ACLU of Kentucky

We came to Bowling Green, Ky., home of our good-humored surrogate, Gail, with a court order from California designating me and Richard — my husband in some states, though not in Kentucky — as the future baby’s legal parents. I’d been hoping to avoid Kentucky. Its laws make it seem unwelcoming to gay people and ambivalent about surrogacy. I figured that culturally it would be red-statey too, full of homophobia, guns and fatty foods. The coasts seemed safer, especially for a black man, a Jew and their black-Jewish daughter.

Read the full NYT peice here .

The Herald-Leader reports on a problematic deportation program in Lexington:

Since Lexington joined a federal program in October aimed at deporting illegal immigrants convicted of serious crimes, 75.6 percent of the 41 people deported have been convicted of a minor crime or no crime at all.

Lexington's percentage of such deportations is well above the national average of 60 percent, according to a Herald-Leader analysis of a report on the program released by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on March 4.

...Kate Miller, a program associate with the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, said "the removals are contrary to ICE's goal of prioritizing dangerous criminals."

Secure Communities, Miller said, "operates with minimal transparency and accountability; it facilitates racial profiling and unconstitutional arrests; it creates a risk of unlawful and prolonged detention and unfairly impacts individuals."  

For the full story, click here.

After arguing a court case for the better part of two days, Joshua Puckett and Mashayla Hays, both 18, were still eager to continue and passionate about the issue — a female student who was suspended after wearing a tuxedo to school in protest.

The Central High School students did such a good job presenting their arguments at the Marshall-Brennan National Moot Court Competition that Joshua won first place and Mashayla was named runner-up.

It was the first time in the tournament's history that two students from the same school finished in the top four, said Joe Gutmann, a law and government teacher at Central.

During the Moot Court Competition, held April 2-3 in Philadelphia, students argued an actual case involving students' rights under the First Amendment before a three-judge panel, much like lawyers do in an appeals court or the Supreme Court.

Students from various Marshall-Brennan programs sponsored by law schools around the country compete. Gutmann's students participate in the ACLU Marshall-Brennan Program through a partnership with the University of Louisville.

Read the full Courier-Journal story here .

IN January 2004, Spec. Joseph M. Darby, a 24-year-old Army reservist in Iraq, discovered a set of photographs showing other members of his company torturing prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison. The discovery anguished him, and he struggled over how to respond. “I had the choice between what I knew was morally right, and my loyalty to other soldiers,” he recalled later. “I couldn’t have it both ways.”

So he copied the photographs onto a CD, sealed it in an envelope, and delivered the envelope and an anonymous letter to the Army’s Criminal Investigation Command. Three months later — seven years ago today — the photographs were published. Specialist Darby soon found himself the target of death threats, but he had no regrets. Testifying at a pretrial hearing for a fellow soldier, he said that the abuse “violated everything I personally believed in and all I’d been taught about the rules of war.”

Read the whole Op-Ed featured in the NYT's here .