Court rejects case of Oklahoma teen killed by police
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court won't hear a civil rights case brought by the parents of a teenager who was naked and unarmed when he was fatally shot by an Oklahoma police officer in 2019.
The high court on Monday rejected without comment the lawsuit bought by the parents of Isaiah Lewis. Police have said that the 17-year-old was shot after he broke into a home in Edmond and attacked two officers. They have said that a stun gun had no effect on him.
Lewis' lawyers wrote that on the day he was shot he had inadvertently smoked marijuana laced with PCP. His parents argued that he was experiencing a mental health crisis and that police used excessive force.
An autopsy report found Lewis suffered a total of four gunshot wounds to his face, thighs and groin.
A federal trial court judge had allowed the lawsuit against the officer who shot Lewis to go forward, but a three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver reversed that ruling. The Supreme Court's decision not to take the case leaves the appeals court ruling in place.
Justices won't review GOP's Kansas congressional map
By John Hanna
AP Political Writer
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court won't review a congressional redistricting law enacted by the Republican-controlled Kansas Legislature that some voters and Democrats saw as political gerrymandering.
The nation's highest court said Monday without explanation that it won't hear an appeal of a Kansas Supreme Court ruling from May 2022 that upheld the redistricting law, which was challenged by 11 voters.
The appeal centered on the Kansas court's rejection of critics' claims that the new congressional map was racially gerrymandered. The Kansas court also ruled that the state constitution permits partisan gerrymandering.
The GOP map had appeared to hurt the chances of reelection last year for the only Democrat in the state's congressional delegation, U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, in her Kansas City-area district. But Davids still won her race in November by 12 percentage points.
The law also moved the liberal northeastern Kansas city of Lawrence into a district with heavily Republican western Kansas.
The Legislature must redraw political boundaries at least once every 10 years to ensure that districts are as equal in population as possible. The Kansas Supreme Court split 4-3 on whether the state constitution allows partisan gerrymandering.
The Kansas court's majority said the state constitution doesn't bar lawmakers from considering partisan factors in drafting their maps. It added that state courts would have no clear standard for what constitutes improper gerrymandering absent a "zero tolerance" standard.
