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Click here to view the full articleOn the same day a jury convicted disgraced socialite Ghislaine Maxwell on five of six counts of sex trafficking related to her former lover Jeffrey Epstein, another Epstein associate received ominous legal news. According to Reuters, two New York judges ordered Wednesday that the 2009 settlement between Epstein and Virginia Giuffre, one of the financier’s numerous accusers, be made public. Giuffre, who said she was trafficked by Epstein, has accused Britain’s Prince Andrew of sexually abusing her when she was a teenager.

A 2009 settlement agreement between deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and Virginia Giuffre, who alleges she was abused by Epstein and forced to have sex with Prince Andrew when she was under 18 years old, will be made public next week, Reuters reported. U.S. District Judges Lewis Kaplan and Loretta Preska on Wednesday ordered that the agreement be released on or around Jan. 3, saying they found no reason to keep it sealed, per the wire service. Giuffre has brought a lawsuit against Andrew, saying that she was forced to have sexual contact with the Duke of York when she...

A federal judge in Manhattan overturned a roughly $4.5 billion settlement between OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP and members of the Sackler family who own the drugmaker, a surprising decision that raises questions about the future of the company and its owners, who have been accused of fueling the nation’s opioid crisis. Judge Colleen McMahon of the Southern District of New York ruled late Thursday that legal releases that would shield members of the Sackler family from civil opioid lawsuits are not permitted under the bankruptcy.

PHOENIX (AP) — A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that Arizona doesn’t have to give voters who forget to sign their mail ballot time after the election to resolve the issue, rejecting a lawsuit filed by Democrats. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 decision, overturned a lower-court ruling that found it’s unconstitutional for Arizona to give voters time after an election to resolve mismatched signatures but not missing signatures. The appellate judges said Arizona’s interest in reducing the burden on busy poll workers justifies the disparity. The overwhelming majority of Arizona voters cast mail ballots, which...

LOS ANGELES A federal judge who previously invalidated a portion of the USA Patriot Act as too vague delayed a decision on a similar challenge to a post-Sept. 11 executive order Wednesday but indicated in a tentative ruling she was inclined to uphold wide powers asserted by President Bush under an anti-terror-financing law. U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins heard more than an hour of arguments from a lawyer for the Washington- based Center for Constitutional Rights and from a Department of Justice lawyer before delaying her final ruling to allow more briefs to be filed. In her tentative 41-page ruling,...

A federal court on Monday declined to block the White House’s COVID-19 vaccine mandates for federal government employees and military service members. In a 41-page memorandum opinion, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly denied emergency relief sought by several avowedly “devout” Christians who have argued that being forced to take the vaccine would compromise their “closely held religious beliefs.” The Washington, D.C.-based judge’s decision to rule against the numerous plaintiffs in the case, some of whom are members of the U.S. Marine Corps, however, is largely a product of their own recent victories against the Biden administration in the exact same...

Nursing Students With Religious Objections To Vaccine Mandate Victorious In Federal Court Against MCCCD: A federal judge in Phoenix issued a preliminary injunction Friday against the Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD) after finding that two nursing students deserve to graduate this year even if they need an accommodation due to their religious objection to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. “Defendant shall make available to Plaintiffs a suitable accommodation that will allow Plaintiffs to satisfy the clinical components of their coursework and complete their academic programs as scheduled in December 2021,” U.S. District Judge Steven P. Logan wrote in his order...

The Biden administration has refused a Washington, DC district court judge's request to halt disciplinary actions against federal employees who are not vaccinated against COVID-19.

Southwest Airlines employees now know the date they must provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination to their employer, or face being placed on unpaid leave. A federal judge denied the Southwest Airlines’ Pilots Association (SWAPA) petition to temporarily strike down the carrier’s December 8, 2021 internal vaccination deadline, along with their entire lawsuit against Southwest alleging violations of the Railway Labor Act. Mandatory Vaccination Will “Improve the Safety of Air Transportation” The pilots union representing roughly 9,000 pilots working for the Dallas-based airline originally sued the carrier in August 2021, claiming the working conditions under the pandemic broke the “status quo”...

A Washington, D.C., district court judge issued a minute order Thursday asking the Biden administration to agree that both civilian and active-duty military plaintiffs will not be terminated while they await a ruling after they sued the administration over religious exemptions to COVID-19 vaccines. "None of the civilian employee plaintiffs will be subject to discipline while his or her request for a religious exception is pending," read a minute order from District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly obtained by Fox News. The Biden administration, which had until noon on Friday to respond, said in a filing that it would not agree to...

A Washington, D.C., district court judge temporarily blocked the Biden administration from firing unvaccinated federal employees who sued the government over religious exemptions."None of the civilian employee plaintiffs will be subject to discipline while his or her request for a religious exception is pending," District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ordered, Fox News reports.Active duty military personnel whose religious exemptions have been denied also cannot be disciplined while the outcome of their appeals are pending. Twenty plaintiffs sued President Biden and members of his administration in their official capacity over the president's Sept. 9 executive order mandating vaccines for federal employees, according...

Prince Andrew must be questioned under oath by Virginia Giuffre's lawyers in her civil sexual assault case by mid-July next year, a US judge has ruled. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan set the deadline of 14 July 2022 to complete depositions in a scheduling order agreed to by lawyers for Andrew and Ms Giuffre It means the questioning could clash with the Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations, which will take place in June. Andrew has vehemently denied allegations he sexually assaulted Ms Giuffre when she was a teenager. Under something known as "Mutual Legal Assistance" (MLA), both prosecutors and the...

A federal court on Thursday nixed a Trump-era rule that limited state and tribal authority to block projects that could impact their waters, including pipelines. California Federal Judge William Alsup vacated the rule and sent it back to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for further proceedings. The Clinton appointee's move came after the agency asked the court to remand the issue back to the EPA amid litigation filed by states and environmental groups... ...The now-vacated rule had limited states’ authorities to block projects by giving them a strict one-year time limit to do so before the federal government could decide...

Pablo Escobar's famed hippos - who have thrived in Colombia since the notorious drug lord was killed almost 30 years ago - got a stay of execution after a United States federal court ruled that animals can be recognized as legal persons. Judge Karen Litkovitz, of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, issued the ruling Tuesday after the nonprofit Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) filed an application seeking to allow two experts in nonsurgical sterilization of wildlife to provide testimony supporting a Colombian lawsuit to stop a cull. The Animal Legal Defense Fund made the...

In a significant win for supporters of Second Amendment rights, the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania granted a preliminary injunction order to William Drummond and the Second Amendment Foundation, Inc. on October 13, 2021. Drummond had sought to open a sportsman’s club at an existing range that had operated as the Greater Pittsburgh Gun Club since the middle 1960s. It consists of 265 acres in Robinson Township, Washington County, Pennsylvania.In December of 2017, Drummond entered into a lease to operate the club. On February 19, 2018, the Robinson Township Board of Supervisors commenced proceedings to...

The U.S. Supreme Court declined Tuesday to hear an emergency appeal of a vaccine requirement imposed on Maine health care workers, the latest defeat for opponents of vaccine mandates. It was the first time the Supreme Court weighed in on a statewide vaccine mandate. It previously rejected challenges of vaccine requirements for New York City teachers and Indiana University staff and students. Justice Stephen Breyer rejected the emergency appeal but left the door open to try again as the clock ticks on Maine’s mandate. The state will begin enforcing it Oct. 29. The Maine vaccine requirement that was put in...

The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday refused to issue an emergency injunction to stop Maine’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.The three-judge panel of the Boston-based court issued a one-sentence statement saying the request was denied without an explanation, The Bangor Daily News reported.A final ruling will likely be issued next week, according to Liberty Counsel, an organization representing more than 2,000 health care workers across the state in the lawsuit.“We look forward to a decision from the Court of Appeals. If that decision is not favorable, we will request emergency relief from the Supreme Court,” Liberty Counsel Founder and...

The nation’s most restrictive abortion law remains in place for now, after a federal appeals court on Thursday sided with the state of Texas. In a brief 2-1 order, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit refused the Justice Department’s request to reinstate an earlier court ruling that had blocked enforcement of the Texas law, which bars the procedure as early as six weeks into pregnancy and makes no exceptions for rape or incest. The brief order, which is expected to be appealed the Supreme Court, was backed by Judges James C. Ho, a nominee of Donald Trump,...

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is drowning in red ink, having lost $9.2 billion in 2020 alone. Things weren’t looking rosy before the pandemic, either. In fact, America’s mail carrier has shed more than $80 billion over the past 15 years. When faced with such gargantuan losses, many businesses swiftly introduce far-reaching changes to pivot back to profitability. But owing to the strange, tangled status of the USPS as a government-managed enterprise, key decisions to get the agency back into the black are undermined by the actions of other branches of government. In recent years, the judicial branch has played...