Month: July 2016

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JURIST – Federal appeals court strikes down portions of North Carolina voting law

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From the decision:

Before enacting that law, the legislature requested data on the use, by race, of a number of voting practices. Upon receipt of the race data, the General Assembly enacted legislation that restricted voting and registration in five different ways, all of which disproportionately affected African Americans.

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[JURIST] A three-judge panel for the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit [official website] on Friday struck down [opinion, PDF] several provisions of North Carolina’s House Bill 589 (HB 589) [text, PDF], most notably its voter identification requirements. In its decision to annul the voter ID provision of the statute, as well as provisions eliminating early voting, pre-registration same-day registration, and out-of-precinct voting, the court stated that the legislation was “passed with racially discriminatory intent.” The panel further explained that it, unlike the lower district court, was unconvinced by the argument that the statute’s enactment was “the innocuous back-and-forth of routine partisan struggle.” Instead the panel suggested that the Republic-controlled state-legislature was motivated to enact HB 589 after an “unprecedented African American voter participation in a state with troubled racial history and racially polarized voting.” While the decision was unanimous, one justice disagreed with the decision to permanently enjoin the voter identification provision, expressing belief that the “reasonable impediment” exception provided ample protection against any potential discrimination. The decision overturns a district court decision [JURIST report] upholding HB 589 in April.

Read complete Jurist-Paper Chase analysis here.

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Aug. 17 Webinar: Protect your Clients, Protect Yourself from Data Theft

Leaders from the IRS, state tax agencies and the tax preparation community recently urged tax professionals to be proactive in the fight against identity theft and launched an expanded awareness campaign, Protect Your Clients; Protect Yourself, that will provide computer security tips and other information leading into the 2017 tax filing season.

As part of this effort, IRS invites tax professionals to participate in a free 1.5-hour webinar, Protect your Clients; Protect Yourself from Data Theft, on Aug. 17 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern. 

 

You can register for the webinar now.

 

Topics include:

    • Security Summit initiatives for FY 2017, including enhancing tax professional awareness of client data safeguards
    • Legal requirements and best practices to better protect taxpayer information
    • Emerging scams, as outlined by our Criminal Investigation expert
    • Steps tax professionals should take if they suffer a loss of taxpayer data
    • Opening remarks from IRS Commissioner John Koskinen and a live Q&A with IRS subject matter experts

Earn one continuing education credit in the category of federal tax.

Mosaic Threat Assessment Systems

MOSAIC is an error avoidance method,

a computer-assisted method for conducting comprehensive assessments – in the same way that diagnosis is a method used by a doctor. An effective medical diagnosis results when a doctor knows which questions to ask, knows which tests will produce the most accurate answers, and then knows how to draw relevant conclusions from all the answers combined together.

Similarly, assessing whether a situation has the combination of factors that are associated with escalated risk and danger requires that you know what questions to ask, and then know how to consider all your answers in a way that enhances insight. The MOSAIC method works by breaking a situation down to its elements, factor-by-factor, and then seeing what picture emerges when the pieces of the puzzle are put together.

MOSAIC helps the assessor weigh the present situation in light of expert opinion and research, and instantly compare the present situation to past cases where the outcomes are known.

Learn more here.

Teens Use Drone To Catch Boat Thieves | Ubergizmo

So in the past we have seen how some thieves have been caught with stolen electronics by tracking the device using features like Find My iPhone/iPad and so on. Recently it seems that a group of teenagers successfully managed to foil an attempt to steal a boat using a DJI Phantom drone.

Read  more here.

State v. Newcomb | Animal Legal & Historical Center

Summary: In this case, the Supreme Court of Oregon reviewed a case in which defendant accused the State of violating her constitutional rights by taking a blood sample of her dog without a warrant to do so. Ultimately, the court held that the defendant did not have a protected privacy interest in the dog’s blood and therefore the state did not violate defendant’s constitutional rights. Defendant’s dog, Juno, was seized by the Humane Society after a worker made a visit to plaintiff’s home and had probable cause to believe that Juno was emaciated from not receiving food from plaintiff. After Juno was seized and taken into custody for care, the veterinarian took a blood sample from Juno to confirm that there was no other medical reason as to why Juno was emaciated. Defendant argued that this blood test was a violation of her constitutional rights because the veterinarian did not have a warrant to perform the test. The court dismissed this argument and held that once Juno was taken into custody, defendant had “lost her rights of dominion and control over Juno, at least on a temporary basis.” Finally, the court held that because Juno was lawfully seized and Juno’s blood was “not ‘information’ that defendant placed in Juno for safekeeping or to conceal from view,” defendant’s constitutional rights had not been violated. 

In reaching that conclusion, the Court recognized that animals “are sentient beings capable of experiencing pain stress and fear” and that it indeed made a legal difference that the property seized was a living thing.

Documents: 

 State v Newcomb 2016.pdf (135.69 KB)

Free Windows 10 App Is Now Counting Down Days Till Deadline-Ubergizmo.com

Microsoft released an app called Get Windows 10 last year which pretty much does what the name suggests. It lets people reserve their free upgrade to Windows 10 as long as they’re running Windows 8.1 or Windows 7. The free upgrade offer is going to expire by the end of this month and it appears that the Get Windows 10 app now has a countdown timer which is counting down the days until the deadline, after which all updates to Windows 10 will have to be purchased.

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(You)… might not want to miss out on this because if the deadline passes … will have to pay $119 for Windows 10 Home if … decided to move up.

Read entire article...

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Texas NAACP v. Steen (consolidated with Veasey v. Abbott) | Brennan Center for Justice

In 2011, the Texas legislature passed SB 14, the strictest photo ID law in the nation. For example, the law requires voters to present photo identification from a very limited list before being allowed to vote. A Texas concealed handgun license is acceptable, but an ID from a public university or a tribal identification card is not.

After a long procedural history, described in detail below, on July 20, 2016, the full 5th Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision finding that SB 14 has a racially discriminatory effect in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, because the law disproportionately diminishes African Americans’ and Latinos’ ability to participate in the political process. The appellate court sent the case back to the district court to craft a rule for the November 2016 election that will remedy SB 14’s discriminatory results. The appellate court also reversed and remanded the district court’s discriminatory intent finding for further review and vacated the district court’s findings on plaintiffs’ poll tax and right to vote claims.

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Read entire article and scroll down for all original documents at all levels of the case…briefs, etc..

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Sidebar_160719-NYSBA

NOTICE

We received a report of a member getting an unauthorized phone solicitation offering six months’ free New York State Bar Association membership. Please be advised that the Association is not engaged in telephone solicitations at this time. Although this is likely an isolated incident, if you receive such a call, do not share any personal information, and please let us know immediately by calling our Member Resource Center at 800.582.2452.

The Showman – The New Yorker

 Jeffrey Toobin‘s May 9 article in The New Yorker, appropriately called, “The Showman,” about United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara’s infatuation with and misuse of the media.

Read more…long article.

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