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NY man suing Facebook must explain missing items
Legal Career News |
2011/08/18 09:12
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A judge gave Facebook access to the personal email accounts of a man suing for half ownership of the social networking website and ordered him to explain why he can't produce documents its lawyers believe are evidence.
Proof that Paul Ceglia's case is a fraud has been sitting on a Chicago law firm's email server since 2004, Facebook attorney Orin Snyder told the federal judge on Wednesday.
An email that Ceglia sent to a former business associate at the firm includes a scanned version of the two-page contract he and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg signed, Snyder said. Unlike the one Ceglia filed, it doesn't mention Facebook, only a street-mapping database Ceglia had hired Zuckerberg to work on, he said.
"The noose is tightening around the neck of this plaintiff, and he knows it," Snyder said during a four-hour procedural hearing that had each side accusing the other of dirty tricks.
Snyder said Ceglia had artificially aged his "phony" contract with light and chemicals, backdated computer files and transferred others to portable storage devices, which he'd likely tossed into Lake Erie.
Ceglia's attorney, Jeffrey Lake, countered that Facebook had tried to "poison the jury pool" by releasing what should have been confidential documents and implied Facebook had planted damning evidence on Ceglia's computers, a statement he backed away from after the hearing. |
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EPA settles with owners of Mass. chemical plant
Legal Career News |
2011/08/17 17:29
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The owners of a suburban Massachusetts chemical plant that exploded in 2006, destroying dozens of homes, have agreed to pay the federal government an estimated $1.3 million to help cover the cost of cleaning up the hazardous waste that was left behind.
The Environmental Protection Agency said a consent decree unveiled Monday requires the companies to pay for some of the $2.7 million spent by the agency to clean up the site after the explosion in Danvers, a town about 25 miles north-northeast of Boston.
The EPA said the action resolves claims against former operator CAI Inc. and property owners Sartorelli Realty LLC and Roy Nelson, of the Nelson Danvers Realty Trust.
The EPA also announced that CAI will pay $100,000 to settle allegations that conditions at the facility violated the federal Clean Air Act. The $1.3 million includes cash and the net proceeds from the sale of the property, assuming the property sells for its appraised value, the agency said.
A series of explosions at the ink and paint factory shared by CAI and Arnel Co. Inc. on Nov. 22, 2006, damaged 270 local homes and businesses. No one was killed or seriously injured. |
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NYC court upholds trustee's calculation of losses
Legal Career News |
2011/08/16 15:28
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A federal appeals court agrees with the method a trustee used to calculate how much each investor lost in the multibillion-dollar fraud carried out by Bernard Madoff. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a written decision Tuesday that investors are only entitled to recover the amount they originally invested with Madoff. Lawyers for investors had argued that they should be entitled to recover profits as well. Madoff had told thousands of investors just before his December 2008 arrest that their investments had more than tripled. Madoff claimed the original investment of about $20 billion had grown to more than $60 billion. Prosecutors say it was actually a Ponzi scheme. Madoff is serving a 150-year sentence after admitting the massive multi-decade fraud. |
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Tech blogger won't be charged in Apple iPhone case
Legal Career News |
2011/08/15 16:10
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Prosecutors said Wednesday that they will not bring charges against a tech blogger who bought an Apple iPhone prototype after it was found at a bar in March 2010 in a case that ignited an unusual First Amendment debate.
San Mateo County Assistant District Attorney Morley Pitt said charges were not filed against Gizmodo.com's Jason Chen or other employees, citing California's shield law that protects the confidentiality of journalists' sources.
"The difficulty we faced is that Mr. Chen and Gizmodo were primarily, in their view, engaged in a journalistic endeavor to conduct an investigation into the phone and type of phone it was and they were protected by the shield law," said Pitt.
"We concluded it is a very gray area, they do have a potential claim and this was not the case with which we were going to push the envelope."
Chen's house was raided and his computer seized after Gizmodo posted images of the prototype. The website and other media organizations objected, saying the raid was illegal because state law prohibits the seizure of unpublished notes from journalists.
"We feel there was not a crime to begin with and still believe that, and are pleased the DA's office has an appropriate respect for the First Amendment," said Thomas J. Nolan Jr., a lawyer for Chen. |
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Lawyer: 'Jeopardy!' burglary suspect a prostitute
Legal Career News |
2011/08/12 17:16
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The lawyer for a San Francisco woman charged with breaking into the hotel room of "Jeopardy!" host Alex Trebek says his client is a prostitute, not a thief.
The San Francisco Examiner reports that attorney Mark Jacobs says his client, 56-year-old Lucinda Moyers, is a prostitute and was in a downtown San Francisco hotel to meet a john on July 26.
Prosecutors say Moyers stole $650, a bracelet and other items from a hotel room where Trebek was staying with his wife. The cash and bracelet were not recovered.
Moyers has pleaded not guilty to felony charges of burglary and possession of stolen property.
Trebek says he chased Moyers out of his room and tore his Achilles tendon. Jacobs says Moyers was not in Trebek's room. |
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Ex-UGA coach settles dispute over investments
Legal Career News |
2011/08/11 15:51
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A former University of Georgia head football coach has settled a legal dispute with a bankrupt liquidation company that accused him of recruiting other high-profile coaches to invest in a Ponzi scheme, according to federal court documents filed this week. Jim Donnan and his wife agreed to transfer about $5.5 million in cash, stocks and other assets to West Virginia-based GLC Ltd. to settle claims he profited by convincing investors to pump money into the company. Donnan has not been charged with any criminal wrongdoing and defense attorney Ed Tolley said his client was "absolutely not involved in a Ponzi scheme." The settlement was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Bankruptcy Court and must be approved by a federal judge. It would end months of litigation between the Donnans and GLC, which claimed the ex-coach invested more than $5.4 million in the firm and that his family ultimately made more than $14.5 million. GLC, a liquidation company that purchased and then resold surplus retail products, is being restructured in an Ohio bankruptcy court and is now being run by new operators who targeted Donnan in the court filings. The firm said Donnan received a commission of up to 20 percent for each investment, and assured each potential investor the money would be used to buy retail items from major companies, according to court records. But only about $12 million of the $82 million was spent on inventory, the firm said. |
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