Notas sobre a reforma do processo penal

Um contributo interessante de Rui Cardoso, a ler aqui.

Amianto, justiça e política

«With 600,000 claimants, upward of $70 billion spent so far on legal fees and awards, and powerful constituencies on both sides of the debate, a congressional solution to the asbestos litigation crisis has long been dismissed as simply too complicated to achieve.

But last week, six years after the Supreme Court called for national legislation to fix the "elephantine mass of asbestos cases," a legislative draft brokered by Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa.. unexpectedly surfaced in the Senate. Even the bill's most ardent opponents concede it has a reasonable chance of success.

The draft legislation, which could be introduced as early as this week and voted out of the Senate Judiciary Committee by late April or May, would establish a federally administered $140 billion trust fund -- paid for by both insurers and defendant companies -- that sets out fixed payments for nine levels of asbestos-related diseases.»