by Kent Scheidegger · Jun 27, 2025 5:14 pm
Junko Ogura and Chris Lau report for CNN:
Japan has executed a man dubbed the “Twitter killer,” who was convicted of murdering and dismembering nine people, mostly women, in the country’s first use of capital punishment in nearly three years.
Takahiro Shiraishi, 34, was hanged Friday at the Tokyo Detention House. He was sentenced to death in 2020 after pleading guilty to killing the nine people – eight women and one man. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Feb 28, 2025 10:06 am
US DEA Agent Enrique Camarena was murdered in Mexico in 1985. Now Mexico has extradited drug boss Rafael Caro Quintero, who is wanted for the crime, along with 28 others. Santiago Pérez and José de Córdoba have this story in the WSJ.
Better late than never.
It would be understandable for a country to refuse to extradite its citizens if it had a functioning justice system that could and would impose a just punishment domestically. But that is not the case in Mexico when it comes to the drug gangs. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Apr 19, 2023 11:36 am
If a corporation is mostly owned by a foreign government, can it be prosecuted in a criminal case in U.S. courts? The U.S. Supreme Court addressed that question today in Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States, No. 21-1450.
The short answer is yes. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Dec 9, 2022 9:56 am
Hans Bader has this post at Liberty Unyielding: “The murder rate has fallen by two thirds since 2018, and crime has fallen by 75%, in El Salvador as it has imprisoned large numbers of criminals. The country has put a hefty 2% of its adult population in prison. This is due to the anti-crime policies of its current president, Nayib Bukele.”
Bader quotes an essay by Edgar Beltrán at Law and Liberty:
In 2015, El Salvador reached a sky-high 103 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants. The year before Bukele came to power, it was 51 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants. Now, it is 17.6, about half the rate of American cities such as Philadelphia or Chicago…. Bukele is, by far, the most popular, democratically elected leader in the world. Independent polls have his local approval rating around 80 or 85%. The explanation is relatively simple: El Salvador went from being one of the most violent countries in the world, absolutely dominated by criminal gangs, to reducing crime by 75%. Bukele promised to end crime and he delivered … by putting in jail almost 2% of the adult population of the country.
by Kent Scheidegger · Jun 4, 2021 9:14 am
HONG KONG—Police arrested two people they accused of using social media to promote a banned candlelight vigil commemorating the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, an annual event that is now seen as testing the limits of China’s crackdown on dissent.
Elaine Yu has this story in the WSJ. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · May 5, 2021 1:13 pm
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will rehear the case of a Guantanamo Bay detainee en banc. That is, all of the judges will hear the case rather than the usual three-judge panel. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Feb 3, 2021 9:36 am
Generally, one cannot sue a foreign government in American courts. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act establishes the basic rule, subject only to specified exceptions.
In Federal Republic of Germany v. Philipp, No. 19-351, the Supreme Court addressed a sale of art allegedly coerced by the government of Nazi Germany in 1935 for only one-third of its value. Can the heirs of the sellers sue the present German government in U.S. courts to get it back? Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Oct 16, 2020 1:59 pm
David Luhnow and José de Córdoba report for the WSJ:
Mexico’s former defense minister received bribes from a leading drug cartel in exchange for allowing them to ship tons of cocaine and other drugs to the U.S. and helping them expand their operations in Mexico, U.S. prosecutors alleged on Friday. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Jan 9, 2020 3:31 pm
Theodore Dalrymple has an article in the City Journal titled Effectively Legalizing Murder.
The recent decision of a French court would, if taken as precedent, in effect legalize murder—provided that the act was committed in a state of temporary madness caused by intoxication with cannabis.
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