Free Republic

The head of his former firm says he did good work. But not all of it was related to voting and civil rights... In one instance, Obama defended a nonprofit corporation that owns low-income housing projects against a lawsuit in which a man alleged that he slipped and fell because of poor maintenance. Obama got the suit dismissed. In another case, Obama appeared on behalf of a nonprofit corporation that provided healthcare for poor people. A woman who claimed income of less than $8,000 a year had sued Obama’s client to obtain a $336 payment for baby-sitting services; Obama’s client...

The federal grand jury investigating the relationship between Rep. Jerry Lewis and a Washington lobbying firm has subpoenaed records from Riverside County and the Cal State San Bernardino Foundation, in addition to San Bernardino County and the city of Redlands, The Press-Enterprise confirmed Friday. Officials with the University of Redlands, Loma Linda University Medical Center and Redlands-based ESRI declined to say whether their organizations had been served. All are or have been clients of the lobbying firm Copeland, Lowery & Jacquez, which has been linked to former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham. The Rancho Santa Fe Republican pleaded guilty last year...

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) wrote at least four letters helpful to Indian tribes represented by Jack Abramoff, and the senator's staff regularly had contact with the disgraced lobbyist's partners about legislation affecting other clients. The activities — detailed in billing records and correspondence obtained by Associated Press — are more extensive than previously disclosed. They occurred over three years as Reid collected about $68,000 in donations from Abramoff's firm, lobbying partners and clients. Reid's office acknowledged last week having "routine contacts" with Abramoff's lobbying partners and intervening on some government matters, such as blocking some tribal...

Texas Monthly November 2001 What happens when a top law firm gets two crooks for clients? At Locke, Liddell, and Sapp, the result was a $30 million settlement for angry investors. by John Spong LOCKE PURNELL ATTORNEY JANE MATHESON'S NOTE ON THE BACK OF A TRADE AGREEMENT her firm was editing for client Russell Erxleben in February 1998 got right to the point: "Tell the truth." Erxleben, an All-American punter and place kicker for the University of Texas Longhorns in the seventies, had enlisted the 110-year-old, blue-chip Dallas law firm to keep his company, Austin Forex Investments (AFI), from running...

A Texas appeals court has reinstated a lawsuit against several Houston strip clubs based on claims the clubs overcharged patrons for lap dances when the men paid using credit cards instead of cash. Paul Brian Meekey and Michael Fulmer brought the lawsuit after they were allegedly charged $25 for $20 lap dances because they paid with plastic. "Texas law is pretty clear that you cannot charge someone extra for using a credit card," said Sandra Krider, one of Meekey and Fulmer’s lawyers. "The fact that they are strip clubs shouldn’t mean they get away with it." But the ruling could...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A lawyer convicted of stealing settlement money from vulnerable clients, including $250,000 from a brain-damaged infant, was sentenced on Tuesday to more than 14 years in prison, prosecutors said.Nikolai Tehin, 58, of San Francisco, was found guilty last October in the embezzlement of more than $2 million from his clients' settlement packages."This is the most severe sentence I've ever received from a federal court judge," Tehin's attorney, Harold Rosenthal, said in a telephone interview.During years defending people in medical malpractice and personal injury cases, Tehin would regularly deposit settlement checks into his firm's account and not...