Court Rulings Research Articles

Rights of nature, indigenous communities and land property: legal perspectives from Latin America

Abstract This article presents some dialogues between the recognition of rights of nature, indigenous communities and land property rights in the context of Latin American legal innovations in recent years. To do so this paper is framed within a socio-legal perspective that involves the analysis of a corpus of documents made up of regulatory texts at national and local level, including constitutions, laws, and ordinances related to the topics as well as relevant court rulings.

Court rules against former employee

Case name: Stratton v. Bentley University, No. 22‐1061 (1st Cir. 08/15/24).

The Impact of Hate Speech Regulations on Freedom of Expression an Indonesian Legal Perspective

This paper explores the impact of hate speech regulation on freedom of expression in Indonesia from a juridical perspective. The study focuses on the legal framework, including the Electronic Information and Transactions Law (UU ITE) and the Indonesian Penal Code (KUHP), both of which are central to the regulation of hate speech. Through an analysis of key statutes, court rulings, and case studies, this paper highlights the tension between protecting public order and safeguarding free speech. The findings reveal that vague legal definitions and broad enforcement of hate speech laws have led to selective prosecution, often targeting political dissent and criticism. These issues raise concerns about the erosion of democratic rights and the potential misuse of hate speech laws for political purposes. Recommendations are provided to clarify legal definitions, ensure proportionality in enforcement, and prevent the misuse of these laws in a manner that balances the protection of social harmony with the preservation of freedom of expression.

Assessing the Influence of Social Justice Movements on Public Policy and Community Empowerment in Indonesia

This paper explores the influence of social justice movements on public policy and community empowerment in Indonesia through a juridical analysis. By examining key legal documents, court rulings, and government policies, the study assesses how social justice movements have shaped the legal landscape in areas such as labor rights, environmental protection, and gender equality. The findings reveal that social justice movements have successfully influenced the development of laws and policies aimed at addressing systemic inequalities, though challenges remain in their implementation. Furthermore, the research highlights how these movements have empowered marginalized communities by providing them with the tools and resources to advocate for their rights. The study concludes that while social justice movements have made significant strides in influencing public policy, continuous efforts are needed to ensure effective enforcement and sustained community empowerment.

Court rules in favor of suspended student

Case name: Doe v. Emory University, No. 22‐13293 (11th Cir. 08/01/24).

Court rules in favor of former student

Case name: Doe v. University of Kentucky, No. 22‐6012 (6th Cir. 08/07/24).

Court rules against former student

Case name: Bassi v. New York Medical College, et al., No. 23‐278 (2d Cir. 08/08/24).

Court rules against former student

Case name: Reiss v. Texas A&M University, et al., No. 23‐20462 (5th Cir. 08/14/24).

A selective diesel vehicle ban’s impact on NO2 concentrations in Munich: a quasi-experimental study

Abstract Background The European Union’s current NO2 concentration limit of 40 μg/m³ is regularly exceeded in Munich, Germany. This limit is likely to be reduced towards the WHO recommended target of 10 μg/m³. In response, the city enacted a selective ban on older diesel vehicles, specifically those categorized as Euro 4 or older, within the current low-emission zone in February 2023. Our study examined how Munich’s selective ban on diesel vehicles impacted NO2 levels, concentrating on the six-month period after its introduction. Methods We employed a synthetic control approach in the primary analysis and a controlled interrupted time series approach in the secondary analysis. These quasi-experimental methods establish a ‘counterfactual’ no-intervention scenario, allowing for comparison with the actual observed scenario and estimation of the impact of the intervention. Historical data from monitoring stations within and outside the low-emission zone from 2014 to 2022 were utilized as controls, while potential confounders were considered. Results NO2 concentrations within Munich’s low-emission zone decreased across the study period. Effects of the selective diesel vehicle ban at monitoring stations within the low-emission zone were minimal, with wide confidence intervals indicating uncertainty. At Landshuter Allee, the average intervention effect was -2.67 μg/m3 (95%-CI = [-12.72; 7.38]), at Stachus it was -2.74 μg/m3 (95%-CI = [-9.91; 4.42]) and at Lothstrasse, it was -1.03 μg/m3 (95%-CI = [-7.75; 5.69]). The secondary analysis confirms these findings. Conclusions Munich’s selective diesel vehicle ban had limited effects in reducing NO2 concentrations. Factors such as its narrow focus on Euro 4 diesel vehicles, numerous exemptions, and unclear enforcement may explain this outcome. Comprehensive strategies and continuous monitoring and evaluation are crucial for effectively addressing urban air pollution and protecting public health. Key messages • Munich’s selective diesel vehicle ban had minimal effects on reducing NO2 levels, possibly due to its narrow scope, many exemptions, and unclear enforcement. • Current guidelines and court rulings signal the need for more effective solutions beyond selective bans, emphasizing the importance of well-designed interventions and rigorous evaluation.

Autonomy of the will: evolution of juridical doctrine and legal norms

In the article on the basis of statistical methods, the use of the term “autonomy of will” in judicial acts by the law enforcement officer is characterized. It is noted that the meaning of the relevant legal category is not sufficiently defined, which is the reason for its relatively rare (in comparison with “freedom of contract”) use in the texts of court rulings. Amendments made to civil legislation concerning decisions of assemblies, pre-contractual relations and the procedure for changing and terminating multilateral agreements are interpreted as the result of a change in the legal paradigm supported by a legislator. Deeply realized over the years of the functioning of the market economy, reinforced by data from related fields of scientific knowledge, the ability to regulate public relations in a decentralized manner by the will of many people has changed the ideas about the nature of the autonomy of participants in civil turnover, the nature of centralized regulation of public relations and the meaning of legal norms.

Advanced neural network-based model for predicting court decisions on child custody

Predicting court rulings has gained attention over the past years. The court rulings are among the most important documents in all legal systems, profoundly impacting the lives of the children in case of divorce or separation. It is evident from literature that Natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning (ML) are widely used in the prediction of court rulings. In general, the court decisions comprise several pages and require a lot of space. In addition, extracting valuable information and predicting legal decisions task is difficult. Moreover, the legal system’s complexity and massive litigation make this problem more serious. Thus to solve this issue, we propose a new neural network-based model for predicting court decisions on child custody. Our proposed model efficiently performs an efficient search from a massive court decisions database and accurately identifies specific ones that especially deal with copyright claims. More specially, our proposed model performs a careful analysis of court decisions, especially on child custody, and pinpoints the plaintiff’s custody request, the court’s ruling, and the pivotal arguments. The working mechanism of our proposed model is performed in two phases. In the first phase, the isolation of pertinent sentences within the court ruling encapsulates the essence of the proceedings performed. In the second phase, these documents were annotated independently by using two legal professionals. In this phase, NLP and transformer-based models were employed and thus processed 3,000 annotated court rulings. We have used a massive dataset for the training and refining of our proposed model. The novelty of the proposed model is the integration of bidirectional encoder representations from transformers (BERT) and bidirectional long short-term memory (Bi_LSTM). The traditional methods are primarily based on support vector machines (SVM), and logistic regression. We have performed a comparison with the state-of-the-art model. The efficient results indicate that our proposed model efficiently navigates the complex terrain of legal language and court decision structures. The efficiency of the proposed model is measured in terms of the F1 score. The achieved results show that scores range from 0.66 to 0.93 and Kappa indices from 0.57 to 0.80 across the board. The performance is achieved at times surpassing the inter-annotator agreement, underscoring the model’s adeptness at extracting and understanding nuanced legal concepts. The efficient results proved the potential of the proposed neural network model, particularly those based on transformers, to effectively discern and categorize key elements within legal texts, even amidst the intricacies of judicial language and the layered complexity of appellate rulings.

Court rules in favor of former student

Case name: Doe v. University of Kentucky, No. 22‐6012 (6th Cir. 08/07/24).

Court rules in favor of former student

Case name: Doe v. University of Kentucky, No. 22‐6012 (6th Cir. 08/07/24).

Litigating Indonesian Forests for Climate: Hendrikus Woro v Provincial Government of Papua

Abstract The forestry sector has been the biggest contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Indonesia. The palm oil industry has been highlighted because it defines how the country can achieve emissions reduction as pledged internationally. Domestically, however, the government continues to expand the industry further to Papua, the last forest frontier, which has been resisted by indigenous communities utilising climate litigation. This article reviews the climate change litigation case initiated by the Awyu Tribe of Papua and demonstrates its relevance to the debate on climate policy in the country. The article questions the legality of court rulings that sustain the validity of environmental approval without prior Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) review and the court’s refusal to examine climate impacts in the proposed project’s EIA document. Consequently, the court decision disrupts the newly established doctrine and practice to incorporate climate assessment within the country’s EIA system.

Court rules in favor of suspended student

Case name: Doe v. Emory University, No. 22‐13293 (11th Cir. 08/01/24).

Court rules in favor of former student

Case name: Doe v. University of Kentucky, No. 22‐6012 (6th Cir. 08/07/24).

Court rules against disciplined employee

Case name: Doe v. The Leland Stanford Junior University, No. H050567 (Cal. Ct. App. 06/26/24).

Court rules against former student

Case name: Reiss v. Texas A&M University, et al., No. 23‐20462 (5th Cir. 08/14/24).

Capitalizing on sport labor migration: The role of ethnic capitalism in the discriminatory, regulatory, and exploitative environment for international college athletes in the United States

International college athletes (ICAs) are integral to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and lie at a particular social location as they are international students and college sport laborers. However, little research examines the discriminatory regulations toward ICAs by the NCAA, its member institutions, and the US federal government. Recent court rulings that permit college athletes to monetize their name, image, and likeness (NIL) do not benefit ICAs because of outdated and exclusionary restrictions imposed by federal immigration policies, visa laws, and US tax laws, which prohibit ICAs from having equitable rights, building their personal brand and professional careers. To examine the discrimination, regulation, and exploitation of ICAs by the US federal government and the NCAA, we apply the theory of ethnic capitalism, which highlights the marginalization of groups based on their ethnicity and national origin. In this setting, ICAs are treated as bodies of athletic labor, recruited for institutional gain and athletic program reputation to benefit US higher education institutions (HEIs). To conclude, we propose the need for the NCAA and its member institutions to treat ICAs equitably and include, support, and advocate for them, specifically regarding their inclusion in NIL on US lands.

Reflections on the implications of proposed legal reform in Israel on ethical dilemmas in social work

Social work ethics are outlined in the Union of Social Workers in Israel Code of Ethics. Israel's current Justice Minister has submitted a bill as part of legal reform, which states that even if the Supreme Court rules that a law enacted by the Knesset violates human dignity and liberty, a Knesset majority can still overturn the Supreme Court ruling. Should this legal reform endeavor succeed, social workers may be faced with complex ethical and legal dilemmas. This article provides a number of recommendations that will assist social workers to better prepare themselves to deal with situations in which they are required to act contrary to both applicable legislation and professional ethics.