Personal Injury Solicitor Lawyers News: lawyer

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Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Lawyer calls on pageant to scrap 'abhorrent' gender rule

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The lawyer for a transgender Miss Universe Canada hopeful is calling on the pageant to clarify whether her client will be allowed to compete, and to scrap the "abhorrent" rule excluding others like her.

Jenna Talackova, 23, was named among 65 Miss Universe Canada finalists last month, only to be disqualified days later after news broke online that she had undergone sexual reassignment surgery.

"Jenna was being eliminated as a contestant not because she lacked beauty or charisma, but because, according to pageant representatives, she was not a ‘naturally born' woman," said famed feminist lawyer Gloria Allred, who is representing Talackova in the U.S.

After an outpouring of public support for the 6-1 tall blond, the pageant issued a statement Monday indicating Talackova could compete only "provided she meets the legal gender recognition requirements of Canada, and the standards established by other international competitions."

But Allred, who recently represented Tiger Woods mistresses Rachel Uchitel and Joslyn James, says the Donald Trump-owned beauty contest has only managed to confuse the issue.

"Instead of stating clearly that Jenna will be allowed to compete, Mr. Trump qualifies it by adding conditions that are ambiguous," Allred said at a Tuesday press conference in Los Angeles.

"We are asking Mr. Trump to step up and be a leader in the fight against discrimination. Or would he prefer to hide behind other organizations and say that if they discriminate, so can he?"

Talackova's Canadian driver's licence, passport and even birth certificate indicate that she is a woman, Allred said.

The pageant said it disqualified the beauty queen because she lied on her application when asked if she was born female. Talackova, who appeared on camera Tuesday for the first time since the controversy arose, says the rule amounts to blatant discrimination, and should be removed.

"I also want Mr. Trump to clearly state that this rule will be eliminated," Talackova said. "I do not want any other woman to suffer the discrimination that I have to endure."

"I am a woman… I have never asked for any special consideration. I only wanted to compete."

Trump responds

Trump told gossip program TMZ in a phone interview after the conference ended that Talackova would unequivocally be allowed to compete if she so chooses.

"We go by the law, and based on the laws she's able to compete if she wants to. She can take her shot, she can maybe win and maybe she won't win," he said.

The billionaire businessman refused to apologize for Talackova's initial disqualification, however.

"There'll be no apology whatsoever," he said. "Frankly, if she competes that's wonderful and if she doesn't want to compete because maybe she thinks she can't win that's fine also, I couldn't care less."

The controversy has been a boon to Miss Universe Canada ticket sales, Trump added.

Talackova has previously represented Canada at Miss International Queen, a transsexual beauty pageant in Thailand, where she placed as a finalist.

In an interview posted on YouTube, she describes herself as having identified as a woman at four-years-old, beginning hormone therapy at 14. She had her reassignment operation at 19.

View the original article here

Monday, April 2, 2012

Egypt army pardons Brotherhood presidency nominee: lawyer - Reuters India

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Muslim Brotherhood's Mohammad Khairat al-Shater, walks into the courtroom in Cairo, Egypt, January 30, 2007.

Credit: Reuters/Nasser Nuri/Files

By Marwa Awad

CAIRO | Sun Apr 1, 2012 10:46pm IST

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's military has dropped two court convictions against the Muslim Brotherhood's new presidential candidate Khairat al-Shater, clearing him to run in the elections to replace ousted leader Hosni Mubarak, the movement's lawyer said on Sunday.

In a policy reversal on Saturday, the Brotherhood opted to field a candidate to contest the votes in May and June and named Shater, a wealthy businessman, as its choice after deciding the other candidates were not worthy of its support.

Shater, 61, was tried in a military court in 1995 and sentenced to five years in jail on charges of "reviving" the Brotherhood. He was also tried and convicted in 2007 on charges of providing university students with arms and training.

He was jailed for seven years in the 2007 case but was freed with many other Brotherhood members in 2011 after serving four and a half years of the sentence.

Under Egyptian law, former convicts cannot occupy official posts.

"All charges and cases against engineer Khairat al-Shater have been dropped," the Brotherhood's lawyer Abdel Moneim Abdel Maqsood told Reuters.

"Shater now has all the civil rights he was deprived of and can now exercise his political rights including running for an official post in the country," he said.

The military would not confirm this but one army source said the Brotherhood would not publicly name any candidate of its own without prior clearance from the ruling military council.

Abdel Maqsood said he had picked up presidential application papers on Shater's behalf from the electoral committee.

Mubarak's overthrow in February last year ended the Brotherhood's official exclusion from politics. Before that, its leaders were often rounded up by state security in what human rights groups said was a deliberate policy to curb their political reach.

The Brotherhood did not begin the protests that toppled Mubarak but has been their most obvious beneficiary, capitalising on a formidable grass-roots campaign machine to secure top spot in a recent parliamentary vote.

That puts Shater among the frontrunners in a race billed as Egypt's first free and fair election in six decades, even though others have months of unofficial canvassing under their belts.

Analysts said the decision to field a presidential candidate suggested the Brotherhood, now on the brink of power for the first time in its 84-year history, was worried it could have its newfound influence snatched away.

Shater's candidacy is likely to split the Islamist vote in the elections further. There are three other Islamist candidates running.

But liberals may still fret over Shater's bid as it signals the rising influence of Islamists after they swept parliament and now dominate an assembly writing a new constitution.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday while visiting Istanbul that the United States will be watching Egypt's political process, urging political actors not to discriminate against minorities.

Many Coptic Christians, who represent around 10 percent of Egypt's population of over 80 million, have voiced concern over the rise of groups pledged to a stricter application of Islamic Sharia law.

(Editing by Tom Pfeiffer and David Stamp)

View the original article here

Bales' lawyer: U.S. is 'hiding evidence' in massacre - Philadelphia Inquirer

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SEATTLE - The attorney for the U.S. soldier accused of killing 17 Afghan civilians said Friday that the U.S. government was "hiding evidence" from the defense team.

John Henry Browne said members of the defense team in Afghanistan were told they would have access to witnesses at a hospital, but later discovered the people had been released.

He also said the U.S. government has not turned over files to the lawyers defending Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales.

The defense team said in a statement the prosecution was withholding information "while potential witnesses scatter."

"It's outrageous," Browne said. "What they are basically doing is hiding evidence. The only reason to hide evidence is if you don't have evidence."

Maj. Chris Ophardt, an Army spokesman, said in a statement that the prosecution would provide Bales' defense with evidence in accordance with court-martial and military rules of evidence. He said that within these guidelines "the prosecution is and has been communicating with the defense."

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, after speaking to hundreds of Marines and sailors aboard the USS Peleliu off the coast of San Diego, told reporters: "I've made very clear that those procedures will be followed and that he'll be entitled to whatever information he would be entitled to under the military code of justice."

At a news conference Friday, Browne said the military is not under a legal obligation to provide his team with certain information at this point, but they were led to believe they'd have more assistance.

He said being given access to information at a later date would not work, especially in regards to witnesses in Afghanistan.

"Normally, we have cooperation with prosecutors and we get information, and in this case they actually promised us if we sent people to Afghanistan . . . that they would cooperate," he said.

Browne also said the military planned to conduct a comprehensive mental-health evaluation of Bales at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

Browne said the military initiated the evaluation and that it would take place within the next two months.

Bales has been charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder.

View the original article here

Lawyer: Afghan suspect had depression after Iraq

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OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — The U.S. soldier accused of killing 17 Afghan civilians suffered a traumatic incident during his second tour in Iraq that triggered "tremendous depression," his lawyer said Wednesday.

Lawyer John Henry Browne said he could not discuss the details of the matter because it remains classified. But he expects the issue to become a focal point in the case against Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales.

"It caused him tremendous depression and anxiety," Browne said.

The lawyer previously said Bales experienced other major dangers in his deployments, including a serious foot injury and head trauma. In addition, a fellow soldier's leg had been blown off days before the Afghanistan massacre, he said.

Bales was charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder and other crimes. He is being held at a U.S. military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

A defense team is now in Afghanistan to collect evidence and interview other U.S. soldiers who knew Bales.

"Everyone they've spoken to in the military has nothing but amazingly positive things to say about him," said Browne, who is not part of the team in Afghanistan.

Due to security concerns, Browne doesn't think the team will visit the villages where the killings occurred. The investigators are likely to stay in Afghanistan a few more weeks.

Browne questioned the U.S. government's case against Bales, noting there is no preserved crime scene to assess.

"It's going to be a difficult case for the prosecution to prove," Browne said. "There's no 'CSI' information. There's no DNA that I know of. There's no ballistics that I know of."

Bales has indicated that he had no recollection of prescription drugs he may have been taking before the shooting — something the attorney took as an indicator of larger memory problems.

The lawyer also said his client has a sketchy memory of the night of the shootings. In a separate interview with The Washington Post, Browne said Wednesday that Bales remembered the smell of gunfire and of human bodies but not much more.

Browne added his client reported suffering from nightmares, flashbacks of war scenes and persistent headaches after his multiple combat tours. Bales told his legal team that he has long woken up with night sweats and often replays memories of a grisly scene in Iraq that he and his infantry company witnessed several years ago, Browne said.

The lawyer stressed that Bales did not confess and seemed surprised when his weapon was taken away, the newspaper reported.

U.S. military officials said Bales was drinking on a southern Afghanistan base on March 11 before creeping away to two villages at night, shooting his victims and setting many of them on fire. Nine were children.

Bales has had incidents involving alcohol and violence in the past.

In 2002, He was arrested for a drunken assault of a security guard at a Tacoma casino. That charge was dismissed after Bales completed 20 hours of anger management training.

In 2008, a couple accused an intoxicated Bales of grabbing a woman's hand and thrusting it toward his crotch before kicking and punching the woman's boyfriend, according to a police report. Prosecutors declined to pursue that case.

___

Associated Press writer Mike Baker can be reached at http://twitter.com/MikeBakerAP

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Lawyer: Father granted humanitarian parole to enter US from Mexico to bury son ... - Washington Post

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Lawyer: Father granted humanitarian parole to enter US from Mexico to bury son killed in fire

( Republican-Herald, David McKeown / Associated Press ) - In this Tuesday, March 27, 2012 , photo, flowers hang on the railing of 117 East Coal Street in Shenandoah, Pa., after fire consumed the home early Tuesday morning claiming four lives. A photo from 2008 displayed inside one of the flower bouquets shows fire victim Damien Lopez, top, holding his half-brother, Izayah Lopez, who was not a fire victim. Lopez’s father, Fidelmar “Fidel” Merlos-Lopez, a Mexican national, said Saturday, March 27, 2012, he has been barred from entering the United States to bury his.

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ALLENTOWN, Pa. — An immigration lawyer says a Mexican man will be allowed to enter the United States to bury his 10-year-old son, a U.S. citizen who died in a house fire in northeastern Pennsylvania.

Fidelmar “Fidel” Merlos-Lopez initially was barred entry into the country. But his Philadelphia-based lawyer, Elizabeth Surin, says her client was issued a humanitarian parole to attend the funeral.

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She said early Sunday that Lopez was on a plane bound for Pennsylvania.

Lopez’s son, Damien Lopez, died Tuesday in a Shenandoah row house fire along with his cousin, aunt and 7-month-old half-brother. The funeral is set for Monday.

Lopez was an illegal immigrant who left the U.S. voluntarily in 2008. He’s in the process of getting his green card so he can rejoin his wife in Shenandoah.

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