A Texas court Monday set the execution date for Mexican national and Texas prisoner Jose Ernesto Medellin  for August 5, after the US Supreme Court ruled in March that President George W. Bush did not have the authority to direct state courts to comply with a ruling from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) granting new court hearings. The government of Mexico and Medellin's lawyers had requested that the judge hold off on setting an execution date, but Judge Caprice Cosper scheduled the lethal injection after refusing to allow a legal adviser to the Mexican Foreign Secretary to speak before the court.

Medellin, a Mexican national sentenced to death for raping and murdering two teenage girls, had appealed a Texas Court of Criminal Appeals November 2006 ruling that Bush had "exceeded his constitutional authority" by ordering state court rehearings for 51 Mexican nationals, including Medellin, convicted in US courts. The president's February 2005 memorandum instructed the Texas courts to follow a March 2004 ICJ decision that held that Medellin and the other Mexican nationals tried in US courts had been denied their right under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations to contact the Mexican consulate for legal assistance and that the US was obligated to grant review and reconsideration of their convictions and sentences.

A business that two employees sued for $35,000 in back wages has countersued the workers and the California Labor Commissioner in a federal class action, claiming undocumented workers should not be able to file such claims, and the Labor Commissioner lacks authority to award them back pay, as such awards violate the Immigration Reform and Control Act.

Kaji Enterprise dba Sushi Sharin and Masayoshi Kaji sued California Labor Commissioner Angela Bradstreet, and Tranquilino Cruz Garcia - who claims he is owed $5,797 in pay, plus penalties of $84 a day - and Rutilino Cruz Garcia - who claims he is owed $29,978 plus daily penalties.

The Cruzes sued Kaji on Feb. 5, alleging wages owed and Labor Code violations. The case is scheduled for trial before the Labor Commission on May 22.

Kaji claims he cannot get a fair trial because the Labor Commissioner "is biased in favor of illegal immigrants," and that the Commissions policies are "calculated to undermine the enforcement of Federal Immigration Law."

Kaji is represented by Ernest Franceschi Jr.

The 10th Circuit denied immunity to five police officers in Albuquerque, N.M., who allegedly arrested a University of New Mexico faculty member during an antiwar protest, simply because he was part of a "large basket containing a few bad eggs."

The court ruled 2-1 that John Fogarty may proceed with a lawsuit accusing the officers of targeting him without probable cause and using excessive force to arrest him during a March 2003 demonstration against the U.S. war in Iraq.

The protest began on the UNM campus and spread to city sidewalks and streets, with between 500 and 1,000 demonstrators voicing their opposition to the war.

Fogarty and a friend joined a drum circle that was "play(ing) a really nice samba," Fogarty claimed. But police accused the drummers of inciting the crowd and making it more difficult to clear the streets.

Capt. John Gonzales told officers to "remove the drums," a statement some interpreted as a direct order to arrest the drummers, Fogarty included. The plaintiff said he was already off the street when officers pelted him with an unknown projectile and arrested him.

Officers allegedly took the handcuffed Fogarty near an area with lingering tear gas, causing Fogarty to suffer an acute asthma attack. He also claimed to have torn a tendon in his wrist during the ordeal.

The majority refused to dismiss Fogarty's claims, ruling that he had provided enough evidence to survive summary judgment at this stage.

"The Fourth Amendment plainly requires probable cause to arrest Fogarty as an individual, not a member of a large basket containing a few bad eggs," Judge Lucero wrote. "In other words, that Fogarty was a participant in an antiwar protest where some individuals may have broken the law is not enough to justify his arrest."

A federal judge on Monday dismissed claims of fraud against State Farm Insurance by a Mississippi couple who claimed that the company denied their insurance claim for damage from Hurricane Katrina based on bad faith and fraud. US District Judge L.T. Senter, Jr. rejected the claim, writing:

Plaintiffs allege that State Farm committed actionable fraud in the handling of the plaintiffs' claim. Plaintiffs primarily rely on their contention that State Farm ordered two engineering reports from Forensic in an effort to dishonestly minimize its liability to the plaintiffs rather than for any legitimate reason. ...

Plaintiffs contend that State Farm, acting through Renfroe and Forensic, deliberately underestimated the amount of wind damage the insured property sustained in order to minimize its liability under the plaintiffs' homeowners policy. While this allegation, if sustained, would support a finding of bad faith, it is not sufficient to support an allegation of fraud. Fraud requires reasonable reliance on a misrepresentation, and the plaintiffs have not relied upon State Farm's evaluation of their claim. Indeed plaintiffs have brought this lawsuit in an effort to establish that State Farm has underestimated the wind damage to the insured property. Although plaintiffs may prevail on the merits of their claims for additional policy benefits and other extracontractual damages, including punitive damages if they establish bad faith on the part of State Farm or its agents, in the absence of any evidence that the plaintiffs relied upon State Farm's damage assessment I can see no basis for a claim of fraud.

Thomas and Pamela McIntosh filed the lawsuit against State Farm after the company refused to pay for most of the damage to their home, which State Farm concluded was caused mostly by flood damage from the storm surge.

State Farm used E.A. Renfroe & Co. to inspect the McIntosh's home, and the couple also alleged that Renfroe aided and abetted State Farm's fraudulent misconduct and that the company breached its duty of loyalty to the plaintiffs. Senter dismissed the aiding and abetting claim as he concluded there was no underlying fraud, and also dismissed the breach of duty claim.

     Blockbuster invaded customers' privacy by sending information about their movie rentals to the Facebook Web site, according to a federal class action. Plaintiffs say Blockbuster's cooperation with Facebook's "Beacon" system violates the Videotape Privacy Protection Act, which Congress passed after a newspaper obtained a list of 146 movies Robert Bork or his family had rented, and publicized it during Bork's failed nomination to the Supreme Court.

    Facebook launched Beacon in November 2007, in cooperation with 44 other Web sites, that automatically fed information to Facebook, plaintiffs say. This was not just for social purposes, but was "a core element in the Facebook Ads system for connecting businesses with users," plaintiffs say.

    Blockbuster sent information about movie rentals to Facebook, which added it to members' Facebook profile, "something like this: 'Preston added Lord of the Rings to his queue on Blockbuster.com,'" the complaint states.

    This was an opt-out system, in which users had to check a box to prevent the information from being distributed, plaintiffs say.

    Faced with furious criticism about privacy invasion, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg was forced to issue an apology, in December, which is quoted, apparently in full, in this filing. "To this day, however, Facebook still receives personal identifiable information from participating Web site with the Beacon javascript, whether the Facebook member has chosen to distribute their information or not," it claims.

    Plaintiffs say that if users did not check the opt-out box quickly enough, their information would be sent to Facebook, and that along with "a picture of the individual who purchased the movie and a Blockbuster ad." They say that Blockbuster did not notify online customers that this information was being sent to Facebook until "sometime in December 2007. However, the summary is immediately sent to a user's Facebook profile even before the user has a chance to decline the distribution of he/her personal identifiable information - as long as you have not marked the privacy feature telling Blockbuster never to send summaries. To this day, Blockbuster online victims remain unsuspecting victims," the complaint states.

    Blockbuster, which has 64 million "active users," is the 7th most popular site on the Web, the complaint states.

    Represented by lead counsel Jeremy Wilson with The Corea Firm of Dallas, plaintiffs demand $2,500 for each violation of the Videotape Privacy Protection Act, and punitive damages.

Lawyers Kym Worthy and Dan Webb are a pair of ferocious competitors in the courtroom. That's both good news and bad news for the mayor.

Worthy, a prosecutor, and Webb, a defense attorney, have emerged as the legal faces of a text-messaging sex scandal that has embroiled Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his former top aide.

Worthy, the first black attorney and first woman to head the Wayne County prosecutor's office, is seeking to prove Kilpatrick lied under oath. Webb is a high-priced litigation gunslinger aiming to keep the mayor out of prison.

Slight of build, the 62-year-old Webb is considered a legal heavyweight in the courtroom, ranked among the nation's top trial lawyers by several publications.

"I hate failing. That's more of my driving force, why I work as hard as I do," he said last week while preparing other cases in San Francisco, Las Vegas and St. Louis.

A big part of Worthy's success is her focus. That's what she preaches to the team of assistant prosecutors preparing for Kilpatrick's next court hearing.

"I spent most of my weekends and holidays here in the library," said Worthy, 52, looking back at her career. "I tried to cross every 'T' and dot every 'I.' Too many things can go wrong in a trial."

Kilpatrick has been besieged since late January, when the Detroit Free Press published excerpts of sexually explicit and embarrassing text messages left on the city-issued pager of his then-Chief of Staff Christine Beatty.

The messages contradict testimony both gave last summer during a whistle-blowers' lawsuit when Kilpatrick and Beatty denied having a romantic relationship in 2002 and 2003. Kilpatrick also is accused of lying under oath about his role in the firing of a top police official.

The text messages also were referenced in a confidential agreement that led to the city settling that lawsuit and a second whistle-blowers' suit for $8.4 million.

After a two-month investigation, Worthy filed multiple felony perjury, misconduct and obstruction of justice charges against Kilpatrick and Beatty. Convictions could send each to prison, and force Kilpatrick from his perch as Detroit mayor.

The embattled mayor is the latest of Webb's high-profile clients. He's represented tobacco giant Philip Morris on racketeering charges and computer giant Microsoft in an antitrust trial.

Former U.S. Attorney Patrick Collins crossed swords with Webb in a six-month corruption trial of former Illinois Gov. George Ryan, who is serving a prison sentence on a fraud and racketeering conviction.

"Dan is a tenacious competitor," said Collins, now a defense attorney. "He's a competition junkie, and I think he loves the action and he's very good at his craft."

Worthy, who moved often while growing up with her military father and earned her law degree from the University of Notre Dame, pursued a law career because of what she didn't see.

"I can only say my father told me I could do anything I wanted," she said. "There were no lawyers in my family. When I watched TV, I didn't see any African American lawyers. They didn't even have black police officers on TV back then."

After two years as a contract worker for the Wayne County prosecutor's office, she was hired on as an assistant prosecutor in 1986. In 1992, an unemployed black steel worker named Malice Green was beaten to death during a confrontation with several white Detroit police officers.

The case put the young, black, female assistant prosecutor on the nation's stage and in the daily glare of cable television. She won second-degree murder convictions against two of the officers.

"She is highly skilled and she could work the courtroom. She prepares as well, if not better, than anybody," Detroit defense attorney Carole Stanyar said.

Webb also is no stranger to the spotlight. He's cross-examined former President Ronald Reagan and won a conviction against U.S. Navy Admiral John Poindexter in the Iran-Contra affair.

Although he would have preferred playing second base for the St. Louis Cardinals, Webb said he discovered his love for law growing up in the small farming community of Bushnell, Ill., about 170 miles southwest of Chicago.

"Somewhere before I got out of high school, I decided I was going to be a trial lawyer come hell or high water," said Webb, who took law classes at night at Loyola University while holding full-time banking jobs.

"I didn't have any money. I was broke," Webb joked. "That's why I worked my way through law school. I knew I didn't want to do banking work."