This past weekend on TalkLeft, TChris wrote about a British court ruling that suspicion is not proof of murder in SIDS cases. The dubious theory debunked by the Court in Britain is known as "Meadow's Law."

One sudden infant death is a tragedy, two is suspicious and three is a murder, unless proven otherwise.

Commenters to TChris's post were quick to condemn the court decision. But, this article in today's New York Times has some support for the decision.

The article concerns Brugada Syndrome, which is a genetic defect that causes a lightening bolt heart attack in structurally normal hearts. According to The Times, Brugada Syndrome "is now believed to be responsible for as many as 12 percent of all sudden deaths and roughly 20 percent of deaths in patients with structurally normal hearts." The Times also reports that one scientist estimates that "one American in 5,000 might be at risk for sudden death from the disease."

What's the link to infant death? Well, again according to The Times:

Although the disease usually strikes in early middle age, cases have been reported in babies only a few days old.

Apparently, Brugada Syndrome can be diagnosed -- via a determination that there is a mutation at the SCN5a gene. According to The Times,

SCN5a mutations have now been found in other sudden-death syndromes, including sudden infant death, or SIDS.

by TChris

While some complain that "junk science" promotes frivolous lawsuits, a British court has recognized the far greater harm that results when prosecutors rely upon bad science to obtain a criminal conviction. Overturning the convictions of Angela Cannings for the murder of her two babies, the court ruled that substituting theory for fact caused Cannings' conviction to rest "almost entirely on a tidy presumption of guilt, rather than on solid evidence."

The popular theory at issue: "one sudden infant death is a tragedy, two is suspicious and three is a murder, unless proven otherwise."

The hypothesis, which is widely quoted, became known in Britain as "Meadow's law." But those assumptions are now being re-examined.

Cannings' first child died after thirteen weeks. Her second child died after seven weeks. As is often the case, doctors could not explain the deaths. Her third child, who was closely monitored, experienced breathing problems but survived after being rushed to a hospital. She is now eight years old.

Cannings' son Matthew was born in 1999. When Matthew was four months old, an alarm alerted Cannings to the fact that he was not breathing properly. Cannings called her husband, then "sat in shock until he rushed home and called an ambulance." Matthew died. Cannings' daughter was removed from her home and Cannings was charged with murdering Matthew and another child. The evidence consisted of "a suspicious pattern of deaths" and Cannings' decision to call her husband, not an ambulance, when she discovered that Matthew wasn't breathing properly.

The prosecution's expert witness, relying on the theory that three deaths is proof of murder unless the parents prove otherwise, told the jury that his clinical diagnosis "would be this was characteristic of smothering."

But he had never seen the babies or interviewed the parents and, as the appellate court pointed out, there was a dearth of evidence: no cause of death could be determined; there was no sign the babies had been injured; and there was no history of parental violence or abuse. In fact, relatives and friends described Mrs. Cannings as a loving mother.

Although other experts advanced other opinions, Cannings was found guilty. Thankfully, after Cannings spent twenty months in prison, the appellate court ruled that a suspicious pattern of deaths isn't enough to prove that a murder was committed. The court said:

"Unless we are sure of guilt, the dreadful possibility always remains that a mother, already brutally scarred by the unexplained death or deaths of her babies, may find herself in prison for life for killing them, when she should not be there at all. In our community, and in any civilized community, that is abhorrent."

The decision prompted the British attorney general to announce "a thorough review of 258 criminal cases similar to Ms. Canning's case," although not all of those cases will likely be revisited. As tragic and emotional as the death of a child always is, mere suspicion must never supplant proof in a criminal prosecution. This case is an important reminder of that bedrock principle.

A federal appeals court has ruled the DEA cannot prevent the sale of hemp products :

A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco said the Drug Enforcement Administration cannot regulate hemp in food because such "non-psychoactive hemp products" are not included in its list of dangerous drugs.

The ruling is a twist in an ongoing battle between drug regulators and an increasing number of entrepreneurs and farmers producing a growing variety of hemp food products, including bread, granola, waffles, pretzels and chips. The industry marketed the hemp products as one the latest nutritional marvels, rich in protein, vitamin E and two essential fatty acids.

Demagogue has an excellent analysis of the rotten Kansas court decision allowing greater punishment for homosexual acts of sodomy than heterosexual acts of sodomy. What a dumb decision. [hat tip to the Beat Bush Blog.]

Colorado has become the first state in the nation to impose term limits on elected prosecutors. 13 of Colorado's elected District Attorneys will be leaving office in January, 2005 after a ruling yesterday by the Colorado Supreme Court upholding results of a 2002 election referendum that rejected prosecutors' requests to be excluded from a 1994 state Constitutional Amendment limiting all "non-judicial" officeholders to two terms in office.

We voted against the referendum. Colorado, particularly the Denver area, has some excellent, career prosecutors, most notably in our view, Bill Ritter in Denver, Bob Grant in Adams and Jim Thomas in Jefferson County. Unlike the federal prosecutor's office, where the President appoints U.S. Attorneys from his political party after being elected, the office has never been a political one in the sense of Democrat vs. Republican. We sense that will change.

On election night in 2002, we were at Tom Strickland's headquarters watching the results. Bill Ritter was standing next to us when the first results came in on the referendum and it looked bad. It was like being at a funeral, we offered our condolences, and although Ritter expressed mild optimism that the Court would reverse it, we could see he was reading the writing on the wall. We know he'll land with his feet up, and probably get a job making a lot more money, but we also know his heart is in public service and think that the public is the loser with this decision.

The good news today keeps on coming as a Federal Judge rules the Patriot Act provision criminalizing the provision of providing material support to terrorist organizations unconstitutional.

A federal judge has declared unconstitutional a portion of the USA Patriot Act that bars giving expert advice or assistance to groups designated foreign terrorist organizations.

The ruling marks the first court decision to declare a part of the post-Sept. 11 anti-terrorism statute unconstitutional, said David Cole, a Georgetown University law professor who argued the case on behalf of the Humanitarian Law Project.

In a ruling handed down late Friday and made available Monday, U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins said the ban on providing "expert advice or assistance" is impermissibly vague, in violation of the First and Fifth Amendments.

Here is the full text of the opinion (pdf).

Update: We wrote about the lawsuit in August here. The Judge based her decision today on First Amendment free speech grounds:

This calls for a major celebration! The Supreme Court today reaffirmed the requirement of Miranda rights. The case is Fellers v. United States, 02-6320.

The full opinion in html is here. It was authored by Justice O'Connor.

Update: Lawyer jlk points out in an email that "Fellers is a Sixth Amendment right-to-counsel case a la Massiah, with all due respect to Ms. Holland (wire reporters are always on the tightest deadlines). If Fellers had been a Miranda case, Scalia would have dissented." We haven't had a chance to read the case yet, but we'll report back later. Feel free to put your analysis in the comments section.

From the Court's syllabus:

Great news. The Illinois Supreme Court has upheld former Governor George Ryan's 2003 commutation of all death row sentences.

The governor may grant reprieves, pardons and commutations on his own terms, and the decisions are "unreviewable," the court said....."The governor's constitutional clemency powers allow him to completely or partially absolve a defendant of the consequences of his crime, and to suspend or commute any sentence imposed by the judiciary," Justice Robert R. Thomas wrote in the opinion.

The full opinion is here (html). Scrivener's Error has this analysis:

Hip Hip Hooray! A federal court in New York has invalidated the recently changed Bureau of Prisons policy refusing to let inmates go to halfway houses until they have completed 90% of their sentences. The Judge ruled the policy runs afoul of the statute and the agency's own legal analysis. The decision will be published on Wednesday. (article by subscription only.)

On the strength of his findings, Southern District Judge Richard J. Holwell on Wednesday ordered the Bureau of Prisons to reconsider its determination not to assign an inmate serving 2 years in prison for involvement in a money laundering scheme to a halfway house prior to May 2.

On that date, Abraham Zucker, an inmate of a minimum security federal prison in Otisville, N.Y., will have served all but 10 percent of his prison term. If assigned to a halfway house, Mr. Zucker would be able to travel to work during the day but be confined in the evenings. In Zucker v. Menifee, 03-10077, Judge Holwell rejected the Bureau of Prisons' legal analysis, which was based on an opinion issued by the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel in December 2002.

....In finding no legal impediment barring the bureau from sending federal inmates to halfway houses for longer than 10 percent of their terms, Judge Holwell reached the same conclusion of at least two of his Southern District colleagues - Judges Denny Chin and Kimba Wood - as well as Eastern District Judge I. Leo Glasser.

Mr. Zucker was represented by Peter Goldberger of Ardmore, Pa., Todd A. Bussert of Naugutuck, Conn. and Richard Willstatter of White Plains. Yes, the same Peter Goldberger that reads and comments on TalkLeft and that won the release of Nick Yarris last week after 22 years spent on death row. Todd Bussert is a regular reader as well. Congrats to both and Mr. Willstatter.

The Supreme Court today agreed to hear a case involving the detention of immigrants:

The Supreme Court will decide whether to extend the reach of a 2001 ruling that limited the detention of some immigrants to a "reasonable period," generally six months. The 2001 ruling covered the detention period, while the United States attempts to find a country to take them, for permanent resident immigrants convicted of a crime and ordered deported.

The new case will determine whether the same six-month time limit also extended to immigrants apprehended at the border while attempting to enter illegally and then ordered removed from the United States.

The case involves Daniel Benitez, a Cuban refugee , who came to the U.S. in 1980 and was later jailed for armed robbery, burglary, battery and other crimes. His sentence was up in 2001 but he has remained in immigration custody under a 1996 law.

His lawyer, John Mills of Jacksonville, Fla., said Benitez and the others "face the very real possibility of spending the rest of their lives incarcerated, not because of any crimes they may have committed, but because their countries will not take them back."

....Records show that 2,269 immigrants awaiting deportation are in prison, and more than half have been detained more than six months, including 920 Mariel Cubans. Lower courts have split on what to do with them since the 2001 Supreme Court ruling that immigrant detentions longer than six months would probably be unconstitutional. The government has been told by some courts to release 63 detainees.

In another blow to personal freedom the high court held today (6-3 opinion by Beyer) that the police may use random roadblocks to seek information regarding recent specific crimes. The case is Illiniois v. Lidster, the opinion is here. Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissented.

The police had set up a highway checkpoint (roadblock) to try and obtain information about a hit and run resulting in a death a week earlier. The checkpoint was in the same location and at about the same time as the earlier incident. Police stopped each approaching vehicle, asked if the occupants knew anything about the hit and run and passed out a flyer with contact information. Lister swerved while approaching and the officer smelled alcohol. Following filed sobriety tests Lister was arrested for driving under the influence.

In Indianapolis v. Edmond, the Supreme Court held that absent special circumstances, the Fourth Amendment prohibits police from stopping people at a checkpoint set up primarily for general “crime control” purposes unless they have individualized suspicion of wrongdoing. The Court distinguished that opinion today, holding that

Specifically, the checkpoint in Edmond was designed to ferret out drug crimes committed by the motorists themselves. Here, the stop’s primary law enforcement purpose was not to determine whether a vehicle’s occupants were committing a crime, but to ask the occupants, as members of the public, for help in providing information about a crime in all likelihood committed by others.

Perhaps of most concern is the “reasonableness factor” the court uses. The Court said:

The Supreme Court has refused to consider a case involving the Bush Administration's secrecy of more than 700 cases in which Arabs or Muslims were picked up after 9/11--none of whom were charged with a terrorist crime.

Most were eventually deported for immigration violations. The government refused to disclose whom it held and why. The court's action, taken without comment, was a victory for the Bush administration. Civil liberties and media organizations had sought access to the names and other basic information about the detainees.

The case is Center for National Security Studies v. Justice Department, 03-472.