Tony Mauro

June 25, 2004 | National Law Journal

In a 5-4 ruling that Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said would have a "disastrous" impact on state and federal sentencing, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday that aggravating facts that increase a defendant's sentence must be proven to a jury, not decided by a judge. The decision could expand the scope of the Court's Apprendi ruling and is sure to accelerate the growing debate over the wisdom of sentencing reforms enacted over the last two decades.

By Tony Mauro

6 minute read

June 06, 2007 | Law.com

A test case is set to go in front of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims that could determine if mercury in vaccines caused autism in some children. Thousands of other cases could be affected by the results.

By Tony Mauro

10 minute read

February 07, 2000 | Law.com

How different is the Supreme Court from other institutions of government? Let's count the ways. First, there's the snow: When all other parts of the federal government shut down Jan. 25 because of snow, the Court stayed open. The Court's open-door stance is a tribute to a former military meteorologist named William Rehnquist, who seems to take pride in weather contrariness.

By Tony Mauro

10 minute read

July 27, 2011 | Law.com

The Supreme Court's two newest justices have decided to remain in the Court's so-called "cert pool," leaving Justice Samuel Alito Jr. as the only justice whose law clerks screen incoming cases for just one member of the Court.

By Tony Mauro

4 minute read

December 14, 2007 | Law.com

The U.S. Marshals Service has released the report on its internal investigation of what it calls the "Hattiesburg Incident" in April 2004. That's when a deputy U.S. marshal in the Mississippi city, believing that she was enforcing Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's policy against recording his public talks, directed two reporters to erase their tapes of his speech. The newly disclosed documents also indicate Scalia was angry at the broadcast media earlier in the day, before the tape incident.

By Tony Mauro

3 minute read

March 20, 2000 | Law.com

For sheer dramatic impact, the oral arguments March 29 in Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe will be hard to beat. It has football, religion, a touch of legal heroism -- even a dose of presidential politics, with Texas Attorney General John Cornyn representing Gov. George W. Bush. But several other cases in this cycle, while less dramatic, carry their own intrigue. And they carry a recurring theme -- federalism.

By Tony Mauro

9 minute read

January 10, 2008 | National Law Journal

When Justice Samuel Alito Jr. joined the Supreme Court in January 2006, Justice Stephen Breyer was 29 days short of having the longest tenure as junior justice in the Court's history. The best-known duty of the junior justice is to answer the door at the Court's private conferences -- a habit that was hard to break once Alito joined the Court, Breyer says in a recent journal article on the role of junior justice: "I had been used to it like a Pavlovian dog."

By Tony Mauro

4 minute read

March 30, 2011 | New York Law Journal

By Tony Mauro

6 minute read

June 22, 2004 | National Law Journal

In a major victory for the health insurance industry, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday unanimously ruled that patients may not sue under state tort law for insurers' refusal to pay for doctor-recommended medicines and procedures. The ruling said that ERISA completely pre-empts such lawsuits, in part because its purpose was to "provide a uniform regulatory regime over employee benefit plans."

By Tony Mauro

6 minute read

March 28, 2006 | Law.com

On the eve of landmark arguments in a case asserting Guantanamo Bay detainees' legal rights, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was asked Monday to step aside from the case because of remarks he made earlier this month on the issue. Authors of a major amicus curiae brief on the side of Guantanamo detainee Salim Hamdan said Scalia's remarks during a speech in Switzerland "give rise to the appearance that, even before briefing in this case was complete, the justice had made up his mind about the merits."

By Tony Mauro

4 minute read