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Court fireworks, but Burning Man deal likely done
Breaking Legal News |
2013/12/02 12:16
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Organizers of the annual weeklong celebration of self-expression and eclectic art known as Burning Man and a Nevada county where it is held thought they had resolved their legal dispute over the festival.
And they hoped to get the blessing of a federal judge overseeing the case, and asked him to dismiss the lawsuit earlier this week. Instead, they got an earful from U.S. District Senior Judge Robert C. Jones, and threats that the lawyers in the case should either go back to law school or be disbarred.
Exactly what in the agreement between festival organizers and Pershing County lawyers prompted Jones' criticism was unclear, though he said the agreement amounted to malpractice.
"You committed virtually a fraud on the federal court and the county commission," Jones said. He said he'll file complaints with the state bar association against all lawyers involved.
The two sides, however, believe they still have an agreement in their year-old legal battle over regulation of the annual event leading up to Labor Day in the Black Rock Desert, about 100 miles north of Reno. |
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Supreme Court Will Take up New Health Law Dispute
Breaking Legal News |
2013/11/29 09:33
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The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to referee another dispute over President Barack Obama's health care law, whether businesses can use religious objections to escape a requirement to cover birth control for employees.
The justices said they will take up an issue that has divided the lower courts in the face of roughly 40 lawsuits from for-profit companies asking to be spared from having to cover some or all forms of contraception.
The court will consider two cases. One involves Hobby Lobby Inc., an Oklahoma City-based arts and crafts chain with 13,000 full-time employees. Hobby Lobby won in the lower courts.
The other case is an appeal from Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp., a Pennsylvania company that employs 950 people in making wood cabinets. Lower courts rejected the company's claims.
The court said the cases will be combined for arguments, probably in late March. A decision should come by late June.
The cases center on a provision of the health care law that requires most employers that offer health insurance to their workers to provide a range of preventive health benefits, including contraception.
In both instances, the Christian families that own the companies say that insuring some forms of contraception violates their religious beliefs.
The key issue is whether profit-making corporations can assert religious beliefs under the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act or the First Amendment provision guaranteeing Americans the right to believe and worship as they choose. Nearly four years ago, the justices expanded the concept of corporate "personhood," saying in the Citizens United case that corporations have the right to participate in the political process the same way that individuals do.
"The government has no business forcing citizens to choose between making a living and living free," said David Cortman of the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Christian public interest law firm that is representing Conestoga Wood at the Supreme Court. |
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Appeals court to review approval of BP settlement
Breaking Legal News |
2013/11/04 12:25
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A year ago, lawyers for BP and Gulf Coast residents and businesses took turns urging a federal judge to approve their settlement for compensating victims of the company's massive 2010 oil spill.
On Monday, however, the one-time allies will be at odds when an appeals court hears objections to the multibillion-dollar deal. That's because several months after U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier approved the settlement, BP started complaining that the judge and court-appointed claims administrator were misinterpreting it. The London-based oil giant is worried it could be forced to pay billions of dollars more for bogus or inflated claims by businesses.
Plaintiffs' attorneys who brokered the deal want the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold the class-action settlement.
As of Friday, payments have been made to more than 38,000 people and businesses for an estimated $3.7 billion. Tens of thousands more could file claims in the coming months.
The settlement doesn't have a cap, but BP initially estimated that it would pay roughly $7.8 billion to resolve the claims. Later, as it started to challenge the business payouts, the company said it no longer could give a reliable estimate for how much the deal will cost.
The dispute centers on money for businesses, not individuals. Awards are based on a comparison of revenues and expenses before and after the spill. BP says a "policy decision" that claims administrator Patrick Juneau announced in January has allowed businesses to manipulate those figures in a way that leads to errors in calculating their actual lost profits. |
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Once notable NJ lawyer given life sentence
Breaking Legal News |
2013/09/25 11:04
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A defense attorney who once had a roster of celebrity clients and boasted of having tried hundreds of cases in federal court was sentenced there on Monday to life in prison without parole after his conviction on nearly two dozen counts including murder conspiracy and racketeering.
Paul Bergrin, in custody since his 2009 arrest, wore khaki prison scrubs and showed little reaction as a judge read what amounted to several life sentences Monday afternoon in a federal courtroom in Newark.
The 57-year-old former federal prosecutor once represented an Army reservist charged in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq and celebrities such as Queen Latifah, the rapper Lil' Kim and the group Naughty By Nature. He also represented reputed gang members and alleged drug kingpins from his offices in Newark.
Bergrin, formerly of Nutley, and several associates were arrested and charged in May 2009 with running his law business as a criminal enterprise. The U.S. attorney's office charged Bergrin with more than 30 counts including racketeering, setting up the murder of a witness, money laundering and drug offenses. His first trial, in which Bergrin represented himself, ended in a hung jury two years ago.
A second trial resulted in his conviction in March on 23 counts related to operating what prosecutors said was a racketeering enterprise that engaged in drug trafficking, prostitution, bribery, plotting to murder witnesses and money laundering. |
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Ind. high court to hear eminent domain lawsuit
Breaking Legal News |
2013/08/27 09:20
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The Indiana Supreme Court has agreed to hear an eminent domain case involving land in southern Indiana that a local board claimed for a planned airport runway expansion.
The state's high court recently vacated the Indiana Court of Appeals' ruling in the case involving the action by the now-defunct Clark County Board of Aviation Commissioners. That board used eminent domain in 2009 to acquire property owned by resident Margaret Dreyer for a runway expansion at the Clark County Regional Airport.
Dreyer sued the board, alleging its appraisals of the property acquired through eminent domain were wrong. She won and was awarded a judgment of $865,000.
The News and Tribune reported Clark County became party to the case last year when Dreyer's motion was granted to have the "civil government of Clark County" pay the judgment. The Court of Appeals later upheld the verdict.
South Central Regional Airport Authority Attorney Greg Fifer said last week in an email that the Indiana Supreme Court could either reach the same verdict as the appellate court, or affirm the county's position that the judgment was void.
Authority President Tom Galligan said the panel, which replaced the now-defunct Board of Aviation Commissioners, is pleased with the court's decision to hear the case. He said the airport authority thought the original ruling "was not a very good ruling."
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Supreme Court OKs early release plan for Calif. inmates
Breaking Legal News |
2013/08/05 23:57
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Despite warnings from California officials, the nation's highest court is refusing to delay the early release of nearly 10,000 California inmates by year's end to ease overcrowding at 33 adult prisons.
In its decision Friday, the Supreme Court dismissed an emergency request by the Gov. Jerry Brown to halt a lower court's directive for the early release.
Law enforcement officials expressed concern about the ruling.
The justices ignored efforts already under way to reduce prison populations and "chose instead to allow for the release of more felons into already overburdened communities," said Covina Police Chief Kim Raney, president of the California Police Chiefs Association.
Brown's office referred a request for comment to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, where Secretary Jeff Beard vowed that the state would press on with a still-pending appeal in hope of preventing the releases.
A panel of three federal judges had previously ordered the state to cut its prison population by nearly 8 percent to roughly 110,000 inmates by Dec. 31 to avoid conditions amounting to cruel and unusual punishment. That panel, responding to decades of lawsuits filed by inmates, repeatedly ordered early releases after finding inmates were needlessly dying and suffering because of inadequate medical and mental health care caused by overcrowding.
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Arizona high court to hear school funding case
Breaking Legal News |
2013/07/23 10:33
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The Arizona Supreme Court on Tuesday hears arguments in an appeal of a lower court's ruling that requires the state Legislature to give schools an annual funding increase even in lean years to account for inflation.
The high court is reviewing a Court of Appeals decision. It said a voter-approved law requires the Legislature to provide an annual inflation adjustment for state funding to public schools.
School districts and education groups sued after the Legislature in 2010 instead only increased schools' transportation funding, eliminating a $61 million increase in general school spending.
The Supreme Court says it is considering is whether the Voter Protection Act allows voters to require the legislature to increase funding for schools.
The Voter Protection Act severely restricts the Legislature's to change voter-approved laws.
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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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