8th Circuit Court

Inmate takes $4K settlement in suit alleging he was denied a toothbrush

An inmate who filed a handwritten federal lawsuit in 2009 alleging that Missouri prison employees had failed to provide him with toothbrushes and toothpaste has settled his case on the eve of trial. Eugene Kenneth Jones has agreed to accept $4,000 from the state to conclude both this lawsuit (PDF)…

Jul 16, 2014 10:44 PM CDT

Lawyer pleads guilty in 3 bank robberies, admits shooting state trooper

A 64-year-old graduate of Washington University School of Law has pleaded guilty to three federal bank robbery counts and admitted shooting a Missouri state trooper. Warren Gladders could get as much as life when he is sentenced in October, according to the Associated Press and KDSK. See also: ABAJournal.com: “News…

Jul 7, 2014 7:35 PM CDT

Paralegal takes federal plea in fake-bribery case

A former paralegal for a Missouri criminal defense attorney has taken a plea in a convoluted fake-bribery case linked both to a client of her ex-boss and a St. Louis County prosecutor she knew. Jillian Nichols, 26, pleaded guilty on Tuesday in federal court in St. Louis to wire fraud…

Jul 2, 2014 3:50 PM CDT

Attorney convicted of laundering proceeds from marijuana operation

A Minnesota attorney has been federally convicted for using his law firm to help launder money from a brother-in-law’s marijuana sales operation. Robert D. Boedigheimer, 51, was found guilty Tuesday by a Minneapolis jury of money laundering and making false statements to an Internal Revenue Service agent, according to the…

Jun 18, 2014 7:19 PM CDT

Student suspended for 7 weeks over 2-word tweet sues police and school officials

A onetime Minnesota high school honor student who ignited a firestorm by tweeting the answer “actually, yeah” in response to a question on an online confession page admittedly made a mistake. But so did police and school officials, says Reid Sagehorn, now an 18-year-old graduate of another high school, in…

Jun 17, 2014 5:00 PM CDT

Inmate who claims his medical problem will result in a painful execution wins SCOTUS stay

The U.S. Supreme Court has granted a stay of execution to a death-row inmate who had sought to videotape his execution. The court sent the case of Russell Bucklew, 46, back to the St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, report the New York Times and the Washington Post.…

May 22, 2014 12:46 PM CDT

Federal judge uses blog to advocate clemency for woman he sentenced 21 years ago

But for the office and background of the man who wrote it, a pointed blog post about the Justice Department’s new clemency effort to get nonviolent offenders out of prison perhaps wouldn’t carry such power: “Sorry Ms. Hasan. Time flies. In your absence, your children have grown up and had…

Apr 24, 2014 8:56 PM CDT

8th Cir. axes $900K verdict because lawyer told personal law school sex-harassment story at closing

A $900,000 jury award in an employment discrimination case, including $600,000 in punitive damages, has been reversed by a federal appeals court because a lawyer for the plaintiff during closing arguments told jurors that as a law student, she was sexually harassed by a professor. The anecdote by attorney Brooke…

Apr 7, 2014 9:10 PM CDT

School to pay $70K to teen pressured to provide passwords after Facebook post critiqued staff member

A Minnesota girl has won a $70,000 settlement in a federal civil rights case. Riley Stratton, now 15, contended her First Amendment right to free speech was violated when she was given detention for criticizing a hall monitor on Facebook outside of school and allegedly pressured by school officials and…

Mar 25, 2014 7:45 PM CDT

Former law firm worker gets 3 years in federal prison for $212K theft

A former employee of a Missouri law firm was sentenced Thursday to a little over three years in federal prison and ordered to pay restitution for embezzling $212,000 between 2006 and 2009. As part of her duties at Carmichael & Neal, account manager Peggy J. Duncan, 63, wrote checks and…

Mar 21, 2014 4:55 PM CDT

8th Circuit nixes suit by breastfeeding mom, says employer conduct wasn’t constructive discharge

A federal appeals court has affirmed a grant of summary judgment to the employer in a sex- and pregnancy-discrimination case, agreeing with the trial court that not having a lactation room available to the employee the day she returned from maternity leave and later having a department head encourage her…

Mar 17, 2014 8:40 PM CDT

Will bank suits against Target in $1B-plus customer data breach help spur security enhancements?

It isn’t just individuals who are taking legal action over a massive data breach in November and December that reportedly involved at least 40 million and perhaps as many as 110 million Target Corp. customer accounts. Contending that banks may have lost hundreds of millions of dollars because of Target’s…

Feb 3, 2014 11:20 PM CST

Inmate was executed while a SCOTUS stay request was pending, lawyers say

Lawyers for death-row-inmate Herbert Smulls say their client was executed while another stay request was pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. The time of death for inmate Herbert Smulls, executed by the state of Missouri on Wednesday, was 10:20 p.m., the Associated Press reports. The Supreme Court’s stay denial was…

Jan 31, 2014 1:18 PM CST

Inmate is executed amid ‘cowardly shroud of secrecy’ surrounding drug source, editorial says

Missouri inmate Herbert Smulls was executed Wednesday night after the U.S. Supreme Court lifted a stay of execution amid questions about the execution drug and its source. Smulls was executed for the murder of a jewelry store owner during a 1991 robbery, report NBC News and the Associated Press. Smulls’…

Jan 30, 2014 12:59 PM CST

Documentary on legal battle over T. rex bones kicks off Sundance Film Festival

The stunning discovery in 1990 of a largely complete Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton near an Indian reservation in South Dakota led to an epic legal battle as multiple parties argued over ownership of the 65-million-year-old bones. The skeleton of the enormous, long-dead dinosaur, known as Sue, was confiscated by the feds…

Jan 21, 2014 9:48 PM CST