelli’s investigators had worked for months to prosecute the group, 14 of which had not simply used false social security numbers, but had stolen and used the social security numbers of law-abiding people. But although every one of the defendants pleaded guilty, Judge Zito refused to impose any period of incarceration, nor did he fine the...

Saskatchewan has become the seventh Canadian jurisdiction to allow same-sex marriages. Madam Justice Donna Wilson of the Court of Queen's Bench ruled Friday that the traditional definition of marriage, as it currently exists, discriminates against gay and lesbian couples. Five couples who were denied marriage licences because they were not of the opposite sex filed a statement of claim seeking a declaratory judgment that the common-law definition of marriage be changed. The group wanted the definition changed to read "two people to the exclusion of others," rather than "two people of the opposite sex." "The judge found that it is...

Sound Transit can continue to collect its motor-vehicle excise tax, even though the tax was repealed by Initiative 776 two years ago, a judge ruled today. King County Superior Court Judge Mary Yu agreed with Sound Transit's argument that ending the tax now would unconstitutionally interfere with a contract it signed with purchasers of agency bonds in 1999. In that contract, Sound Transit promised to keep collecting the 0.3 percent tax until the bonds are paid off. That isn't scheduled to occur until 2028, and over the next 24 years the tax will generate far more revenue than the $350...

WASHINGTON -- For the second time in a year, a federal judge ordered the military Wednesday to stop requiring anthrax vaccines for U.S. military personnel. U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan said the Food and Drug Administration violated its own procedures when it gave final approval to the vaccine last year because it failed to give the public an adequate opportunity to comment. "The men and women of our armed forces deserve the assurance that the vaccines our government compels them to take into their bodies have been tested by the greatest scrutiny of all -- public scrutiny," Sullivan said....

U.S. District Court Judge Frank C. Damrell Jr. on Wednesday blocked enforcement of the remnants of Proposition 208, which requires that the names of top donors to political organizations be included in advertising for political candidates or initiatives. The injunction, sought by the two major political parties, means the names can be pulled from ads or mailers during the last few days before the Nov. 2 election. Damrell said the provisions of the 1996 effort to reform campaign finance do not achieve the stated goal of the proponents of Proposition 208, which was disclosure of top donors to political causes....

I'VE HAD IT!!! NO...REALLY! How long do we have to tolerate these homosexual judges? How long do we have to put up with RINO's in the Republican party? This activist judge... the DIS-honorable and unrespectable William A. "Bill" Morvant, Republican, is due for re-election Dec 31, 2008. I can't tolerate this piece of garbage that long! I want to go to his home at CENSORED , and hang him in effigy to demonstrate how offensive his actions against the will of the people are unaccecptable. I'd like to call him and tell him how I will never vote for...