News & Blog

Are Presidential Candidates Legally Required To Release Their Tax Returns?

Candidates Are Not Legally Required to Release Tax Returns No. There is no legal requirement of any kind that presidential candidates release tax returns from any year. Indeed, there is a strict, strong constitutional right to privacy for all tax returns. Thus, tax returns can be released by an individual taxpayer, but cannot released by the IRS to the public. However, one Senator has proposed......
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Are Your Neighbor’s Crazy Christmas Lights A Legal Nuisance?

In a Mississippi suburb Carol and Mike Richardson have been working on an increasingly elaborate Christmas display over the last 20 years. However, neighbors claimed the display was drawing loud music and traffic from viewers, and even buses. The display, traffic, and noise have annoyed neighbors so much that they asked the Board of Aldermen to declare it a public nuisance. An Ohio man erected......
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Can You Shoot Down Drones Flying Over Your House?

In Kentucky a self-described “drone slayer” was arrested after shooting down a drone in his backyard. The man said that the drone was hovering over his teenage daughter, who was sunbathing. The criminal charges were later dismissed when witnesses testified that the drone was flying below the trees. In 2014, a New Jersey man faced unlawful weapons charges  for shooting down a drone over his property. Surprisingly, even in Texas, you cannot shoot a drone. In Houston, Texas, KHOU 11......
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History’s 16 Most Creative Legal Defenses … And Their Result!

As long as judicial systems have existed, there has been a tug-of-war between prosecutors and the defense. Often, the conflict is straight-forward, but some struggles are more complicated. For example, in the 19th Century as advancements were made in the field of science and psychology, defense experts took to blaming the full moon for an increase in erratic and criminal behavior. This became known as......
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Fact or Fiction: In China Convicted Defendants Can Hire “Body Doubles” to Serve Their Sentences

Incredibly, this is true! Slate.com originally broke the story of how the super rich in China get away with pretty much everything, including murder. According to Slate, a wealthy 20-year-old named Hu was drag racing his friends, when he struck and killed a pedestrian. Although Hu received a three-year prison sentence, allegations arose that the man appearing in court and serving the three-year sentence wasn’t......
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10 Epic Law Firm Catch Phrases

Did you know that the word “slogan” has its origins in a similar sounding Scottish term for “battle cry”? Although law firm slogans and catchphrases may not be as cool as a Scottish war cry, below are some of the best, and worst law firm catch phrases we have come across. Generally speaking, catch phrases are supposed to set a firm apart from all of......
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Is the “Warrior Gene” A Defense to Murder?

The first gene to be linked to antisocial behavior was identified in 1993 in a large Dutch family that was notorious for violence.  Fifteen years of painstaking research revealed that they all lacked the same gene. This gene produces an enzyme called MAOA, which regulates the levels of neurotransmitters involved in impulse control. If you lack the MAOA gene or have the low-activity variant you are......
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Can Unpaid Interns and Volunteers Sue Employers for Wrongful Termination?

The Art Institute of Chicago, home to a world famous collection including Vincent Van Gogh’s The Bedroom, Grant Wood’s American Gothic, Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks, and Georges Seurat’s A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, fired all of its trained volunteers and guides last month, who were mostly older white women. Until their firing, the Art Institute had more than 100 docents, 82 of whom were active....
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Are Lottery Winners Required to Reveal Their Identities?

Why Would Lottery Winners Want to Stay Anonymous? Lottery winners should watch their backs. In November 2015, Craigory Burch Jr. won  $434,272 in a Georgia jackpot. Two months later, Burch was killed in his home by seven masked men. His family members said the public announcement of the lottery winnings had made him a target. In 2006 Abraham Shakespeare won a $30 million lottery prize. Two......
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