Two from Indiana join ABA Day in Congress
American Bar Association members are on Capitol Hill Wednesday and Thursday to advocate that lawmakers fund legal aid services and continue the student loan forgiveness program.
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Trump: Raid on his lawyer abuses attorney-client privilege
Federal agents have raided the office of President Donald Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen, seizing records on topics that include a $130,000 payment made to porn actress Stormy Daniels, who says she had sex with Trump. The raid prompted a new blast Tuesday from the president, who tweeted that “Attorney-client privilege is dead!”
East Chicago lead contamination cleanup might take 3 years
EPA officials say excavating the remaining lead and arsenic contamination near a federal Superfund site in northwestern Indiana could take another three years.
Mueller’s Russia probe shows it pays to cooperate
George Papadopoulos, taken by surprise by FBI agents at an airport last summer, now tweets smiling beach selfies with a Mykonos hashtag. Rick Gates, for weeks on home confinement with electronic monitoring, gets rapid approval for a family vacation and shaves down his potential prison time. Michael Flynn, once targeted in a grand jury investigation, travels cross-country to stump for a California congressional candidate and books a New York speaking event. The message is unmistakable: It pays to cooperate with the government.
AP Source: Mueller says Trump not criminal target currently
Special counsel Robert Mueller has informed President Donald Trump’s attorneys that the president is not currently considered a criminal target in the Russia investigation, according to a person familiar with the conversation.
Alleged DOJ misconduct spreads to Indiana death penalty case
Accusations of sexual harassment and prosecutorial misconduct at the U.S. Department of Justice’s Capital Case Section have ensnared a death penalty case in the Southern District of Indiana against a federal inmate charged with killing his cellmate.
First person sentenced in Russia probe draws 30 days, fine
A Dutch attorney who lied to federal agents investigating former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was sentenced Tuesday to 30 days in prison in the first punishment handed down in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. He was also ordered to pay a $20,000 fine.
Fair Housing Center to mark milestones at annual conference
The Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the passage of the Fair Housing Act at its annual conference Wednesday in Indianapolis. The event also coincides with the date of the slaying of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., 50 years ago.
EPA, U.S. Steel reach consent decree over chemical spill
.S. Steel will pay a $600,000 civil penalty and $630,000 to reimburse various federal agencies for costs and damages after one of its plants discharged wastewater containing a potentially carcinogenic chemical into a tributary of Lake Michigan, federal and state officials said Monday.
Marathon to pay $335K for 2016 diesel spill
Marathon Petroleum Corp. has agreed to pay $335,000 for a 2016 spill where nearly 36,000 gallons of diesel fuel leaked into the Wabash River near the Indiana-Illinois border. The settlement came as about 42,000 gallons of diesel fuel spilled last week into Big Creek in Posey County.
SEC litigation against former ITT executives continues
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s lawsuit against two principal officers of ITT Educational Services, Inc., continues to proceed to trial after a federal court Friday denied most of the partial summary judgment motions filed separately by the SEC and the defendants.
Supreme Court limits reach of tax crime statute
The Supreme Court is making it harder for the federal government to use a section of the tax law to convict someone of a crime. The court Wednesday limited the application of a statute that the government had interpreted to give it a broad ability to charge someone with obstructing or impeding the work of the Internal Revenue Service.
School threats can lead to severe consequences for juveniles’ impulses
A sampling of recent incidents includes a 12-year-old boy arrested for writing a threat against his classmates at Greenfield Intermediate School; a teenage girl at Austin High School arrested and charged with juvenile delinquency/intimidation for making threats to “harm others”; and a 17-year-old boy arrested and charged with felony intimidation for writing a threat on a bathroom stall at F.J. Reitz High School in Evansville.
Trump wildlife protection board defends trophy hunting
Among the appointees is Steven Chancellor, a longtime Republican fundraiser and chairman of American Patriot Group, an Indiana-based conglomerate that supplies Meals Ready to Eat to the U.S. military.
Local attorney sentenced to six years in prison for immigration fraud
An Indianapolis-area attorney who pleaded guilty to fraud and identity theft was sentenced Friday to more than six years in federal prison.
Timeliness hurdle blocks attempt to intervene in consent decree
Although a federal judge sympathized the with East Chicago residents who have been waiting years for their neighborhoods to be decontaminated, he ultimately held that their quest to intervene in a consent decree was untimely.
Settlement with polluting East Chicago coke plant offers complex resolution
The consent decree reached between the state of Indiana, the federal government and the metallurgical coke manufacturers in East Chicago is 69 pages of terms and conditions detailed in dense legal and scientific language.
Financial advisers encourage lawyers to set goals, diversify for retirement
The last few weeks have demonstrated to those saving for retirement the sudden volatility that can rattle the stock market in particular.
AP source: Ex-FBI No. 2 to be criticized in watchdog report
The Justice Department’s inspector general is expected to criticize former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe as part of its investigation into the bureau’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email probe, a person familiar with the matter said Thursday night.
Sessions pushes back on Trump criticism over handling of FBI
Harshly criticized yet again by his boss, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has abandoned his usual stony silence and pushed back against President Donald Trump for saying Sessions’ response to Republican complaints about the FBI was “disgraceful.”