Twin Cities Criminal Law Blog

A Minnesota judge just wrapped up the trials of nine recruits to a terror network who attempted to join ISIS. The Judge handed down sentences that ranged from time served and probation in a halfway house to 35 years in prison.

What made the difference for each defendant’s sentence? All of them were accused of similar crimes under the U.S. Patriot Act. All were similar in age, and all were stopped before they could carry out their plans to join ISIS. Why, then, did the judge show more compassion to some defendants than others?

Over the past three years, there has been a nationwide increase in the number of children being placed in foster care, according to federal records. Today’s numbers have several moving parts, as the federal data suggests that more kids are staying in foster care for longer periods of time. Other children may be in foster care for a short period, but reentering at a later date.

The data says that total number of children in foster care has risen for three consecutive years. However, the acting secretary of the Administration on Children and Families, Mark Greenberg, says that fewer kids today are in foster care than the numbers recorded a decade ago, according to The Chronicle of Social Change.

Hiring for the upcoming holiday shopping season has begun in earnest. While actual numbers likely won’t be available for a month or so, it is possible for hundreds of thousands of temporary employees to be hired in the last months of 2016.