Morning Wrap: KBR Granted Privilege | ACLU Victory
A round up of news from ALM affiliated publications and around the web: Defense contractor Kellogg Brown & Root Inc.'s docs are protected by attorney-client privilege, Ohio's Board of Professional Conduct says Ohio judges can't refuse to marry same-sex couples and a federal appeals court orders jail officials to deliver ACLU letters sent to inmates.
August 12, 2015 at 04:41 AM
3 minute read
Protected by privilege: A federal appeals court in Washington ruled on Tuesday that defense contractor Kellogg Brown & Root Inc.'s internal documents are protected by attorney-client privilege, the NLJ's Zoe Tillman reports. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit for the second time oversaw a fight over documents in a whistleblower case against KBR. Judge Robert Wilkins wrote that he expected Tuesday's ruling “will conclusively resolve the issue on which this case has seemed stuck as with a scratch on a broken record.” In the case, a former KBR employee filed a False Claims Act lawsuit accusing the company of defrauding the U.S. government during the war in Iraq. He sought documents from KBR about its internal investigation into the alleged fraud.
Ohio marriage: Ohio's Board of Professional Conduct in an advisory opinion yesterday said that Ohio judges cannot refuse to marry same-sex couples, Buzzfeed reports. The advisory opinion is nonbinding, but would be instructive if an ethics complaint were filed against a judge for not performing marriages. The opinion concludes that “[a] judge who performs civil marriages may not refuse to perform same-sex marriages while continuing to perform opposite-sex marriages, based upon his or her personal, moral, and religious beliefs, acts contrary to the judicial oath of office.”
Jail mail: A unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit on Tuesday ruled that Livingston County Jail is required to deliver American Civil Liberties Union letters sent to inmates. The Sixth Circuit affirmed a lower court's ruling in favor of the ACLU, which argued that the jail's failure to deliver the letters ran afoul of the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
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