US hostage held
by Islamic State militants
is female aid worker
WASHINGTON — The Islamic State militant group is holding hostage a young American woman who was doing humanitarian aid work in Syria, a family representative said Tuesday. The 26-year-old woman is the third American known to have been kidnapped by the militant group.
The Islamic State group recently threatened to kill American hostages to avenge the crushing airstrikes in Iraq against militants advancing on Mount Sinjar and the Kurdish capital of Irbil.
The 26-year-old woman was captured last year while working with three humanitarian groups in Syria. A representative for the family and U.S. officials asked that the woman not be identified out of fear for her safety. All spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue publicly.
Direct talks between Ukraine, Russian leaders produce no sign of quick end to conflict
MINSK, Belarus — Ukraine’s president said Wednesday that Vladimir Putin accepts the principles of a peace plan for Ukraine but the Russian leader insisted that only Kiev can reach a cease-fire deal with the pro-Moscow separatists.
Following meetings between Putin and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that included a one-on-one session that stretched into the night, there was no indication of a quick end to the fighting that has engulfed eastern Ukraine.
“This is not our business,” Putin said of any cease-fire plan. “This is Ukraine’s business.”
Russia “can only help to create an atmosphere of trust for this important and necessary process,” Putin said. “We in Russia cannot talk about any conditions for the cease-fire, about any agreements between Kiev, Donetsk, Luhansk,” the two rebel regions.
Federal appeals judges chide lawyers for Indiana, Wisconsin over gay marriage bans
CHICAGO — Federal appeals judges bristled on Tuesday at arguments defending gay marriage bans in Indiana and Wisconsin, with one Republican appointee comparing them to now-defunct laws that once outlawed weddings between blacks and whites.
As the legal skirmish in the United States over same-sex marriage shifted to the three-judge panel of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, more than 200 people lined up hours before to ensure they got a seat at the much-anticipated hearing.
While judges often play devil’s advocate during oral arguments, the panel’s often-blistering questions for the defenders of the same-sex marriage bans could be a signal the laws may be in trouble — at least at this step in the legal process.
Richard Posner, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1981, hit the backers of the ban the hardest. He balked when Wisconsin Assistant Attorney General Timothy Samuelson repeatedly pointed to “tradition” as the underlying justification for barring gay marriage.
“It was tradition to not allow blacks and whites to marry — a tradition that got swept away,” the 75-year-old judge said. Prohibition of same-sex marriage, Posner said, derives from “a tradition of hate … and savage discrimination” of homosexuals.
History suggests Justice Dept. prosecution won’t be easy
in Ferguson police shooting
WASHINGTON — As the Justice Department probes the police shooting of an unarmed 18-year-old in Missouri, history suggests there’s no guarantee of a criminal prosecution, let alone a conviction.
Federal authorities investigating possible civil rights violations in the Aug. 9 death of Michael Brown in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson must meet a difficult standard of proof, a challenge that has complicated the path to prosecution in past police shootings.
To build a case, they would need to establish that the police officer, Darren Wilson, not only acted with excessive force but also willfully violated Brown’s constitutional rights. Though the Justice Department has a long history of targeting police misconduct, including after the 1991 beating of Rodney King, the high bar means that many high-profile police shootings that have raised public alarm never wound up in federal court.
“It’s a very difficult standard to meet, and it really is satisfied only in the most egregious cases,” said University of Michigan law professor Samuel Bagenstos, the former No. 2 official in the department’s civil rights division. “Criminal enforcement of constitutional rights is not something that is easily pursued. It really requires building a case very carefully, very painstakingly.”
By wire sources
