**Texas Appeals Court Rubber-Stamps Crypto Theft Conviction** A Texas appeals court on December 31, 2025, upheld Daniel Nicholas Villazana’s conviction from Camp County’s 276th District Court, finding no errors in the trial judgment. While full opinion details remain sparse, the ruling affirms a case tied to local crime (Tr. Ct. No. CF-22-02923), waiving appeal costs…
Texas Murder Conviction Stands Despite Evidence Rule Fights A Texas appeals court upheld Daniel Villazana’s 42-year murder sentence after a deadly house party shooting, rejecting claims that prosecutors sandbagged expert witnesses and broke witness sequestration rules. The ruling reinforces trial judges’ wide latitude in handling discovery slip-ups and “The Rule” violations, prioritizing fairness over technical…
**Texas Court Backs Trust in Construction Feud – No Crypto Angle** A Texas appeals court on December 31, 2025, upheld a lower court’s ruling in a mundane construction dispute, affirming judgment against Billy Marquis of Marquis Brothers General Construction and in favor of Zachary Sadeghian, trustee of Kamy Real Property Trust. This routine affirmance in…
**Texas Court Shields Frivolous Roof Suit from Sanctions Penalty** A Texas appeals court just upheld a trial judge’s refusal to slap sanctions on a real estate trust that sued a roofer over shoddy 2015 work discovered nine years later, dropping the case days after the roofer hit back with a limitations defense. This ruling reinforces…
**Court Slams Pro Se Suit Over Pharmacy Promise Gone Wrong** A Second Circuit panel unanimously affirmed dismissal of Brian Ng’s lawsuit against claims handler Sedgwick and employee Sandra Brach, ruling his promissory and equitable estoppel claims flopped hard. Ng blamed Kmart Pharmacy for botching his prescription, then targeted Sedgwick for allegedly promising a document review…
**Court Slams Frivolous Suit Against Pharmacy Claims Firm** A Second Circuit panel unanimously affirmed dismissal of Brian Ng’s lawsuit against Sedgwick, the third-party administrator for Kmart Pharmacy, tossing claims of promissory estoppel, equitable estoppel, and negligent misrepresentation over a botched prescription fill. Ng, representing himself, alleged a Sedgwick employee promised a favorable review of his…
### Clerks Immune: Court Shields Restitution Errors from Lawsuits An Ohio appeals court slammed the door on a crime victim’s bid to sue a county clerk for bungled restitution checks, affirming absolute immunity for quasi-judicial acts. Trent Haery, shorted in a $300,000 payout from financial fraud cases, got overpaid $40,000 by mistake, spent it, then…
Oregon Supreme Court Narrows “Physical Force” in Robbery Law Oregon’s top court just gutted a key robbery conviction, ruling that snatching a motel keycard from someone’s hand without touching them or sparking fear doesn’t count as “physical force.” This reverses years of lower court precedent, forcing a retrial and raising the bar for what elevates…
Oregon Supreme Court Clears Lawyer in Verbal Order Dispute Oregon’s highest court just tossed out a disciplinary case against attorney Anne-Marie Clark, ruling the state bar failed to prove she knowingly disobeyed a judge’s verbal order. Clark, acting as trustee for her disabled cousin’s special needs trust, stopped sending $20 monthly checks after a chaotic…
**Tennessee Court Slaps Down Stalker’s Appeal in Protection Order Case** A Tennessee appeals court dismissed Aaron Cregati’s challenge to a 10-year extension of a protection order against him for stalking a pregnant teen, ruling he waived all arguments by skipping hearings and failing to raise issues below. The decision awards the victim’s attorney fees, reinforcing…
Tennessee Court Bolsters Multi-Victim Gun Crime Prosecutions A Tennessee appeals court mostly upheld harsh sentences against a man who fired six shots at a Waffle House parking lot SUV packed with three adults and four teens, grazing one juvenile, then pistol-whipped threats at another couple. The ruling reverses a lower court’s merger of two reckless…
### Pastor Sues Over Rape Claim, Court Shields Free Speech Washington appeals court slams the door on a pastor’s defamation suit against his ex-assistant, ruling her “rape” accusation in a letter and blog post is protected speech under the new Uniform Public Expression Protection Act (UPEPA). Pastor Micahn Carter, who bedded assistant Mary Jones in…
### Washington Court Greenlights Warrantless Drug Searches on Supervised Offenders A Washington state appeals court upheld a conviction for drug possession by ruling that probation-like supervision kicks in immediately upon sentencing, even during electronic home monitoring, allowing warrantless home searches on failed drug tests. This unpublished decision clarifies when Department of Corrections (DOC) authority begins,…
**Washington Court Slaps Estate Heir with Contempt Over Secret Home Sale** A Washington appeals court just upheld a contempt ruling against Shane Hurd, who secretly sold his late father’s house—out from under the man’s longtime partner Dorothy Phillips—then blew the $165,000 proceeds without proof. Phillips, who poured cash into the down payment, renovations, and bills…
**Fifth Circuit Slaps Down Prisoner’s Habeas Bid – No Crypto Link** A federal inmate’s bid to revive his stalled habeas corpus petition crashed in the Fifth Circuit, where judges dismissed his appeal as meritless and denied pauper status for appeal. Olamide Bello failed to counter the lower court’s dismissal for lack of prosecution, handing a…
Uniswap’s token burn, protocol fee proposal backed overwhelmingly by voters Uniswap governance has approved a wide-ranging tokenomics proposal that activates protocol fees for the Uniswap exchange and sets up a major UNI token burn, marking a shift in how value flows through the ecosystem. The proposal, called “UNIfication” and jointly introduced by Uniswap Labs and…
Trust Wallet users lose $7 million to hacked Chrome extension Trust Wallet said users lost roughly $7 million after attackers compromised a version of its Google Chrome browser extension, draining funds shortly after victims imported their recovery phrases. The incident surfaced on Dec. 25, when users began reporting on X that their wallets had been…
Bitcoin Hits $90,000—But Rally May Not Last Through Holidays Bitcoin briefly climbed above $90,000 this week, reaching an eight-day high of $90,353 on Monday, as traders tested a level that has repeatedly capped the market through December. But several indicators suggest the move may be difficult to sustain into the holiday period. Analysts and market…
Flare Launches New Way For XRP Investors To Earn Flare Network has launched earnXRP, a new onchain yield product built with Upshift Finance and Clearstar that aims to let XRP holders earn returns while keeping their exposure denominated in XRP. According to the project’s description, earnXRP targets 4% to 10% returns by deploying wrapped XRP…
The 7 Largest Publicly Traded Ethereum Treasury Firms Publicly traded companies are increasingly adopting crypto treasury strategies that extend beyond Bitcoin and into other major digital assets, led by Ethereum. Data from StrategicETHReserve.xyz shows public entities with Ethereum treasuries collectively hold more than 6.7 million ETH, valued at about $20 billion, representing over 5.5% of…
