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Family of alleged Bulger victim to get day in court
Breaking Legal News |
2007/11/26 01:54
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Another family of a man allegedly ordered killed by Whitey Bulger may be able to win damages against the FBI without going through a trial. On February 19, U.S. District Court Judge Reginald Lindsay will consider a motion for summary judgment by the widow of Richard Castucci. Bulger allegedly had the 48-year-old Castucci killed in 1976 because he told the FBI about the hiding place of 2 fellow gangsters. Bulger allegedly learned about Castucci from rogue FBI agent John Connolly. Lindsay scheduled the Castucci hearing last week, right after he ruled the federal government liable for the 1982 murders of Edward Brian Halloran and Michael Donahue. Halloran was allegedly murdered by Bulger after Connolly told him Halloran was going to implicate him in a murder. Donahue was an innocent bystander. |
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If you fail to pay, law firm will come calling
Legal Business |
2007/11/26 01:02
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If you refuse to pay your property taxes in Dallas County, chances are you're going to hear from a lawyer. And the chances are even greater that lawyer will be from Linebarger Goggan Blair & Sampson. Dallas County and most of its cities and other taxing entities pay the law firm to collect delinquent taxes each year and foreclose on properties when necessary. Linebarger is a giant in the collections field – the largest law firm of its kind in the nation. The Austin-based firm has offices across the country. It aggressively seeks governmental contracts, uses an army of lobbyists and has millions to spend on political campaigns. Linebarger has had the lucrative Dallas County tax collection contract since 1984. The firm represents nine of the 10 largest taxing authorities in Texas. It also handles collection efforts for governments in California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana and Pennsylvania, as well as for the U.S. Treasury. "We're good at it. There's a reason why people hire us," said DeMetris Sampson, a managing partner of the firm's Dallas office high atop the Univision tower downtown. The incentive for Dallas County is that the firm's services are free to taxpayers. Delinquent property owners subsidize the collection effort by paying an additional attorney fee that's tacked onto their bill. County officials say that they are pleased with Linebarger's work and that privatizing the tax collection process has been a success. The firm says it has collected more than $374 million for Dallas County since 1984. This year alone, Linebarger will collect more than $1 billion for its 1,800 clients nationwide, Ms. Sampson said. She declined to say how much the Dallas County contract is worth or how much her firm earns. But assuming a fee of at least 15 percent, its revenue this year could translate to $150 million. Linebarger was one of three private collection firms the IRS began using last September to collect outstanding federal income taxes. But its contract was not renewed when it expired in March. The U.S. House voted in October to end the controversial private-collection program, but the measure died in the Senate. Despite its successes, Linebarger has not avoided controversy. In 2002, a partner was indicted on charges of conspiring to bribe two San Antonio City Council members who had voted to award the firm a collection contract. Juan Pena resigned from the firm and pleaded guilty two years later. The law firm settled a lawsuit around the same time from a competitor that accused Linebarger of offering illegal gifts and bribes and rigging bids to win collection contracts from several local governments. Ms. Sampson said people can file lawsuits for just about anything. She said the firm wins contracts by relying on its track record. But money doesn't hurt. From 2000 through this July, Linebarger gave more than $1.9 million to candidates for statewide office, most of it to Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott and Gov. Rick Perry, according to data from the Texas Ethics Commission. The law firm also gives generously to local Dallas County politicians. Linebarger and its lawyers typically give between $1,000 and $5,000 to each Dallas County commissioner every year. In total, the firm has spent at least $90,000 in campaign contributions to Dallas County commissioners since 1999. More than half of sum that went to commissioner John Wiley Price, campaign finance reports show. Mr. Price said the campaign money does not influence his decision-making on matters related to the firm, which he praises for its work. "They're in the business of trying to collect. What would you expect?" he said about the campaign donations. "I would expect them to be aggressive." In 2002, the firm's Dallas office asked Dallas County for and received an increase in its fees from 15 percent to 20 percent of all delinquent taxes, penalties and interest it collects – the maximum allowed under state law. That means the firm gets a fee equal to 20 percent of every dollar collected, regardless of whether the firm does anything on the case. In 2005, Dallas County commissioners extended Linebarger's contract for seven additional years, from January 2008 to January 2015, in exchange for the firm agreeing to provide the county with a Web-based tax collection system. "We think we're doing a great job," said Nancy Primeaux, regional manager of the firm's Dallas office. |
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CA Aims to Appease Death Penalty Appeals Process
Court Watch |
2007/11/21 11:43
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The California Supreme Court proposed a constitutional amendment to change the death penalty appeals process on Monday in an effort to ease the backlog in the state's death penalty system.
California has the largest number of inmates on Death Row in the nation. With 666 condemned inmates who must appeal through the Supreme Court, the average time between sentencing and execution is more than 17 years—twice the nation’s average.
Thirty people have been on death row for more than 25 years, 119 for more than 20 years and 408 for more than a decade.
Chief Justice Ronald George, who announced the proposal, said the court spends around 20 percent of its time on capital cases alone. The amendment would allow the Court, which is required to hear all death sentence appeals, to send some of the cases to one of six appeals court in the state.
“For many, many years, people have lamented the very slow process of these capital cases," George told the San Francisco Chronicle. "And rather than just speak about the delay and how the system is dysfunctional, I thought this would be a good idea to consider as a way to improve the system."
If the amendment were approved, the court would refer 30 cases a year at most to the appellate courts, according to George.
The chief justice said death penalty rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court and the 400 death penalty cases decided by the State Supreme Court would provide considerable guidance to the state appeals court, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The state high court, however, would retain the right of final review, George noted.
George said he is looking for a legislator who will sponsor the measure, which he hopes will secure the two-thirds vote needed from lawmakers to appear on the November 2008 ballot. A majority of state voters would also need to approve the amendment.
Professor Evan Lee at UC Hastings College of the Law welcomed the proposal and said that the court should be spending more answering “highly controversial questions of law or novel questions of law.”
Many death penalty cases "are what we call fact-bound," Lee told the San Francisco Chronicle. “Those are the kinds of cases that for the Supreme Court are sort of a waste of time.”
California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, a defense lawyers' association, disagreed that the constitutional amendments would cure “court congestion” in the state. The major problem instead is the lack of qualified attorneys, a matter not addressed in the proposal, argued the group, according to the Associated Press.
Stefanie Faucher, a spokeswoman for Death Penalty Focus, a San Francisco-based organization that opposes capital punishment, said the proposal has her “very concerned.”
"Further increasing of the number of individuals reviewing these cases ... could cause increased disparities in the already unfair administration of the death penalty,” she said. |
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No Return for Guantanamo Detainee to Kenya
International |
2007/11/21 11:10
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A Kenyan court ruled on Wednesday that it has no jurisdiction in a case filed by Kenyan relatives of an alleged al-Qaida operative in U.S. custody, but suggested Kenyan law be changed to ensure the rights of such suspects.
Abdul Malik, also known as Mohamed Abdulmalik Abduljabar, is accused in the deadly 2002 bombing of a hotel in Kenya in which 15 people were killed. U.S. officials announced in March he had been transferred to U.S. custody and sent to the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but the exact circumstances of his capture and transfer were never revealed.
Soon after the U.S. announcement, relatives filed a case demanding Malik be produced in court here to determine whether he was lawfully detained.
High Court Judge Jacton B. Ojwang said Wednesday he had no jurisdiction to order Malik be brought to court. Ojwang also declined to order Internal Security Minister John Michuki and anti-terrorism police chief Nicholas Kamwende, among other officials, to testify in court and produce records of any correspondence between Kenya and the U.S. regarding Malik.
But Ojwang said Malik's rights had been infringed, and recommended that a law be enacted to regulate "the exercise of executive discretion to take Kenyans away from the jurisdiction of local courts," to ensure the rights of suspects are safeguarded in future.
Lawyer Harun Ndubi, representing the family, said he will file an application on whether Malik's constitutional rights have been violated following Ojwang's ruling.
"We still have a chance," he said.
In October, police told the court that they arrested Abdul Malik in February and released him after 14 days.
An East Africa al-Qaida network is blamed for the 1998 bombings of the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 225 people, as well as the car bomb hotel attack in which Malik is implicated. The hotel attack was accompanied by a near-simultaneous, failed attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner. |
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New York Man Cleared on "Standing" Charges
Court Watch |
2007/11/21 11:02
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New York state's highest court ruled it was not illegal to stand on a sidewalk, handing a win to a man arrested after refusing to move from the spot where he was standing and talking to friends in busy Times Square.
The New York Court of Appeals decided in favor of Matthew Jones on Tuesday. He was charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest — by flailing his arms — on June 12, 2004. Police said other people "had to walk around" him, and he would not move when asked.
Jones man pleaded guilty to a violation after spending a night in jail, but he later appealed.
In order to prosecute someone for disorderly conduct in New York, the person must be acting "with intent to cause public inconvenience, annoyance or alarm, or recklessly creating a risk thereof" and obstructing vehicular or pedestrian traffic, according to the opinion written by Judge Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick. The opinion was unanimous.
The court found that Jones' behavior did not meet the definition of disorderly conduct just because he stood in the middle of the sidewalk at 2:01 a.m. with friends.
"Otherwise, any person who happens to stop on a sidewalk — whether to greet another, to seek directions or simply to regain one's bearings — would be subject to prosecution under this statute," the opinion said.
The court also found that Jones could not have resisted arrest because his arrest was not authorized by the law. |
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Healy Law Firm Receives $20.2M Verdict
Law Firm News |
2007/11/21 10:23
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A Cook County jury recently awarded a total of $20.2 million to three families, whose children were killed in a car accident with a Dean Foods tractor-trailer at an Indiana intersection in case number L016261. Martin Healy, Jr., Daniel Malone, and David Huber of The Healy Law firm represented the estate of the passengers of the car, Diana Kakidas and Adam McDonald. The jury awarded $8 million to each of the families of these two passengers. The family of Christina Chakonas, the driver, was represented by another firm, and was awarded $7 million. Due to the driver's contributory negligence of failure to yield at a stop sign, this settlement was reduced by forty percent, and $4.2 million received.
According to a recording module on the truck, operator Jamie Reeves was driving 9.5 miles over the posted speed limit of 40 mph. It was also claimed that he was over the federally mandated hours of service for the week. All three plaintiffs filed suit against Jaime Reeves, The Alder Group, Inc. and Alco of Wisconsin, Inc., his employers, as well as Dean Foods Company, on whose behalf he was transporting milk at the time of the accident. Dean Foods denied that Reeves was its agent.
At trial, all parties presented expert testimony interpreting event recorders on both the tractor-trailer and the car. The Healy Law Firm contended the event recorders on the tractor-trailer showed the driver of the truck was in fact speeding. The defense argued the event recorder on the car showed that the driver failed to stop at the stop sign, and that the driver of the tractor-trailer was actually traveling under the speed limit prior to the collision.
The Healy Law Firm focuses on representing seriously injured individuals and their families against multi-million dollar corporations and insurance companies. By combining aggressive representation with compassionate client service, the firm offers superior legal counsel to injured parties, working tirelessly to secure fair financial compensation on behalf its injured clients. Among legal professionals and Illinois residents, the attorneys of The Healy Law Firm are recognized as an excellent choice for experienced and proficient legal representation. |
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Uzan Family's $1 Billion Upheld by Appeals Court
Court Watch |
2007/11/21 10:02
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A U.S. appeals court upheld a $1 billion punitive damages award to Motorola Inc against the Uzan family of Turkey on Wednesday.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit said the lower court "properly applied the variety of factors relevant to state and federal law."
U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff had awarded the punitive damages against certain members of the Uzan family, which ran Turkey's second-largest mobile phone operator, Telsim, and a media and banking empire.
Rakoff had concluded that the defendants fraudulently obtained loans from Motorola for more than $2 billion and from Nokia for about $800 million.
Rakoff had said the family used a "campaign of lies and misrepresentations to swindle Motorola," but in February 2006 he cut the punitive award to $1 billion from $2.1 billion.
"Judge Rakoff's findings establish beyond cavil the extraordinary nature of the Uzans' wrongful behavior and form a valid basis for the substantial punitive award of $1 billion against them," Circuit Judge Guido Calabresi wrote in a 23-page opinion. |
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Class action or a representative action is a form of lawsuit in which a large group of people collectively bring a claim to court and/or in which a class of defendants is being sued. This form of collective lawsuit originated in the United States and is still predominantly a U.S. phenomenon, at least the U.S. variant of it. In the United States federal courts, class actions are governed by Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule. Since 1938, many states have adopted rules similar to the FRCP. However, some states like California have civil procedure systems which deviate significantly from the federal rules; the California Codes provide for four separate types of class actions. As a result, there are two separate treatises devoted solely to the complex topic of California class actions. Some states, such as Virginia, do not provide for any class actions, while others, such as New York, limit the types of claims that may be brought as class actions. They can construct your law firm a brand new website, lawyer website templates and help you redesign your existing law firm site to secure your place in the internet. |
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