Free Republic

Lower-income Californians will gain a new right next year -- free legal representation in certain civil cases -- at least temporarily. The so-called "Civil Gideon law" will provide legal counsel for poor Californians doing such things as fighting evictions, home foreclosures or in family law matters such as child custody disputes and cases of neglect.

Small business owners say they plan give California lawmakers an ear full today about how their livelihoods are being threatened by shakedown lawsuits filed over alleged ADA violations. Mom and pop shops and other small and mid-sized businesses say a cottage industry has sprung up in the Golden State in which trial lawyers are filing lawsuits over alleged violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and state disability access laws.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Legal Newsline)-While California lawmakers are traditionally busy in their home districts during autumn, after the state Legislature recesses, this year they will be called into at least three special sessions to address a bevy of complex issues. Not among them is legal reform, which proponents say would help kick-start California's lagging economy and draw new industry to the Golden State, where unemployment has topped 12 percent,

The establishment media in the United States fears Rush Limbaugh more than any other media figure. Liberals who actually start to listen to his show frequently discover that his insights are rewarding, his humor is entertaining, and his combination of common sense and sophisticated analysis is compelling. Ever since his national show began, those who depend on establishment media for their information have been fed the line that he is hateful, racist, crude, and above all, not to be listened to. The ability to persuade those who pay little attention to politics that Limbaugh is anathema to all that is...

AP) A Russian court ruled against Josef Stalin's grandson Tuesday in a libel suit over a newspaper article that said the Soviet dictator sent thousands of people to their deaths. A judge at a Moscow district court rejected Yevgeny Dzhugashvili's claim that Novaya Gazeta defamed Stalin in an April article referring to the strongman leader as a "bloodthirsty cannibal." A ruling against Novaya Gazeta would have been seen as an exoneration of Stalin more than 50 years after his death. It would have been a major setback to beleaguered Russian liberals who say the country must acknowledge the truth of...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Legal Newsline)-California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger drew praise Monday for his vetoes of three bills that critics said would have cost jobs and increased litigation in the state. In interviews with Legal Newsline, representatives from tort reform groups and the business community said the governor acted in the best interests of the Golden State's economy when he rejected Democrat-backed proposals that would have expanded civil liability in certain cases.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Legal Newsline)-Legislative leaders in California have just hours to reach a deal with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to convince the Republican not to veto many of the 704 bills awaiting his action, including proposals opposed by legal reformers. The Republican governor has threatened to veto most of the bills on his desk unless he and Senate and Assembly leaders agree on a multibillion plan to upgrade the state's complex water system.

Yesterday, Emily Gillette filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Burlington, Vermont, setting the stage for a legal battle, according to the Burlington Free Press. Three years ago, Gillette, her husband, Brad, and their then 22-month-old daughter, River, were ordered to leave a plane at Vermont's Burlington International Airport. It was a New York-bound Delta Connections flight operated by Freedom Airlines. Gillette was nursing River when a flight attendant asked her to cover up. Gillette refused. The flight attendant asked again, offering a blanket. The then 27-year-old mother continued to refuse. The flight attendant "pointed to the exit...

Litigation: The Founding Fathers envisioned the states as laboratories for ideas and choices. If the administration needs a demonstration project for successful tort reform, it need look no further than Mississippi. When President Obama said during his health care speech to Congress that he would "look into" malpractice reform and support "demonstration projects" at the state level, Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi, a Republican, responded: "If they want a demonstration project, come down to Mississippi. I'll show you a demonstration project." Mississippi enacted tort reform in 2004, including caps on medical malpractice awards. As a result, the number of medical...

WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline)-- U.S. Sen. Max Baucus on Wednesday unveiled his $856 billion much-anticipated plan to overhaul the nation's health care system. Baucus, the Democrat from Montana and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, introduced his 10-year-plan with no support from Republicans, whom he has been courting.

WASHINGTON (CNNMoney.com) -- As President Obama turns up the heat on health care reform, one new and surprising detail to emerge is his pledge to tackle medical malpractice. "I don't believe malpractice reform is a silver bullet, but I have talked to enough doctors to know that defensive medicine may be contributing to unnecessary costs," Obama said Wednesday night. Obama's decision to wade into the issue has some insiders scratching their heads, because cutting down on medical malpractice lawsuits is a Republican tenet.

The White House invited an ACLU attorney, who has built a career over the past six years of litigating against the United States in support of terrorists, to an official White House dinner last night to celebrate Ramadan with President Obama. Jameel Jaffer, who runs the ACLU's "national security project," has filed lawsuits challenging the FBI's "national security letter" authority, the constitutionality of warrantless wiretaps, and has been a leader in pushing for the shut down of Guantánamo Bay, and providing legal rights to terrorists held by the United States overseas in such countries as Iraq and Afghanistan. His efforts...

A former attorney for Toyota has accused the automaker of illegally withholding evidence in hundreds of rollover death and injury cases, in a "ruthless conspiracy" to keep evidence "of its vehicles' structural shortcomings from becoming known." The explosive allegations are contained in a federal racketeering suit filed in Los Angeles by Dimitrios P. Biller, former managing counsel for Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc., who claims his complaints about the company's legal misconduct cost him his job.

We've always suspected that fear of angering trial lawyers was the only reason President Obama refused to embrace tort reform as a crucial part of achieving his goal of reduced health care costs. Now we know for sure. A moment of candor by Howard Dean, the former chairman of the DNC and an enthusiastic backer of Obama's health reform initiative, confirmed our suspicions. "The reason that tort reform is not in the bill is because the people who wrote it did not want to take on the trial lawyers in addition to everyone else they were taking on," Dean said...

For arbitration’s opponents, ensuring that consumers can go to court is not the end goal. It is actually the first step of a two-step dance at the plaintiffs’ lawyer prom. The second step is to allow these consumer cases to become large class actions—the kind that are famous for making a relatively few plaintiffs’ lawyers rich while giving the consumer masses pennies on the dollar, or even coupons, for their trouble.

In 1975, Indiana lobbyist Frank Cornelius, whose clients included the Insurance Institute of Indiana, helped secure passage of a $500,000 cap on medical malpractice awards and elimination of all damages for pain and suffering in Indiana. As he wrote in the New York Times on October 7, 1994, he now “rue[s] that accomplishment.” Beginning in 1989, Frank Cornelius experienced a series of medical catastrophes that resulted in his wheelchair confinement, respirator-assisted breathing and constant physical pain.

President Obama's health care "reform" plan has met with significant criticism across the country. Many Americans want change and reform in our current health care system. We recognize that while we have the greatest medical care in the world, there are major problems that we must face, especially in terms of reining in costs and allowing care to be affordable for all. However, as we have seen, current plans being pushed by the Democratic leadership represent change that may not be what we had in mind -- change which poses serious ethical concerns over the government having control over our...

Sarah Palin, posting again on Facebook, asks President Obama how health care costs can be reduced without first reforming tort law: No Health Care Reform Without Legal ReformPresident Obama's health care "reform" plan has met with significant criticism across the country. Many Americans want change and reform in our current health care system. We recognize that while we have the greatest medical care in the world, there are major problems that we must face, especially in terms of reining in costs and allowing care to be affordable for all. However, as we have seen, current plans being pushed by the...

Health Costs: Lawyers are responsible for more unneeded procedures than "greedy" doctors. But instead of capping malpractice awards, bureaucrats will soon decide which treatments are OK and whether you're worth it.Health Costs: Lawyers are responsible for more unneeded procedures than "greedy" doctors. But instead of capping malpractice awards, bureaucrats will soon decide which treatments are OK and whether you're worth it.

In the 70s, Obama's Science Adviser Endorsed Giving Trees Legal Standing to Sue in Court Thursday, July 30, 2009 By Christopher Neefus (CNSNews.com) – Since the 1970s, some radical environmentalists have argued that trees have legal rights and should be allowed to go to court to protect those rights. The idea has been endorsed by John P. Holdren, the man who now advises President Barack Obama on science and technology issues. Giving “natural objects” -- like trees -- standing to sue in a court of law would have a “most salubrious” effect on the environment, Holdren wrote the 1970s. “One...

Republican Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky talked about the high costs of health care today. In particular, Mr. McConnell pointed out how malpractice lawsuits affect how expensive healthcare can become. Dr. Orrin Devinsky, NYU Langone Medical Center neurologist and researcher agrees with Senator McConnell. Dr. Devinsky told the Washington Times,: "By some calculations forty-five to well over fifty percent of the money paid for malpractice actually goes to lawyers and administrators not to the patients. The large percentage of malpractice suits when reviewed independently of doctors and lawyers are felt not to be justified and many people who are wronged...

Last month, the Statistical Assessment Service (STATS), a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization affiliated with George Mason University, released "Science Suppressed: How America became obsessed with BPA," a report which accuses the media "of ignoring the extensive research of respected scientists and major health agencies in the United States and around the world, which found BPA was not only safe but played an important role in ensuring food safety."   It also confirms what countless previous studies have said; BPA is safe. If you're unfamiliar with Bisphenol A (BPA), it is a chemical used to make lightweight, versatile, durable, high-performance plastics.  It's...

"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" -- Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus" (engraved on pedestal of Statue of Liberty) Foreign litigants suing American companies for torts committed abroad hope the golden door swings open into American courtrooms, even when the conduct and events underlying their claims occurred in far-off lands and have no effect on U.S. citizens. With increased frequency, American companies conducting operations abroad face lawsuits in American courts by...

A bizarre lawsuit filed by Gregory McKenna in a U.S. District Court in Missouri accuses Apple, the St. Louis Police Department, the FBI, and an auto mechanic, of conspiring to stalk, extort and torture the plaintiff. McKenna, representing himself, explains the conspiracy and Italian Mafia connections throughout a 124-page document. After purchasing an iPod shuffle on eBay, McKenna claims he quickly discovered that the device was manufactured "with an illegal receiver as the Mafia proceeded to transmit extortion threats and audible harassment to it." The plaintiff became even more convinced of Apple's involvement after allegedly purchasing a new iPod mini...

Another Ethics Complaint Rejected July 15, 2009, Anchorage, Alaska - The Alaska Personnel Board has rejected another ethics complaint lodged against Governor Sarah Palin. The complaint alleged that the governor misused state time by accepting media interviews. The complaint also alleged that Governor Palin was paid for television and radio interviews. Governor Palin has not been paid for media interviews. This complaint was filed by Raymond Alvin Ward on July 9. It was rejected in part because it was not properly notarized. In addition, Personnel Board Chairman Debra English said the board had already determined media interviews did not violate...

Former Boeing instructor pilot Anthony Keyter has filed a federal civil lawsuit against Boeing, alleging that the Chicago-based aerospace company plotted to murder him. Boeing test pilot Anthony Keyter says that Boeing plotted to kill him. The lawsuit indicates that Keyter lives in Gig Harbor and that he is representing himself. The suit, filed Monday with the U.S. District Court of Western Washington, charges that Boeing plotted to kill Keyter after Keyter filed another civil complaint against President George W. Bush. "President Bush, via his agents, contacted high level executives of The Boeing Company and initiated a criminal plot to...

This one's going to blow baby boomers' minds. It concerns a little-known law dating to Elizabethan England suddenly being enforced with gusto in Pennsylvania. The law can force adult children to pay their parents' health-care costs. If Mom and Pop can't pay, you pay. If they have the money but refuse to pay, you pay. If you don't, watch your credit rating sink under the weight of a legal judgment that will haunt you for life. It happened to Don Grant. It can happen to you. The Havertown man is nearly 50 and struggling to pay his mortgage and $100,000...

from the seems-to-leave-a-lot-of-leeway dept Back in May we wrote about a lawsuit questioning whether or not a blogger could use journalism shield laws to protect a source who sent her info she used for a blog post. The company the info was about is suing her for slander (which is odd, since slander is usually spoken, while libel is written). The woman, Shellee Hale tried to claim that she was protected under New Jersey's shield law, which allows a journalist to protect sources. In writing about this case originally, we pointed out that the judge in question clearly did not...

Chambliss blocks regulatory pick over animal lawsuits By Alexander Bolton Posted: 06/28/09 07:57 PM [ET] Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) has blocked President Obama’s candidate for regulation czar, Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, because Sunstein has argued that animals should have the right to sue humans in court. Obama has picked Sunstein, his adviser and longtime friend, to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, an office that has power to review and assess all draft regulations proposed within the administration. But Chambliss worries that Sunstein’s innovative legal views may someday lead to a farmer having to defend himself in...

MOBERLY, Mo. (AP) - Attorneys say a northeast Missouri city has agreed to pay $2.4 million to survivors of a man who died after police fired a Taser at him numerous times. Lawyers for the family of Stanley Harlan, 23, say the settlement with the city of Moberly was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in St. Louis. The agreement includes an indefinite moratorium on the use of Tasers by Moberly police officers. Harlan died in August 2008 after being pulled over by a Moberly police officer who suspected him of drunken driving. The lawsuit said other Moberly officers arrived...

President Obama says he will not place caps malpractice awards: "Now, I recognize that it will be hard to make some of these changes if doctors feel like they're constantly looking over their shoulders for fear of lawsuits. I recognize that. (Applause.) Don't get too excited yet. Now, I understand some doctors may feel the need to order more tests and treatments to avoid being legally vulnerable. That's a real issue. (Applause.) Now, just hold on to your horses here, guys. (Laughter.) I want to be honest with you. I'm not advocating caps on malpractice awards -- (boos from some...

Why Are You Protecting The Wolf At The Door?

Bay City, Michigan - In 1994, a jury awarded a New Mexico woman $2.9 million after she was burned by spilled McDonald's coffee. Now a Bay County woman claims she's steamed at Starbucks for the same reason. Irene Bruno alleges she endured severe burns and permanent scars three years ago when a worker at a Midland County Starbucks Coffee outlet improperly secured a lid on a large cup of coffee, causing the hot liquid to spill onto Bruno's lap, inner thighs and legs. Bruno, in a lawsuit filed in May in U.S. District Court, claims the lid on the coffee...

"First Latina Picked for Supreme Court; GOP Faces Delicate Task in Opposition," blared the four-column headline on the front page of the May 27 Washington Post. Leave aside the Post's odd failure to put in the headline the name of the person nominated--itself a nice example of the de-individualizing effect of identity politics. Consider instead the even odder decision to highlight neither the nominee's potential influence on the Court, nor the president who picked her, but the "delicate task" faced by an opposition party powerless to block her. It was a theme the White House and much of the media...

Use ChangeDetection.com to monitor this page. Latest and the Greatest - December 31, 2008, 1:00 PM (PDF brochure) Latest Update: (05/27/09) Common Law Grand Jury Updates: * Grand Jury and Secret Service! * Jury Update: WorldNetDaily Coverage of Citizen Grand Jury Indictments * Rhode Island and Media Take First Glance at Citizen Grand Jury Movement * Military Officers Sign on to Treason Complaint; More Citizen Grand Jury Action * Jury Update: Fraud, Treason Indictment; Juries Now Online * Jury Update: Texas, Arkansas and Evidence * Grand Jury Memo * Jury Update: Online Grand Jury Indicts Obama for Fraud, Treason *...

A 66-year-old Swedish man has reported a woman to the police for fraud because she refused to have sex with him. The man and the woman got to know each other because they lived in the same neighbourhood in Motala in central Sweden. “He lent her 8,000 kronor ($1,040) to help with the purchase of a car,” said Pär-Åke Ekholm of the Motala police to the Motala & Vadstena Tidning newspaper. But when the man later spoke with the woman about repayment, she refused to hand over the money, suggesting some other form or repayment instead. The woman told the...

Home furnishing giant Ikea has launched legal proceedings over the rights to the domain name iloveikea.se, a site which currently specializes in selling used Ikea furniture. The site, which is modeled after the popular Swedish buy-and-sell site blocket.se, has been operating for about a month. Ikea has now asked the Internet Infrastructure Foundation (Stiftelsen för internetinfrastruktur), the body responsible for registering domain names ending in ‘.se’, to help resolve the dispute over iloveikea.se, claiming the site infringes on the Ikea brand. “It’s obvious that a visitor to a homepage with the description iloveikea as the impression that it is the...

WASHINGTON, (AP) -- The Obama White House is reversing a Bush administration initiative that used federal health and safety regulations to limit the ability of injured consumers to sue companies in state courts. ...Trial lawyers who file class-action lawsuits on behalf of millions of consumers praised Obama's action.

WASHINGTON – The Washington Redskins won another legal victory Friday in a 17-year fight with a group of American Indians who argue the football team's trademark is racially offensive. The decision issued Friday by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington doesn't address the main question of racism at the center of the case. Instead, it upholds the lower court's decision in favor of the football team on a legal technicality. The court agreed that the seven Native Americans waited too long to challenge the trademark first issued in 1967. They initially won — the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office...

A federal appeals court dismissed damage claims against gun manufacturers Monday by the victims of a white supremacist's shooting rampage in the San Fernando Valley, saying a 2005 federal law backed by the firearms industry bars such lawsuits.

"Somehow, you know it’s coming. That OMG moment is just around the corner. You can feel the inescapable reality creeping up on you. Something will leak. Someone will spill the beans." — Sam Sewell, National Grand Jury to Indict Barack Obama "The biggest question, and the biggest reason for asking more questions, is the fact Obama has enlisted law firms across the nation to battle every attempt to access, among other documents, his birth, schooling, immigration or passport records." — New Jersey attorney Mario Apuzzo "The man is a mystery. Nobody can make public his actual birth certificate, or even...

As American taxpayers shell out hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out U.S. companies, a federal court in New York recently paved the way for significantly increasing some of these firms' financial burdens. Relying on the Alien Tort Statute of 1789, the court ruled this month that certain companies that did business with apartheid South Africa -- including distressed firms such as General Motors and Ford -- can be held liable for South Africa's human rights violations during that period. The Alien Tort Statute was designed to allow diplomatically sensitive tort cases to be brought in federal court in...

Obama for America spends nearly $9.5 million in the first three months of this year. ### If you glanced at the expense side of the report filed Wednesday night by President Obama's campaign committee, you might be excused for thinking there was a presidential election afoot. Obama for America, the fundraising juggernaut that powered Obama's ascent to the presidency, spent nearly $9.5 million in the first three months of this year, including $684,000 on telemarketing and print and online advertising, $994,000 on event staging and $310,000 on payroll and taxes. To be sure, some of the payments stem from...

Radio talk show icon Michael Savage has teamed up with the Thomas More Law Center of Ann Arbor, Mich., to file a lawsuit against Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. "It is a civil rights action brought under the First and Fifth Amendments to the United States Constitution, challenging the policy, practice, and custom of the United States Government that targets for disfavored treatment those individuals and groups that are considered to be 'rightwing extremists,'" the complaint announced today said. The federal agency recently targeted those individuals in its report called "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling...

In a major legal win for immigrant workers, thousands of California construction workers will start receiving checks April 15 to compensate for unpaid wages and other alleged labor violations committed during California's housing boom. The $8.5 million legal settlement benefits nearly 3,100 former and current workers for several companies that built houses in Southern California, the Central Valley, Central Coast and San Francisco East Bay. A few workers initiated the complaint in 2006 after approaching a Spanish-speaking attorney, but lawyers say the case grew into one of the biggest class-action lawsuits in California involving mostly Latino construction laborers, including some...

Californians have started many national trends, from surfing to solar energy, but we should be ashamed of the newest fad: class-action lawsuits against retailers asking for ZIP-codes. Like other states, California has passed laws prohibiting businesses from requesting or requiring "personal identification information" while accepting a credit-card payment. Some attorneys are filing class actions against retailers alleging that retailers can't ask customers for any information at the time of a credit-card transaction - even ZIPcodes - without breaking the law. A class-action lawsuit was filed against Old Navy challenging this very practice. Even when customers can't prove they were harmed,...

State Attorneys General regularly hire private plaintiffs lawyers on a contingency-fee basis to prosecute cases. The trial bar returns the favor with campaign donations to state office holders. And despite the inherent conflicts of interest and questionable ethics of the practice, corporate defendants have rarely challenged such arrangements. Which is why a motion pending before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court is so remarkable -- and deserves more public attention. Janssen Pharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, is a defendant in a lawsuit filed by the state of Pennsylvania over Janssen's antipsychotic drug Risperdal. The state alleges that Janssen has improperly...

Below are summaries of class action lawsuits filed against major credit card banks. This is not a complete list, just a few samples. First USA (which became BankOne which became Chase)-- A class action lawsuit was filed against First USA when it changed the due date so that some customers, accustomed to paying by a certain date each month, would be caught off guard. Many of them would send in their payments late, not realizing that their due date was a few days earlier than they thought. First USA charged customers $29 every time a payment was late. When two...

WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline)- Even trial attorneys are not immune from the historic economic crisis hammering the United States, legal observers said. With rising concern over cash flow, firms across the country are increasing their marketing efforts, crafting deals with state attorneys generals and lobbying Congress for plaintiff-friendly legislation. Following a recent exclusive conference for plaintiffs attorneys, Harlan Schillinger, vice president and director of marketing for Network Associates, the nation's largest lawyer advertising agency, told Legal Newsline that lawyers are not immune during these troubled times.

This pistol-packing granny, who shot a man she accused of mugging her in her wheelchair, wishes she had finished the job -- because now, he's suing her for millions. "I'm a peaceful person. I wish that I had killed him," said Margaret Johnson, 59, whose grandfather, Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson, once ruled Harlem's underworld and was immortalized in several hit movies.