A Doctor Had His Wife Killed to Protect a Motorcycle Gang Drug Ring, Police Say
January 10, 2018 by admin
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A New Jersey doctor running an illegal prescription opioid drug ring with a motorcycle gang had a member hire someone to kill his wife after she threatened to expose the scheme while trying to force him to agree to a divorce, authorities said Tuesday.
James Kauffman and a member of the Pagans Outlaw Motorcycle Gang were charged in the May 2012 shooting death of radio host April Kauffman. Another six people connected to the gang were charged with racketeering in the drug ring, which prosecutors said continued until last summer, when Kauffman was arrested at his office while brandishing a gun.
Kauffman “was intent to have her killed, as opposed to losing his financial empire,” Atlantic County prosecutor Damon Tyner said.
Ferdinand Augello, the Pagan charged with finding someone to kill April Kauffman, also was charged Tuesday with trying to have James Kauffman killed, authorities said.
Kauffman has long maintained his innocence and denies any involvement in his wife’s death, his attorney Ed Jacobs told Philly.com. It wasn’t immediately known if Augello or any of the other defendants had lawyers to represent them.
April Kauffman’s daughter, Kimberly Pack, who had long alleged that her stepfather killed her mother, said the death “forever changed my life.”
“I have been waiting patiently for justice, and today I was lucky enough to be granted justice,” Pack said. “I think for the first time, today I can actually breathe.”
Pack had earlier fought a legal battle against her stepfather sparked by his attempts to claim April Kauffman’s two life insurance policies. His claim was turned down because prosecutors couldn’t provide a letter saying he wasn’t considered a suspect.
April Kauffman was a local businesswoman who hosted weekly talk shows and advocated for military veterans. She had received a governor’s award for outstanding community service a few days before her death.
Prosecutors said James Kauffman gave free prescriptions to people sent by Augello and Augello would receive $1,000 per script or a number of pills after the script was filled. Those who received them either used the drugs or sold them, authorities said.
In the summer of 2011, April Kauffman wanted a divorce and after James Kauffman objected she threatened to expose the drug ring, Tyner said.
Tyner said that Kauffman told Augello about his wife’s threats and solicited him to have her killed. After about a year, a man who agreed to do it, Francis Mullholland, was driven to the home, where the doors were left open, and was given a gun, authorities said. April Kauffman, 47, was shot twice, and her body was found by a handyman.
Tyner said Mullholland, who said he got about $20,000 in cash, was later found dead of a drug overdose.
Mullholland originally was identified as a cousin of a member of the motorcycle gang, but a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office later said that was incorrect. She declined to release more details about him.
Prosecutors said the drug empire lasted until June, when Kauffman was arrested on weapons charges at his Egg Harbor Township office. Authorities said he brandished a handgun as agents executed a search warrant and said, “I’m not going to jail for this!” A hostage negotiator persuaded him to surrender.
Kauffman’s license was suspended after his arrest.
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North Carolina Congressional Map Ruled Unconstitutionally Gerrymandered
January 10, 2018 by admin
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In October, the court heard an appeal of another three-judge panel’s ruling that Republicans had unconstitutionally gerrymandered Wisconsin’s State Assembly in an attempt to relegate Democrats to a permanent minority. In the second case, the justices will hear arguments by Maryland Republicans that the Democratic-controlled Legislature redrew House districts to flip a Republican-held seat to Democratic control.
The Supreme Court has struggled without success for decades to develop a legal standard for determining when a partisan gerrymander crosses constitutional lines. The court once came close to ruling that such cases were political matters beyond its jurisdiction. But the rise of extreme partisan gerrymanders in the last decade, powered by a growing ideological divide and powerful map-drawing software, has brought the question back to the justices with new urgency. A Supreme Court ruling outlawing at least some such gerrymanders could reshape the political landscape.
Fights over voting rights and election procedures have often taken center stage in Raleigh, North Carolina’s capital, and Tuesday’s ruling noted that “partisan advantage” had been a criterion lawmakers used when mulling how to map the state.
Republican officials in the General Assembly said Tuesday evening that they intended to appeal the ruling, which many elected officials and political strategists were still scrambling to digest. Dallas Woodhouse, the executive director of the North Carolina Republican Party, criticized Judge Wynn and accused him of “waging a personal, partisan war on North Carolina Republicans.”
In a separate post on Twitter, Mr. Woodhouse argued that Judge Wynn had concluded that North Carolina’s Republicans “should not be allowed to draw election districts under any circumstances under any set of rules,” an effort he called “a hostile takeover” of the General Assembly and legislatures nationwide. Republicans could ask the Supreme Court to stay the decision and allow the disputed map to be used this year.
But critics of the congressional map welcomed a decision that was notable for its tartness and urgency.
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“Clearly, the courts have realized that they do need to step in and police extreme partisan gerrymanders, and the court recognized that North Carolina’s gerrymander was one of the most extreme in history,” said Ruth Greenwood, senior legal counsel at the Campaign Legal Center and a lawyer representing some of the map’s challengers.
The chairman of the North Carolina Democratic Party, Wayne Goodwin, said the decision was “a major victory for North Carolina and people across the state whose voices were silenced by Republicans’ unconstitutional attempts to rig the system to their partisan advantage.”
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The judges issued their decision fewer than 24 hours before the General Assembly was to convene in Raleigh for a special session. The ruling unmistakably placed lawmakers on the clock, giving them two weeks to present a “remedial plan” and declaring that the court would institute its own map if it finds the new district lines unsatisfactory.
“Politically, this gives hope to Democrats,” said J. Michael Bitzer, a professor of political science at Catawba College, which is near Charlotte. “I can imagine the Republicans being furious, but they have to see political reality, and it’s not just in the next two weeks: It’s come November.”
Professor Bitzer, though, cautioned that the ultimate political fallout would not become clearer until the courts settled what could be a cascade of appeals and injunctions.
The ruling left little doubt about how the judges assessed the Legislature’s most recent map. Judge Wynn, who sits on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and was a member of a special panel considering the congressional map, said that “a wealth of evidence proves the General Assembly’s intent to ‘subordinate’ the interests of non-Republican voters and ‘entrench’ Republican domination of the state’s congressional delegation.”
Most federal lawsuits are first heard by a district court, and later — if needed — by an appeals court and the Supreme Court. But under federal law, constitutional challenges to the apportionment of House districts or statewide legislative bodies are automatically heard by three-judge panels, and appeals are taken directly to the Supreme Court.
In addition to Judge Wynn, an appointee of Mr. Obama’s, Senior Judge W. Earl Britt of the Federal District Court in Raleigh joined the opinion. Judge Britt was appointed by President Jimmy Carter.
Judge William L. Osteen Jr., who was appointed by President George W. Bush and sits on the federal bench in Greensboro, said he agreed that the existing map violated the 14th Amendment, but he disputed other parts of Judge Wynn’s opinion, including the decision to appoint an independent expert to begin preparing an alternative map.
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