Category Archives: Legal matters

Fifth Circuit upholds dismissal of campus carry lawsuit

Posted on August 20, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Not a surprise. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday upheld Texas’ campus carry law, delivering another clear victory to the state in a longshot, long-running lawsuit brought by University of Texas at Austin professors opposed to the … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged campus carry, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, gun control, Ken Paxton, lawsuit, Texas, The Lege, UT | 3 Comments

Woodfill and Hotze take their next shot at same sex employee benefits

Posted on August 19, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Here we go again. Anti-LGBTQ activists are again asking a Harris County judge to halt benefits for the same-sex spouses of Houston city employees, according to a recently filed motion. The motion for summary judgment in Pidgeon v. Turner, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Annise Parker, Election 2018, gay marriage, gay rights, Harris County, health insurance, Houston, Jared Woodfill, judicial races, lawsuit, Lisa Millard, Noel Freeman, Sonya Heath, Steven Hotze, Supreme Court, Texas | 2 Comments

Partial halt to bail lawsuit order

Posted on August 18, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Here comes the Fifth Circuit again. A majority opinion by Circuit Judge Jerry E. Smith halted part of an order by Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal which compelled certain defendants to be released immediately on no-cost bail in … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged bail, Civil Rights Corps, Equal Justice Under Law, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Harris County, lawsuit, Texas Fair Defense Project | Comments Off

Dallas County Republicans still trying to knock all the Dems off the ballot

Posted on August 16, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Here comes the appeal. Dallas County Republicans will appeal a ruling that blocked efforts to remove scores of Democrats from the November election ballot. A formal intent to appeal was filed Monday on behalf of Missy Shorey, the chairwoman of … Continue reading →

Posted in Election 2018, Legal matters | Tagged Carol Donovan, Dallas County, Democratic primary, Election 2018, lawsuit, Republican Party, Texas | 4 Comments

The end of the voter ID fight

Posted on August 13, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

I guess that’s it. After seven long years of litigation, opponents of Texas’ voter ID law say the case is over. In a court filing on Wednesday, opponents of the law requiring Texas voters to present photo identification to vote … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, lawsuit, redistricting, SCOTUS, Texas, The Lege, voter ID, Voting Rights Act | Comments Off

Rape kit lawsuit dismissal will be appealed

Posted on August 11, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

To be expected. Two women who on Friday lost a lawsuit against the City of Houston and a variety of officials over a rape kit backlog will file an appeal, an attorney for the women announced in a news release … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Annise Parker, crime lab, DeJenay Beckwith, DNA, Houston, Houston Forensic Science Local Government Corporation, lawsuit, rape kits, Sylvester Turner | 1 Comment

The DACA hearing

Posted on August 10, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

I don’t know about this. The state of Texas will continue to incur irreparable financial harm if an Obama-era immigration program isn’t halted immediately, attorneys for the state argued in Houston on Wednesday. But lawyers representing nearly two dozen recipients … Continue reading →

Posted in La Migra, Legal matters | Tagged Barack Obama, Donald Trump, DREAM Act, immigration, Justice Department, lawsuit, MALDEF, New Jersey, SCOTUS, Texas | Comments Off

Bail practices lawsuit hearing

Posted on August 9, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

We so need to be done with this. More than a dozen Harris County misdemeanor judges contend that public safety would be imperiled if they followed an “untenable” new pretrial release order by a Houston federal judge who has found … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged bail, Civil Rights Corps, Election 2018, Equal Justice Under Law, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Harris County, jail overcrowding, jails, lawsuit, Texas Fair Defense Project | 3 Comments

One federal court orders DACA restored

Posted on August 6, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

But hold on, because there’s another ruling to come. A federal judge on Friday upheld his previous order to revive an Obama-era program that shields some 700,000 young immigrants from deportation, saying that the Trump administration had failed to justify … Continue reading →

Posted in La Migra, Legal matters | Tagged Barack Obama, DC Circuit Court of Appeals, Donald Trump, DREAM Act, immigration, Justice Department, Ken Paxton, lawsuit, SCOTUS, Texas | 2 Comments

Rape kit backlog lawsuit dismissed

Posted on August 4, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Interesting. A federal judge has dismissed a 2017 lawsuit two rape victims filed against Houston’s current mayor and police chief and five sets of predecessors, among others, for allowing a backlog of rape kits to accumulate over decades without being … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Annise Parker, Charles McClelland, crime lab, DeJenay Beckwith, DNA, Houston, Houston Forensic Science Local Government Corporation, HPD, lawsuit, rape, rape kits, Sylvester Turner | 1 Comment

Firefighters file suit over handling of pay parity proposal

Posted on August 1, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

I figured we’d have to wait till after the eventual vote on the firefighters’ pay parity proposal for there to be litigation over it, but no. The union representing Houston firefighters sued Mayor Sylvester Turner and a City Council member … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters, Local politics | Tagged Dave Martin, Election 2018, HFD, Houston, Houston City Council, HPFFA, lawsuit, Mayor, petitions, Sylvester Turner | 13 Comments

Census lawsuit proceeds

Posted on July 29, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Good. A federal judge in New York on Thursday allowed a lawsuit challenging the addition of a citizenship question to the Census to move forward. U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman’s decision rejected the Trump administration’s request to dismiss the lawsuit, … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged ACLU, Census, Commerce Department, Connecticut, Delaware, Donald Trump, Illinois, immigration, Iowa, Justice Department, lawsuit, Maryland, Massachusett, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, U.S. Conference of Mayors, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wilbur Ross | Comments Off

Business groups file brief opposing Paxton’s anti-DACA lawsuit

Posted on July 24, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

This is good. A federal lawsuit by Texas officials earlier this year seeking to order the end of the federal immigration program called the Deferred Act for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, will have “immediate, irreparable injury” to Texas businesses and … Continue reading →

Posted in La Migra, Legal matters | Tagged Attorney General, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, DREAM Act, Election 2018, immigration, Justin Nelson, Ken Paxton, lawuit, Southwest Airlines, Texas, Texas Association of Business | 1 Comment

“Fetal remains” trial ends

Posted on July 22, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Now we wait for a ruling. State and reproductive rights attorneys wrapped up a five-day trial in federal court on Friday that will determine whether a Texas law requiring health providers to cremate or bury fetal remains can go into … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged abortion, Attorney General, Center for Reproductive Rights, Donna Howard, HHSC, lawsuit, Texas, The Lege | Comments Off

Another homeless feeding lawsuit dismissed

Posted on July 20, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Not the end of the story, though. A state district judge this week dismissed a lawsuit a local activist filed last year against Houston’s ordinance regulating the charitable feeding of the city’s homeless, but the case is proceeding on with … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters, Local politics | Tagged Annise Parker, homelessness, Houston, Houston City Council, lawsuit, Philip Bryant | 2 Comments

New frontiers in strip club tax collections

Posted on July 18, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

A new-ish development in a decade-long battle. Dozens of “bikini bars” from Houston to San Antonio are suing the state after the Texas Comptroller accused them of skirting the so-called pole tax on nude entertainment and slapped them with seven-figure … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Comptroller, Glenn Hegar, lawsuit, strip clubs, Texas, Texas Entertainment Association, The Lege | 1 Comment

“Fetal remains” lawsuit trial underway

Posted on July 17, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Here we go. State and reproductive rights attorneys are going head to head again in federal court on Monday to argue whether Texas should require health providers to cremate or bury fetal remains. “It’s a tough case for everybody,” U.S. … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged abortion, Attorney General, Center for Reproductive Rights, HHSC, lawsuit, Texas, The Lege | 1 Comment

Campus carry at the Fifth Circuit

Posted on July 13, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

We’ll see if this gets a better reception than it got at the lower court. Two years ago, three University of Texas at Austin professors — Jennifer Lynn Glass, Lisa Moore and Mia Carter — filed a lawsuit against state … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged campus carry, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, gun control, Ken Paxton, lawsuit, Texas, The Lege, UT | 1 Comment

Still waiting on families to be reunited

Posted on July 8, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Horrible story remains horrible. The clock is ticking on a court-ordered Tuesday deadline for the federal government to reunite migrant parents with kids under 5 who were taken from them at the border. With a mere four days left, government … Continue reading →

Posted in La Migra, Legal matters | Tagged Donald Trump, ICE, immigration, Justice Department, lawsuit, Office of Refugee Resettlement, refugees, Texas | 15 Comments

Pension bond lawsuit dismissed

Posted on July 6, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

This hit my inbox late in the day on July 3. The City of Houston is pleased that a court challenge to the 2017 election on the City’s pension bonds has been decided in its favor. Today, State District Judge … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Election 2017, Houston, James Noteware, lawsuit, pension fund, pension obligation bonds, Sylvester Turner | 1 Comment

Census lawsuit may proceed

Posted on July 6, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Good. A federal judge said Tuesday that there was a “strong showing of bad faith” by the Trump administration in adding a controversial question about US citizenship to the 2020 census. The judge hinted that he would allow the case to move forward … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged ACLU, Census, Commerce Department, Connecticut, Delaware, Donald Trump, Illinois, immigration, Iowa, Justice Department, lawsuit, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, U.S. Conference of Mayors, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wilbur Ross | 2 Comments

Same maps, different day

Posted on July 5, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

The coda to the SCOTUS redistricting ruling. The 2018 elections will move forward without any tweaks to Texas’ political maps. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling to uphold all but one of the state’s political districts, a three-judge federal panel … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Congress, Election 2018, Election 2020, HD90, redistricting, SCOTUS, Texas, The Lege, Voting Rights Act | Comments Off

No indefinite detention of asylum seekers

Posted on July 4, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

That title is one of those things I can’t believe I have to write. A federal district judge has ruled President Donald Trump’s administration’s practice of indefinitely detaining some asylum seekers can’t proceed, dealing a major blow to what immigration … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged ACLU, Donald Trump, ICE, immigration, lawsuit, Office of Refugee Resettlement, refugees, Texas | 17 Comments

Revised final bail order

Posted on July 2, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

We go from here. The federal judge in a landmark bail lawsuit against Harris County set new ground rules for law enforcement and judges about pretrial release for thousands of low-income people arrested on low-level offenses in a revised injunction … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged bail, Civil Rights Corps, Equal Justice Under Law, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Harris County, Harris County Attorney, jail overcrowding, jails, lawsuit, Texas Fair Defense Project | Comments Off

The Lawrence decision, 15 years later

Posted on June 30, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Time flies, but society moves slowly. Theirs was an unlikely case. John Lawrence and Tyron Garner weren’t in love, they weren’t a committed couple and it’s not clear that they were even having sex one September 1998 evening in Lawrence’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged DOMA, Election 2018, gay marriage, gay rights, Houston, lawsuit, Mark Phariss, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Texas | 1 Comment

The fruit of the poisoned tree

Posted on June 29, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

If the discriminatory intent of the Texas redistricting was no biggie, then surely the discriminatory intent of the voter ID law is no biggie too. Right? In a motion filed Wednesday, the Texas attorney general’s office asked U.S. District Judge … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Ken Paxton, lawsuit, SCOTUS, Texas, The Lege, voter ID, Voting Rights Act | 1 Comment

Texans cheerleader lawsuit update

Posted on June 28, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Couple points of interest here. A former Texans cheerleader who says cheer director Alto Gary derided her as “skinny fat” and applied duct tape to her stomach before a 2017 game added her name Friday to one of two lawsuits … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters, Other sports | Tagged arbitration, cheerleading, football, Houston, Houston Texans, lawsuit, minimum wage, NFL, sexual harassment | Comments Off

SCOTUS upholds Texas redistricting

Posted on June 26, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Screw this. Extinguishing the possibility that Texas could be placed back under federal electoral supervision, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday pushed aside claims that lawmakers intentionally discriminated against voters of color when they enacted the state’s congressional and state … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged CD23, CD27, CD35, Congress, HD90, lawsuit, MALC, Marc Veasey, NAACP, Ramon Romero, redistricting, SCOTUS, Texas, The Lege, Voting Rights Act | 5 Comments

Supreme Court affirms trashing Laredo’s plastic bag ban

Posted on June 25, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Not really a surprise. The Texas Supreme Court handed a loss to local government on Friday, striking down a Laredo ban on plastic bags. The decision imperils about a dozen other cities’ bans across the state. In a decision viewed … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Ken Paxton, Laredo, lawsuit, local control, plastic bags, Supreme Court, Texas, Texas Municipal League, The Lege | 9 Comments

SCOTUS and sales taxes

Posted on June 24, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

This ruling will be good for Texas. Texas stands to gain hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue after the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that states may force online retailers to collect sales tax even when they … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Comptroller, Dale Craymer, lawsuit, sales taxes, SCOTUS, Texas, The Lege | 4 Comments

Dem primary loser in CD06 files “vote fraud” lawsuit

Posted on June 23, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

That sound you hear is me banging my head on my desk. Democrat Ruby Woolridge has filed a lawsuit challenging her 717-vote primary runoff loss for the 6th Congressional District to Jana Lynne Sanchez. In the lawsuit, Woolridge claims that … Continue reading →

Posted in Election 2018, Legal matters | Tagged CD06, Congress, Democratic primary, Jana Sanchez, lawsuit, petitions, Ruby Woolridge, runoff, Texas | Comments Off

Texans move to dismiss one cheerleader lawsuit

Posted on June 22, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

Standard stuff, I presume. Attorneys for the Houston Texans have asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit filed against the team by five former cheerleaders or to delay proceedings while the former cheerleaders’ complaints are submitted to arbitration. Team … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters, Other sports | Tagged arbitration, cheerleading, football, Houston Texans, lawsuit, minimum wage, NFL | Comments Off

Paxton wants magistrates’ lawsuit tossed

Posted on June 20, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

We all want things, Kenny. The state attorney general Monday asked a judge to dismiss a lawsuit by three Harris County hearing officers who are fighting sanctions by Texas’ judicial ethics commission earlier this year over unfair bail practices. Texas … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Attorney General, bail, Eric Hagstette, Harris County, Jill Wallace, Joseph Licata, Ken Paxton, lawsuit, State Commission on Judicial Conduct, Texas, Travis County | Comments Off

SCOTUS punts on non-Texas redistricting cases

Posted on June 19, 2018 by Charles Kuffner

The Magic 8 ballSCOTUS says Reply hazy, try again later in the two partisan gerrymandering cases before it. On Monday, the court punted two major political redistricting cases: Gill v. Whitford, a challenge to Wisconsin’s Republican gerrymander, and Benisek v. Lamone, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Congress, lawsuit, Maryland, redistricting, SCOTUS, Texas, Wisconsin | 1 Comment

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