U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent was sentenced to 33 months Monday. He was also fined $1,000 and ordered to pay $6,550 in restitution to the two women whose complaints resulted in the first sex abuse case against a sitting federal judge.

Kent could have received up to 20 years in prison after admitting to obstruction of justice, but prosecutors said they wouldn't seek more than three years under a plea agreement.

"Your wrongful conduct is a huge black X ... a stain on the judicial system itself, a matter of concern in the federal courts," U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson said as he imposed the sentence. Vinson is a visiting senior judge called in from Pensacola, Fla.

Kent pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice in February as jury selection for his trial was about to begin. He had been charged with obstruction and five sex-crime counts alleging that he groped his secretary and his former case manager. Conviction on the most serious of those charges could have sent him to prison for life.

All appeared quiet at Demjanjuk's home in the Cleveland suburb of Seven Hills as his wife tended to her lilac bush and an unidentified man visited Saturday, one day after Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers delivered the notice.

It is the most recent development in a complex 32-year case linking Demjanjuk (pronounced dem-YAHN'-yuk) to World War II atrocities. An arrest warrant in Munich accuses the native Ukrainian of 29,000 counts of accessory to murder at Sobibor in Nazi-occupied Poland, one of the infamous, horrific sites of the Holocaust.

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens had refused Thursday, without comment, to deal with the case.

Demjanjuk's son, John Demjanjuk Jr., said there are no plans to appeal to another Supreme Court justice. He said such a move might be seen as a delay tactic, a claim made by the U.S. government about other Demjanjuk appeals.

Hsu, 58 years old, pleaded guilty to five counts of mail fraud and five counts of wire fraud at a hearing before U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero in Manhattan.

"I would use later investments to pay off earlier investments, so as to create the impression that my investment strategy was operating properly when, in fact, it was not," Hsu said. "I knew what I was doing was illegal,"

Jury selection is scheduled on the four remaining counts of campaign finance fraud in his case beginning Monday.

Hsu faces up to 20 years in prison on the mail and wire fraud charges.

Alan Seidler, Hsu's lawyer, said Hsu made the plea without having a plea agreement with the government.

Prosecutors had alleged Hsu falsely represented to investors that his companies - Components Ltd. and Next Components Ltd. - were in the business of extending short-term financing to companies and promised short-term, high-return investments.

Between 1997 and August 2007, the government claims Hsu convinced investors to entrust him with at least $60 million in a Ponzi scheme. After repaying some investors their principal and interest, Hsu allegedly swindled other investors out of at least $20 million, prosecutors said.

During his plea, Hsu said the scheme began in 1999.

Prosecutors also have alleged Hsu, in order to raise his public profile, pressured some investors between 2004 and 2007 to individually contribute thousands of dollars to candidates for president and Congress whom Hsu supported.

In some cases, Hsu allegedly reimbursed investors for making political contributions with proceeds from the scam, prosecutors said.

In 2007, Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign agreed to return $850,000 in funds raised through Hsu. Clinton, who was running for president at the time, has since been named U.S. Secretary of State.

A Los Angeles judge has blasted one of the nation's leading plaintiffs firms in asbestos litigation for attempting to obtain an upper hand in the case through what he called a "type of judicially sanctioned extortion."

The judge's statements came in a lawsuit filed by Waters & Kraus on behalf of a Los Angeles man who died of mesothelioma in December 2007. Six months before, the man had been deposed in Texas, where the case was first filed. The case has since been re-filed in California. During the past month, industrial product manufacturer Crane Co. sought to exclude the man's deposition from the case. In court papers, Crane argued that the information gleaned from the deposition, which under Texas law is limited to six hours, was insufficient to obtain summary judgment in California.

On April 7, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Aurelio Munoz, while refusing to grant summary judgment, concluded that Waters & Kraus had re-filed the case in California intentionally as a means to force a settlement. Calling such tactics a "waste of the court's time," Munoz noted that Waters & Kraus has played the same "grisly game of asbestos litigation" in at least nine cases.

Peter Kraus, managing partner of Dallas-based Waters & Kraus, told The National Law Journal that the judge "got it 180 degrees wrong." While not denying the firm's actions, Kraus said that its attorneys must file asbestos cases in jurisdictions where ailing clients don't have to endure lengthy depositions.

"And if they die, the facts necessary to prove their case die with them," he said.

Lawyers for Crane, in an April 24 appellate petition, said that the dispute could affect "potentially hundreds of pending and future asbestos personal injury and wrongful death actions in California."

"I definitely think this is something the defense and plaintiff's bar are going to watch very, very closely, and it will have very important ramifications regardless of whichever way it goes," said Alexandra Epand, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Nixon Peabody who handles asbestos litigation.

Hsu, 58 years old, pleaded guilty to five counts of mail fraud and five counts of wire fraud at a hearing before U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero in Manhattan.

"I would use later investments to pay off earlier investments, so as to create the impression that my investment strategy was operating properly when, in fact, it was not," Hsu said. "I knew what I was doing was illegal,"

Jury selection is scheduled on the four remaining counts of campaign finance fraud in his case beginning Monday.

Hsu faces up to 20 years in prison on the mail and wire fraud charges.

Alan Seidler, Hsu's lawyer, said Hsu made the plea without having a plea agreement with the government.

Prosecutors had alleged Hsu falsely represented to investors that his companies - Components Ltd. and Next Components Ltd. - were in the business of extending short-term financing to companies and promised short-term, high-return investments.

Between 1997 and August 2007, the government claims Hsu convinced investors to entrust him with at least $60 million in a Ponzi scheme. After repaying some investors their principal and interest, Hsu allegedly swindled other investors out of at least $20 million, prosecutors said.

During his plea, Hsu said the scheme began in 1999.

Prosecutors also have alleged Hsu, in order to raise his public profile, pressured some investors between 2004 and 2007 to individually contribute thousands of dollars to candidates for president and Congress whom Hsu supported.

In some cases, Hsu allegedly reimbursed investors for making political contributions with proceeds from the scam, prosecutors said.

The law firm of Gallop, Johnson & Neuman, L.C. (www.gjn.com) served as counsel to Stratus Building Solutions, an industry-leading provider of integrated facilities maintenance services for retail, commercial, industrial, professional and multi-family buildings and real estate property, in connection with  expansion of the company's successful licensed building services and building maintenance operations into Canada.


The transaction, which was effective May 4, 2009, allows Stratus Building Solutions of Canada, a newly formed entity based in Toronto, Ontario, to use Stratus Building Solutions' trade secrets, copyrighted materials and branding in Canada.  The new entity will offer building services and maintenance licenses under the Stratus Building Solutions brand in Alberta, British Columbia, Quebec, Manitoba, Ontario, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Saskatchewan.

Robert D. Cantwell, a partner at Gallop, Johnson & Neuman, L.C., served as lead counsel for Stratus Building Solutions.  Mr. Cantwell’s legal practice focuses on business, corporate and governmental law with an emphasis on complex mergers and acquisitions, gaming and franchising.

St. Louis-based Stratus Building Solutions (www.stratusclean.com) offers 16 different building service and maintenance plans providing “environmentally green” cleaning systems, products, services and marketing support. These include the “Stratus GreenClean” program which uses environmentally-friendly products and services to help sustain healthier, more productive facilities. Also, the firm offers a program called “Stratus Sani-Proof” that kills Influenza Type A and Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA), and other bacteria often found in offices, schools, daycare centers, health clubs, medical facilities and industrial buildings.

Stratus Building Solutions of Canada will operate under an agreement established with Stratus Building Solutions. Jeffrey B. Aibel and Kenneth Casseri will own and manage the new Canadian operation.  

Dennis Jarrett, chief executive officer, and Pete Frese, president, founded Stratus Building Solutions in 2004 after each worked for more than a decade as senior executives in building services and maintenance industries.

Gallop, Johnson & Neuman has served clients around the world since 1976 from its offices in St. Louis, Missouri. It is one of the largest law firms in St. Louis. The firm serves entrepreneurs, privately-held companies and start-up firms; public corporations; private equity funds; individuals and families; trustees and trust beneficiaries; charities; and non-profit entities. Offices are located at 101 South Hanley Road, Suite 1700, Clayton, Missouri, 63105.  

Stratus Building Solutions currently has U.S. operations in Connecticut, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas, with plans for further international expansion.  

For information about Gallop, Johnson & Neuman, please contact Lois A. LaDreier at 314.615.6000 or visit the website www.gjn.com. For information about Stratus Building Solutions, see the website www.stratusclean.com 

or call  314.731.2000 or toll-free at 877.731.2020. Media contact: Jeff Dunlap at 314.993.6925.