Wyoming is preparing for about 120 new state laws to take effect this week.

July 1 marks the start date for many of the bills the Legislature passed during this year’s session. The new rules and procedures will affect law enforcement, transportation and other parts of state government.

One of the most heavily debated bills was the elimination of the implied consent law for suspected drunken drivers.

Starting Friday, motorists will lose the right to refuse chemical tests when they are suspected of driving under the influence.

The bill also creates a “remotely communicated search warrant.” That means a judicial official does not need to be physically present to approve the warrant to force the test.

Rep. Keith Gingery, R-Jackson, who sponsored that bill, said it could have one of the largest effects of all legislation passed this year. He added that judges and prosecutors have worked for the past few months to arrange the logistics of the new law.

“Potentially, it will have a dramatic impact on the reduction of deaths on our roads,” he said. Read the rest of this entry »

South Carolina Republican Governor Nikki Haley on Monday signed into law a bill that requires police to check the immigration status of anyone they stop or arrest for another reason and suspect may be in the country illegally.

The immigration crackdown, which goes into effect January 1, follows similar action by lawmakers in Georgia and Alabama.

Under the new law, employers in South Carolina will be required to use the federal E-Verify system to check the citizenship status of employees and job applicants. Penalties for knowingly employing illegal immigrants will include suspension and revocation of a business license by the state.

The law also creates a $1.3 million Illegal Immigration Enforcement Unit within the state public safety department to serve as a liaison between local police and federal immigration officials. The unit will have 12 full-time officers, as well as its own unique uniforms and vehicle markings.

The unit will be formed after July 1 when the new state budget takes effect. Haley has not yet signed the budget but is not expected to veto the funds.

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A federal judge Monday blocked parts of Georgia’s law cracking down on illegal immigration from taking effect until a legal challenge is resolved.

Judge Thomas Thrash granted a request to block parts of the law that penalize people who knowingly and willingly transport or harbor illegal immigrants while committing another crime. He also blocked provisions that authorize police officers to verify the immigration status of someone who can’t provide proper identification.

Thrash wrote that under parts of the law, the state is enforcing immigration law that should be left to the federal government. Most parts of the law were set to enter into effect July 1. Civil liberties groups had filed a lawsuit asking the judge to declare the law unconstitutional and to block it from being enforced.

Omar Jadwat with the American Civil Liberties Union argued the law was fundamentally unconstitutional and infringed on federal authority, while Senior Assistant Atty. Gen. Devon Orland said the measure was needed because medical facilities and prisons were being strained by illegal immigrants.

Civil liberties groups argue the law could encourage racial profiling. Provisions that penalize people for harboring and transporting illegal immigrants in certain situations also have the potential to punish people for innocent interactions with illegal immigrants, the groups have said.

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The Supreme Court ended its term with a vigorous defense of free speech, striking down a California law that banned sales of violent video games to minors and effectively shielding the entertainment industry from any government effort to limit violent content.

“Like books, plays and movies, video games communicate ideas,” said Justice Antonin Scalia in his majority opinion Monday. And he said there “is no tradition in this country of specially restricting children’s access to depictions of violence. … Grimm’s Fairy Tales, for example, are grim indeed.”

The decision, coming on the term’s last day, highlights a consistent theme of the high court under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.: Freedom of speech is almost always a winner, even if the context is unusual.

The court will have another opportunity next term to test the reach of the Constitution’s protection of speech. The justices said they would hear a case about the longstanding federal regulation of prime-time television broadcasts. The case concerns whether the Federal Communications Commission can punish broadcasters for showing nude scenes or airing four-letter words in prime time.

Over the last few years, the court’s 1st Amendment cases have leaned heavily toward protecting speech. Last year, the court upset animal-rights advocates when it struck down a law that forbid the sale of videos showing animals being tortured. And in a much disputed decision, the justices ruled that corporations and unions had a free-speech right to spend unlimited sums on campaigns. Last week, the court struck down a Vermont law that barred the sale of private drug prescription records. The court said this data is “speech” and can be traded in the “marketplace of ideas.”

Monday also saw another campaign-funding law fall on free-speech grounds. A 5-4 decision rejected part of an Arizona law and said states may not give extra money to candidates who abide by spending limits because doing so impedes the speech of candidates who would prefer to spend more.

While the outcome in 1st Amendment cases has been consistent, the voting has not followed the usual conservative-liberal pattern.

In Monday’s decision, in the case of Brown vs. Entertainment Merchants Assn., a 7-2 majority voted against California’s law, but the justices were divided 5 to 4 over whether violence in the media can ever be regulated to protect children.

Scalia, one of the court’s most conservative justices, wrote for the five-member majority that included three liberal justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, as well as Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, who is often the court’s swing vote. Read the rest of this entry »

Zamansky & Associates LLC announces that on June 20, 2011 it filed a class action lawsuit against David Lerner Associates, Inc. (”David Lerner”) and its senior officers, Apple REITs Six through Ten (”Apple REITs”) and their principal Glade M. Knight, in the United States District Court, District of New Jersey, Case No. 2:33-av-00001. The lawsuit was brought on behalf of all investors in the $3.2 billion of non-traded Apple Real Estate Investment Trusts (”Apple REITs”) sold by David Lerner. If you were an investor with a substantial loss, contact Jake Zamansky at (212) 742-1414, or email at jake@zamansky.com.

The class action complaint alleges that David Lerner acted negligently in its sales, marketing and underwriting of more than $6.8 billion of shares in the Apple REITs to DLA’s brokerage customers. DLA allegedly sold Apple REITs to many customers who were elderly, retired and/or unsophisticated by misstating the fundamental business model of the Apple REITs, omitting material information about how the Apple REITs were intended to operate, omitting to disclose material risks associated with an investment in the Apple REITs, and misrepresenting the value of Apple REIT shares and the returns investors would receive on their investments. DLA allegedly told investors that Apple REITs which invested in extended stay hotels such as Marriott and Hilton paid safe and secure returns from earnings generated by revenues. Read the rest of this entry »

A new North Carolina law requiring that sales of certain cold medicines be entered into a national database will help law enforcement agencies better track criminals who are making methamphetamine, Attorney General Roy Cooper said Friday.

Gov. Beverly Perdue signed the bill into law requiring retailers starting Jan. 1 to participate in the electronic tracking system involving medications with pseudoephedrine. The state already requires stores to keep the medicine behind the counter, record buyer information and require a photo ID.

Retailers would reject the sale when the database warns that the buyer is exceeding the daily or monthly limits on the product under state law.

“Being able to block illegal purchases of the key meth ingredient is a significant step in our battle against this highly addictive drug,” Cooper said in a prepared statement. “This new tool will help us zero in on criminals who make meth so we can rid our communities of dangerous drug labs.” Read the rest of this entry »

The Supreme Court yesterday struck down a Vermont law barring the sale of prescription drug records for marketing purposes, potentially derailing an effort by Massachusetts lawmakers to enact a similar patient privacy law.

The court, in a 6-to-3 ruling, said Vermont violated the free speech rights of drug manufacturers by forbidding pharmacies from selling doctors’ prescription information to them yet allowing the data to be sold for other purposes, such as research.

The ruling was a victory for pharmaceutical companies, which buy the data to uncover prescription patterns so they can better market their drugs to doctors. But it dampens the hope of physician groups, consumer health advocacy organizations, and some Massachusetts legislators of passing the state’s own prescription privacy bill.

“I’m not so sure that a Massachusetts law would have much viability now,’’ said Dr. Lynda Young, president of the Massachusetts Medical Society. “We consider the sale of prescription data commercial activity, not free speech. It is an intrusion into the physician-patient relationship.’’

Two state senators, Mark Montigny from New Bedford and Richard Moore from Uxbridge, both Democrats, have repeatedly filed legislation to stop the commercial use of prescription data. They also expressed disappointment in the ruling but said it was not shocking given what they called a conservative, corporate leaning of the Supreme Court. Read the rest of this entry »

Illinois Democratic Governor Pat Quinn signed into law on Friday a new congressional district map that could reverse gains Republicans made in the state in 2010 midterm elections.

Democrats were able to leverage their control of the General Assembly and a Democratic governor to approve a new election map for 2012 that analysts said could help Democrats win at least three more congressional seats in the state.

The effects of the law, which Republicans or third-party interest groups may challenge in court, would be to pit strong Republicans against each other, extend Chicago Democratic incumbent districts into suburban Republican districts, and incorporate new voter blocs into Republican strongholds.

Quinn denied that the redistricting was a partisan ploy by Democrats.

“This map is fair, maintains competitiveness within congressional districts, and protects the voting rights of minority communities,” Quinn said. Read the rest of this entry »

The focus of the gay rights struggle in the United States shifted yesterday to the New York state legislature in Albany, where hundreds of supporters and opponents of a draft bill to give full marriage rights to gay and lesbian New Yorkers jammed corridors and hallways as a final vote went down the wire.

Both sides were feeling the suspense as the Democrat Governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, urged passage of the law in the Republican-controlled Senate. Approved by the lower house last week, the bill would make New York the sixth – and the most populous – state to give full marriage rights to gays, lesbians and transsexuals.

As day wore into evening, the fate of the law remained in the balance, with backers one vote shy of securing a majority. As well as Mr Cuomo, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been in the state capital in recent days, lobbying in favour of gay marriage.

The drama in Albany – the camps of supporters and opponents sang opposing anthems to try to get the attention of wavering lawmakers – comes amid subtly shifting sentiments at the national level. President Barack Obama is due later this week to host a Gala with the Gay Community in New York, a first such event for him. Mr Obama’s personal position on gay marriage has become a subject of speculation, although he remains on the record as stopping short of supporting full marriage rights for gay couples.

The administration has also stopped supporting the Defence of Marriage Act, the federal law signed by former president Bill Clinton in 1996 that defines marriage as being between a man and a woman. The move opened the door to legal challenges of the law as being discriminatory and therefore in violation of the US Constitution.

Mr Cuomo, who was elected last year in the footsteps of his father, Mario Cuomo, one of the longest-serving governors of New York, has meanwhile invested much of his early political capitol in getting a gay marriage bill passed. The law would grant same-sex couples equal rights to marry “as well as hundreds of rights, benefits and protections that are currently limited to married couples of the opposite sex”, he said. Opposition has been led in part by the Catholic Church. The Bishop of New York, Timothy Dolan, preached against it from the pulpit at the weekend.

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The 140,000-member statewide teachers union sued Gov. Rick Scott and other state officials Monday to block a new law that requires state employees to begin contributing to their retirement plans.

The challenge, filed in Leon County circuit court, asserts that the law’s required 3 percent contribution to the state’s retirement fund amounts to a breach of contract with public employees, who accepted their positions with the promise of certain benefits. Those benefits included a pension plan that did not require contributions.

“It is essentially an income tax levied only on workers belonging to the Florida Retirement System. It’s unfair — and it breaks promises made to these employees when they chose to work to improve our state,” said Florida Education Association president Andy Ford.

The initial suit listed 11 public-employee plaintiffs, including teachers, health-care professionals and laborers representing other unions. Two other unions — the Florida Police Benevolent Association and the SEIU Florida Public Services Union, whose members work for the cities of Orlando and West Palm Beach and the Palm Beach County School Board — also asked to join.

Florida lawmakers spent most of the 60-day legislative session on the pension bill. The state’s retirement system is in relatively good financial shape, but lawmakers acknowledged they needed the pension contributions — more than $1 billion from 572,000 public employees — to help offset a revenue shortfall of nearly $4 billion.

Scott had made pension reform one of his campaign issues and spent much of the session advocating for a 5 percent rate, arguing that Florida was the only state that did not require employees to contribute to their pensions. Amid heavy lobbying from law enforcement, teachers and other public employees, lawmakers settled on 3 percent.

Scott, who was in Washington, D.C., on Monday, said that asking employees to contribute to their retirement “makes all the sense in the world,” noting that private-sector retirement benefits are far less generous and require employees to contribute.

“It’s the right thing to do for our state,” he said. “It’s within the rights of the Legislature to do it. It’s the right thing for taxpayers. It’s the right thing for those employees, frankly. People should participate in their retirement plan.”

The FEA suit is one of several lawsuits challenging laws passed by the 2011 legislative session.

The American Civil Liberties Union has filed two lawsuits, one to stop drug testing of public employees and the other over new laws regulating elections. The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence and the Florida chapters of three physicians’ groups have also sued to block a new law that restricts a doctor’s ability to ask patients about guns in their homes.

Ford of the FEA, in a conference call with reporters, said Monday’s lawsuit would be the first in a “series of judicial challenges.” The union will likely soon sue to block a teacher merit-pay law that was a top priority for GOP lawmakers. Instead of basing pay and hiring decisions on seniority, the law creates a new evaluation system for teachers that focuses more on student test scores.

The FEA is also raising legal concerns about a proposed constitutional amendment that would eliminate language in the state Constitution that bars state funding of religious institutions, including parochial schools.

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