Parents, Sheriffs, And Tax Court Favored by Court

The Supreme Court yesterday:

• Ruled parents don't need a lawyer to pursue lawsuits in federal courts over their children's special education needs. The decision supported parents from Ohio who said they were unable to afford a lawyer to sue over their autistic child's needs.

• Reversed a federal appeals court ruling against sheriff's deputies who, armed with a valid search warrant, entered the home of white Los Angeles residents even though the warrant identified suspects as African-American. The appeals court said the search was unreasonable and allowed the residents, who were naked in bed when deputies entered, to pursue their lawsuit.

• Agreed to review a case from Kentucky, with potentially big implications for the $3 trillion municipal bond market. At issue is whether states can exempt their municipal bonds from taxes while taxing such bonds issued by other states.

• Concluded that only the U.S. Tax Court may review refusals by the Internal Revenue Service to reduce interest payments on people who underpay their taxes.

• Declined to decide an employment discrimination lawsuit against the office of a former senator, Mark Dayton, a Democrat of Minnesota.

• Using the case of a convicted child sex abuser, will consider whether state courts can apply recent Supreme Court rulings to older cases involving state prison inmates. The court ruled earlier this term that federal courts could not retroactively apply a 2004 decision giving defendants a constitutional right to cross-examine witnesses against them. The court has never ruled whether state courts are similarly bound.

• Refused to intervene in the cases of three American Muslims challenging their convictions for preparing for holy war against America.