High Court

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected yesterday Microsoft Corp.'s request to hear an appeal of its antitrust case, but it was unclear whether that action will hasten a settlement between the world's largest software company and government attorneys or set the stage for more courtroom battles well into next year. Microsoft, the Justice Department and attorneys general from 18 states and the District of Columbia have been ordered to agree on a mediator to facilitate settlement talks if they don't reach an agreement themselves by Friday, according to an order by U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who is hearing the case.

The collapse of a soccer goal on a Howard County practice field has led the state's highest court to reconsider more than 150 years of personal injury law, in a case that could significantly improve injured plaintiffs' chances of winning payouts. The case - which began when a crossbar crashed into then-20-year-old Kyle Coleman's face, crushing the bones around his eye - has drawn national attention, as Maryland's unusual legal standard meets its first judicial test in decades. Maryland is one of only four states, plus the District of Columbia, that bar injured people from winning lawsuits if they had any role in an accident - even if a jury finds the defendant in their suit deserved a much greater share of the blame.

The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that foreigners may file lawsuits in U.S. courts to address some abuses overseas, a decision legal experts said might provide an opening for human-rights cases filed against Unocal Corp. and other corporations to move forward. By a 6-3 vote, the justices said the Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789 permits foreigners to sue in the United States for violations of certain international laws. The decision was the court's first major ruling on the obscure law that has been used by Holocaust survivors and relatives of people tortured or killed under dictatorships overseas.

THE SUPREME Court may never get out of the redistricting brier patch. This thicket of political manipulation seems to defy efforts by the high court to define, once and for all, how congressional boundaries should be redrawn every 10 years. Even as the redistricting cycle following the 2000 census is about to begin, the high court finds itself still haggling over a case stemming from the 1990 census redistricting. Unfortunately, the court's 5-4 decision may have made matters worse, not better.

The recent headline reporting the Supreme Court's decision involving Arizona, "High court repeals most of Ariz. Immigration law" (July 26) is factually incorrect. No court can "repeal" a law. A court can interpret a law, hold it unconstitutional and therefore void (judicial review), or issue an injunction to temporarily or permanently block its enforcement (for a variety of reasons). Only a legislature can "repeal" a law that it passed. Only the Arizona legislature (or perhaps its voters by referendum)

Annapolis lobbyist Bruce C. Bereano is appealing a federal judge's decision to uphold his 1994 fraud convictions, according to court records. Bereano will be taking his case — based on an argument from the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court's decision in an appeal of the case against former Enron president Jeffrey Skilling — to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, his attorneys wrote in a court filing Thursday. A federal jury convicted Bereano on eight counts, though one was later dismissed, of mail fraud that stemmed from the funneling of illegal campaign contributions to Maryland politicians.

The peril of judicial elections was underscored earlier this year with the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling critical of a West Virginia Supreme Court justice who failed to recuse himself from a case involving a company whose CEO spent more than $3 million to get the judge elected. While a majority of the high court looked askance at the justice's behavior, it didn't offer clear rules on when a campaign donation becomes a matter of impropriety. If $3 million is bad, what about $500,000?

THE FLORIDA RECOUNT has started -- again -- thanks to a decision yesterday by the Democratic state Supreme Court that said discarded ballots in 67 counties must now be examined. Meanwhile, the Republican Florida Legislature is poised to bypass the legal wrangling over vote-counting and name its own slate of presidential electors early next week. You can see where this is headed: a bitter, partisan power struggle between Florida's highest court and its Legislature over the laws of that state.

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld yesterday the public corruption law used by Maryland federal prosecutors in a number of recent high-profile cases, including those against Edward T. Norris, the former Baltimore police commissioner, John S. Stendrini, his chief of staff, and Stephen P. Amos, the former executive director of the Governor's Office of Crime Control and Prevention. The law lets U.S. prosecutors pursue virtually any local corruption investigation, provided that the probe is linked to a government agency that received at least $10,000 in federal funds.