The O'Reilly Law Firm is very pleased to announce the return of James P. Collins to the noted trial law firm headquartered in San Mateo, effective immediately. The name of the firm is now O'Reilly II Collins. 

Collins was a founding member of the firm in 1987, originally known as O'Reilly & Collins.  In 2002, Collins left the firm in order to teach algebra and coach football and rugby at Menlo Atherton High School, a public school located in Atherton, California. 

A graduate of UC Berkeley and University of San Francisco Law School, Collins first worked as an Assistant District Attorney in San Francisco, then with Gerry Sterns's trial law firm before joining O'Reilly to form their own firm.

O'Reilly & Collins soon became pre-eminent in the field of aviation law,winning many air disaster cases for plaintiffs with scores of multi-million judgments and settlements.  The firm also won major product liability cases that received national media attention.  Collins investigated, prosecuted and won many landmark cases involving tires and improper tire replacements which led to loss of control by cars on wet roads, resulting in many deaths and serious injuries to consumers.  Collins's thorough investigations of the causes of these accidents led to important changes in the tire replacement industry that resulted in many lives being saved.

O'Reilly said, "Obviously, I am extremely happy to welcome Jim back in the fold.  He is a great friend and a great trial lawyer.  It is also a reunion of my old teammate, for we both played for the Old Blues Rugby Club of Berkeley, one of the great rugby clubs in the United States, and national champions." Collins lives in San Carlos.

In 2008, the firm set a record for judgments and settlements of air disaster with $300 million in awards for its plaintiffs.   www.oreillylaw.com

Alvord pleaded guilty last month to drunken driving, third-degree assault and reckless driving in Multnomah County Circuit Court. He also pleaded no contest to hit-and-run driving.

On Thursday, Judge Michael McShane sentenced him to 22 months in prison.

Defense lawyer Jim O'Rourke told the court that Alvord booked himself into a 30-day residential treatment center. He pushed his insurance company to settle with his victim for $1.25 million. Once he is out of prison, he has agreed to sit beside the man he injured, Norman Larkin, and tell other drunken drivers what happened when he made the decision to drink and drive.

Larkin says he now considers Alvord "a new friend." The 51-year-old Larkin suffered a broken pelvis and broken legs when Alvord's car jumped onto the sidewalk Feb. 7 and pinned him against a utility pole.

Fourteen people saw the crash and some followed Alvord, 61, as he drove off. They boxed him in less than a mile away.

Alvord had a blood-alcohol level of 0.30 percent, approaching four times the legal intoxication threshold.

Larkin acknowledges he was angry and in a lot of pain for a few weeks but says he now believes Alvord is truly remorseful.

News reports say a Taiwan court has imposed a life sentence on former President Chen Shui-bian after convicting him of corruption.

Friday's verdict came as hundreds of Chen supporters demonstrated outside a downtown Taipei court holding flags and banners saying "free him" and "Chen's innocent."

Six TV stations say a three-judge Taipei District Court panel has found the 58-year-old Chen guilty on multiple corruption counts.

Chen was charged with embezzling $3.15 million during his 2000-2008 presidency from a special presidential fund, receiving bribes worth at least $9 million in connection with a government land deal, laundering some of the money through Swiss bank accounts, and forging documents.

The Indiana Court of Appeals has ruled that a pizza shop must pay for weight-loss surgery for an obese employee to ensure the success of another operation for a back injury he suffered at work.

The decision is raising concern among businesses bracing for more such claims.

Boston's The Gourmet Pizza cook Adam Childers of Schererville weighed 340 pounds when he was injured by a freezer door. Doctors said he needed back surgery, but it wouldn't be successful unless he had weight-loss surgery first.

Boston's argued it shouldn't have to pay because Childers' weight was a pre-existing condition.

But a workers' compensation board and the court said the company had to pay because his weight and the accident created a single injury.

Frontier Airlines has received bankruptcy court approval of its reorganization plan, the Denver-based carrier announced today.

The action by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York is the last major hurdle before Frontier emerges from bankruptcy.

Republic Airways Holdings is expected to acquire all of the assets of Frontier and its subsidiary, Lynx Aviation, on about Oct. 1.

"This is an extremely proud day for everyone in our company," said Frontier chief executive Sean Menke. "Many people doubted that we would even survive, let alone accomplish a successful reorganization, provide a recovery for our creditors and emerge a stronger competitor and company."

Menke, who thanked Frontier and Lynx employees for their hard work and sacrifice, said the airline will be "a successfully restructured airline, well-positioned to be a competitive, successful, sustainable airline for years to come."

The White House plans to nominate the judge who presided over the Bernard Madoff case to the appeals court that Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor served on, Sen. Charles Schumer said Wednesday.

Schumer said in a statement that his office told the White House that U.S. District Judge Denny Chin "would be an outstanding choice" for an appointment to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.

One of the four openings on the appeals court was created Sotomayor was elevated to the U.S. Supreme Court. She heard her first case as a justice on Wednesday.

Chin, 55, sentenced Wall Street swindler Madoff earlier this summer to 150 years in prison for cheating thousands of people out of billions of dollars.

Schumer praised Chin in his two-sentence statement, saying: "Even in the most high-profile of cases, he has been unflappable, erudite and steadily applied the law." Chin did not comment publicly on Schumer's statement Wednesday.

Chin was widely celebrated for his decision to jail 71-year-old Madoff immediately after he pleaded guilty to fraud charges in March and for sentencing him to the maximum prison term in June. Yet Chin also has gained respect for his compassion on the bench.

In November 2007, he cited then-83-year-old Oscar Wyatt Jr.'s age and military service during World War II as he sentenced the Texas oilman to a year and a day in prison for his role in the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal.

Nine months earlier, he reversed a jury verdict, saying evidence did not support the fraud conviction of a former New York Stock Exchange floor supervisor who once oversaw all trading in General Electric Co. stock.

An appeals court panel upheld on Wednesday the conviction of a pharmacist for conspiracy to unlawfully distribute prescription drugs through a Wichita-based Internet pharmacy.

But the panel from the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver also threw out the conviction of a co-defendant who worked as a computer technician for Red Mesa Pharmacy.

Pharmacist Jerry Lovern and computer technician Robert Barron were convicted in February 2008 of one count of conspiracy and three counts of unlawfully distributing controlled substances.

Prosecutors said Red Mesa Pharmacy distributed more than 9,200 orders between December 2005 and March 2006 for prescriptions approved by doctors who did not physically examine the buyers or have any communication with them. The prescriptions cited included Ambien, a controlled drug used for insomnia; and phentermine, a stimulant that is sometimes contained in prescription drugs used for weight loss.

Red Mesa's owner, Dr. Wilbur Hilst of Wewoka, Okla., is serving a 33-month sentence after pleading guilty to conspiracy to unlawfully distribute prescription drugs.