Forum examines rising attacks on judges

Federal judges read profane death threats and praised U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts’ recent comments condemning personal criticism of judges during an unusual forum to highlight rising attacks on the judiciary, reported The Associated Press.

None of the four judges singled out President Donald Trump or members of his administration, who have railed against judges that have ruled against them. One of the judges on the panel, U.S. District Judge Mark Norris in Tennessee, was appointed by the president.

He recalled receiving pizza deliveries at his rural home one night for Daniel Anderl, the slain son of a federal judge in New Jersey. Dozens of judges have had unsolicited pizzas delivered to their homes, often in Anderl’s name.

Norris said such threats have become routine against judges.

The event was sponsored by Speak up for Justice, a nonpartisan group supporting an independent judiciary. The group held a similar event last year — both of them unusual because judges mostly limit their comments to the courtroom and written decisions. But more judges have recently begun talking about personal threats and attacks.

The U.S. Marshals Service, responsible for protecting judges, reported 564 threats in the government fiscal year that ended in September, up from the year before. On Tuesday, Roberts warned that personal criticism of federal judges is dangerous and “it’s got to stop.”

Norris and the other panelists pushed back on criticism that their rulings reflect the political affiliations of the presidents who appointed them.

“I sit with four other judges who were appointed by President Trump, and they are phenomenal judges,” said U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who sits in Washington.

She would trust them to handle any case, she added, though they wouldn’t always reach the same decision.

Last month, Reyes used part of a court hearing to read email and social media death threats she received following her ruling blocking the Trump administration from ending temporary immigration protections for Haitians living in the United States. She read the threats again during the forum.

U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee read messages that threatened to kill her at home. One of the messages led to an indictment, she said.

“I think everybody needs to speak up,” she said. “It’s not just the judges who need to speak up.”

Roberts’ comments came two days after Trump called a federal judge who ruled against the administration “wacky, nasty, crooked and totally out of control.” The chief justice, too, did not single out the president.

U.S. District Judge Michelle Williams Court said Roberts had helped open up a discussion about the threats. Court recalled a threat against her children years ago that led her and her husband to inform their school.

She also said she has seen a rise in “veiled threats” in court filings by attorneys.

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Texas civil commitment office: Since 2015 more than 700 detained, only 30 released

According to The Marshall Project, the Houston Chronicle reported on the state’s civil commitment office, which holds people convicted of sex crimes when they are deemed to have a “mental abnormality” that makes their behavior uncontrollable. The U.S. Supreme Court allowed this kind of commitment in a 1997 decision.

The population is old by design, since all of those admitted are coming off long prison sentences, and unlike prisoners serving criminal sentences, those in civil commitment are not eligible for compassionate release. According to the Chronicle, the program spent $7.2 million on medical care in 2025 after budgeting just $1.8 million. Of the more than 700 men (and one woman) who have been admitted since the program began in 2015, only 30 have ever been released.

“They say it’s rehabilitation,” Gene Anthes, an Austin attorney, told the Chronicle. “But that’s bull. It’s an opportunity to lock them up and throw away the key.”

A win for free press and supporters of the U.S. Constitution

A federal judge ruled on Friday that the Pentagon’s restrictions on news outlets violate the First Amendment and issued an order tossing parts of the Defense Department’s policy, handing a victory to The New York Times, which filed suit in December over the restrictions.

Judge Paul Friedman, of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, also ordered the Pentagon to restore the press passes of seven journalists for The Times. They had surrendered those passes in October instead of signing the policy, which empowered the Pentagon to declare journalists “security risks” and revoke their press passes if they engaged in any conduct that the Pentagon believed threatened national security.

In his 40-page ruling, Judge Friedman wrote that the Pentagon’s policy rewarded reporters who were “willing to publish only stories that are favorable to or spoon-fed by department leadership.”

Siding with an argument advanced by The Times, Judge Friedman added that the Pentagon had given itself too much power to enforce its new rules. The policy also violates journalists’ due process rights under the Fifth Amendment, he said, writing that it “provides no way for journalists to know how they may do their jobs without losing their credentials.”

The ruling was a defeat for the Trump administration, which has been engaged in a multifaceted pressure campaign against the news media. ABC News and CBS News’s parent company agreed to multimillion-dollar settlements to resolve suits that President Trump brought against the networks. The ABC late-night star Jimmy Kimmel was temporarily pulled off the air last year after Mr. Trump’s top communications regulator assailed his program and suggested that he might take regulatory action against the broadcaster.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a former host on Fox News, has continued Mr. Trump’s adversarial stance toward the news media. He proposed denying access to Pentagon to a reporter from NBC News, then removed several news organizations from their on-site workstations. Months later, he curtailed the unescorted roaming privileges of journalists within the complex.

Friday’s ruling against the Pentagon followed a similarly stark decision this month from a federal judge to restore the operations of Voice of America, a government-funded news organization that Mr. Trump had ordered shuttered a year ago in an executive order.

A spokesman for The Times said Judge Friedman’s ruling “reaffirms the right of The Times and other independent media to continue to ask questions on the public’s behalf,” adding that “Americans deserve visibility into how their government is being run, and the actions the military is taking in their name and with their tax dollars.”

Sean Parnell, the chief spokesman at the Pentagon, said in an X post, “We disagree with the decision and are pursuing an immediate appeal.”

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Trump ally Lewandowski sought payment for DHS contract

More than a year ago, The GEO Group founder George Zoley asked for a meeting with Corey Lewandowski, a close ally of President Donald Trump who had just started a powerful position as a top adviser to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, reported NBC News.

As a titan of the private prison industry, GEO Group stood to benefit from Trump’s mass deportation agenda, which would require the federal government to spend tens of billions of dollars to transport, detain, monitor and deport undocumented immigrants. The company’s federal contracts in those areas already totaled more than $1 billion per year.

But Zoley and his advisers were worried that the road to securing new government contracts now ran through Lewandowski. The two had history: Lewandowski and Zoley had butted heads during the transition between Trump’s November 2024 election and his January 2025 inauguration, before Lewandowski officially worked for the government, according to two industry sources and one senior DHS official familiar with the matter.

During the transition, Lewandowski told Zoley that he wanted to be paid in exchange for protecting and growing GEO Group’s DHS contracts, according to a senior DHS official and three people familiar with their discussion. Zoley, concerned about the propriety of the ask, told Lewandowski he would have no part of it, the sources said, describing the confrontation as tense.

Lewandowski took a role as an unpaid “special government employee” at DHS once the new administration was sworn in, where he advised and acted as a “de facto chief of staff” to Noem and, sources said, influenced contract awards. Zoley scrambled to find a way to assuage tensions from the meeting during the transition, two industry sources familiar with the matter said. He secured a follow-up with Lewandowski in late February or early March 2025.

That second meeting did not go much better.

Zoley offered to put Lewandowski on retainer — a recurring consulting fee — with GEO Group, according to two industry sources familiar with the matter.

Lewandowski balked, saying he wanted to be compensated based on the company’s new or renewed contracts with DHS, the two sources said.

“He wanted payments — what some people would call a success fee,” said a person with knowledge of the meeting.

Zoley declined, the two sources said. In the months that followed, the length of two of GEO Group’s federal contracts shrank, and currently several of its facilities that could house migrants sit idle, even as Congress and Trump have poured money into DHS to execute the mass deportation campaign. GEO Group officials believe that is tied to their not agreeing to Lewandowski’s solicitations, said a source familiar with the GEO Group officials’ thinking.

A senior DHS official told NBC News that within weeks of Lewandowski’s second meeting with Zoley, Lewandowski told him not to award more contracts to GEO Group. Lewandowski, through a spokesperson, denied that. Months later, in December 2025, GEO Group did receive a new contract for $121 million for services that help locate immigrants DHS is trying to find.

Lewandowski‘s spokesperson denied this account of his interactions with GEO Group. “This is absolutely false and did not happen — Mr. Lewandowski never demanded any payment or compensation from the Geo Group, at any time,” his representative said.

Asked whether he has ever received “any money from any of the contracts” he has signed off on, Lewandowski previously told NBC News in an interview, “zero, not one penny.”

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THIEL COLLEGE: Comment No. 3

What is the impact of Miller v. Alabama  on juvenile punishment?

Why do states continue to enact laws that apply the death penalty to non-death cases i.e. child rape?

'Campus Carry' arming college students and staff is a lousy idea

In at least six statehouses this year, lawmakers are revisiting a long-running debate over whether guns should be allowed on college campuses, reported Stateline.

Republican lawmakers in Florida, Louisiana, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming have introduced bills that would allow students, staff or visitors with concealed carry permits — and in some cases, without permits — to bring firearms onto public college campuses.

Supporters say the proposals would allow people to defend themselves during emergencies. Opponents argue they could make campuses less safe and increase the risk of accidental or impulsive violence.

The push comes amid another year of intense debate over gun policy in state legislatures, where lawmakers are advancing sharply different measures.

And it comes as college campuses continue to grapple with the threat of gun violence.

On March 12, a gunman opened fire inside a classroom at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, killing one person and injuring two others before ROTC students fought back. One of the students stabbed the gunman, killing him, according to law enforcement officials.

Virginia law currently prohibits firearms on public college and university campuses. The FBI is investigating the attack as a possible act of terrorism.

The Old Dominion University attack was the most recent of 17 deadly shootings on college campuses nationwide since 1966, according to Stateline research.

More than half of the states prohibit firearms on public colleges and universities. In some states, individual institutions may decide whether to allow guns on campus.

At least 14 states currently allow firearms on public college campuses, though some restrict them to people who have a valid carry license.

Legal debates

The U.S. Supreme Court has long suggested that governments can bar guns in certain locations — including schools and government buildings — but it has offered little guidance on how far those gun-free zones can stretch across today’s sprawling college campuses.

“It’s fair to say that states and universities still have broad authority to make decisions about guns on campus, to regulate them or to deregulate them,” Blocher said.

The Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen said that modern gun laws must align with the country’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.

Bruen also limited the extent to which states can restrict who may carry guns in public, which has shifted some legal debates to focus on where guns can be carried.

Courts generally accept that schools fall within the category of “sensitive places,” Blocher said, but the doctrine is still underdeveloped: Judges have said far less about how to treat off-campus housing, remote research sites or other university properties.

“It is the category that we kind of have the least guidance on — what locations are OK to restrict guns in, and why,” he said.

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Florida carries out nation leading fourth execution of the year

 The 7th Execution of 2026

A Florida man, Michael Lee King was executed on March 17, 2026 for killing a young mother who frantically called 911 from her attacker’s cellphone while tied up in his car, reported The Associated Press.

King, 54, was pronounced dead at 6:13 p.m. following a three-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke. He had been convicted of first-degree murder, sexual battery and kidnapping in the 2008 killing of Denise Amber Lee, 21.

The curtain to the death chamber went up at 6 p.m., the scheduled execution time, and King gave a nearly inaudible statement, its text relayed by Gov. Ron DeSantis office.

“Since finding Jesus in prison, I have tried to live as His disciple obeying the Two Great Commandments: To love God with all my heart, my mind and all my being, and to love my neighbor to include everyone — my family, Denise Lee’s family, everyone in the gallery,” as well as Catholic volunteers who visit the prison and “those on the team to end my life,” he said.

King did not apologize or seek forgiveness. Meanwhile, a clergy member was at the foot of the gurney beside him.

As the drugs started flowing, King began breathing heavily, his body twitching. All movement ceased minutes later, and the warden shook King and yelled his name, but he did not respond. A medic subsequently pronounced him dead.

Court records show the victim was outside her North Port home on Jan. 17, 2008, with her two sons — a toddler and an infant — when King drove by, spotted her, and later abducted her while leaving the children home alone.

King took Lee to his home where he bound and raped her, investigators said. Later that day, King drove to his cousin’s house to borrow a flashlight, shovel and gas can, according to prosecutors. While Lee was bound in King’s car, she managed to get his cellphone and called 911. She can be heard on a recording of the call begging for her life so that she could see her husband and children again.

King eventually drove Lee to a remote area of North Port, a southwest Florida community, where he shot her in the face and buried her, authorities said. A state trooper pulled King over a short time later because his 1994 green Chevrolet Camaro matched the description give by another 911 caller. A woman had heard screams coming from the vehicle while stopped at a traffic light and had called police to report a possible child abduction.

Investigators later recovered Lee’s hair and belongings from King’s home and vehicle, authorities said.

Months later, the Florida Legislature unanimously passed the Denise Amber Lee Act, which provides better training for 911 operators. The Denise Amber Lee Foundation, created by her husband Nathan Lee, continues to promote training and raise public awareness nationwide.

The foundation said that besides Lee’s 911 call, at least four other 911 calls were made by others that day, including from her husband and people who saw parts of the crime unfolding — but that communication failures and other issues prevented help from being sent.

Nathan Lee, as well as the victim’s father and one of Lee’s two sons were among relatives who witnessed the execution. All wore shirts in pink, her favorite color.

Afterward, the husband said he was relieved to close out this chapter and continue to focus on improvements to the nation’s 911 system.

”I’m just super blessed that I got to know Denise, let alone marry her and have two amazing kids with her,” he said.

Richard Goff, the woman’s father, pointed out that King didn’t even apologize.

”If you can’t say something from your heart, don’t say it,” Goff said. He added his daughter was a hero after purposely hiding hair and other DNA in King’s car and making sure to leave fingerprints for investigators to find.

Noah Lee was 2 years old when his mother was killed and said he still feels her loss.

“I unfortunately didn’t get the opportunity to know her and be raised by her,” the young man said.

King’s execution was the fourth this year in Florida and the seventh overall in the U.S. in 2026, including two executions in Texas and one in Oklahoma. Two more Florida executions are scheduled this year on March 31 and April 21.

A total of 47 people were executed in the U.S. in 2025, including a record 19 executions last year in Florida.

All Florida executions are carried out by injecting a sedative, a paralytic and a drug that stops the heart, according to the Department of Corrections.

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected King’s final appeals without comment Monday.

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