Can a county Board of Elections choose a substitute candidate in a closed meeting? This was the central question in The State ex rel. Koebel v. Erie County Board of Elections et al debated in the Ohio Supreme Court. It was filed by a voter who demanded the removal of a Republican replacement candidate from the shortly forthcoming November 2026 general election ballot. While the court agreed this voter’s claims had legal standing, they objected that his 25-day delay in filing this lawsuit meant that they were now beyond the point when ballots could be changed without extremely wasteful costs. Overseas and military ballots had already been mailed starting on September 18. And rewriting and reprinting 36,450 physical ballots was deemed to be too costly. Original article: https://anaphoraliterary.com/2026/10/26/voter-vs-ohio-county-board-choosing-primary-substitute-in-a-closed-meeting

The common problem in American courts is for cases to be instantly dismissed for a lack of merit due to slight errors made by lawyers, despite their central claims being of significance to the public. The Raysor v. Safi civil lawsuit displays a less common problem: how cases truly without merit clutter the courts’ dockets and thus force judges to reject potentially more weighty disputes. Original article: https://anaphoraliterary.com/2026/10/26/how-a-fantastical-claim-from-a-presidential-candidate-was-stuck-in-pre-trial-for-7-years-before-dismissal

A public reprimand was issued by the Oklahoma Supreme Court against Tulsa County District Judge Sharon Holmes in Investigation of Sharon Holmes (2026 OK 67) for cumulative violations of the Code of Judicial Conduct. Previously, the Council on Judicial Complaints had recommended invoking removal proceedings for “oppression in office”, but the Supreme Court found her actions were merely legal errors and abuses of discretion as opposed to grounds for removal.

In 2023, Ford was arraigned on falsification charges for publishing a Facebook post aimed at four Norwalk city officials—the Mayor, Law Director, Police Chief and Safety Service Director. She claimed she had these officials “on” their “knees”, adding: “I will escort you to your demise in a manner more akin to Malcolm X than Martin Luther King Jr.” Though the rest of the post stated she hoped to “crumble the reputation” of justice-blockers by pursuing them in the “court of public opinion”. She accused them of being guilty of municipal corruption, sex scandals and fiscal mismanagement. Initially, the court agreed with the officials that the reference to the “manner” of “demise” of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King suggested a threat of an assassination, finding her guilty of four felony counts of intimidation, punished with a probation sentence.

The lawsuit was first filed by investor Arshad Assofi against the founder of Bitcoin Latinum token (LTNM) Donald Basile and GIBF GP, Inc., alleging this operation was a worthless scam. Assofi argued that Basile convinced him to invest based on false information about the other backers, such as receiving $20 million from the producers of Star Trek (denied by Paramount). Basile had suggested this association by naming this currency after “latinum", a fictional currency employed by the Ferengi in Star Trek. Basile had also falsely claimed that the coin was backed by an asset trust and insured for up to $1 billion.

On September 25, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Northern District of Illinois affirmed the conviction in United States v. Gary L. Howard of Howard to a 13-year prison sentence. Howard was appealing that the drug deal he was caught making was part of the work he previously did as a confidential informant for Homeland Security Investigations (HSI). Howard has been convicted on three federal drug charges for selling cocaine in a 2018 sting when he attempted purchasing 10 kilograms of cocaine for $280,000 in the parking lot of informant seller “Z’s” furniture store. A search of his home uncovered a loaded firearm and a drug ledger.

On September 30, 2026, in 3M Company v. Glenn M. Hammond et al, Judge Robert E. Wier of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky allowed 3M’s federal civil RICO claim to proceed to discovery while dismissing Kentucky state fraud and conspiracy claims. The defendants being sued by 3M are three lawyers—Glenn Hammond (of Kentucky), Michael Martin (of Texas), and Johnny Givens (of Mississippi)—who had filed 22 mass-tort product liability lawsuits in Kentucky against 3M on behalf of over 850 coal miners, who allege 3M’s dust mask respirators were defective, and thus caused them to contract black lung. 3M alleges that to obtain a massive settlement these lawyers cold-called “fraudulent claimants”, who they allege never wore 3M masks, never mined or had not been diagnosed with black lung.