April 2, 2006
This blog is moving tomorrow, to http://www.beloblog.com/ProJo_Blogs/newsblog/
Monday, April 3, we'll start blogging from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. each weekday. We're moving to a new blog -- ProJo 7 to 7 -- and a new URL.
Unfortunately, you'll need to change your bookmarks and RSS feed to reach the new blog. This old URL -- http://www.beloblog.com/ProJo_Blogs/9to5/ -- will remain, but won't be updated any more. All new posts will be on the new blog.
Please bookmark the new link: http://www.beloblog.com/ProJo_Blogs/newsblog/ and start using it Monday. Of course, you'll still be able to reach this blog from the projo.com homepage and from projo.com/blogs
The good news about the new URL is that someday, when we move to 24/7, we won't have to break it again.
If you're up and online at 7, we'll be here.
Sheila Lennon
for projo.com
Posted by Sheila Lennon 
at 8:28 PM | Permalink
March 31, 2006
Journal photo / Andrew Dickerman
A portrait of workers' rights activist Cesar Chavez looks out at the scene at Smith Hill's Davis Park in Providence after a groundbreaking ceremoney today for a memorial garden to Chavez.
Posted by Andrea Panciera at 5:02 PM | Permalink
Don't forget to spring your clocks forward this weekend for Daylight Saving Time.
Daylight Saving Time begins at 2 a.m. Sunday, and clocks should be turned ahead an hour.
That's right. This weekend is an hour shorter, but it means an extra hour of daylight to enjoy spring after work.
Posted by Jack Perry at 4:49 PM | Permalink
BRISTOL -- President Bush’s system of military tribunals for suspected terrorists might be in jeopardy, based on questions posed by U.S. Supreme Court justices earlier this week, the president of the National Institute of Military Justice said today at Roger Williams University law school.
Eugene R. Fidell gave the keynote address during a law school symposium titled “Challenges and Changes to Military Law from the War on Terror.”
Before and after the speech, Fidell talked about Tuesday’s oral arguments before the Supreme Court in a case involving Osama bin Laden’s driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan.
Hamdan’s lawyers are challenging the military commissions set up for terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. And on Tuesday justices seemed skeptical of the administration’s contention that the tribunals can be used without adhering to U.S. military procedures or the Geneva Convention.
In 2003, Rhode Island Supreme Court Chief Justice Frank J. Williams was named to the military review panel that would hear appeals from suspected terrorists tried before the military commissions.
But, Fidell said, “If I were Judge Williams, I would not have myself measured for a uniform yet. The fate of the military commissions lies in the hands of the justices of the Supreme Court. And while it’s always hazardous to predict the actions based on oral arguments, the government certainly had its work cut out for it at the Hamdan arguments.”
-- More to come on projo.com and tomorrow's Journal
-- Journal staff writer Edward Fitzpatrick
Posted by Jack Perry at 4:41 PM | Permalink
Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch is questioning the legality of the decision that gave retired Traffic Tribunal Judge Marjorie R. Yashar credit for eight months she spent on unpaid leave in 2005 when court officials calculated her pension.
Lynch is urging the Rhode Island Supreme Court to examine whether Yashar truly qualified for the $120,310 annual pension she is now receiving.
“State law clearly states that former Judge Yashar is not entitled to have the eight months she spent on unpaid leave calculated into her pension benefits,” Lynch said in a statement issued today. “To heap an extra serving of this proportion on a plate that’s fully funded by the taxpayers of Rhode Island is not only costly and offensive, but wrong, under the law. It’s imperative that former Judge Yashar’s pension is adjusted to reflect her actual service to the state during her employment.”
Court officials have said that according to their interpretation of state law, they had no choice but to give Yashar credit based solely on when she started and ended her service.
Read more on this issue.
Read letters between state officials and Yashar regarding her pension.
-- With reports by Journal staff writer Scott Mayerowitz
Posted by Kate Bramson at 4:18 PM | Permalink
