News Roundup

The New Hampshire presidential primary happened Tuesday.  Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders won the contest for their respective parties.  Politico reports that the New Hampshire results forecast an intense battle in the coming months for the presidential nomination in each political party.  There was not any sports news whatsoever this week, so let’s take a look at the legal news:

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News Roundup

The AOC announced here that 2016 marks the 50th anniversary of North Carolina’s unified court system, the Administrative Office of the Courts, and the district courts.  Next year, the Court of Appeals celebrates its 50th anniversary while the superior court marks 240 years of existence.  The Supreme Court will have been around for two centuries in 2019.  For the few who forgot these important milestones, shame on you but there’s still time to do something nice for the court or administrative office that holds a special place in your heart – maintain proper decorum in the courtroom, strive to preserve the record for appellate review, clarify and reorganize those statutes that the court has been grumbling about.  Here’s to all the folks who work hard to keep our court system running smoothly.  Let’s roundup the other news of the week:

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News Roundup

The anti-government occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge appears to be winding down this week with The Oregonian reporting here that the “ragtag remnants” of the occupying group seem to be surrendering or leaving.  The dissolution of the occupation follows the arrests earlier this week of the group’s leaders and the killing of the group’s de facto spokesman.   In other news:

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News Roundup

Monday was Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Americans across the nation observed the national holiday and celebrated Dr. King’s contribution to the Civil Rights Movement.  ABC 11 reports here that N.C. State professor Jason Miller launched a website that contains a restored recording of a November 1962 speech that King delivered in Rocky Mount.  The website explains that King first delivered the famous “I have a dream” refrain during the Rocky Mount speech.  The tape recording of the speech was stored for nearly 50 years before being discovered in a library in 2013.  The analog tape was digitally restored and the nearly hour-long speech is now available for listening on the website.

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News Roundup

The Charlotte Observer reports that North Carolina did not have a Powerball jackpot winner but that two tickets worth $2 million each were sold in the state, one in Raleigh and the other in Spring Lake.  According to the Chicago Tribune, lottery winners should hire lawyers before coming forward to claim their prizes.  According to the ABA Journal, if you participate with others in a ticket-buying group, it may be a good idea to consult with a lawyer before even buying tickets in order to avoid a potentially costly dispute regarding the terms of the joint purchase agreement.  The first thing we do, let’s hire some lawyers, as it were.

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News Roundup

[Editor’s note: We’re trying a new system for the news roundup. Rather than having a faculty member, usually Jeff, compile the roundup, we’ve asked a staff attorney to take the lead most weeks.]

In the fortnight since the final news roundup of 2015, a group of armed protesters seized a building in a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon, President Obama announced new executive actions intended to reduce gun violence, Durham posted the job description for the city’s Chief of Police, and the new Star Wars film became the highest-grossing film in North America.  The news has wandered many a weary foot since auld lang syne, and it’s time to round it up:

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