court

Updated at 4:00 p.m. PDT: In something of a surprise move, four state attorneys general who previously praised the effectiveness of Microsoft's antitrust settlement with the feds said they're not ready to see five years of oversight wind down just yet.

In a nine-page court filing with U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly on Thursday, officials in New York, Maryland, Louisiana and Florida said they were joining a group of six states, led by California and the District of Columbia, in calling for dragging out oversight on Redmond until 2012.

"An extension is appropriate to … Read more

The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Monday to take on a case that accuses Microsoft and Best Buy of deliberately tricking customers into signing up for MSN Internet service and improperly charging them when a trial period expires.

Microsoft and Best Buy had asked the high court to review the matter after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals opted in May to let a class action suit against the companies proceed. The Supreme Court's decision not to review the case, which arrived without comment, means the class action can theoretically move forward.

The case began in 2003, when … Read more

Minnesota authorities have missed a court-imposed deadline for turning over the source code for a breath-testing machine at the heart of a a high-profile dispute that recently made it to the state's Supreme Court.

That means now there's a greater chance that charges could be dropped against third-degree DUI defendant Dale Lee Underdahl.

The next step is a court hearing scheduled for September 19, Underdahl's attorney, Jeffrey Sheridan, told CNET News.com in a phone interview on Tuesday. At the hearing, Sheridan is expected to ask the judge to throw out any evidence the state had obtained … Read more

At least for now, Spamhaus, the popular British spam-blacklisting organization, won't have to cough up $11.7 million as part of a spat with an Illinois e-mail marketing company.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit on Thursday vacated a lower court's decision last fall to award the damages and to impose an injunction, which required the organization to cease causing any e-mail sent by e360insight or Linhardt to be "blocked, delayed, altered, or interrupted in any way" and to publish an apology (click here for a PDF of the opinion).

The three-judge … Read more

Open government is a central tenet for democracy. After all, if it's your government then you have the right to know what your money is going toward. But what about the rights of public employees' personal privacy? As reported in today's SFGate , the California Supreme Court has ruled that "the public has the right to know the names of police officers and the salaries of local and state government employees."

… Read more

I've written before about the Supreme Court's landmark patent-reform case, KSR v. Teleflex [PDF]. It appears that this case has been having its desired effect, according to the Wall Street Journal (Subscription req'd):… Read more

It's long been a practice within the software world to refer to terms and conditions of a service or product via URL.

In other words, I might sign a physical contract with Customer X, but the contract points to all sorts of other online "documents" for specifics of training, support services, etc. Savvy attorneys, therefore, require that such "moving targets" be removed, forcing them to be hard-wired into the document.

But now the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit (which covers California, Washington and Oregon) is helping the not-so-savvy, as ComputerWorld reports. You can read the ruling in its entirety here (PDF).

The legality of a Maine state law designed to prevent minors from buying cigarettes online is slated to get another look from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Right now, the 2003 law is on ice, after successful legal challenges from trade associations representing air and motor carriers in Vermont, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. But the high court agreed on Monday to accept a petition from Maine State Attorney General G. Steven Rowe to review the earlier decisions.

Federal district and appeals courts in recent years have largely agreed that the state law conflicts with a federal law known as the … Read more

As a senior in high school in the city of Juneau, Alaska, Mr. Frederick created a large banner that read "Bong Hits For Jesus" and unveiled the banner outside his school on the sidewalk while the Olympic torch relay accompanied by television camera crews passed by on the way to the 2002 games. Upon seeing the spectacle, the principal, Deborah Morse, seized the banner and suspended Frederick for violating the school's anti-drug policy. Frederick appealed and eventually filed a lawsuit in federal court.

… Read more