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Lawyer defends Nevada truck firm in Amtrak crash
Court Feed News |
2011/07/11 08:47
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A lawyer for the Nevada trucking company whose tractor-trailer slammed into an Amtrak train, killing six people, defended the company’s safety record Thursday and said it was not at fault in two previous accidents cited in state safety records.
John Davis Trucking Co. has been cooperating with local, state and federal investigators and is as anxious as anyone to learn why the driver who died in the June 24 crash ignored flashing lights and crossing gates before skidding the length of a football field into the side of the train, Steven Jaffe of Las Vegas said.
But he said four negligence lawsuits filed against the Battle Mountain company — combined with the ongoing investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board — has kept the brothers who own the family-run business from sharing information that would help shed more light on the tragedy.
“There’s a lot more than meets the eye,” Jaffe told The Associated Press. “I think when it all comes down to it, the public is going to see a very different John Davis Trucking than was originally put out there.
“I believe the evidence will show their conduct was defensible in all of this,” he said. “I have a great deal of trust in the legal system, and if some day we go in front of a jury, I’m confident it will give us the chance to say that we did everything right.”
Federal records reviewed by the AP show the state Department of Public Safety cited the company for 16 vehicle maintenance violations over the past two years and noted it had been involved in two crashes during that period, including one in February 2010 that injured a person in Washoe County. |
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Ohio appeals court rules in against Browns in Bentley suit
Court Feed News |
2011/07/10 07:47
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An Ohio appeals court has ruled in favor of former Cleveland Browns center LeCharles Bentley, saying the team can't force NFL arbitration to halt a lawsuit on the career-ending staph infection he says he contracted at the team's training facility.
The Ohio 8th District Court of Appeals in Cleveland on Thursday upheld a Cuyahoga County judge's ruling, saying the issue is not related to the collective bargaining agreement and can be handled in county court.
Bentley's attorney has said he nearly died from the infection he contracted while rehabbing from a knee injury at the team's suburban Berea facility. The team is accused of persuading Bentley to rehab at the training site and failing to tell him about unsanitary conditions and other players who had contracted staph.
The team had argued that state and federal laws support arbitration over litigation.
Bentley never played a game for the Browns after signing a six-year, $36 million contract as a free agent. He tore his left patellar tendon in training camp in 2006, and his career never recovered after the infection.
In 2007, Bentley told The Associated Press that he had undergone four operations since getting hurt, the final two to clean out the staph infection, which ate away at his tendon. |
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Court: Firing worker who took hot dogs unjustified
Court Feed News |
2011/07/08 14:29
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The Indiana Court of Appeals says a department store wasn't justified in firing a worker who took two leftover hot dogs from a company picnic, so it must pay him unemployment benefits. The court ruled Thursday in the case of Nolan Koewler, who was fired from a Dillard's store in Evansville a year ago. Dillard's hosted a Fourth of July cookout for employees. Afterward, a manager ordered the leftovers stored in a break room freezer until Labor Day. The next day, Koewler took two hot dogs and ate them, an act caught on surveillance video. He claimed he never heard the instruction to save the hot dogs, and the three-judge panel sided unanimously with him. The opinion didn't reveal the amount of unemployment benefits at stake. |
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Orange County judge to restrict Costa Mesa layoffs
Court Feed News |
2011/07/06 15:39
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An Orange County judge said Tuesday that she will issue a court order to restrict Costa Mesa from laying off nearly half of the city's workforce and outsourcing jobs.
Superior Court Judge Tam Nomoto Schumann said she would grant the Orange County Employees Association's request for a preliminary injunction. But the city has until Friday to file objections before she issues her ruling.
The union filed suit in May, arguing that the city's plan to outsource municipal jobs violates state law and the union contract.
In March, the Costa Mesa City Council majority voted to outsource jobs to mostly private companies in a drastic move to plug a $15 million budget hole.
Soon afterward, 213 of 450 employees got layoff notices that would take effect in September.
Union spokeswoman Jennifer Muir said the court order would protect employees' jobs until the case against the city goes to trial.
Schumann said the city must follow proper procedures when laying off workers, but she didn't explain what those procedures are.
Assistant City Attorney Harold Potter contends the city has been following procedures while pursuing austerity measures.
The judge's ruling won't stop the city from exploring outsourcing options, he said. |
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Bill revision could mean money for NJ drug company
Court Feed News |
2011/07/05 15:12
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A billion-dollar "technical revision" added to a patent bill passed by the House last week could provide huge financial benefits to one pharmaceutical company and a law firm.
On the surface, the barely noticed amendment simply clarifies a process by which the Food and Drug Administration approves a patent for a brand-name drug, and gives the manufacturer 60 days to apply for an extension with the U.S. Patent and Trade Office.
In reality, the measure could give a New Jersey drugmaker, The Medicines Co., 2½ more years of patent protection for its lucrative blood thinner Angiomax. It would also save the law firm WilmerHale $214 million it would owe the drug company under a malpractice lawsuit if a generic alternative is sold in the United States before June 15, 2015.
The amendment barely won House approval and it is not a part of the Senate version of the patent system overhaul bill, so it is questionable whether it will ever become law. The amendment would write into law a court decision in favor of the drug company and would pre-empt any appeal.
It shows how, hidden behind the lines of obtuse legislative language, huge fortunes can be at stake, sometimes for specific companies. |
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Administration supports lesbian employee's case
Court Feed News |
2011/07/03 18:50
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In a strongly worded legal brief, the Obama administration has said the federal act that defines marriage as being between a man and a woman was motivated by hostility toward gays and lesbians and is unconstitutional.
The brief was filed Friday in federal court in San Francisco in support of a lesbian federal employee's lawsuit claiming the government wrongly denied health insurance coverage to her same-sex spouse.
The Justice Department says Karen Golinski's suit should not be dismissed because the law under which her spouse was denied benefits — the Defense of Marriage Act — violates the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of equal protection.
"The official legislative record makes plain that DOMA Section 3 was motivated in large part by animus toward gay and lesbian individuals and their intimate relationships, and Congress identified no other interest that is materially advanced by Section 3," the brief reads, referring to the section in the act that defines marriage as being between a man and a woman.
Though the administration has previously said it will not defend the marriage act, the brief is the first court filing in which it urges the court to find the law unconstitutional, said Tobias Barrington Wolff, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania. |
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