9,901 articles
Baybaşin family
Baybaşin family: Kurdish-Turkish crime clan from Lice, Turkey, also called the Bombacilar; led by brothers Huseyin (life sentence, Netherlands), Abdullah and Mehmet; once controlled up to 90% of UK heroin.
Bayh–Dole Act
The Bayh–Dole Act (Public Law 96-517, 35 U.S.C. 200–212, also the University and Small Business Patent Procedures Act of 1980) lets universities, small businesses, and nonprofits elect title to federally funded inventions, subject to utilization reporting, domestic-manufacture preferences, and government march-in rights.
Bear Brook murders
Bear Brook murders: four bodies, an adult woman and three girls, found in two barrels near Bear Brook State Park, Allenstown, New Hampshire, 1985 and 2000. Killer Terry Peder Rasmussen, alias Bob Evans and Curtis Kimball, identified by genetic genealogy; victims identified 2019 and 2025.
Beast Games lawsuit
Beast Games lawsuit: proposed class action filed September 16, 2024 in Los Angeles Superior Court (No. 24STCV24042) by five anonymous contestants of MrBeast's Amazon Prime Video show, alleging worker misclassification, unpaid wages, unsafe conditions, and sexual harassment; still unresolved as of 2026.
Beau Biden
Beau Biden (Joseph R. Biden III, 1969–2015), eldest son of President Joe Biden, was Attorney General of Delaware 2007–2015 and a Delaware Army National Guard Major who served in Iraq 2008–2009; he died of brain cancer at 46.
Beef Tribunal
The Beef Tribunal (Tribunal of Inquiry into the Beef Processing Industry) was an Irish public inquiry chaired by Liam Hamilton, 1991–1994, which found Goodman International engaged in systematic tax evasion and cost IR£18.5 million in legal fees.
Beheading video
Beheading video: recorded decapitation footage disseminated online, chiefly by jihadist groups; from Daniel Pearl (2002) and Nick Berg (2004) to IS's Foley video (2014), with studied production, audiences, and moderation.
Beilis affair
The Beilis affair (1911–1913) was a Kiev blood libel trial in which Mendel Beilis, a Jewish brick-factory clerk, was falsely accused of ritually murdering Andrei Iushchinskii; a jury acquitted him while affirming a ritual murder.
Bela G. Lugosi
Bela G. Lugosi (Béla George Lugosi) is a Los Angeles intellectual property attorney, son of the Dracula actor, whose suit against Universal in Lugosi v. Universal Pictures (1979) shaped California's 70-year postmortem right of publicity law.
Béla Kiss
Béla Kiss, the "Monster of Cinkota", was a Hungarian tinsmith born 1877 who murdered women lured by marriage ads under the alias Hoffmann, preserving bodies in alcohol-sealed drums; discovered 1916, he vanished and was never caught.
Belarusian language law of 1990
The Belarusian language law of 1990 made Belarusian the sole state language of the Byelorussian SSR, in force from September 1990 until reversed in the 1990s.
Belene labour camp
The Belene labor camp was communist Bulgaria's largest and longest-operating forced-labor camp, on Persin island in the Danube, holding over 15,000 regime opponents without trial from 1949 to 1987.
Belle Gunness
Belle Gunness (Brynhild Paulsdatter Strseth, 1859–disappeared 1908), Norwegian-American serial killer and 'Lady Bluebeard' of La Porte, Indiana, who lured suitors via matrimonial ads; her death in the 1908 farmhouse fire was never confirmed.
Belovezha Accords (Беловежские соглашения)
Belovezha Accords (Беловежские соглашения), signed December 8, 1991 by Yeltsin, Kravchuk, and Shushkevich at Viskuli, Belarus, declared the USSR defunct and created the CIS.
Belva Ann Lockwood
Belva Ann Lockwood (1830-1917), American lawyer and suffragist; first woman admitted to the U.S. Supreme Court bar (1879) and first to argue before it (Kaiser v. Stickney, 1880); Equal Rights Party presidential candidate 1884 and 1888.
Ben Emmerson
Ben Emmerson (Benedict Emmerson, born 1963) is a British KC and international lawyer, founding member of Matrix Chambers, UN Special Rapporteur on counter-terrorism 2011–2017, and counsel in the Haradinaj, al-Senussi, and Litvinenko cases.
Ben Ferencz
Ben Ferencz (Benjamin Berell Ferencz, 1920–2023), last surviving Nuremberg prosecutor, chief prosecutor of the 1947 Einsatzgruppen Trial of 22 SS officers, later restitution advocate and campaigner for the International Criminal Court.
Ben Field (murderer)
Benjamin Luke Field, former deputy churchwarden of Maids Moreton, convicted in 2019 of murdering lecturer Peter Farquhar (36-year minimum term); the Court of Appeal quashed the conviction in April 2026 over a causation misdirection, with a Supreme Court appeal pending.
Ben Hall (bushranger)
Ben Hall was an Australian bushranger who led a prolific gang in New South Wales in the early 1860s and took part in the Eugowra gold escort robbery.
Bench trial
Bench trial: a trial by judge alone, no jury, with the judge deciding facts and law. US federal waiver needs written waiver, government consent, court approval; bench conviction rate 55% vs jury 84%.
Benita Y. Pearson
Benita Yalonda Pearson is an American jurist serving as a United States district judge for the Northern District of Ohio since 2010, appointed by President Barack Obama.
Benito Juárez
Benito Juárez (Benito Pablo Juárez García, 1806–1872), Zapotec-born liberal president of Mexico (1858–1872), author of the Ley Juárez, leader of the Reforma and resistance to Maximilian's French-backed empire, executed Maximilian in 1867, declared Benemérito de la Patria.
Benjamín Arellano Félix
Benjamín Arellano Félix (aliases El Min, El Colores), Sinaloa-born leader of the Tijuana Cartel (Arellano Félix Organization); arrested in Puebla in 2002, extradited to the US in 2011, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 years.
Benjamin Brafman
Benjamin Brafman, New York criminal defense lawyer and principal of Brafman & Associates, P.C.; former Manhattan ADA (Rackets Bureau). Known for white-collar and high-profile defense, including Sean Combs' 1999 acquittal and Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
Benjamin Chew Howard
Benjamin Chew Howard (1791–1872) was an American lawyer and Democratic politician from Maryland who served four terms in Congress and was the Supreme Court's Reporter of Decisions from 1843 to 1862.
Benjamin Crump
Benjamin (Ben) Crump, American civil rights and personal injury attorney based in Tallahassee, Florida; founder of Ben Crump Law. Known as "Black America's Attorney General"; represented families of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor; won $641M Flint settlement and $27M Floyd settlement.
Benjamin H. Settle
Benjamin H. Settle, also known as Benjamin Hale Settle, is an American jurist serving as a senior United States district judge of the Western District of Washington, appointed by George W. Bush in 2007.
Benjamin Hoskins Paddock
Benjamin Hoskins Paddock (1926–1998), also Patrick Benjamin Paddock, American bank robber, FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive #302 from 1969 to 1977; escaped La Tuna prison, captured 1978 in Oregon as Bruce Ericksen; father of Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock.
Benjamin J. Beaton
Benjamin J. Beaton, born in 1981 in Paducah, Kentucky, is a United States district judge for the Western District of Kentucky, appointed by President Trump in 2020.
Benjamin J. Cheeks
Benjamin Jerome Cheeks, born 1977 in Albany, Georgia, is a United States district judge for the Southern District of California, confirmed in 2024 and seated since 2025.