Daily News Briefs: March  27, 2000
Date: Monday 27 March 2000 09:55:49 -0800

Table of Contents

High Court to Weigh Prayer at School Games
U.S. sees software giant's offer as inadequate; verdict may come soon
Jurors Consider Damages in Florida Smokers' Case
Ex-hostage Terry Anderson wins $341 million judgment against Iran
Popularity Of Legal Insurance Grows
Judge to Ban Mattel Blacklist?
Webcasters in License Limbo

Criminal Law
Supreme Court to tackle hate crime law
Supreme Court to tackle hate crime law
Pushy fan ordered to pay O's mascot $60K
 

High Court to Weigh Prayer at School Games
Washington Post

Pre-kickoff prayer over the loudspeakers, a ritual inseparable from
Friday night football in towns across Texas and elsewhere, is before the
Supreme Court this week. The case focuses on the gridiron, but its
outcome could influence the larger debate about prayer in public schools
and reveal the court majority's inclinations in the delicate balancing
of government and religion.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20427-2000Mar26.html

U.S. sees software giant's offer as inadequate; verdict may come soon
CNN

Government lawyers have concluded that an 11th-hour offer by Microsoft
Corp. to settle its antitrust case was inadequate, and they are
preparing for the trial judge to deliver his verdict Tuesday, sources
close to the lawsuit say. These sources, speaking on condition of
anonymity, expressed skepticism Sunday that any late settlement would be
successful, despite the four months of efforts by a federal appeals
judge acting as mediator in Chicago.

http://cnnfn.com/2000/03/27/technology/wires/microsoft_wg/ 

Jurors Consider Damages in Florida Smokers' Case
ABC News

The first question is fairly straightforward: Calculate the cost of
cancer in three smokers. The follow-up question is the stumper: Set a
dollar figure to punish the tobacco industry for decades of selling
death in a neat little package. Closing arguments on the smokers' pleas
for compensatory damages were set to begin today in a segment of the
case nearly overshadowed by the next step - consideration of punitive
damages.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/smokers000327.html

Ex-hostage Terry Anderson wins $341 million judgment against Iran
Court TV

Former hostage Terry Anderson was awarded $341 million from Iran on
Friday by a federal judge who said his treatment during his nearly seven
years of captivity in Beirut was "savage and cruel by any civilized
standards." U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ordered Iran to
pay $24.5 million to Anderson, $10 million to his wife, Madeleine
Bassil, and $6.7 million to their daughter, Sulome. The judge also
ordered the Iranian Ministry of Information and Security to pay the
three $300 million in punitive damages.

http://www.courttv.com/national/2000/0324/anderson_ap.html  

Popularity Of Legal Insurance Grows
Dow Jones

About 540,000 New Jerseyans are among millions nationwide participating
in the growing popularity of "legal insurance" provided by an employer
or purchased with a small monthly premium. The services involve people
picking an attorney from an HMO-like network to handle a real estate or
traffic dispute, even a divorce, knowing the lawyer's services will be
free, or at least sharply discounted.

http://dowjones.wsj.com/i/law/SB954163866231576321-d-industry-c1-law.html

Cyberlaw News

Tech-Deals - Internet Contracts - The Details
http://techdeals.findlaw.com

Meg Whitman & eBay, Dr. Koop's deal with drkoop.com
Amazon, AOL, eBay, Excite, iVillage, Netscape, TheStreet.com, Yahoo!

Judge to Ban Mattel Blacklist?
Wired News

A federal judge in Boston will hear arguments on Monday over whether a
program that reveals Cyberpatrol's secret blacklist should be banned
from the Internet. A subsidiary of toy giant Mattel, which sells
Cyberpatrol, has sued two cryptanalysts for publishing instructions on
how to circumvent the encryption and view the program's controversial
scrambled list of verboten websites and newsgroups.

http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,35196,00.html

Webcasters in License Limbo
Wired News

If you can't figure out how to legally broadcast music online, you're
not alone. Webcasters seeking to establish legitimate businesses are
wading through a challenging set of royalty rules and copyright
conundrums that only the IRS could love.

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,34115,00.html

Criminal Law

Supreme Court to tackle hate crime law
Court TV

Charles Apprendi Jr. says he was high on alcohol and drugs - not filled
with racial hatred - when he fired shots into the home of a black family
in his predominantly white neighborhood in 1994. "It was just criminal
mischief. That's all it was. I had no idea it was a black family's
home," he insists. A judge saw it differently. He determined that
Apprendi's actions were motivated by prejudice and imposed a longer
prison term under New Jersey's hate crimes law, one of the first adopted
in the country.

http://www.courttv.com/national/supreme/032700_hate_ap.htm 

Unusual Legal News

Not necessary for Florida town's police to view adult videos
CNN

Sheriff's deputies in Lake City, Florida won't have to watch thousands
of hours of alleged pornography. Florida officials had anticipated
having to spend weeks viewing all 1,304 videotapes confiscated from the
Adult Movie Video to determine if they were legally obscene. Instead,
according to an agreement between prosecutors and store owner James D.
Cox, the tapes will be destroyed in exchange for Cox not being charged.

http://www.cnn.com/2000/US/03/23/fringe/seized.porn/

Fan ordered to pay O's mascot $60K
Baltimore Sun

A man who pushed the Baltimore Orioles' mascot over the outfield wall
has been ordered to pay nearly $60,000. The mascot, John J. Krownapple,
suffered a broken left ankle and a bruised right heel after falling 15
feet to the field below.

http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/gx.cgi/AppLogic+FTContentServer?section=cover&pagename=story&storyid=1150300204032
 

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