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China court reduces sentence of American Wendell Brown
Legal Information |
2018/12/05 22:16
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A Chinese court has reduced the prison sentence for former college football player and American citizen Wendell Brown from four years to three for his involvement in a bar fight, a rights monitoring group said Wednesday.
Brown, a native of Detroit who played for Ball State University in Indiana, had been teaching English and American football in southwest China when he was arrested in September 2016 and charged with intentional assault. He denied hitting a man at a bar and said he was defending himself after being attacked.
The San Francisco-based Dui Hua Foundation said Brown will be transferred from a detention center to a prison in the southwestern city of Chongqing, from where he can then apply for early release. He is now due to be set free on Sept. 24, 2019.
The court issued no official statement and an assistant judge in the case, reached by phone, directed inquiries to the court's management office, which did not immediately respond to faxed questions seeking comment.
Brown, 31, was convicted on June 28 and his reduction in sentence is one of an estimated 15 percent of appeals that are successful in China, Dui Hua said. Friends, family and supporters had hoped he would be immediately deported, as is allowed under Chinese law.
"While this is not the result we hoped for it is nevertheless the best that could be achieved," the group's executive director, John Kamm, said in an emailed statement.
"I salute the team of legal advisers and friends who have worked tirelessly to bring Wendell home. Dui Hua acknowledges the sympathetic handling of the case by the appellate judges in Chongqing," Kamm said.
Michigan and U.S. officials have lobbied China on Brown's behalf and hundreds of people have donated to a GoFundMe account to help in his case, Dui Hua said.
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Arguments in "Serial" case focus on lawyer, alibi witness
Attorney Interview |
2018/12/04 22:15
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Roughly two years after a new trial was ordered, Maryland's highest court on Thursday heard arguments in their review of the high-profile case of a man whose murder conviction was chronicled in the hit "Serial" podcast that attracted millions of armchair detectives.
Tasked with upholding the retrial order for Adnan Syed or reviewing a decision that could reinstate a conviction, Maryland's Court of Appeals heard about an hour's worth of arguments in the long-running case. Syed was convicted in 2000 of strangling his high school sweetheart and burying her body in a Baltimore park. He's been serving a life sentence ever since.
But a Baltimore judge vacated his conviction two years ago and a court ordered a new trial after concluding that his trial lawyer was ineffective. The state appealed. Earlier this year, the special appeals court upheld the lower court's ruling. The state appealed that decision, too.
On Thursday, state prosecutor Thiru Vignarajah acknowledged that the late trial lawyer for Syed did not contact an alibi witness but he asserts that the attorney understood the "gist" of what that witness, Asia McClain, might have told her at the time. The attorney in question, Cristina Gutierrez, died of a heart attack in 2004, about four years after Syed was convicted of murdering 18-year-old Hae Min Lee.
"The record is not silent on whether or not Ms. McClain was contacted. The state agrees with that. The record is silent on the critical question of why," he said, suggesting that it is not clear why Gutierrez decided to take one investigative path over another and asserting that it's wrong to conclude that Syed's constitutional right to effective counsel was violated. |
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Alec Baldwin appears in court in parking-spot case
Legal Information |
2018/12/03 22:14
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Alec Baldwin appeared in a New York court on Monday after being accused of striking a man in the face over a parking space.
The 60-year-old actor said nothing as he was arraigned on misdemeanor and violation-level charges. He has previously stated that he did nothing wrong.
Baldwin was arrested on Nov. 2. Police were told a driver pulled into a Manhattan parking space that one of Baldwin's relatives was holding for him, and the two men started quarreling and pushing each other.
The other driver told police Baldwin punched or slapped him. The 49-year-old man was taken to a hospital complaining of jaw pain and redness around his neck.
"Mr. Baldwin is a public figure whose reputation has been damaged by media reports that claim that he punched a man on a New York City street," said his lawyer, Alan Abramson.
"There is incontrovertible video evidence that has been turned over to the district attorney's office that proves beyond all doubt that Mr. Baldwin never punched anyone," the lawyer said. "Mr. Baldwin did not commit any crime and we are confident that once this matter is fully investigated it will be resolved swiftly and appropriately in court."
"Mr. Baldwin is a public figure whose reputation has been damaged by media reports that claim that he punched a man on a New York City street," said his lawyer, Alan Abramson.
"There is incontrovertible video evidence that has been turned over to the district attorney's office that proves beyond all doubt that Mr. Baldwin never punched anyone," the lawyer said. "Mr. Baldwin did not commit any crime and we are confident that once this matter is fully investigated it will be resolved swiftly and appropriately in court."
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Trial starts for Hong Kong businessman in bribery case
Legal Information |
2018/12/02 22:13
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The New York trial of a prominent Hong Kong businessman charged in a United Nations-linked bribery conspiracy is set to begin with jury selection Monday.
The trial of Dr. Chi Ping Patrick Ho begins a year after he was arrested on charges accusing him of paying bribes so a Chinese energy conglomerate could secure business advantages. He has been held without bail.
His lawyer has said Ho is looking forward to clearing his name. Ho was once Hong Kong's home affairs secretary.
Ho has insisted he is not guilty of charges that he conspired in October 2014 to bribe the president of Chad and the Ugandan foreign minister.
Prosecutors say Ho's former co-defendant, Cheikh Gadio, will testify at trial that Ho arranged a $2 million bribe to be delivered to Chad's president in gift boxes.
Last Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Loretta A. Preska overruled defense objections, saying Gadio can testify that he understood Ho's $2 million cash payment to President Idriss Deby to be a "bribe."
Ho's lawyers had argued that Gadio's testimony as to whether the $2 million was a "bribe" was lay opinion and should be kept out of evidence the jury can consider. |
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