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Supreme Court wades into Abortion issue AGAIN

Supreme Court Steps Into Abortion Dispute By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Tuesday intervened again in a long-running fight over protests outside abortion clinics.

Justices said they will consider whether an anti-abortion group's campaign against abortions, conducted outside these clinics 20 years ago, may have violated federal racketeering and extortion laws.
The court has already dealt with the same case several times before. Most recently justices ruled in 2003 that the laws were wrongly used against anti-abortion leader Joseph Scheidler and others.

That ruling, written by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, lifted a nationwide ban on protests that interfere with abortion clinic business.

An appeals court, however, questioned whether the ban should be renewed on other legal grounds.

The announcement Tuesday came as justices resolved about 20 cases that were still pending from their term. The court met for the last time Monday before beginning a three-month break.

The abortion case is one of two to reach the Supreme Court recently. A month ago, the court in a surprise announcement said that it would hear an appeal involving a parental notification law from New Hampshire. Both cases will be argued late this year.

As part of the 1998 ban, anti-abortion demonstrators were barred from trespassing, setting up blockades or behaving violently at abortion clinics for 10 years.

Although the case does not directly involve abortion, it does address an issue important to people who want to protest at clinics without the fear of lawsuits and large damage awards.

The National Organization for Women and abortion clinics filed suit to stop protests with a federal law originally intended to target mobsters. Abortion providers claimed that a coordinated effort to close down or disrupt clinics in several cities in the 1980s went far beyond the actions of individual protesters, and should be treated much like organized crime.

Protesters were accused of menacing doctors, roughing up patients and trashing clinics.

Rehnquist conceded in 2003 that abortion protesters interfered with clinic operations and in some cases committed crimes. But he said because they did not extort money or valuables from the clinics, a lower court had wrongly imposed a ban on protests.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago then renewed the case on other grounds, that the threats of violence, or violent acts, may have been enough to qualify to sue under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.

NOW attorney Fay Clayton, in papers filed with the Supreme Court, cited several examples of violence during protests, including one in which a patient was beaten unconscious with an anti-abortion sign.

Jay Sekulow, representing Operation Rescue, told justices "this court put a definitive end to a meritless marathon civil RICO suit," in 2003 and should intervene now to make that clear.

The dispute has been to the Supreme Court several times. The court first ruled that the RICO law could be applied to abortion protesters. Then justices decided that the law, which requires a conclusion that someone has committed an underlying crime, was improperly used in this particular case.

The cases are Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, 04-1244, and Operation Rescue v. National Organization for Women, 04-1352.

___

On the Net:

Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/

RICO is FAR more invasive to the civil rights of this country than the Patriot Act ever thought about being and I am mostly opposed to any further expansion of it.

The court gets a 3 month break?

WTF? That is a freaking long break!

Quote:

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

RICO is FAR more invasive to the civil rights of this country than the Patriot Act ever thought about being and I am mostly opposed to any further expansion of it.

If the activity of the anti abortion crowd falls under the purview of RICO, then I am ALL FOR IT as a rationale for stopping the thug-like behavior of the kooks that terrorize the abortion clinics.

I dont have much hope of the Supremes ruling in favor of this, however, they have been coming up with very very weird stuff lately.

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishgrl

I think you nothing about RICO and the bane of the Fourth Amendment it has become. But, as long as abortion on demand is preserved what the hell does the right against unwarranted searches and seizures matter.

Quote:

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I am against unreasonable searches/seizures but RICO hasnt been as detrimental to that as the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine has....or possibly even the Patriot Act....I admit I dont know everything about RICO but
if the terroristic activities of the anti abortion nutjobs falls under the purview of RICO, then it does, and the perpetrators should be prosecuted for it. There has to be a clear message to these eejits that they cant go to these clinics and physically harm patients, or destroy the clinic, or threaten the patients or the medical personnel. What is it going to take? enuff is enuff.
These folks have demonstrated they have no problem stalking or killing doctors who perform abortions, so, as I said, I hope it flies.

Unfortunately, I dont think it will, and you have nothing to worry about :shrug:

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishgrl

RICO has been expanded from a method to catching criminal rackteers to a civil and criminal method for a witch hunt. Any lawyer who knows anything about RICO will tell you that. I am opposed to anything under RICO because I am opposed to any application of RICO past its original intent - no matter how harsh that application is to me personally.

And - if these folks are doing everything you say they are, then many other state and Federal laws exist to catch and prosecute them without further defiling the Fourth Amendment. I am a little shocked you disagree here, which leads me to believe you do not know about RICO and what it has become, which is a method of conducting witch hunts.

Quote:

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I said I dont know a lot about RICO, all I do know is what it was originally intended for. But from the original article I posted, the issue was to STOP anti abortion protesters from physically harrassing abortion clinic patients, stop destroying clinics, stop harrassing doctors who perform abortions.

the State and Federal laws you mentioned have been useless against these folks, apparently even Rehnquist isnt willing to stop them:

Quote:

Rehnquist conceded in 2003 that abortion protesters interfered with clinic operations and in some cases committed crimes. But he said because they did not extort money or valuables from the clinics, a lower court had wrongly imposed a ban on protests.

in case you missed it, here is the rationale for the current case:

Quote:

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago then renewed the case on other grounds, that the threats of violence, or violent acts, may have been enough to qualify to sue under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.

NOW attorney Fay Clayton, in papers filed with the Supreme Court, cited several examples of violence during protests, including one in which a patient was beaten unconscious with an anti-abortion sign.

I'll read your articles but Im sure I'll have comments later...

Quote:

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Here are some articles on RICO :

http://www.aclu.org/NationalSecurity...?ID=9139&c=111

http://www.varley.net/Pages/VarleyYarns/nbor.htm

:cool:

Jason, the first article is about the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001 ??? I dont see any mention of RICO, in fact it seems more likely this is related to the Patriot Act......the other article seems to be an Opinion piece, more of a rant actually...I think I will do my own research and I will share what I find :xoxo:

PS: even tho I am a card carrying member of the ACLU, I now detest them because they objected to the bill I was trying to have passed on the grounds that my bill "treated sex offenders as a separate class of people" to wit:
SB 544 (Battin)
Page 3

2. The blanket prohibition created in this bill
(you may recall, my bill REQUIRED
supervised visitation for children under 14 if a parent
had been convicted of certain sex related crimes where
the victim was a minor) eliminates judicial
consideration of the child's best interest

Judicial Council of California, the American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU) and the California Judges
Association (CJA) oppose this bill because it eliminates
all judicial discretion in determining the best custody
or visitation arrangement for the child. The ACLU urges:

SB 544 is fundamentally flawed because it treats
registered sex offenders as a class of individuals to
whom it would not be 'in the best interests of the
child' to grant custody or unsupervised visitation
rights.(DUH!) Depending on the nature of the parent's crime
and the relationship between both parents and the
child, it may be in the best interest of the child for
custody to be granted to the registered sex offender
parent.

THIS bit of idiocy from my good friends at the ACLU....

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishgrl

From the first Article:

Part II -- General Concerns

There are other provisions of the bill that we believe warrant hearings and full debate and should be carefully reviewed for their due process and privacy implications. We believe these provisions raise serious civil liberties and due process concerns notwithstanding the events of September 11th.

Examples of these changes are:

Section 301 - eliminating the statute of limitations in terrorism offenses. This raises due process concerns. If the government delays in bringing a criminal charge the case may be so old that a person cannot adequately defend herself;

Section 302 - increasing all terrorism offenses to possible life sentences. This could create some very unfair results by exposing some people with limited involvement in the case to life sentences;

Section 303 --expanding RICO - the ACLU has had a long-standing concern about the RICO statute in that it is so broad and creates First Amendment concerns by prosecuting people because of "guilt by association";

________________________________________

I wrote a huge article on the damage done by the expansion of RICO from its original intent - I wish I could find it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by irishgrl

I disagree - many, though certainly not all, have been caught and prosecuted :shrug: I just do not think that essentially eradicating the Fourth Amendment justifies perhaps catching the rest when the same people enfircing the law will have to enforce the RICO statute and would seemingly be loathe to do that as well, if their law enforcement effort is the problem.

Quote:

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago then renewed the case on other grounds, that the threats of violence, or violent acts, may have been enough to qualify to sue under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.

NOW attorney Fay Clayton, in papers filed with the Supreme Court, cited several examples of violence during protests, including one in which a patient was beaten unconscious with an anti-abortion sign.

I know and I am unsure that a mere threat is enough or should be enough to prosecute :shrug: but certainly the battery they mentioned would be. A threat would perhaps under a harrassment type of statute though. But, people should not go to jail for five or so years for threatening an abortion clinic any more so than they should for threatening an individual on the street.

here is what I found:

Quote:

In 1970, Congress passed the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1961-1968. At the time, Congress' goal was to eliminate the ill-affects of organized crime on the nation's economy. To put it bluntly, RICO was intended to destroy the Mafia.

Throughout the 1970's, RICO's intended purpose and its actual use ran parallel to each other. Seldom was RICO used outside of the context of the Mafia, and it is not an overstatement to say that civil claims under RICO were simply not brought.

In the 1980's, however, civil lawyers noticed section 1964(c) of the RICO Act, which allows civil claims to be brought by any person injured in their business or property by reason of a RICO violation. Any person who succeeded in establishing a civil RICO claim would automatically receive judgment in the amount of three times their actual damages and would be awarded their costs and attorneys' fees. The financial windfall available under RICO inspired the creativity of lawyers across the nation, and by the late 1980's, RICO was a (if not the most) commonly asserted claim in federal court. Everyone was trying to depict civil claims, such as common law fraud, product defect, and breach of contract as criminal wrongdoing, which would in turn enable the filing of a civil RICO action.

RICO's broad application was the result of Congress' inclusion of mail and wire fraud as two crimes upon which a RICO claim could be brought. Given the breadth of activities that had historically been criminally prosecuted under the mail and wire fraud statutes, it was not difficult for creative civil attorneys to depict practically any wrongdoing as mail or wire fraud.

During the 1990's, the federal courts, guided by the United States Supreme Court, engaged in a concerted effort to limit the scope of RICO in the civil context. As a result of this effort, civil litigants must jump many hurdles and avoid many pitfalls before they can expect the financial windfall available under RICO, and RICO has become one of the most complicated and unpredictable areas of the law.

Today, RICO is almost never applied to the Mafia. Instead, it is applied to individuals, businesses, political protest groups, and terrorist organizations. In short, a RICO claim can arise in almost any context.

The purpose of this website is to simplify this very complicated area of the law and to articulate and make more predictable the legal standards that govern such claims.

and here is the outline of RICO (with commentary)

here is the part that relates to the case at hand:

Quote:

3. Extortion

What laypeople call extortion, lawyers call a violation of the Hobbs Act. The Hobbs Act states:

Whoever in anyway or degree obstructs, delays, or affects commerce or the movement of any article or commodity in commerce, by robbery or extortion or attempts or conspires so to do, or commits or threatens physical violence to any person or property in furtherance of a plan or purpose to do anything in violation of this section shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.

As used in this section:

(1) The term "robbery" means the unlawful taking or obtaining of personal property from the person or in the presence of another, against his will, by means of actual or threatened force, or violence, or fear of injury, immediate or future, to his person or property, or property in his custody or possession, or the person or property of a relative or member of his family or of anyone in his company at the time of the taking or obtaining.

(2) The term "extortion" means the obtaining of property from another, with his consent, induced by wrongful use of actual or threatened force, violence, or fear, or under color of official right.

(3) The term "commerce" means commerce within the District of Columbia, or any Territory or Possession of the United States, all commerce between any point in a State, Territory, Possession, or the District of Columbia and any point outside thereof, all commerce between points within the same State through any place outside such State and all commerce over which the United States has jurisdiction.

18 U.S.C. § 1951 (emphasis added). In essence, the Hobbs Act elevates all but the simplest acts of robbery and extortion to the level of federal crimes.

This also applies:

Quote:

3. Civil Remedies Under Section 1964(c)

When passed by Congress in 1970, the expectation was that most RICO claims would be brought by U.S. Attorneys in the criminal context. In the 1980s, however, RICO's tail (i.e., it's civil remedies provision) began to wag the dog. Civil RICO claims exploded, and ever since, the number of criminal RICO claims filed every year is a small fraction of the number of civil actions brought under RICO. Congress paid so little attention to RICO's civil remedy provision that it failed to specify a statute of limitations for civil RICO claims.

RICO's civil remedies provision, section 1964(c), states:

Any person injured in his business or property by reason of a violation of section 1962 of this chapter may sue therefore in any appropriate United States district court and shall recover threefold the damages he sustains and the cost of the suit, including reasonable attorney's fees . . . .

Although apparently straight-forward, this provision contains several nuances that must be considered before filing any civil RICO claim.

Here are the basic concepts summarized:

Quote:

CONCLUSION: KEY CONCEPTS OF RICO JURISPRUDENCE

There are 17 key concepts of RICO jurisprudence. Before bringing any civil RICO action or before responding to any civil RICO complaint, a practitioner or party should understand and be able to apply all of these concepts:

1. RICO encompasses both legitimate and illegitimate enterprises. United States v. Turkette, 452 U.S. 576 (1981).

2. Under RICO, section 1962(c), there must be a distinction between the RICO "person" and the RICO "enterprise." An individual cannot "associate" with himself. This is known as the person / enterprise distinction. River City Markets, Inc. v. Fleming Foods West, Inc., 960 F.2d 1458 (9th Cir. 1992).

3. With regard to the person / enterprise distinction, one can associate with a group of which he is a member while the member and the group remain distinct. Riverwoods Chappaqua Corp. v. Marine Midland Bank, N.A., 30 F.3d 339 (3d Cir. 1995).

4. RICO's person / enterprise distinction is NOT met by alleging that a corporation associated with its own employees, agents, subdivisions or affiliates. Riverwoods Chappaqua Corp. v. Marine Midland Bank, N.A., 30 F.3d 339 (3d Cir. 1995).

5. Under RICO, section 1962(c), there also must be a distinction between the enterprise and the racketeering activity; in other words, members of an enterprise must be linked by more than their participation in the same pattern of racketeering activity. This is known as the racketeering activity / enterprise distinction. McDonough v. National Home Ins. Co., 108 F.3d 174 (8th Cir. 1997).

6. A RICO enterprise need not be economically motivated. National Organization for Women, Inc. v. Scheidler, 510 U.S. 249 (1993).

7. To be liable under section 1962(c), a person must participate in the operation or management of the enterprise itself. Reves v. Ernst & Young, 507 U.S. 170 (1993).

8. Since 1995, a civil RICO claim cannot be based upon allegations of a securities fraud violation; a defendant must be criminally convicted of securities fraud before he can be subject to civil liability on the basis of securities fraud violations. 18 U.S.C. § 1964(c).

9. A RICO claim can be predicated on mail and wire fraud alone but should not be so predicated. RICOAct.com.

10. The factors of continuity plus relationship combine to produce a pattern. H.J. Inc. v. Northwestern Bell Tele. Co., 492 U.S. 299 (1989).

11. A close-ended pattern must generally last one year. Grimmett v. Brown, 75 F.3d 506 (9th Cir. 1996).

12. A plaintiff has standing only to the extent that she has been injured in her business or property "by reason of" the conduct constituting the violation; a defendant who violates section 1962(c) is not liable for treble damages to everyone she might have injured by other conduct (e.g., breach of contract or negligence) nor is the defendant liable to those who have not been injured. Sedima, S.P.R.L. v. Imrex Co., Inc., 473 U.S. 479 (1985); Holmes v. Securities Investor Protection Corp., 503 U.S. 258 (1992).

13. Always bring a section 1962(d) claim; never bring a section 1962(a) or (b) claim without a 1962(c) claim. RICOAct.com

14. A RICO claim must be brought within 4 years of accrual. Agency Holding Corp. v. Malley-Duff Associates, Inc. 483 U.S. 143 (1987).

15. Aa RICO claim accrues and the statute of limitations begins to run when the victim discovers or reasonably should have discovered its injury. Klehr v. A.O. Smith Corp., 521 U.S. 179 (1997); Rotella v. Wood, 528 U.S. 549 (2000).

16. A plaintiff can bring a federal civil RICO claim in either state or federal court. Tafflin v. Levitt, 493 U.S. 455 (1990).

17. If agreed to by the parties, RICO claims may be arbitrated. Shearson / American Express, Inc. v. McMahon, 482 U.S. 220 (1987).

Quote:

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Jason, I fail to see how an application of RICO with respect to anti-abortion protesters wreaking violence upon clinic patients constitutes gutting the 4th Amendment!!! Please explain how this is considered an unreasonable search or seizure? What is the connect here? DO speak UP!