http://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.aspNews Blawghttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=1047Wayne County prosecutors have made an unusual move in a murder case that could be likened to calling defense attorneys to testify against their own clients.Seven University of  Michigan law students and a California journalist who was a U-M fellow are on the witness list submitted by assistant Wayne County prosecutor Bob Stevens in a case involving a Detroit man whose murder conviction was overturned last year. Six of the students are or have been affiliated with the U-M Law School's Innocence Clinic, which represents Dwayne Provience. Found guilty of murder in 2001 and sentenced to as much as 60 years in prison, the 36-year-old man's conviction was overturned last year. But Provience is still fighting to retain his freedom as the prosecutor's office presses on for the new trial. Wayn...Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:42:34 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=1044The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, known as ACORN, scored another victory in court Wednesday when a federal judge in Brooklyn reaffirmed her December decision that congressional efforts to cut off all federal funding of the embattled nonprofit antipoverty group were unconstitutional.Responding to a government request that she reconsider her previous ruling, U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon made permanent her ruling that the attempted cutoff, done without establishing wrongdoing on the part of ACORN, amounted to an unconstitutional "bill of attainder.""The judge's ruling is a complete rebuke of the right wing's smear tactics that unfortunately Congress fell for," Bill Quigley, legal director for the Center for Constitutional Rights told the Associated Press. "This is...Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:32:00 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=991Big news today regarding the Detroit International Bridge Company and its attempts to build a new span adjacent to its Ambassador Bridge. In a letter dated Wednesday, March 2, the U.S. Coast Guard notified bridge company President Dan Stamper that it is returning the company's permit application because it has failed to acquire a piece of city-owned property needed to build the new span.The property in question is a section of Riverside Park just west of the existing bridge. The bridge company fenced off a swath of parkland shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and refused to relinquish it; the city took the company to court late in 2008 in an attempt to force it to tear down the fence and give the city back its property. After a protracted battle, 36th District Court Judge Beverly Haye...Tue, 02 Mar 2010 18:24:47 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=987Within the next few months, the emergency financial manager of Detroit Public Schools said on Wednesday, there will be announcements about new school design, new teaching strategies, more investigations and updates about the troubled district's finances."Let's make no mistake about it. This is a school district in crisis," Robert Bobb told a crowd of a couple hundred at a Wayne State University Alumni Affairs-organized event.Bobb reviewed his first year at the district, describing how he and his team reviewed thousands of documents before coming and the steps they've taken to audit, restructure and budget for the district since he's been here.Many in the crowd were supportive, applauding Bobb's calls for better parental support and higher student achievement as well as his descriptions of...Wed, 24 Feb 2010 16:56:55 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=976Sam Riddle (with microphone, of course) during U-M administration building protest in 1975.Like Larry Gabriel, who reflects on Sam Riddle in his Stir It Up column this week, I've followed Sam Riddle since college days at Michigan State University, when I was student and he was a radical BMOC. Erudite, charming in a roguish way, Riddle was always quick with analysis boiled to a soundbite.But his recent courtroom saga — the jury is still out as I write this — sent me to my basement the other day in search of something I'd written about him back then.I dug through boxes of memorabilia to get to a 1975 issue of Grapevine Journal, a black student newspaper at MSU that I was the editor of. By that time Riddle had left MSU for law school at the University of Michigan and had become deeply involve...Wed, 10 Feb 2010 15:46:40 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=975She drew applause, two standing ovations and laughs for throwing in, among other quips, a "Who Dat?"Speaking at Wayne State University on Tuesday, retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wasn't shy in sharing her opinion about the need for a more independent judiciary.Judges needs to be free of politics and the perception that they are influenced by outside forces, said O'Connor, a Ronald Reagan appointee and the first woman to serve on the high court. She also equated the escalating spending, especially in statewide judicial elections, to the arms race of the Cold War.The importance of judicial independence can be traced to this country's founders, who set in place a system of lifetime appointments for federal judges. "There had to be a place where being right is more...Tue, 09 Feb 2010 16:01:17 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=972Outside the Guardian Building in downtown Detroit on Thursday, a charged-up crowd of at least 150 pickets had no shortage of targets for its ire: Detroit Mayor Dave Bing,  Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano and Detroit Public Schools Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb. "Hey hey, ho ho, _____ [fill in one of the above] has got to go."County workers, DPS employees and other demonstrators circled for at least an hour on the sidewalk in front of the county's new headquarters at the art deco-style building. Of particular issue, the forced furlough days for county workers, Bobb's reduction of teachers and other school district employees and Bing's support of both."No layoffs, no cuts, Detroit won't move to the back of the bus."Wayne County Commissioner Keith Williams stopped by...Thu, 04 Feb 2010 18:51:55 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=969The word "hero" gets tossed around a lot, but we've just lost someone who was the real deal. Historian, author, playwright, teacher and social crusader Howard Zinn is dead at the age of 87.Best known for his groundbreaking book A People's History of the United States, Zinn was both an academic and activist. Having served as a bombardier in World War II, he was an early and important opponent of the war in Vietnam. Talking to The Boston Globe about the death of his friend and fellow left-wing intellectual, Noam Chomsky said, "He opened up approaches to history that were novel and highly significant. Both by his actions and his writings, for 50 years he played a powerful role in helping and in many ways inspiring the civil rights movement and the antiwar movement."Back in 2006, I did an inte...Thu, 28 Jan 2010 13:28:46 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=968The judges for this weekend's canceled medicinal marijuana contest at the Caregivers Cup will wait until October to decide which Michigan grower produces the best "medicine" for their condition, says Anthony Freed, executive director of the Michigan Marijuana Chamber of Commerce.A second Caregivers Cup is planned for then — the time of year when the harvest is better — and organizers will better formulate the contest format to avoid legal questions, Freed says."I don't consider having to postpone the main event a failure. I'm doing it so I can make sure everyone can still come and enjoy this great event," he says.The judges — people with valid state cards for medicinal marijuana use — are being offered refunds of their $250 judges' fees, but Freed says those that have been contacted have o...Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:38:29 ESThttp://www.metrotimes.com/blog/newsblawg.asp?perm=967Defense attorneys are asking for sanctions and a Wayne County Circuit Court judge says he may get tough with the Detroit Police Department over a set of missing files in a murder case. Calling it an act of "last resort," Wayne County Circuit Judge Tim Kenny told defense attorneys Wednesday that if Detroit police don't produce missing files, he'll step in."If there is a problem with you being ignored by the Detroit Police Department," he said during a motion hearing, "then I would intervene." Kenny did not make clear what he would do were he to "intervene" except to ask that police show up at a hearing later this year if the files are not found. Police representatives were not in court to give their side. But attorneys and law students from the University of Michigan Innocence Clinic have a...Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:27:47 EST