Lawyer news

• Criminal legal aid challenge resumes

  10-03-2015 18:57 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Law Society and practitioner groups continue their fight in the Court of Appeal.
  
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• Wikimedia joins civil rights groups in lawsuit against NSA internet spying

  10-03-2015 17:37
  
  Lawsuit against spy agency and Justice Department challenges ‘suspicionless seizure and searching of internet traffic’ uncovered by Edward SnowdenThe Wikimedia Foundation, Amnesty International and a host of civil rights groups sued the National Security Agency and the US Department of Justice on Tuesday challenging the mass surveillance programme uncovered by whistleblower Edward Snowden.“We’re filing suit today on behalf of our readers and editors everywhere,” said Jimmy Wales, found
  
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• Irish Es are smiling – ecstasy and other drugs temporarily legal in Ireland

  10-03-2015 17:26
  
  Court of appeal rules law on controlled substances unconstitutional after challenge, and emergency legislation is expected to take a day to come into effectPossession of ecstasy and other drugs is currently legal in Ireland, but only for a day, after a court ruling on Tuesday morning.A written judgment released by the Republic’s court of appeal said part of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977, which allows certain substances to be controlled, is unconstitutional, meaning all government orders banning
  
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• Joseph Beltrami obituary

  10-03-2015 17:26
  
  Scottish lawyer whose client list was a Who’s Who of Glasgow’s hardmenFrom the 1960s onwards, the first words Glaswegian career criminals were likely to utter after being arrested were “Get Beltrami”. The client list of the Scottish lawyer Joseph Beltrami, who has died aged 82, reads like a Who’s Who of Glasgow’s hard men, and included the compulsive safebreaker Johnny Ramensky, “Scotland’s most violent man”, Jimmy Boyle, and the one-time undisputed king of the G
  
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• Foreign construction workers stage rare protest in Dubai over pay

  10-03-2015 17:08
  
  Riot police called in but no arrests made in protest over low wages for work on Emaar’s Fountain Views developmentSeveral hundred south Asian migrant workers have held a rare protest in the heart of Dubai’s ritzy downtown, temporarily blocking traffic. The workers, dressed in green construction outfits and matching hardhats, were demanding higher wages for their work on the Fountain Views development, a project by the Dubai-based Emaar Properties to build high-end apartments. Related: Dubai'
  
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• DWF opens first office outside British Isles

  10-03-2015 15:41 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Dubai presence will help support clients in MENA region.
  
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• More than 105,000 households 'helped by troubled families programme'

  10-03-2015 15:01
  
  Communities secretary Eric Pickles claims programme – which works with families with various social problems – has saved taxpayers £1.2bn
  The government’s drive to turn around troubled families has helped more than 105,000 of the hardest-to-help households in England, the communities secretary, Eric Pickles, has claimed.In his latest update of progress on the troubled families programme on Tuesday, he said that 105,671 families with complex needs had received support from local authority
  
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• SRA wins plaudits for complaints-handling

  10-03-2015 14:19 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Auditor says fall in complaints about the regulator is ‘likely’ to reflect better performance.
  
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• Barristers offered 'payment plan' for clients

  10-03-2015 14:09 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Bar Council says tie-up with credit broker will give barristers ‘peace of mind’.
  
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• Peers call for rethink on legal aid for extradition

  10-03-2015 13:59 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  House of Lords committee also recommends duty solicitor accreditation through ‘ticketing’ system.
  
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• New law means job applicants cannot be forced to reveal spent convictions

  10-03-2015 11:48
  
  Change aims to ensure that those who have committed less serious crimes have better chance of finding job once they have reformed their lives Employers who force job applicants to reveal their spent convictions will be committing a criminal offence from Tuesday.The change to the Data Protection Act is aimed at protecting the rehabilitation of offenders and ensuring that those who committed less serious crimes have a fairer chance of finding employment once they have reformed their lives. Contin
  
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• UK extradition procedures may breach human rights, say peers - The Guardian

  10-03-2015 11:18
  
  The Guardian
  UK extradition procedures may breach human rights, say peers
  The Guardian
  The 150-page study by the House of Lords select committee on extradition law acknowledges that recent changes have improved the way in which cases are handled. Photograph: Linda Nylind/Guardian. Owen Bowcott Legal affairs correspondent.
  
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• UK extradition procedures may breach human rights, say peers

  10-03-2015 11:18
  
  Study by House of Lords select committee also says people facing removal should encounter fewer obstacles in obtaining legal aidUK extradition procedures may breach human rights and those facing removal should encounter fewer obstacles in obtaining legal aid, according to a House of Lords report.In a detailed examination of law and practice, peers found no “systemic problem” but highlighted flaws - particularly in the way assurances given by foreign states seeking suspects were not always be
  
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• Ivory Coast court sentences wife of ex-president to 20 years in prison

  10-03-2015 10:46
  
  Simone Gbagbo convicted for her role in 2011 post-election crisis in which around 3,000 people were killed, her lawyer saidA court in Ivory Coast has sentenced Simone Gbagbo, the wife of the former president, to 20 years in prison for her role in a 2011 post-election crisis in which around 3,000 people were killed, her lawyer said. Gbagbo, who is also wanted by the international criminal court, was tried alongside 82 other allies of the former president, Laurent Gbagbo, in a case that revived de
  
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• Cameroon lawyer urges world to join her in fight against anti-gay legislation | Clár Ní Chonghaile

  10-03-2015 08:00
  
  Despite death threats, Alice Nkom is taking on Cameroon’s repressive law in the supreme court and says her campaign is part of a wider struggle for human rights
  Alice Nkom knows she might not be alive today were it not for international support for her battle to defend homosexuals in Cameroon. But now she wants the world to do more to breathe life into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and make it tangible for all, including gay people in Africa.
  Nkom, a lawyer, has been in London
  
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• Singapore axes eight UK law varsities - The Star Online

  10-03-2015 01:52
  
  Singapore axes eight UK law varsities
  The Star Online
  KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysians planning to study law in Britain and later practise in Singapore should choose their law schools carefully as eight of the 19 previously recognised in the island republic have been axed. “If Singapore is the preferred eventual ...
  
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• Protect pensioners from scammers who want their savings, say MPs

  10-03-2015 01:01
  
  Work and pensions select committee warns people will need guidance to avoid mis-selling from April, when the annuity requirement is abolished Pensioners are at risk of being ripped off when new rules on cashing in pension pots are introduced next month, MPs have warned.
  Changes to accessing retirement savings come into force on 6 April and the public needs better protection from the accompanying threat of scams, mis-selling and poor decision-making, said the work and pensions select committee.
  
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• Ferguson judge behind aggressive fines policy resigns as city's court system seized

  10-03-2015 00:53
  
  Ronald J Brockmeyer, accused in a scathing report of aggressively using the municipal court to raise revenue for the city, has stepped downA judge in Ferguson, Missouri, who is accused of running a modern-day debtors’ prison while fixing traffic tickets for himself and owing $170,000 in unpaid taxes, resigned on Monday as state authorities seized control of the city’s court system.Ronald J Brockmeyer stepped down as Ferguson’s municipal court judge after Missouri’s supreme court ordered
  
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