Source: http://www.cooscountywatchdog.com/blog/category/the%20supreme%20court
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 14:37:02+00:00

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On Thursday, the Oregon Supreme Court decided in AFSCME v. Lebanon that cities can be held liable for individual councilor statements, even when the councilor has no independent decision-making authority.
In Oregon, it is unlawful for employers to interfere with employees who wish to form a union, retaliate against employees who form or join a union, or encourage employees to disband a union. Although an individual city councilor has no independent authority to act on behalf of a city, the court explained that a city could still be liable for a councilor’s actions if employees reasonably believe that the councilor was acting on behalf of the city.
Because of the potentially far-reaching effects of this case, the League encourages city officials to review the court’s decision with their city attorney in order to make any changes to ensure compliance with state labor laws.
The Oregon Supreme Court ruled this week in Oswego that when a local historic designation is imposed on a property, only the property owner Lake Oswego Preservation Society v City of Lake at the time the restriction is imposed has the right to remove that designation under ORS 197.772. If the original property owner does not exercise this right, subsequent property owners who acquire the property will remain subject to the designation and any accompanying restrictions.
In this case, a subsequent property owner challenged in 2013 an historic designation that had been in place since at least 1992. The court examined the statutory text in context along with its legislative history (including a lengthy discussion of the meaning of the word “a” as compared to the term “the”). A key part of that context was a legislative requirement that local governments create and implement comprehensive plans and regulations to protect historically significant properties, incorporated in 1996 into Statewide Planning Goal 5, which required the identification and preservation of historically significant properties. If ORS 197.772 applied to subsequent property owners, such a result would effectively dismantle the established statutory and regulatory framework for the Goal 5 protection of historic properties, which the Legislature would not have intended. The court noted that when an historic designation is placed upon a property for the first time, the designation can significantly, and sometimes negatively, impact the property.
ORS 197.772 provides the original owner with a right to refuse the designation to protect that owner’s reasonable expectations as to the use of the property at the time the designation was imposed. Subsequent owners acquiring the property with notice of the designation and, “most likely, at a price or valuation that reflects the designation” have no reasonable expectation of using the property in a manner inconsistent with that designation and therefore suffer no harm to their property interests.
The Supreme Court in the case of Hurst v. Florida.
By a 7-1-1 vote-in fact, even overruling two of its own prior rulings-the Supreme Court of the United States has upheld the jury as the sole fact-finding authority in capital sentencing.
Specifically, the Court found that the Florida capital sentencing scheme, in which the judge is the one whose job is "to make the critical findings necessary to impose the death penalty", violates the Sixth Amendment, in light of its own ruling in Ring v. Arizona (2002) requiring that the jury find the aggravating factors if the death penalty is to be imposed.
Ring, in turn, traces back to the case of Apprendi v. New Jersey (2000). In Apprendi, the Court ruled that the penalty for a crime could not be extended beyond the statutory maximum due to the findings of a judge based on a preponderance of evidence, but instead could only be based on the findings of a jury meeting the standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Ring was the application of the Apprendi ruling to capital cases.
"In arguing that the jury's recommendation necessarily included an aggravating circumstance finding, Florida fails to appreciate the judge's central and singular role under Florida law, which makes the court's findings necessary to impose death and makes the jury's function advisory only. The State cannot now treat the jury's advisory recommendation as the necessary factual finding required by Ring."
In addition to Florida, two other states have a judicial override provision in place that allows a judge to unilaterally impose the death penalty against the jury's recommendation of a life without parole sentence: Delaware and Alabama. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, "Of the 33 states with the death penalty, Alabama is the only jurisdiction where judges routinely override jury verdicts of life to impose capital punishment. Since 1976, Alabama judges have overridden jury verdicts 111 times. Although judges have authority to override life or death verdicts, in 91 percent of overrides elected judges have overruled jury verdicts of life to impose the death penalty."
I am currently consulting with legal experts to better understand what, if any, implications Hurst holds for judicial override in Delaware and Alabama, in addition to Florida.
It is absolutely unconscionable that in the most serious of all legal cases-those in which the state claims the right to purposely put people to death-government can not only usurp the jury's traditional, legal function in judging the law, but also jurors' well-established and uncontroversial role as the fact-finders in the case. If the jury are neither to judge the law nor the facts, then the next step is the elimination of the jury altogether.
Many jury issues with respect to capital cases still need to be addressed including non-unanimous votes in capital sentencing, the unjust effects of death qualification of jurors during voir dire, and so on. But the Hurst ruling upholding the jury as the final arbiter of facts in capital sentencing is greatly encouraging that the endangered species that is the jury can be brought back from the brink of extinction.
Together, let us continue our work with a solid hope that the protective role of the jury in safeguarding human rights and liberty can be more fully restored in our legal system.
The following court case will effect me. Many accuse me of being very intimidating, all because I have a tendency to be brutally honest and have a tact to dissect problems to the bone. The powers that be do not like that ability and they would love to find a way to silence their critics. They have accused me of being abusive and rude, and they might be right, but it is no more rude than to be a government bureaucrat that denies the citizenry their right to freedom of expression. I'm one of the few who think it is wrong to be denied my right to yell "Fire" in a crowded theater, because it erodes civil liberties.......Rob T.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In refusing to hear a legal challenge to the indefinite detention provision of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 (NDAA), the United States Supreme Court has affirmed that the President and the U.S. military can arrest and indefinitely detain individuals, including American citizens. By denying without comment a petition for review in Hedges v. Obama, the high court not only passed up an opportunity to overturn its 1944 Korematsu v. United States ruling allowing for the internment of Japanese-Americans in concentration camps, but also let stand a lower court ruling empowering the President to use “all necessary and appropriate force” to indefinitely detain persons associated with or “suspected” of aiding terrorist organizations. In weighing in on the case before the lower court, attorneys for The Rutherford Institute challenged the Obama administration’s claim that the NDAA does not apply to American citizens, arguing that the NDAA’s language is so unconstitutionally broad and vague as to open the door to arrests and indefinite detentions for speech and political activity that might be critical of the government.
The NDAA 2012, the mammoth defense bill passed by Congress in 2011 and signed into law by President Obama, contains a provision allowing for the indefinite detention of those who “associate” or “substantially support” enemies of the U.S. such as terrorist groups. These terms, however, are not defined in the statute, and the government itself is unable to say who exactly is subject to indefinite detention based upon these terms, leaving them open to wide ranging interpretations which threaten those engaging in legitimate First Amendment activities. Soon after the NDAA was enacted, a lawsuit was filed by citizens and non-citizen activists and journalists alleging that it violated their constitutional rights by threatening them with indefinite detention for engaging in protected speech, such as protesting American foreign policy or interviewing suspected terrorists for journalistic purposes. On September 12, 2012, U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest of the Southern District Court of New York ruled in favor of the plaintiffs and placed a permanent injunction on the indefinite detention provision. However, President Obama appealed the decision to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled in July 2013 that the journalists and activists did not have standing to challenge the detention provisions. In rationalizing its decision, the court stressed that there had been no history of enforcement against persons such as these plaintiffs (activists and journalists, but non-combatants), the statute is not aimed at persons like them, and there has been no specific threat by the government to apply the statute to them. Critics of the NDAA had hoped that the U.S. Supreme Court would agree to hear the case and, in so doing, reverse its 1944 ruling in Korematsu v. United States, which concluded that the government’s need to ensure the safety of the country trumped personal liberties and allowed for the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
In 1973, the Supreme Court held that police officers did not need a warrant to look inside a pack of cigarettes that they found in the coat pocket of a man who had been arrested. Those kinds of warrantless searches were allowed, the Court reasoned back then, to protect police officers and to prevent the destruction of evidence.
Forty years later, California and the federal government urged the Supreme Court to adopt the same rule for cellphones. Once someone is arrested, they contended, police should be able to go through the entire contents of his phone without a warrant because cellphones are just like any other item that you can carry in your hand or pocket. But today the Supreme Court emphatically rejected that argument. Therefore, unless it’s an emergency, police need to get a warrant before they can search your cellphone. Let’s talk about the decision in Riley v. California in Plain English.
Supreme Court Rules You Cannot Buy A Gun For Another Approved Person.
Today the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that if you purchase a firearm and transfer it to another "approved" buyer, you are a "straw purchaser" and may go to prison.
The ruling is in the case US vs Abramski, a case to which Oregon Firearms contributed to an Amicus brief.
The buyer of the gun purchased a gun legally and transferred it to his uncle who was also an approved buyer. The uncle took possession of the gun after passing a background check. Abramski (a former police officer) was charged with a "straw purchase."
"The Obama administration had argued that accepting Abramski's defense would impair the ability of law enforcement officials to trace firearms involved in crimes and keep weapons away from people who are not eligible to buy them."
Clearly this transfer had nothing to do with crimes or people who are ineligible to receive firearms. This ruling will vastly complicate any future transfers of legitimately owned guns.
June 23, 2104 - Supreme Court Says EPA "Overreached, Violated Separation of Powers"
The United States Supreme Court today held that the Obama Administration's Environmental Agency overstepped its authority by rewriting the Clean Air Act to fit its regulatory scheme on greenhouse gas emissions. The Court struck down the agency's broad assertion of power and held that the EPA must have Congressional authorization to rewrite the Clean Air Act. "This is a powerful end to the five-year climate change challenge," said Shannon Goessling, SLF executive director and chief legal counsel.
The following stories are from two different court cases that have to do with searches and seizures. The first case, from 2011, has to do with an officer entering the apartment of a drug user. The reason the officer claimed to make the entry without a warrant was because the officer thought the people inside the apartment was destroying evidence. The officer created his own exigent circumstances.
Many Social Conservatives chided me for espousing the idea that this ruling by the Supreme Court will effect everyone, not just lowlife druggies.
Well, the second story, from 2014, is about a court case in the 7th District involving an officer violating the 4th amendment rights of a gun activists. The cop, using exigent circumstances as the justification, entered the department of a gun activist and seized guns without a warrant. The ruling demonstrates that the Drug War and Drug Laws are about eliminating civil liberties, not about stopping drug use. The destruction of individual rights is an exercise in government egalitarianism......Rob T.
563 U.S. ___ (2011), is a legal dispute that was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2011, holding in an 8-1 opinion that warrantless searches conducted in police-created exigent circumstances do not violate the Fourth Amendment so long as the police did not create the exigency by violating or threatening to violate the Fourth Amendment.
The facts of the King case differ from the typical “knock, announce, hear movement behind the door, and enter without a warrant” fact pattern of most exigent circumstances cases. The situation began when police set up a controlled sale of crack cocaine outside the apartment complex where the defendant, Hollis King, lived. For clarity, it should be noted that the controlled sale involved a suspect and transaction entirely unrelated to King. After the sale, an observing officer radioed to other nearby officers to “move in on the suspect.” He noted that the suspect was “moving quickly toward the breezeway of an apartment building” and told them to hurry. As the officers arrived at the breezeway, they heard one of the rear apartment doors shut but did not see which door the suspect entered. They noticed a strong odor of marijuana issuing from the left rear apartment, which led them to believe that the door had recently been opened and shut and that the suspect had entered that apartment. The officers knocked on this door and identified themselves as police. After the knock, they heard things being moved around inside. Believing that the people inside were in the process of destroying evidence, the officers entered the apartment. The officers found the defendant and two others but not the suspect of their pursuit. One of the individuals in the apartment with King was smoking marijuana. While conducting a protective sweep of the apartment, officers found marijuana and cocaine in plain view.
King was charged with trafficking a controlled substance, possession of marijuana, and being a persistent felony offender. The trial court denied his motion to suppress the evidence found during the warrantless search on the basis that exigent circumstances justified the warrantless entry. King appealed the denial of his motion to suppress, arguing that the search of his apartment was “conducted in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution because it was unsupported by probable cause and an exigent circumstance.” The state intermediate appellate court affirmed the ruling of the trial court.
Milwaukee police who forced their way into a gun rights advocate's home without a warrant, took her for an emergency mental evaluation and seized her gun were justified under the circumstances and protected from her civil rights claims, a federal appeals court has ruled.
Krysta Sutterfield, who twice made news because of her practice of openly carrying a handgun — at a Brookfield church and outside a Sherman Park coffee shop — drew police attention in 2011 after her psychiatrist reported a suicidal remark Sutterfield made during a difficult appointment.
Sutterfield, 45, claimed police violated her rights against unreasonable search and seizure and Second Amendment rights to keep a gun, but a district judge dismissed the case.
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 75-page opinion analyzing existing law about when police may act without search warrants, upheld the decision but suggested there might be better ways to balance personal privacy rights in the context of emergency mental health evaluations.
"The intrusions upon Sutterfield's privacy were profound," Judge Ilana Rovner wrote for three-judge panel. "At the core of the privacy protected by the Fourth Amendment is the right to be let alone in one's home."
But the court also found, that on the other hand, "There is no suggestion that (police) acted for any reason other than to protect Sutterfield from harm."
In a short concurrence, Judge Daniel Manion said he hoped state legislatures will "provide for a judicially issued civil warrant process that would authorize law enforcement to enter someone's home when there is probable cause to believe that she poses a risk to herself or others because of mental illness."
The Oregon League of Cities are celebrating the fact that property owners have lost more of their rights. The LOC is the organization that is trying to bureaucratize the cities of Oregon, thus eliminate all forms of representative government. This group advises city councils, like Bandon and Coos Bay, to get them to follow this extreme agenda of socialism. We have to beware of who is pulling the strings and it explains why the governor wants to regionalize our area.....Rob T.
This week, the Oregon Supreme Court held that the city of Milwaukie did not owe a homeowner damages for a sewer backup that caused damage to the homeowner’s property. The claim arose when the city was hydro-cleaning its sewers and caused a backup, resulting in damage on the homeowner’s property. Because of a delay in filing a claim, the homeowner could not file a negligence action, so instead argued they were entitled to compensation under inverse condemna-tion. Ordinarily, an inverse condemnation case arises when the government takes private property for a public use without going through a condemnation proceeding. In rejecting the homeowner’s legal theory, the court concluded the city’s conduct must be "intentional" for there to be a claim of inverse condemnation. Although the risk of a backup was a known, but relatively rare, conse-quence of the hydro-cleaning process, the court concluded that the city did not intentionally cause the sewer backup and therefore the homeowner could not recover damages from the city for the damage to their home.
Given the importance of this case to cities, the League filed amicus briefs in support of the city. The League is very pleased with the outcome of the case, which appropriately limits the types of cases that can qualify for inverse condemnation claims. To read more about the case, click here.
Washington D.C. - The Supreme Court heard oral argument today in Wood v. Moss, a case brought by us on behalf of a multi-generational group of peaceful protesters, who were forcibly moved on orders of the Secret Service to a place where their protests could no longer be seen or heard by President Bush. The protest took place during a visit to Jacksonville, Oregon in 2004. Demonstrators supporting the President were allowed to remain much closer to him.
The lawsuit claims that the protesters were targeted because of their political views in violation of their free speech rights.
“The Secret Service does not have immunity from the First Amendment,” said Steven M. Wilker, a lawyer with Tonkon Torp LLP in Portland, who argued the case as a cooperating attorney for the ACLU.
Plaintiffs supported their claim of viewpoint discrimination by alleging that they were treated less favorably that Bush supporters, that the decision to move them was not made until after the President sat down to dinner and could hear their chants, and was consistent with at least 12 similar incidents during the first Bush administration. In addition, the decision was also consistent with the Bush White House Advance Manual which instructed the President’s staff to “work with the Secret Service” to ensure that protesters were kept far away from the President’s view and hearing.
Nevertheless, the Justice Department has asked the Supreme Court to dismiss the case on the ground that plaintiffs’ claim of viewpoint discrimination is “implausible.” Defendants also argue that Secret Service agents could not have been expected to know in 2004 that their actions in this case violated the First Amendment even if plaintiffs’ allegations are accepted as true.
Both arguments were rejected by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in a 2012 ruling.
“The job of the Secret Service is to shield the president from danger, not from criticism,” said Steven R. Shapiro, the national legal director of the ACLU.
The initial complaint in this case was filed in 2006 and there have been two appeals of lower court decisions to deny the federal government’s motions to dismiss the case. If plaintiffs prevail in the Supreme Court, the case will finally proceed to discovery and trial.
Earlier today, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in the “rails-to-trails” property rights case, Marvin M. Brandt Revocable Trust v. United States—a case in which PLF attorneys participated as an amicus curiae. By an 8-1 margin, the Court ruled in favor of the property owner, upholding one of the most important and fundamental policies of our property law system: certainty and predictability in land titles. That is a win for all property owners. We congratulate our friends at Mountain States Legal Foundation, who represented the Brandt family in this case.
SCOTUS battle: Did EPA overstep on global warming?

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