New Mexico
Fired state archaeological official sues governor, others
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — The former director of the New Mexico Office of Archaeological Studies is suing state officials, saying his race and gender played a role in his firing.
Eric Blinman filed a lawsuit in federal court late Thursday against Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, state Cultural Affairs Secretary Debra Garcia y Griego, and several others, the Santa Fe New Mexican reported.
In the suit, Blinman alleges Garcia y Griego wrongfully terminated him because he was an older white man who complained about a lack of resources to do his job.
He also claims his firing was retaliation because he told a human resources director, who is a defendant, in confidence about his suspicions of improper conduct by Garcia y Griego.
He is asking for an unspecified sum for wrongful termination and intentional infliction of emotional distress, as well as punitive damages.
Daniel Zillmann, a Department of Cultural Affairs spokesperson, called the allegations “untrue and unfounded.” There was “sound and carefully considered reasoning behind the termination of Dr. Blinman.”
A representative for the office of Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, did not respond to a message seeking comment Thursday night.
New Hampshire
Judge: State must stop holding psychiatric patients in ERs
CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — New Hampshire has one year to stop the involuntary holding of psychiatric patients in emergency rooms, a federal judge ruled, several months after declaring the state’s practice unconstitutional.
U.S. District Court Judge Landya McCafferty issued an order Wednesday after giving the state and hospitals time to submit proposed orders or a timeline for how they would develop an order together. But both sides couldn’t come to an agreement. McCafferty ruled following a hearing Monday.
McCafferty also ruled the state can only hold people in emergency rooms for up to six hours, before transferring them to a facility for treatment. State officials had asked for up to 12 hours. She asked for status reports from the state every four months.
New Hampshire has long struggled with a mental health system that advocates say is overburdened at every stage, from initiation of treatment to re-entry into the community. Emergency room boarding, with people in crisis waiting days or weeks for treatment, has become a flashpoint and focus of multiple lawsuits.
McCafferty’s ruling in February that said the state is violating the rights of hospitals by seizing their property came after a lawsuit filed by patients who argue they were involuntarily held in emergency rooms without an opportunity to contest their detentions. A group of hospitals joined the lawsuit, arguing their rights also were violated.
Illinois
Firearms industry could face more legal risk under bill approved by state lawmakers
CHICAGO (AP) — The firearms industry, including gun sellers, could be sued for alleged violations of Illinois law including marketing to young people under legislation Illinois state senators approved Thursday.
The House previously approved the bill and it now goes to Gov. J.B. Pritzker, also a Democrat, who said that he will sign it. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, a Democrat, spearheaded the proposal.
“Gun violence is a public health epidemic, and those who encourage unlawful use of a firearm or target sales of firearms to minors worsen the scourge of gun violence in our communities,” Pritzker said in a statement. “This legislation finally protects Illinoisans from predatory actions by the firearms industry.”
Republican lawmakers objected to the proposal during Thursday’s Senate vote, saying it was too broad and would lead to court challenges.
The federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, approved in 2005, broadly exempts gun makers from being sued for injuries caused by criminal misuse of their products. But it provides exceptions, including an allegation that the manufacturer or seller violated state or federal law on the sale or marketing of firearms.
Senate President Don Harmon, a Democrat from Oak Park, said the proposal makes clear that the industry must comply with Illinois law, including a prohibition on marketing guns to anyone under 18. Before Thursday’s vote, Harmon referenced advertising campaigns for a “JR-15” rifle that dubbed the weapon “smaller, safer and lighter.”
“This is how people are marketing guns to our children,” he said.
Tennessee
Lawsuit: FBI failed to protect man slain amid political scandal decades ago
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The son of a key federal witness who authorities say was killed decades ago with the help of a former Tennessee governor’s administration during the state’s largest political scandal is suing the FBI, saying it failed to protect his father.
Marrell Graham filed the federal lawsuit this week claiming that the United States’ actions led to the deprivation of “the loss of income, services, protection, care, assistance ... counsel, and advice of his father.”
Details surrounding the movie-like case were first revealed in 2021 after law enforcement officials spent more than 40 years chipping away at the case of Samuel Pettyjohn’s killing.
Ultimately, officials unveiled a wild scandal showing that Pettyjohn, an ally of union boss Jimmy Hoffa, was gunned down in 1979 in downtown Chattanooga after testifying about corrupt officials selling prison pardons. The slaying took place during the early phases of Tennessee’s notorious “cash-for-clemency” scandal, as federal investigators were examining whether persons in the governor’s office were exchanging cash for parole.
Pettyjohn became involved in the investigation after he was subpoenaed to testify about the matter. He eventually agreed to cooperate with FBI agents, even going as far as providing a list of people who allegedly made payments to the governor’s office for the early release of certain prisoners.
However, officials said, fear over how much Pettyjohn knew led to several sources hiring a suspected hitman — Ed Alley, a known bank robber who died in 2005 in federal prison. Former Hamilton County District Attorney Neal Pinkston said in 2021 that those sources included an undisclosed third party who paid some of the contract money on behalf of Democratic Gov. Ray Blanton’s administration. They said the estimated total price for the killing was between $25,000 and $50,000.
According to officials, Alley donned a wig and blackface to throw authorities off the trail.
A spokesperson for the FBI didn’t immediately respond Thursday to a request for comment regarding the lawsuit.
“Essentially, Mr. Pettyjohn cooperated with authorities and knew too much about what was going on locally, as well as the state level, and individuals didn’t like that and so individuals hired someone to murder him,” Pinkston said at the time. “Here we are some 42 years later.”
In 2021, a Hamilton County grand jury concluded that if Alley were alive today, he would be charged with first-degree premeditated murder of Pettyjohn.
Meanwhile, Pinkston is no longer in elected office and is representing Marrell in the case.
The “cash-for-clemency” scandal ultimately led to the ousting of Gov. Blanton, who was never indicted in the investigation — although three of his aides were. However, questions lingered about the extent to which the governor’s administration actively worked to thwart the investigation.
The 12-page federal lawsuit alleges that the FBI has refused to disclose any information surrounding Pettyjohn’s death after local law enforcement publicized their findings two years ago.
“As a direct and proximate result of the intentional, reckless and/or negligent actions and omissions of the defendant as set forth above, the plaintiffs father, Samuel Pettyjohn, suffered a wrongful death,” the lawsuit claims. “As a surviving child, Graham can seek recovery for the wrongful death of his father, including the monetary value of the decedent’s life.”
Mississippi
Trans girl is told not to wear dress to graduation, lawsuit says
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi school district is refusing to let a transgender girl wear a dress and heeled shoes with her graduation cap and gown for high school graduation this weekend, her family says in a federal lawsuit against the district.
The lawsuit filed Thursday demands that the Harrison County School District allow the 17-year-old to wear what she wants as she and her classmates graduate from Harrison Central High School on Saturday.
The teenager is listed in court documents by her initials, L.B. The lawsuit said L.B. had worn dresses to classes and to extracurricular events throughout high school, including to a prom last year.
The Harrison Central principal, Kelly Fuller, told L.B. and her parents May 9 that the school on the Mississippi Gulf Coast would make L.B. follow a dress code requiring male students to wear white shirts, black slacks and black shoes for graduation, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing the family. The dress code says girls are to wear white dresses.
Fuller said the request to meet with L.B. about the dress code was prompted by Harrison County School District Superintendent Mitchell King, who had called to ask what transgender students were wearing to graduation, according to the lawsuit.
King told the teenager’s mother in a phone call that L.B. “needs to wear pants, socks, and shoes like a boy,” and King repeatedly misgendered L.B. as a boy, the ACLU said in a news release.
U.S. District Judge Sul Ozerden scheduled a Friday hearing on the family’s request for temporary restraining order against the school district.
Wynn Clark, attorney for the Harrison County School Board, declined to comment on the lawsuit Thursday.
“I have not read the entirety of their complaint,” Clark told The Associated Press.
The AP left phone messages Thursday for Fuller and King about the lawsuit, which says L.B. should not face discriminatory and unequal treatment.
“My graduation is supposed to be a moment of pride and celebration and school officials want to turn it into a moment of humiliation and shame,” L.B. said in the news release. “The clothing I’ve chosen is fully appropriate for the ceremony and the superintendent’s objections to it are entirely unfair to myself, my family and all transgender students like me. I have the right to celebrate my graduation as who I am, not who anyone else wants me to be.”
The lawsuit said L.B. “has lived every aspect of her high school career as a girl.”
“L.B. should be focused on celebrating this important milestone alongside her peers; however, this targeted attack by the leaders of the Harrison County School District seeks to strip her of her right to celebrate this occasion as her true self,” said McKenna Raney-Gray, staff attorney for the ACLU of Mississippi.
