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Laws that protect student privacy can also harm efforts to discover and investigate campus crimes. And they may be abused by schools to shield themselves, rather than students. Preferring to keep statistics about sexual assaults undercover, some schools may be relying on student privacy laws to keep campus scandals hushed. A recent editorial in The New York Times asks how much a university should have to reveal about sexual-assault cases, and whether schools are using student privacy laws as a means of covering up sexual crimes on campus....

Yesterday, the Arizona state Senate voted 17-11 to pass what some call the country’s strictest and most controversial immigration bill, requiring police to question people about their status if there’s reason to suspect they’re in the country illegally. The bill would also allow individual lawsuits to be brought against government agencies that hinder enforcement of immigration laws and make it illegal for employers to hire or knowingly transport illegal immigrants for day labor....

You’re going through your work day, lifting boxes and doing other chores. Suddenly, you feel a pain in your side, and there’s a bulge in you abdomen or groin area. You may have a hernia. Can you get workers’ compensation for a hernia? Hernia A hernia is an injury that occurs when an organ or fatty tissue is pushed through a weak spot or a tear in surrounding muscle tissue. There are several common types of hernias: inguinal (inner groin), femoral (outer groin), umbilical (belly button), and hiatal (upper stomach)....

Late fees. Fines. Wage garnishment. Even prison time. There are plenty of well-known penalties for failing to pay your federal income taxes. Add losing your passport to the list. If you are seriously delinquent tax debt, the IRS can now report that debt to the State Department, who can in turn either revoke your passport or refuse to issue you one. So what kind of debt classifies as “seriously delinquent”? And how long before the IRS clips your international travel wings?...

Just because your ex missed a child support payment doesn’t mean the obligation goes away. Like any financial obligation, the amount you’re owed will accumulate and your ex will still be responsible for making back child support payments. But for how long? Child support generally runs until a child turns 18, but if your ex missed payments during that time, can you still collect back child support after that? Here’s what you need to know....

Renting out property is not easy. You have to deal with a wide web of laws, a variety of professionals and tenants. It can be a lot to manage. Which is why landlords often make mistakes – and the same ones, at that. Most try to stay on top of the law, but things change. Other laws are just open to legal interpretation. Not sure if this applies to you? Consider the following landlord mistakes to see if you need to modify your behavior....

It’s common wisdom that when you leave a job, you should give at least two weeks’ notice to your boss. That’s definitely a good general rule. After all, if you leave without giving two weeks’ notice, you run the risk of damaging the relationships you’ve built with people at your workplace. Even if you don’t like your boss, giving less than two weeks’ notice can place a huge burden on your co-workers....

Small business owners, listen up: Don’t forget that your so-called “Obamacare letters” must be mailed to employees by October 1. While small businesses with fewer than 50 full-time employees are generally not required to offer employee health insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act, the “Obamacare letter” requirement still applies to almost all companies. If your business falls under the Fair Labor Standards Act, then you are required to notify your employees about the Affordable Care Act’s health-care exchanges, Fox News reports....

If a court has ordered alimony payments as part of your divorce, whether you’re receiving or paying, you might be wondering how long that alimony will last. While court orders or alimony agreements usually provide a timeframe, conditions, or procedure for modification or termination, typically courts will allow modification for changed circumstances. Retirement will usually qualify as a changed circumstance worthy of a modification of the order if certain conditions are met....

Of all the potential reasons not to like Facebook: divorce. That’s one you may not have heard before. This sort of Facebook divorce “evidence has gone from nothing to a large percentage of my cases coming in,” Linda Lea Vicken, a South Dakota divorce attorney, told the Associated Press. MySpace came in second at 14% and Twitter with 5%. Still, it isn’t entirely fair to put the blame on social media, as the marriages were likely to fail with or without the service, notes ZDnet....

Absinthe has long been rumored to be illegal in the United States, yet brands like Lucid and St. George openly sell their absinthe products in liquor stores across the nation. So why all the hubbub about absinthe? The liquor traditionally made from wormwood has a murky legal history in the United States and abroad, which has led absinthe producers to only recently begin marketing to Americans. Acknowledging this background, is absinthe legal?...

Congress better move their seasonal gift giving along, because without action, around 1 million laid off workers will see their federal unemployment benefits end right after the holidays. Although a new law was passed on November 6th, extending federal unemployment benefits an additional 14 weeks for workers who had already exhausted state and federal limits, these new extensions will end on December 31, unless the program is renewed by congressional action....

The hits just keep on coming for Lumber Liquidators in their burgeoning formaldehyde flooring scandal. Amidst class action lawsuits and criminal investigations comes news that the company’s stock price has been tanking, even farther than expected. Why? Because the flooring in question is even more of a cancer risk than expected. The Centers for Disease Control released an elevated warning, saying the the risk of contracting cancer from exposure to certain laminate floors is now at six to 30 cases per 100,000 people, triple what it had previously warned....

Studies have shown that Facebook can be a useful hiring tool. Just a 5- to 10-minute perusal of a user’s profile can net more information than a basic personality test. It’s no wonder employers head to the site to check out prospective hires. But one problem remains: Many users are now going private, cutting off their profiles from outside viewers. As a result, a new trend has emerged. Employers are reportedly now asking job applicants for Facebook passwords....

One North Carolina school district is going to great lengths to monitor its students’ social media habits, paying thousands to a third party to scan students’ posts. Jackson County Schools are contracting with Social Sentinel Inc. in a pilot project that will use computer algorithms to scan student social media posts for safety or security threats, reports The Sylva Herald. The program will be launched at Smoky Mountain High School in Sylva this fall, and will cost $9,500 for the first year....

Being involved in a rear-end accident is bad enough, but its even worse when you’re stopped at a red light or stop sign. These kinds of accidents can be more than just annoying fender-benders; depending on your vehicle, they may cause serious injury or even death. That was certainly the case early Friday when a hit-and-run driver slammed into an Arizona motorcycle cop at a red light, killing the officer, Phoenix’s KNXV-TV reported....

The Internet is often prime recruiting grounds for sex offenders to recruit children or expose them to sexual exploitation. In many cases, children have come into contact with sex offenders through chat rooms and social networking sites including MySpace and FaceBook. So, what are the limits on computer and technology use for those convicted of sex offenses? Although rules may vary, many state lawmakers have begun to advocate for ways to limit sex offenders’ use of technology to find more victims....

On behalf of Planned Parenthood, the ACLU filed suit late last week, challenging a South Dakota abortion law that imposes a 3 day abortion waiting period and forces women to receive counseling from unregulated “pregnancy help centers.” The civil rights organizations are arguing that the law severely restricts women’s access to health care, violates a patient’s right to privacy, and impinges on a doctor’s First Amendment rights against compelled speech....

Surrogate moms are in the news, with E! host Giuliana Rancic recently announcing her use of a surrogate. But if you’re looking to become a surrogate mom yourself, you’ll want to give careful consideration to your surrogacy contract. Many surrogate moms are more than happy to help and experience no complications, legal or otherwise. Take, for example, the North Dakota woman who carried 11 surrogate children over the last 16 years....

Outside of buying a house, or a boat, or a houseboat perhaps, buying a car is one of the biggest financial investments we’ll make. So it goes without saying that you should take the car buying process seriously and therefore you’ll probably have a lot of questions you’ll want answered before you finalize the deal. So here are three of the biggest legal questions about buying a car, from our archives:...