Nashville and Franklin Lawyers

Justice Department Defends Drone Strikes on Citizen-Terrorists

Travis Hawkins — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 04:17:49 +0000

It is constitutional for the U.S. government to kill a U.S. citizen posing an imminent terrorist threat to the country if capturing that person isn’t feasible and the strike is conducted in accordance with the laws of war, Attorney General Eric Holder said Monday.

At a speech at Northwestern University Law School, Mr. Holder offered the administration’s most forceful defense of the September killing of Anwar al-Awlaki, a leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, with a drone strike.

Read the full story at WSJ.com

Tennessee Appeals Court Overturns Murder Conviction

Travis Hawkins — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 13:26:17 +0000

The Defendant was convicted of first degree murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment. On appeal, he complained that the trial court impermissibly commented upon the evidence by issuing an incomplete statement to the jury on the element of premeditation. The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals concluded that the trial court did commit reversible error by improperly commenting on the evidence and giving an incomplete statement of the law in its expanded premeditation instruction. The trial court had granted a special jury request by the State as to the element of premeditation, which was a misstatement of the law. The judgment of the trial court was reversed and remanded for a new trial.

This case was tried in Memphis. The Westlaw citation is W2010-02455-CCA-R3-CD, Shelby County, 12/08/11. Call our office if you have any questions: 615-599-1010.

Former Coal Exec Gets Three Years in Prison

Travis Hawkins — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 13:57:04 +0000

BECKLEY, W.Va.—A federal judge sentenced a former Massey Energy Co. security chief to three years in prison Wednesday for obstructing a criminal probe into the 2010 explosion that killed 29 miners in the worst U.S. coal-mining disaster in four decades, according to The Wall Street Journal.

A jury in October convicted Hughie Elbert Stover of lying to federal investigators about a company policy of providing advance notice of federal inspections, and of obstructing a federal criminal investigation of the blast by ordering the destruction of more than 50,000 documents.

Read the full story at:

Insider Targets Expanding on Wall Street

Travis Hawkins — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 03:19:49 +0000

Federal authorities are seeking to build insider-trading cases against roughly 120 individuals on and off Wall Street in an expanding criminal insider-trading investigation that has shaken the financial and corporate worlds, according to today’s Wall Street Journal.

The disclosure—the first time authorities have quantified the number of people under scrutiny—comes on the heels of a string of successful prosecutions of insider trading. Since late 2009, prosecutors have charged 66 individuals at hedge funds and other companies with insider trading and won 57 convictions or guilty pleas.

Read the full story at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203833004577249710504638728.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories

U.S. Supreme Court To Revisit Affirmative Action

Travis Hawkins — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 13:22:52 +0000

The U.S. Supreme Court is revisiting the issue of affirmative action in state-college admission, this time in a case involving the University of Texas at Austin, which said it based its policy on an earlier case, Grutter versus Bolinger, the WSJ’s Jess Bravin reports. The Supreme Court agree to hear the case Tuesday, but the arguments aren’t expected until the court’s 2012-13 term, beginning in October.

Both sides see the case as a vehicle for narrowing or even overruling Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s opinion in Grutter, according to the Wall Street Journal.

U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati Reverses Bank Fraud Conviction

Travis Hawkins — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 03:35:52 +0000

In United States versus Parkes, the federal appellate court for the Sixth Circuit (which hears all federal appeals coming out of federal courts in Tennessee) recently reversed the conviction of Benton, Tennessee businessman and entrepreneur Timothy Parkes. The government alleged that Parkes was complicit in a scheme by the president of Benton Bank to conceal FDIC lending violations by incorporating straw borrowers. Overturning the jury verdict of guilty, the Court of Appeals found that the government failed to prove Parkes intended to join in the fraud. “We conclude that any rational trier of fact would have a reasonable doubt about Parkes’s guilt,” the court wrote.

Noteworthy were the three-judge panel’s findings that prosecutor U.S. Attorney Gary Humble committed prosecutorial misconduct by making the improper (and inaccurate) suggestion during closing argument that only the jury could prevent Parkes from getting away with 4 Million in the bank’s losses.

This case teaches that — notwithstanding a bad jury verdict — the Court of Appeals can step in and correct an unjust verdict resulting from prosecutorial misdeeds. If you are interested in reading the full text of the case, the case number is 09-6525. Better yet, email or call us, and we’ll send you a copy. Godspeed.