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Class Action Lawsuit Against NutriSystem, Inc.
Criminal Law Updates |
2007/10/16 10:17
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| Klafter & Olsen LLP announces that it has filed a class action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on behalf of a Class consisting of all persons other than Defendants who purchased the common stock of NutriSystem, Inc. ("NutriSystem") between February 14, 2007 and October 3, 2007, inclusive (the "Class Period"), seeking to pursue remedies under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (the "Exchange Act"). As described below, if you purchased NutriSystem publicly traded securities during the Class Period, you have until December 10, 2007 to move to be appointed as a Lead Plaintiff. The complaint charges NutriSystem and certain of its officers with violations of the Exchange Act while at the same time selling nearly $7 million in their personal holdings of NutriSystem stock. According to the complaint, during the Class Period, defendants issued materially false and misleading statements that misrepresented and/or failed to disclose: (a) that the Company had been signing up fewer new customers and was not performing according to internal expectations; (b) that the Company's costs of acquiring new customers were significantly increasing; and (c) that the Company's performance had been negatively impacted by competition from other weight loss products on the market. As a result, the defendants lacked a reasonable basis for their positive statements about the Company and its prospects, which artificially inflated NutriSystem stock to Class Period highs exceeding $70 per share while the defendants unloaded nearly $7 million in NutriSystem stock. After the markets closed on October 3, 2007, the Company announced its preliminary third quarter 2007 results and revised earnings guidance for the full year of 2007. In response to this announcement, the price of NutriSystem common stock fell $15.98 per share, or approximately 34%, to close at $31.59 per share, on extremely heavy trading volume. If you are a member of the class, you may move the Court, through counsel of your choice, no later than December 10, 2007 to serve as lead plaintiff. A lead plaintiff is a representative party that acts on behalf of class members in directing the litigation. Your ability to share in any recovery is not, however, affected by the decision whether or not to serve as lead plaintiff. If you have sustained losses on your purchases of NutriSystem publicly traded securities during the Class Period, please contact Klafter & Olsen LLP at http://www.klafterolsen.com or call us at 202/261-3553 for a more thorough explanation of the lead plaintiff selection process and the claims that can be asserted against NutriSystem. Klafter & Olsen LLP has extensive expertise in prosecuting investor class actions involving financial fraud and has offices in Washington D.C. and New York. Please visit our website for more information about the Firm. |
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China "furious" at Dalai Lama's U.S. award
Legal World News |
2007/10/16 10:08
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| China expressed fury on Tuesday that the United States is to honor the Dalai Lama with an award and warned that the activities of his supporters were increasing in Chinese-controlled Tibet. The Dalai Lama, who has lived in exile in India since staging a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, is to receive the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal on Wednesday after being hosted at the White House by President George W. Bush. "We are furious," Tibet's Communist Party boss, Zhang Qingli, told reporters. "If the Dalai Lama can receive such an award, there must be no justice or good people in the world." China, which views the Dalai Lama as a separatist and a traitor, pulled out of a meeting this week at which world powers were to discuss Iran in protest at the U.S. plan to honor him. China has also cancelled an annual human rights dialogue with Germany to show is displeasure over German Chancellor Angela Merkel's September meeting with the Dalai Lama. Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said China had expressed its "resolute opposition" to the award. "China has solemnly demanded the United States cancel the above-mentioned and extremely wrongful arrangement," Yang told reporters on the sidelines of the 17th Communist Party Congress. |
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Medtronic Faces Suit Over Cardiac Leads
Lawyer Blog News |
2007/10/16 08:19
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A pair of former users of Sprint Fidelis cardiac leads made by Medtronic Inc. (MDT) said Tuesday they are suing the medical device firm over injuries they claim to have sustained from the product. The two are suing both for their own damages and as members of a class of all users of the leads. The suit, filed in federal court in Minnesota, has plaintiffs Leonard Stavish and Kelly Liusi alleging the lead wire portion of the implanted heart defibrillators was defective and they "received jolting shocks when it falsely detected that the user needed a jolt from the device, or that the device failed, so that when they actually needed defibrillation they could not get it," according to their attorneys. -William Spain; 415-439-6400 |
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EU Court Backs Mandatory Retirement Age
Legal World News |
2007/10/16 08:11
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| The European Union's highest court on Tuesday backed the system of mandatory retirement age to combat high unemployment. In a judgment, the European Court of Justice said that even though discrimination based on age was illegal, the imposition of the 65-year threshold for workers can be justified to stabilize the labor market and if proper pension is provided. A Spanish manager, Felix Palacios de la Villa, took his company Cortefiel to court when he was notified of his pension two years ago, arguing it amounted to dismissal. A court statement said that since it was part of national labor measures to promote employment "the legitimacy of such an aim of public interest cannot reasonably be called into question." If the court had ruled against the pension system, it would have caused widespread disruption of social and economic policies throughout the 27-nation EU. |
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Philadelphia Law Firm Accused Of 'Pay To Play'
Headline News |
2007/10/15 14:54
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Attorney Pat Biswanger filed a federal complaint last month in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against the Philadelphia law firm Cozen O'Connor P.C. Ms. Biswanger claims she was the victim of sexual discrimination and fired illegally from the firm in retaliation for her involvement in Haverford Township politics. Ms. Biswanger claims in her accusation that Delaware County Common Pleas President Judge Kenneth Clouse had inappropriately involved himself in Haverford Township politics led to Judge Clouse contacting Cozen O'Connor and demanding her firing.
In 2004, Judge Clouse hired the politically powerful and well-connected attorney Richard Sprague to sue Ms. Biswanger and Haverford Township Commissioner Andy Lewis on grounds they had defamed him.
Ms. Biswanger alleges Mr. Sprague threatened to include Cozen O'Connor as a defendant in the defamation suit unless the firm agreed to fire her.
In July 2005, the same month former Philadelphia City Treasurer Corey Kemp was sentenced by a federal judge for his role in helping to direct city bond work to firms willing to contribute to, among other things, the mayor's reelection campaign, Ms. Biswanger was asked if she would be interested in applying for the general counsel position in the School District of Philadelphia.
She claims she spoke with Mr. O'Connor about the opportunity. He told her he wanted to recommend someone to the district who would be loyal to his firm and continue to send it bond work.
He allegedly told her he considered the job a "corporate opportunity."
Mr. O'Connor, she says, told her he would recommend her to district CEO Paul Vallas and School Reform Commission Chairman James Nevels. She claims that after she was fired Mr. O'Connor no longer supported her application.
A check of school district records shows corporate bond work was an economic opportunity for the firm. Cozen O'Connor attorneys Alan Wohlstetter and Steven Goldfield served as special council to the district between 2003 and 2005. During that time the firm received fees of $390,000 for its participation in bond issues for the district. |
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Attorney general pick has had terrorism cases
Lawyer Blog News |
2007/10/15 13:53
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Early in the Bush administration, Michael Mukasey's position at the intersection of terrorism and the justice system may have cost him a promotion. Mukasey, then chief judge of the federal court in Manhattan, caught the eye of the White House in early 2002 for elevation to the U.S. Court of Appeals. A conservative intellectual whose admirers cut across party lines, he was running the nation's busiest courthouse just a mile from Ground Zero, one that had handled trials of Islamic radicals for nearly a decade.
But that June, President George W. Bush declared "dirty bomb" suspect Jose Padilla an enemy combatant. When Padilla's lawyers filed a challenge, Mukasey drew the case. White House lawyers decided they could not offer him the appellate post without seeming to undermine his impartiality, those familiar with the issue said.
Now, Mukasey's experiences in the Padilla case and other terrorism prosecutions undergird his credentials for nomination to become attorney general.
Mukasey recently argued in an opinion article for The Wall Street Journal that Congress should find ways to relieve the strain on a legal system trying to stop terrorist plots while still guarding the rights of terrorist suspects. He has advocated national security courts, where classified information could be presented in secret.
"If there is anybody who has a handle on the debate on terrorism issues, it's him," said David Kelley, who served as New York's U.S. attorney from 2003 to 2005. "He is one of the only people who has sufficient practical experience together with the intellectual ability."
The 1995 trial of Omar Abdel Rahman, an Egyptian known as the blind sheik, in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center presented Mukasey with questions that have fueled public debate since 9/11: how to ensure lawful treatment for terror suspects without impeding government efforts to protect citizens from attack.
Three years of litigation, including a nine-month trial, served as a "deep primer" on radical Islam, said Mary Jo White, the former U.S. attorney who brought the case. Andrew McCarthy, who led the prosecution, recalled months of litigation over questions on the limits of free speech and religious practice and the difficulty of prosecuting terrorism without making classified information public. "The arguments we've been having the last six years are the arguments we were having then," McCarthy said.
The appeals court had high praise for Mukasey's handling of the case, saying he "presided with extraordinary skill." Prosecutors in other terrorism cases say they study his jury instructions on the use of speech and religious convictions as evidence.
Only one of several attorneys interviewed who had clients in Mukasey's court after 9/11 had complaints about the way his client was treated.
However, Alexander Eisemann, who represented Zacarias Moussaoui's driver, said Mukasey was responsive to complaints that Hussein al-Attas was being physically mistreated in detention.
Also, Mukasey was presented with what has proved to be an intractable issue in dealing with suspected terrorists - Bush's assertion that he has the authority to designate even people captured in the U.S. as "enemy combatants." In late 2002, the judge gave the White House a split decision in the case, upholding the president's authority to consider an American citizen detained on U.S. soil an enemy combatant but ruling that Padilla was entitled to a lawyer who could challenge that status. |
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