Pfizer and Lilly lead a parade of U.S. companies that have paid $7 billion in penalties after promoting drugs for uses not approved by the FDA. This unlawful behavior may not end until prosecutors force a drugmaker into bankruptcy.
Two Indiana teenagers whose sexually suggestive slumber party pictures made their way into the hands of the high school principal are fighting back against what they say is an unfair suspension from athletics for activities that took place off school grounds.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana has filed suit on behalf of the two sophomore girls. The suit claims the Smith-Green Community School Corporation and Churubusco High School Principal Austin Couch violated the girls' First Amendment rights when they suspended them from extra-curricular activities and forced them to attend counseling sessions over a few racy photos that were posted on their MySpace pages.
So if you're a loyal Democrat, you're probably all riled up about the health insurance reform going on in congress. You're probably anxious for Congress to get something, ANYTHING passed. Not so fast there buddy. Health insurance reform, even if it's done by Democrats could end up making things WORSE, not better.
"What? How could this possibly be?" you might ask. Well...
It's old news by now that insurance giant Wellpoint, owner of Maine's Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, is suing the State of Maine, to increase their profits. But you may not know the entire backstory: Anthem Blue Cross, in anticipation of the individual mandate for health insurance, has jacked up their rates 18% from what they were previously, jacking many people's rates through the roof.
What may surprise you if you're not paying close attention, is that the Health Insurance industry is actually in favor of health insurance "reform." How could this be? Did they suddenly grow a concience, and decide that letting people die to increase their profit margin was wrong? Are they crying out to Big Government to regulate them like Sinners calling out to Jesus? "Please, Government! Save us from our own wicked nature!"
Not a chance in Hell.
It's no surprise that Wellpoint has run television ads in favor of the health insurance "reform" being pushed by Democrats in Congress. If the individual mandate becomes a final part of the bill, whether you can afford to or not, we will all end up having to pay these new increased rates, or face federal fines of up to three thousand dollars, depending on which version of the individual mandate ends up in the final bill.
Maine's state government has the power to regulate insurance rates. In light of this 18% increase, the State of Maine stepped in, and reduced the increase from 18% to 11%. So people's rate are still going up, and health insurance is still becoming less affordable. But that wasn't enough for the private insurance giant.
Last year Wellpoint made $2 billion in profits. In Maine alone, they've paid out over one million dollars in CEO bonuses. Rather than cut CEO bonuses to reduce their overhead, they are increasing their rates. Let's call a spade a spade. Wellpoint is essentially suing to ensure not their profit margin, but their CEO bonus margin.
[full article at link]http://punkpatriot.blogspot.com/2009/10/insurance-giant-wellpoint-sueing-maine.html... more
To defend itself in a major environmental lawsuit in Ecuador, it appears that American oil giant Chevron is employing methods -- and people -- that are as dirty as the toxic waste pits it left scattered across the rainforest floor.
According to The New York Times:
"An American whose secret recordings have placed him at the center of a $27 billion lawsuit against Chevron in Ecuador is a convicted drug trafficker, records show, throwing another complication into a case already tainted by accusations of bribery and espionage."
Click on the link to read my full story on Alternet about Chevron's contrived "corruption scandal" and its desperate attempts to derail a lawsuit by 30,000 indigenous people and campesinos in Ecuador who are seeking to hold the oil giant accountable for massive contamination of their rainforest communities.http://www.alternet.org/environment/143628/chevron_goes_to_drastic_measures_to_escape_p... more
A Sacramento, California radio stunt gone gone bad will cost the radio station and its parent company $16.57 million.
The survivors of a woman who died almost three years ago after her participation in radio station's KDND "Hold Your Wee for a Wii" contest were awarded the money for a wrongful death suit.
The contest promised to give the person who could drink the most water without urinating or vomiting a free Nintendo Wii video game system.http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local-beat/Hold-Your-Wee-for-a-Wii-Costs-Radio-Station-D... more
NEW YORK (CNN) -- A new lawsuit alleges that convicted swindler Bernie Madoff financed a cocaine-fueled work environment and a "culture of sexual deviance," and he diverted money to his London, England, office when he believed federal authorities were closing in at home.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in New York's State Supreme Court, was brought on behalf of former investors and seeks unspecified punitive damages and compensation.
Beyond that, it offers a look at what the plaintiffs' attorneys say was once Madoff's multimillion-dollar empire and what is now his world in a federal prison in North Carolina.
Among the allegations in the 264-page lawsuit are that during the mid-1970s, Madoff began sending employees to buy drugs for company use.
The complaint alleges that some employees and investors were aware of the drug purchases, and that BMIS [Bernard Madoff Investment Services] was known by insiders as the "North Pole" in reference to the excessive amount of cocaine use in the work place...(Continued)NEW YORK (CNN) -- A new lawsuit alleges that convicted swindler Bernie Madoff financed... more
A lawsuit filed by the Cancer Project accuses McDonald's Corp., Burger King Holdings Inc. and Friendly Ice Cream Corp. of selling chicken they know contains a chemical that can cause cancer even in small amounts. A similar suit against seven restaurant chains in 2006 and another against Yum! Brands Inc.s KFC unit last month were filed in California. That state listed the chemical, PhIP, which forms during the grilling process, as a known carcinogen in 1994, according to the complaint.(Source: Bloomberg)A lawsuit filed by the Cancer Project accuses McDonald's Corp., Burger King Holdings... more
California’s attorney general, Jerry Brown, said Tuesday that he was suing State Street, the large Boston-based bank, accusing it of committing “unconscionable fraud” against the state’s two largest employee pension funds, Calpers and Calstrs.California’s attorney general, Jerry Brown, said Tuesday that he was suing State... more
New York medical staff took legal action Thursday to halt a massive swine flu inoculation program being rolled out across the United States, claiming the vaccines have not been properly tested.
Lawyers for the group filed a temporary restraining order in a Washington federal court against government medical regulators they claim rushed H1N1 vaccines to the public without adequately testing their safety and efficacy.
"None of the vaccines against H1N1 have been properly tested," attorney Jim Turner, one of half a dozen lawyers working on the case, told AFP.
If the complaint is upheld, it would stop the roll-out of the H1N1 vaccine nationwide, said Turner, who accused public health officials of hyping the swine flu outbreak but failing to back up their stance with adequate testing of the vaccine.
"Officials have said the virus is so much like the ordinary flu virus that they don't need to do special new drug testing on it because it's just the same old virus with a minor change to it," said Turner.
"We're saying, if that's the case, then all the hype about this thing being a worldwide threat is misplaced and they've stampeded the state of New York into taking an action they never would have taken if it were just another flu."New York medical staff took legal action Thursday to halt a massive swine flu... more
An 18-year Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism Manager for the FBI has called for a Special Counsel to be appointed to investigate the allegations of FBI translator-turned-whistleblower Sibel Edmonds. John M. Cole, who now works as an intelligence contractor for the Air Force, made his comments during an audio interview released late last week with radio journalist Peter B. Collins.
He also offered a detailed insider's look at the concerns among high-level officials inside the Bureau as Edmonds' disturbing allegations began coming to light back in 2002, before they would be quashed for seven long years by the Bush Administration's unprecedented use of the so-called "State Secrets Privilege" to gag her.
Earlier last week, following the publication of a remarkable American Conservative magazine cover story interview with Edmonds --- detailing a broad bribery, blackmail, and espionage conspiracy said to have been carried out between current and former members of the U.S. Congress, high-ranking State and Defense Department officials and covert operatives from Turkey and Israel, resulting in the theft and sale of nuclear weapons technology on the foreign black market --- Cole had been quoted by the magazine confirming one of Edmonds' key allegations.
"I am fully aware of the FBI's decade-long investigation of" Marc Grossman, he said in response to the AmCon article/interview. Grossman had served as the third-highest ranking official in the Bush State Department and was alleged by Edmonds in the interview, and in a sworn, video-taped deposition a month earlier, to have been the U.S. ringleader for a massive Turkish espionage scandal reaching through the halls of power and into top-secret nuclear facilities around the country to the benefit of allies and enemies alike. Cole said that the FBI's counterintelligence probe "ultimately was buried and covered up," and that he believes it is "long past time" for an investigation of the case to "bring about accountability."
In his subsequent interview with Collins last week (audio and text excerpts posted below) Cole elaborated on those comments in much greater detail, noting that Edmonds has been "one hundred percent right on the money, on the mark" and confirming the existence of an "ongoing and detailed effort by Turkey to develop influence in the United States" through various illegal activities.
"Yes, I can confirm that," Cole told Collins, "That's true."
The FBI veteran executive also offered an insider's account of the panic that ensued inside the highest echelons of the bureau following Edmonds' first disclosure of information in 2002, recounting how an executive assistant director admitted to him at the time, just after the story first broke, "Well, all I know is that everything that Sibel is stating is true. I read her file. Everything she stated is, in fact, accurate."
Cole further describes how the concerns about Edmonds ultimately led to the Bush Administration's two-time use of the Draconian "State Secrets Privilege" in hopes of keeping her extraordinary information from becoming public. "Everybody at headquarters level at the bureau knew that what she was saying was extremely accurate."
"I know they didn't want her to go out and speak about it at all," Cole revealed, "and I know they were trying to figure out ways of keeping this whole thing quiet, because they didn't want Sibel to come out."
He also offered information which directly counters one of the criticisms of Edmonds' allegations as frequently offered by skeptics. Namely, that as a short time FBI contract translator --- even though she was tasked to review some seven years of counterintelligence wiretaps made from 1996 to 2002 --- she couldn't have had enough understanding of the full scope of the investigations to understand what was really going on.
More...An 18-year Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism Manager for the FBI has called for... more
A heavily bandaged man lies in a hospital bed while a sexy nurse tends to him. The man glances around the hospital room through bandaged eyes, spotting the nurse and asking her that all-important question.
“Who can I sue?”
The nurse refers him to www.whocanisue.com, a South Florida-based website, where the man finds a lawyer, files a lawsuit and winds up with a convertible Mercedes Benz as well as the nurse – who has traded her nurse uniform for a sexy short dress.
Although the television ad is not anymore risqué than your average Go Daddy commercial, it has still raised the ire of some in Florida’s legal community.
But not those lawyers who are advertising on the site.
"I'm getting probably twice as many phone calls," Martin Saenz, a Miami labor and employment lawyer who has been advertising on the site for just more than a month, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
But critics say whocanisue and other online referral services degrade the legal profession and often steer the public to lawyers who operate under a business model of "bring in as many cases as you can and settle them."
The website, which is run out of Boca Raton and launched in October 2008, is not the first time unconventional methods have been used to attract clients.
In 2007, a Chicago law firm came up with the slogan “Life is Short. Get a Divorce,” which is posted on billboards throughout the city, to much controversy and success.
In fact, the slogan became so popular that the firm, Fetman, Garland & Associates, created a website to sell t-shirts.
However, earlier this year, a Chicago alderman had one of their signs torn down under a technicality. The firm apparently did not have the proper permit for the sign.
But so far, critics have not found a pretext to remove the Who Can I Sue website despite the fact that they also use billboards to advertise the site. Considering they are lawyers, don't be surprised if they eventually do.
Gary Lesser, managing partner of a 10-lawyer firm started by his grandfather as well as vice chairman of the Florida Bar’s advertising committee, which oversees lawyer advertising, calls the site “egregious.”
“There are real people who are hurt, who need lawyers," he said. "Whocanisue.com is part of an emerging trend. They are not a law firm, but a referral agency."
F. Gregory Barnhart a senior partner at Searcy Denney Scarola Barnhart & Shipley in West Palm Beach calls the site a “disgrace” because they are targeting people looking to make money off whiplash cases.
But those are the type of clients that a personal-injury lawyer would seek, so it made sense to Mitch Polay of Fort Lauderdale, who says his phone hasn’t stopped ringing in the month he’s been using the site.
Whocanisue was launched in October 2008 by Curtis Wolfe, 46, a former in-house counsel at a large Miami firm.
“We wanted to provoke people,” he said. “Most lawyer advertising is unremarkable and not memorable. I would sit at home and see these ads asking if you're injured blah, blah, blah. There was no branding involved. We have a brand."A heavily bandaged man lies in a hospital bed while a sexy nurse tends to him. The man... more
"Listen Beyonce, I'm a let you finish.. You had one of the best videos of all time. But at least Taylor Swift writes all of the songs that she claims to write.."
I have always been a fan of Destiny's Child and the solo pieces from each of the remaining three members. It has been a beautiful thing to watch over the last decade. I love watching people Horatio Alger their way to success. It is the American Dream. I enjoy watching others achieve it while I am still on my way up. But I have definitely also been a hater of Beyonce, the person. She has great media training but there is something about 'the real her' that 'really' annoys me. That aside, I have never been able to deny that she is a very talented young woman. She has a beautiful voice and her songwriting credits are extensive. So I'm a lover and a hater.
Now, let us find out that SonyBMG has been involved in some old-fashioned corporate thuggery, hacking an indie artists computer and stealing music and video treatments from independent artists and passing the content on to artists signed to the major label. Madonna and Beyonce are two of the biggest players in the music industry and have been involved with this type of claim this entire decade, although major media outlets have barely reported on the matter. I knew that there was something funny about Beyonce and I feel like my intense hate has been vindicated. She and her former-manager/father, Matthew Knowles, have been taking a lot of credit for the hard work of others in the music industry. They have been wildly successful, that is for certain. But as with all major wealth, to acquire the multi-million dollar fortunes the old saying goes: "If you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin'."
Accessing unreleased copyrights on a private, protected computer, then using it to enrich yourself to the tune of millions, constitutes:
Felony hacking (you commission or participate in a crime, you did it)
Copyright infringement
Criminal copyright infringement
Fraud
Grand theft larceny
Violation of the Computer Abuse Act
Violation of the Digital Millennium Act
Violations of the RICO Act
Money Laundering
Conspiracy
I understand artistic license and being inspired by another artist, etc. The problem lies when one passes the ideas on as their own without giving proper credit where it is due. Knowles has 'forgotten' to pay the Wilhwlmina Artist Management $88,000 for brokering her $900,000 L'Oreal contract in April 2001. Knowles and family gave Greg Walker of Icon Entertainment the slip to the tune of $25,000 for his services rendered in brokering the $15,000,000 fashion deal for the House of Dereon in 2004. She has publicly claimed to have written "Crazy in Love" and "Irreplaceable," though they were actually written by their respective producers Greg Harrison and Ne-yo. Fans may also be saddened to hear of the ongoing litigation involving such hits as "Survivor", "Baby Boy", and "Independent Women." It should be noted that Beyonce fired her father from her manager position back in 2007 and Destiny's Child member Kelly Rowland followed suit in January 2009. Millions of dollars in royalties are deserving of the plaintiffs, independent artists doing just that: creating art. But decide for yourself.
Blogs and the internets have tried their best to disseminate the message but we all know how easy it is to discredit independent news outlets, especially weblogs."Listen Beyonce, I'm a let you finish.. You had one of the best videos of all time.... more
The maker of Monster energy drinks has taken aim at a Vermont brewery that sells a beer called "The Vermonster," ordering it to stop selling, advertising and promoting the craft brew because it could confuse consumers.
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.2)
Matt Nadeau, who owns the brewery with his wife, Renee, says he's been told by five trademark attorneys that the law is probably on his side, but that proving it through lengthy litigation could bankrupt him.
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.3)
Nadeau contacted Reed to say the products are in two different markets — beer and energy drinks — and offered to surrender any rights to use the name on an energy drink. According to Nadeau, Reed said that's not Hansen's concern, but that Hansen wants to enter the alcoholic beverage market.
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.10)
"The way the law is arranged, the holder of a trademark has to be very aggressive in defending it, even when it's overreaching," said Douglas Riley, Nadeau's trademark attorney. "If you miss a legitimate infringement, people will point out in later years that you weren't defending your properties. You can lose it if you don't defend it, so you err on the side of caution.
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.13)
David S. Welkowitz, a trademark law expert who's not involved in the case, says there isn't a hard-and-fast answer, but that litigating the dispute could take a long time — and a lot of money.
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.16)
Nadeau has taken his beef online. Rock Art's Web site headlines a description of the dispute as "Rock Art Brewery vs. Corporate America."
(AP, 2009, October 12, par.18)The maker of Monster energy drinks has taken aim at a Vermont brewery that sells a... more
Starbucks Corp. says in a federal lawsuit it lost a key veteran executive to Dunkin’ Donuts and wants a Seattle judge to stop him from working there.
Starbucks filed the lawsuit against Paul Twohig, who oversaw the company’s retail operations in the Southeast before joining Canton, Mass.-based Dunkin’ Donuts empire. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. district court in Seattle.Starbucks Corp. says in a federal lawsuit it lost a key veteran executive to Dunkin’... more
A New Mexico woman kicked off an airplane at the Burlington International Airport three years ago for breast feeding her baby is suing Delta Air Lines.
The Burlington Free Press says negotiations failed to reach a settlement between the Atlanta-based airline and Emily Gillette.
On Wednesday Gillette filed suit in U.S. District Court in Burlington.
Gillette was ordered off a Delta Connections plane by a flight attendant after twice refusing an order to cover up while she breast fed her baby prior to takeoff.
Gillette's lawsuit says she felt "shame and embarrassed" after being ordered off the plane.A New Mexico woman kicked off an airplane at the Burlington International Airport... more
A student who transferred from Texas A&M is suing her former university, saying an academic counselor recommended that she intentionally fail three classes.
The classes were taken in the fall of 2007, the first semester of her freshman year, according to the suit, and the student approached the counselor because she was having trouble understanding her professors.
The student, Jennifer Temple, wanted to Q-drop the classes, but she contends in her suit that the adviser told her that she would lose her parents' health benefits if she did. Students are given a limited number of Q-drops, which allow them to drop a class from their schedule within the first 50 days of classes.
The counselor, Sofie Fuentes, told Temple that she should fail the classes because of an A&M rule allowing freshmen to exclude as many as three grades of D, F or U (unsatisfactory) from their transcripts, the suit alleges.A student who transferred from Texas A&M is suing her former university, saying an... more
We know big business corporations make legalese and throw this into tiny print concocted by lawyers and attorneys. Normally this is illegible by average people. However, this blog post explores the Macintosh iTunes user agreement fine print to see what they're really forcing you to agree to! Is it fair and equitable or sneaky?We know big business corporations make legalese and throw this into tiny print... more
An Ellenwood man who said he suffered permanent scarring to his penis following a series of treatments for erectile dysfunction was awarded more than $9 million by a DeKalb County jury.
John Henry Howard, 53, was awarded $750,000 in compensatory damages and $8.5 million in punitive damages in his suit against Boston Men’s Health Center Inc.
He was treated with an injection in his penis using a proprietary formula that includes papaverine. That drug is used to improve blood flow, said Chad Ritenour, an assistant professor of urology and at the Emory University School of Medicine and director of the Men’s Health Center at the Emory Clinic.
Use of the drug can lead to priaprism, a prolonged erection for more than four hours, and to permanent damage and tissue scarring, Ritenour said, especially if it’s the same injection site.
Howard purchased a six-month supply of of the treatment for $1,210 and was instructed to inject himself with it three times a week.
The company said it explained in detail to Howard the proper procedures to take with his injections and what to do in case of a complication.
The defense said Howard waited too long to seek medical help after his first home self-injection led to an erection that lasted two days.An Ellenwood man who said he suffered permanent scarring to his penis following a... more
Eolas, the company that won a patent case against Microsoft in 2003, has filed another patent infringement lawsuit, apparently targeting as many high-tech companies it could find. Citing infringement on the very same patent as the one that resulted in a $585 judgment against Microsoft, Eolas is now suing 23 companies, including Apple, Google, Adobe, Amazon, eBay, Playboy, Yahoo, and YouTube for implementing browser plug-ins in one form or another, plus another patent that addresses the use of asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX).Eolas, the company that won a patent case against Microsoft in 2003, has filed another... more
