ABA Journal

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From behind bars, to passing the bar

Each state sets its own rules for formerly incarcerated people who want to practice law. In Kansas, Mississippi and Texas, for example, no one with a felony can practice law. But even for those who live in less restrictive states, there are other hurdles to overcome.



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4th Circuit strikes down effort to purge suspected noncitizen voters

A federal appeals court on Sunday upheld the ruling of a Virginia judge who struck down an effort from state officials to automatically cancel voter registrations of suspected noncitizens, pointing to a federal law that prohibits states from purging voters 90 days before a presidential election.



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5th Circuit rules ballots that arrive late shouldn't be counted despite postmarks

A federal appeals court Friday ruled invalid a Mississippi law that allows election officials to count mail ballots that arrive after Election Day as long as they are postmarked by then.



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Only 36% of young legal professionals say work has positive impact on mental health, new survey finds

Half of surveyed male lawyers in larger law firms report that work has a positive effect on their mental health, but only 35% of female lawyers feel the same.



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ABA President Bay urges ICE to notify counsel when transferring detainees

In a letter to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ABA President William R. Bay called attention to a “concerning trend” involving transfers of detained people from the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego without the required notice to their attorneys.



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Her teenage son killed himself after talking to a chatbot; now she’s suing

The mother of a 14-year-old boy says Character.AI—the startup behind the personalized chatbot—is responsible for his suicide. In a lawsuit, she alleges that Character.AI recklessly developed its chatbots without proper guardrails or precautions, instead hooking vulnerable children with an addictive product that blurred the lines between reality and fiction.



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DOJ reaches $100 million settlement in Baltimore bridge collapse

The owner of the Dali container ship that crashed into Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge earlier this year, collapsing the span and killing six people, has agreed to pay more than $100 million in damages to resolve a Justice Department lawsuit, authorities said Thursday.



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DA requests resentencing for Menendez brothers, opening path to release

The Los Angeles district attorney’s office announced on Thursday that it will request the resentencing of Erik and Lyle Menendez, a pair of brothers sentenced in 1996 to life in prison for killing their parents, after new evidence emerged backing the brothers’ defense that they were physically and sexually abused by their father.



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Business etiquette classes boom as people relearn how to act at work

More than two years after employers began urging white-collar workers back to offices, Americans are still reckoning with the ripple effects of pandemic-induced disruption when it comes to workplace behavior. The years spent apart from colleagues have rusted workers’ social skills, and new ways of working have spawned a host of fresh etiquette issues.



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Trump says he’d fire special counsel Jack Smith in 'two seconds' if elected again

Former President Donald Trump said Thursday that he would “fire” special counsel Jack Smith on his first day back in the White House if he is elected again, making clear that he would push to drop a pair of federal cases against him.



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