Penny Dean and Your Rights

A federal appellate court judge has scolded an attorney for filing a shotgun complaint, a term used to define a complaint that contains multiple counts, each incorporating by reference the preceding allegation with no clear cause of action asserted.

During oral argument on a foreclosure matter before a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, attorney Kenneth Lay of Birmingham, Alabama, acknowledged his "shotgun" complaints may be "an issue in federal court," but they "are not disfavored in Alabama courts."

An Amazon Echo device could play a role in a double-homicide case in Farmington.

A judge has ordered Amazon to turn over recordings that might have been captured by an Echo smart speaker in the Farmington house where two women were stabbed to death in January 2017.

Timothy Verrill of Dover is charged with first-degree murder in the stabbing deaths of Jenna Pellegrini, 32, and Christine Sullivan, 48. He has pleaded not guilty.

Montgomery County Sheriff Darren Popkin believes Maryland’s new "red flag law" can save lives.

It gives family members, health professionals and law enforcement the authority to seek a judge’s order to take guns away from someone in crisis before they hurt themselves or others.

"Law enforcement has been running into people having some sort of mental health crisis forever, however, we never had an statutory authority to take the guns away," said Popkin.

From when the law went into effect in October, 114 red flag warrants have been served across Maryland.

Two New York lawmakers are working to draft a bill that would propose a social media check before a gun purchase.

Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and state Sen. Kevin Palmer’s proposal would allow authorities to review three years of social media history and one year of internet search history of any person seeking to purchase a firearm.

“A three-year review of a social media profile would give an easy profile of a person who is not suitable to hold and possess a fire arm,” Adams explains.

If you’re white, live in the United States, and a distant relative has uploaded their DNA to a public ancestry database, there’s a good chance an internet sleuth can identify you from a DNA sample you left somewhere. That’s the conclusion of a new study, which finds that by combining an anonymous DNA sample with some basic information such as someone’s rough age, researchers could narrow that person’s identity to fewer than 20 people by starting with a DNA database of 1.3 million individuals.

In the United States, we normally have a clear separation of powers: the legislative branch makes the laws, the judicial branch interprets them, and the executive branch enforces them. But every now and then, when one branch isn't around to help, another has to step in. Or, in this case, run down.

Read more at http://www.kentuckynewera.com/multimedia/video/news/youtube_c2674705-960...

A Southwest Side man said he didn't have time to think as he sprang into action and opened fire on another man who had allegedly shot a police officer in suburban Cicero on Thursday.

"You think a lot of things after that, you know. He could have tried to get somebody else car and try to run away," said the man, who wished to remain anonymous.

For journalists, researchers and the general public, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention serves as an authoritative source of information about Americans’ health, including estimates of how many people are killed or injured by guns. The agency’s most recent figures include a worrying uptick: Between 2015 and 2016, the number of Americans nonfatally injured by a firearm jumped by 37 percent, rising from about 85,000 to more than 116,000. It was the largest single-year increase recorded in more than 15 years.

There is a staggering amount of data on our smartphones. So it's no surprise investigators want access to those phones as easily as possible. And we want our privacy. So smartphone companies, like Apple, have attempted to make phones as secure as possible, with passcodes, fingerprints, and now, facial recognition software.