Free Republic

SHREVEPORT, La. -- The U.S. Supreme Court will not hear an appeal by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in their fight to keep the Confederate monument on the Caddo Parish Courthouse grounds. Said spokeswoman Jackie Nichols: "Our petition was denied today by the Supreme Court. Although we are disappointed by this news, we are not dissuaded in our fight to protect our monument. We fight on!" The denial of the writ upholds the previous decision of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, which affirmed the trial court’s ruling in favor of the Parish, dismissing the lawsuit. “The parish is...

A federal judge has ruled one Florida city cannot ban therapists from practicing a controversial “gay conversion” therapy in their jurisdiction. NBC affiliate WFLA-TV reports the judge struck down a 2017 ban imposed by the city of Tampa, ruling that the city has no authority to regulate health professionals and only the state government can do that – a victory for some religious based groups....

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday threw out a challenge to Republican-drawn congressional districts in Ohio that Democrats said were drawn to unlawfully diminish their political clout, a move that follows a major ruling by the justices in June that foreclosed such lawsuits. The court’s action in the case involving a practice known as partisan gerrymandering means that 16 U.S. House of Representatives districts will no longer be reconfigured, as a three-judge panel had ordered in May. The Supreme Court had put the panel’s ruling on hold ahead of its rulings, issued the next month, in two major gerrymandering cases...

EL PASO, Texas - ABC-7 has learned the families of the young engaged couple killed when their semi-truck collided with a piece of construction machinery sticking out on Interstate 10 have settled their lawsuit against the company that was overseeing the construction site. The parents of Patrick Van Fossen and Keserie Paredes had filed a wrongful death lawsuit against JAR Construction, accusing JAR of causing the deaths of Van Fossen and Paredes on the early morning of Dec. 21, 2017. In July, ABC-7 reported that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, found numerous safety hazards at JAR's construction...

The Supreme Court of the United States announced Friday that it would take up its first abortion case since Justice Brett Kavanaugh was added to the bench. According to a court order, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case of June Medical Services v. Gee, which comes out of Louisiana and deals with a state requirement that abortion providers have admitting privileges to a hospital within 30 miles. Proponents of the admitting privileges requirement say that the measure is a safety precaution for women undergoing the procedures. “Abortion activists are more than willing to lower the bar on...

Two environmental groups are suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in an effort to protect the dunes sagebrush lizard, also known as the sand dune lizard, under the Endangered Species Act. The Center for Biological Diversity and the Defenders of Wildlife filed a lawsuit in federal district court on Tuesday. The small lizard only lives in southeast New Mexico and west Texas. It thrives in sand dunes and shrubs called shinnery oaks. In May 2018, the groups asked Fish and Wildlife to list the species as threatened or endangered. The lawsuit argues the agency should have responded within 90...

Robert De Niro routinely subjected his longtime employee to creepy and abusive behavior, including leaving her voicemails threatening “you’re f—ing history” and calling her a “bitch” and a “brat,” an explosive new lawsuit charges. Graham Chase Robinson says for years she was the victim of “gratuitous unwanted physical contact” from the Oscar winner, who also hurled “sexually-charged comments to her” when she worked at his production company, Canal Productions Inc. Robinson’s allegations against the “Taxi Driver” star are levied in a $12 million lawsuit filed Thursday in Manhattan federal court for gender discrimination and wage violations. She said she began...

As Laura Ingraham tells Rudy Giuliani, it’s certainly a “novel” approach to the tension between the executive and legislative branches. In an entertaining segment on Fox News Channel’s Ingraham Angle, Ingraham spends a significant amount of time in trying to talk Giuliani off the ledge of filing lawsuits and back to more solid ground in pushing back against impeachment. Giuliani keeps pulling the conversation back to his idea of suing the House over civil rights violations suffered by Donald Trump and himself: On Tuesday night, Rudolph W. Giuliani proposed an unusual legal strategy in response to the ongoing investigation...

A Virginia teacher who was fired for not agreeing to use the preferred pronouns of a trans-identified student has filed a complaint against the school board that dismissed him. Peter Vlaming, a former French teacher at West Point High School in Williamsburg, filed the complaint in the Circuit Court for the County of King William on Monday. The lawsuit argued that the school board violated “Vlaming’s constitutional, statutory, and contractual rights” when they decided to fire him last year. Vlaming is seeking a permanent injunction that allows him to be reinstated, a permanent injunction preventing the school board from punishing...

Congressional Democrats are running roughshod over the Constitution and the rights of the president of the United States and Rudy Giuliani is sick and tired of it. And while he’s fed up with the manner in which the Garbage Party is attempting to ensnare President Trump and hamstring him on a daily basis, we’re frankly fed up with Republicans in the Senate who won’t do anything to protect him, either.

Marietta, GA – In an unusual case with national implications, a jury in Cobb County, Georgia, has found now-retired abortionist Daniel McBrayer and his defunct Alpha Gynecology and Consulting liable for causing a nuisance that affected other tenants of a business park that once housed the abortion business. The Governor’s Ridge Office Park Association and other plaintiffs were awarded almost $1.5 million by a Cobb County jury, including more than $311,000 in attorney fees and expenses, according to Law.com. The office park association contended that McBrayer was already the subject of frequent protests when he moved into the office in...

The Supreme Court should hold that the federal statute which prohibits employment discrimination “because of sex” prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation and against transgender individuals. When the Supreme Court returns from its summer recess, among the first cases it will hear will be three that raise the important question of whether federal law prohibiting employment discrimination protects LGBTQ individuals. Until 1964, no federal law prohibited employment discrimination. The landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 changed this by forbidding employers from discriminating based on race, sex or religion. There have been many attempts to amend the law to expressly prohibit...

A federal judge ordered a temporary injunction Thursday against California’s first-in-the-nation law requiring candidates to disclose their tax returns for a spot on the presidential primary ballot, an early victory for President Trump but a decision that will undoubtedly be appealed by state officials. U.S. District Judge Morrison England Jr. said he would issue a final ruling in the coming days but took the unusual step of issuing the tentative order from the bench. He said there would be “irreparable harm without temporary relief” for Trump and other candidates from the law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in July. Morrison...

The family of slain mobster James “Whitey” Bulger intends to file a $200 million wrongful death claim against the government today over the murder of the onetime Southie serial killer who was beaten to death in a West Virginia prison. The family said the legal filing was part of its effort to discover why the 89-year-old was was beaten to death in less than 24 hours after being put in general population at U.S. Penitentiary Hazelton, the Wall Street Journal reports. Bulger was murdered in his cell at the notorious Hazelton lockup on Oct. 30. He died from “blunt force...

In the third lawsuit filed against the Church of Scientology and its leader, David Miscavige, in three months, a 25-year-old woman alleges she was repeatedly sexually assaulted as a child in Scientology’s care, including at the church’s Clearwater Academy. On top of the abuse, the lawsuit explains how church officials allegedly knew it was occurring and did nothing to stop it or alert law enforcement, actions rooted in policy written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. When the woman spoke of her alleged abuse after leaving Scientology in 2018, the church deployed a campaign of harassment against her, a tactic...

President Donald Trump on Thursday sued Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, who subpoenaed eight years of Trump's personal and corporate tax returns earlier this month. The subpoena stems from Vance's criminal investigation into the Trump Organization about payments made to two women who have alleged affairs with the president. The president has strongly denied the affairs. NBC News

Over the years, the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has faced numerous lawsuits for defamation and other claims. The SPLC earned its reputation by suing the Ku Klux Klan, and in recent decades it has accused various organizations of being "hate groups," listing them along with the KKK in a cynical attempt to raise money and destroy its political enemies.... Every lawsuit against the SPLC has been stalled or dismissed or settled, with none reaching the discovery process — a legal process by which a plaintiff can investigate the internal documents of the organization or person he or she...

Christian artists Breanna Koski (L) and Joanna Duka say they cannot create art for events that celebrate same-sex marriage. | (Photo: Alliance Defending Freedom) A pair of Christian artists cannot be forced by a city ordinance to make wedding invitations for same-sex marriages, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled Monday.In Brush & Nib v. City of Phoenix, Arizona’s highest court ruled that Joanna Duka and Breanna Koski, owners of Brush & Nib Studio, cannot be compelled by a local antidiscrimination ordinance to provide their services to same-sex weddings.Writing for the majority, Justice Andrew Gould concluded that the city of Phoenix “cannot...

"The lawsuit is filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia. It says Fairfax’s character was defamed and says CBS intentionally inflicted emotional distress on him." "In addition, he believes former Gov. Terry McAuliffe and Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney attempted to use Tyson’s allegation against him for political purposes. All three are potential candidates for governor in 2021."

A Virginia state judge ruled Wednesday that statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson that were at the center of 2017 protests must remain standing in Charlottesville, Va. Circuit Judge Richard Moore ruled that Virginia state law prohibits moving war memorials and that moving the statues would break that law. Moore issued a permanent injunction preventing the statues from being moved at the beginning of a trial over a lawsuit brought against the city by groups that wanted to preserve the statues. People pressing for the statues to be moved argued it was wrong to celebrate generals who had...