tagged w/ Lawsuit
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Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) said Friday she would no longer block medical marijuana dispensaries from opening in the state. The news came in a statement announcing that the state would not try again after a lawsuit she filed blocking implementation was dismissed in federal court earlier this month.|
Read More....
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2012/jan/13/arizona_governor_gives_medical_mArizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) said Friday she would no longer block medical marijuana... more
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A court hearing in New York City at the end of this month will determine if a "pre-emptive" lawsuit by a clutch of U.S. and Canadian organic producers against seed and ag chem firm Monsanto will go ahead.
U.S. District Judge Naomi Buchwald said she will hear oral arguments Jan. 31 in Manhattan on a motion by St. Louis, Mo.-based Monsanto to dismiss the suit filed last March 31 by a group of 83 farmers, seed growers and farm organizations.
The suit "seeks court protection for innocent family farmers who may become contaminated by Monsanto seed," according to a release last week from the Colorado-based lead plaintiff, the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA).
The suit, the plaintiffs claim, is "to protect themselves from being accused of patent infringement should their crops ever become contaminated by Monsanto's genetically modified seed."
"Last August we submitted our written rebuttal and it made clear that Monsanto's motion was without merit," OSGATA president Jim Gerritsen, a seed potato grower in northern Maine, said in the release. "Our legal team, from the Public Patent Foundation, is looking forward to orally presenting our position."
Canadian plaintiffs attached to the suit include Ottawa-based Canadian Organic Growers (COG), Quebec advocacy group Union Paysanne, the Manitoba Organic Alliance, the Peace River Organic Producers Association and a number of producers in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario.
"Monsanto's technology is harmful for organic producers and processors," COG executive director Beth McMahon said in a separate release this week. "To penalize our growers for GMO contamination adds insult to injury, and we won't back down from this fight."
"Never been"
Monsanto's previous suits against farmers for alleged infringement on its patented seed suggest the company "intends to assert its transgenic seed patents against certified organic and nontransgenic seed farmers who come to possess more than 'trace amounts' of Monsanto's transgenic seed, even if it is not their fault," the plaintiffs claimed last year.
Between 1997 and April 2010, the organic producers' suit claims, Monsanto filed 144 lawsuits against farmers in at least 27 different states for alleged infringement of its transgenic seed patents and/or breach of its license to those patents.
More at the linkA court hearing in New York City at the end of this month will determine if a... more
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The fascist cabal known as the Bilderbergers, CFR, committee of 300 etc., is desperately and without hope trying to start WW3 and install a fascist world government in an attempt to pre-empt criminal investigations closing in on them from all sides. Their efforts will fail because the Pentagon and the agencies in the US (with the exception of homeland Gestapo) are preparing to remove them from power, according to CIA and other sources. For example, multiple investigations are closing in on alleged President Obama, including one for illegally declaring war on Libya. A count among US representatives show the votes necessary to impeach him are there, US law enforcement officials say. In addition, evidence of bribery and other forms of illegally tampering with government is being compiled against George Soros, among others. There is also a lot going on under and on the surface in Europe, Japan and the Middle East. I highly recommend you watch this first, as it will draw you directly into the mystery -- which flickered for the briefest moment in mainstream media, only to disappear into shuddering silence: http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/bizzareweird/43041-the-trillion-dollar-lawsuit-that-could-end-financial-tyrannyThe fascist cabal known as the Bilderbergers, CFR, committee of 300 etc., is... more
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STOCKTON, Calif. (CN) - A woman with a prosthetic leg sued Starbucks, claiming its employees wouldn't let her use a restroom to fix a loose screw unless she bought something first.STOCKTON, Calif. (CN) - A woman with a prosthetic leg sued Starbucks, claiming its... more
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The law firm of Steven J. Baum in Buffalo, New York, held a homeless themed Halloween party last year and a former employee decided to “leak” the pictures this weekend. The firm represents banks and mortgage servicers as they attempt to foreclose on homeowners and evict them from their homes. What horrible people. The epitome of heartlessness.The law firm of Steven J. Baum in Buffalo, New York, held a homeless themed Halloween... more
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Corporations carry out some of the most horrific human rights abuses of modern times, but it is increasingly difficult to hold them to account. Economic globalization and the rise of transnational corporate power have created a favorable climate for corporate human rights abusers, which are governed principally by the codes of supply and demand and show genuine loyalty only to their stockholders. http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/recent-news/43017-some-of-the-qmost-wantedq-corporate-human-rights-violatorsCorporations carry out some of the most horrific human rights abuses of modern times,... more
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A Mississippi woman has sued Facebook in federal court, accusing it of violating federal wiretap laws to track her online activity, even when she wasn't logged onto the site.
Facebook denies the allegations, but it has conceded in the past that it inadvertently tracked users through so-called cookies -- small files a website sends to your computer when you visit. It has said it fixed the problem before the Mississippi suit was filed.
"Leading up to September 23, 2011, Facebook tracked, collected, and stored its users' wire or electronic communications, including but not limited to portions of their Internet browsing history even when the users were not logged-in to Facebook," reads the complaint by Brooke Rutledge of Lafayette County, Miss. "Plaintiff did not give consent or otherwise authorize Facebook to intercept, track, collect, and store her wire or electronic communications, including but not limited to her Internet browsing history when not logged-in to Facebook."
It is not the first lawsuit of its kind (there are suits in Kansas, Kentucky and Louisiana), and Facebook is not the only large company to be accused of violating visitors' privacy. But the issue has spread since Faceook's Mark Zuckerberg introduced the site's new Timeline and Ticker features in September. "All your stories, all your apps, a new way to express who you are," he said at the introduction.
Oleksiy Maksymenko/Getty ImagesA Mississippi woman has sued Facebook in... View Full Size Oleksiy Maksymenko/Getty ImagesA Mississippi woman has sued Facebook in federal court, accusing it of violating federal wiretap laws to track her online activity, even when she wasn't logged onto the site.A Mississippi woman has sued Facebook in federal court, accusing it of violating... more
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Rather than judicially review significant evidence in the events of September 11, 2001, on April 27, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s dismissal of an Army Specialist’s complaint against former Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard Myers.
One of Plaintiff April Gallop’s attorneys, William Veale, didn’t know whether to relate the decision to “Kafka, Orwell, Carroll, or Huxley,” referring to the absurdity and dearth of reason emanating from the court regarding the deadliest attack on U.S. soil the nation has ever faced.....
http://www.factoverfiction.com/article/4170Rather than judicially review significant evidence in the events of September 11,... more
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A 290-pound man is suing the White Castle fast food chain because, he claims, their seats aren't built for a person of his size. Stock broker Martin Kessman took legal action last week, 2 years after complaining to the corporate office about the size of the stationary booths at White Castle's Nanuet, N.Y., location. According to the Kessman, White Castle responded with three "very condescending letters," each of which included a coupon for three free hamburgers, but "the cheese was extra," he notes in his lawsuit. White Castle also sent Kessman plans for for how they were going to modify their booths, but no adjustments had been made as of last week. Kessman's beef is unique to White Castle -- he claims to have no issue with seating at other fast-food establishments or on airplanes.
Watch The Video
http://www.waneenterprises.com/news/770A 290-pound man is suing the White Castle fast food chain because, he claims, their... more
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In response to Bethesda’s lawsuit against Minecraft developer Mojang over the use of the name “Scrolls” for its upcoming trading card game, founder Markus “Notch” Persson has challenged the RPG titan to the gamer’s equivalent of Pistols at Dawn: a game of Quake 3.
In his blog, Persson wrote:
I challenge Bethesda to a game of Quake 3. Three of our best warriors against three of your best warriors. We select one level, you select the other, we randomize the order. 20 minute matches, highest total frag count per team across both levels wins.
If we win, you drop the lawsuit.
If you win, we will change the name of Scrolls to something you’re fine with.In response to Bethesda’s lawsuit against Minecraft developer Mojang over the... more
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By Dan McCue for the Courthouse News Service
http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/08/02/38655.htm
In fact, the commission vote in favor of the map was 13-2, with more Democrats voting for the preliminary map that against it. The map would next be reviewed by Judge Spatt, subjected to a public comment period, reviewed by the outgoing board of supervisors, and then put up for the aforementioned public vote.
But my neighbor's good intentions aside, politics would weigh very heavily on the weeks that followed, when input from the public was supposed to lead to tweaks to the lines.
And Sabbath wasn't the only one to be aggrieved. Commission member Neal Lewis, the independent, quickly unveiled his own map that sought to encompass a broader definition of "minority" to include Asians, women and other interest group. Radically different from any of the other alternatives considered, it was quickly cast aside from the commission.
In the meantime, I had gotten to know the team of Democratic and Republican demographers working on the project, and the story they told about the drawing of district lines was markedly different from that promulgated by the commission.
No matter how the 19 districts were drawn, simple demographics would ensure certain districts would be safe Republican or Democratic strongholds. What was really up for grabs was the fate of the so-called "fair fight districts", and that is where the process became very interesting.
The reason is a subtle shift that had been occurring in elections below the county level in the years leading up to the creation of the legislative districts. Despite the edge the Republicans had in voter registration, Democrats, led by a Republican-turned Democrat candidate for town supervisor named Ben Zwirn, had swept into office in the Town of North Hempstead, and another Democratic, Lew Yevoli, had won the supervisorship in the Town of Oyster Bay.
At the same time, two other members of the Board of Supervisors, Bruce Nyman of Long Beach and Tom Suozzi of Glen Cove, were also Democrats.
With that as context, there was a tremendous amount at stake for both political parties as demographers entered each proposed district's borders into their computer programs.
Once the minority district question was settled - incidentally creating a Democratic minority district and a Republican minority district - a lot of tweaking was done with eye toward the legislative races to come.
The new county legislature would open up opportunities for advance for members of both parties who had gone as far as they could either in local government or in their local party committee, and many were not shy about declaring their intention to run - long before the ink was dry on even the earliest versions of the district map - and leaning on their respective party leaders to have things come out their way.
Well, let me clarify, the Democrats were rumbling in the ranks, being the more boisterous of the two local parties. The Republicans, on the other hand, mainly quietly expressed their interest, fearing that to say or do more would alienate then- Republican Chairman Joe Mondello, who ran the party with an iron will.
(In short, if you wanted to have any future in Republican politics, he told you, you didn't tell him. That said, some of Mondello's preferences where known fairly early on.)
One afternoon as I went to pick up copies of the latest districts maps, I fell into a conversation with the handful of people working in the Charter Revision Commission's office that day.
Compared to recent days, the mood was relaxed and the conversation strayed from demographics to politics, and the game of matching names of prospective candidates to districts.
What was clear is that each party - and quite understandably - wanted to ensure that no significant competition be drawn into a district where one of the respective favorites lived - if such a situation could possibly be helped.
"In some cases, it's relatively easy," one of the staffers told me.
"Barbara [a prominent Democrat] lives here, and Mike [a rising star n the local Republican party] lives over there, and their homes are far enough apart that you can easily place them in different districts without upsetting the populations of each district that we're striving for," another staff chimed in.
"Where it gets tough is when they live in same neighborhood or close to it," the first staffer continued.
What do you do then? I asked.
"Well that's when you get out the phone book, verify the address, and see if you can inch the district line over to put a border between them," one of the staffers said.
"You can do that?" I said, trying to seem as wide-eyed as I possibly could.
"So long as you move another part of the line to even out the district populations again," somebody said.
I must have looked surprised during the pregnant pause that followed.
Finally, the first staffer smiled and shrugged.
"When it comes to a deal, there is no law," he said. "Remember, the court-mandates have been met, but getting the approval of the parties, the sitting leaders and the public... that's a process outside of what any court can do."By Dan McCue for the Courthouse News Service... more
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By DAN MCCUE
(That's me!) For The Courthouse News Service
It isn't often that I read a serious legal story, sit back and chuckle to myself, but I found myself doing so twice in recent days - first as I read Courthouse News coverage of a gerrymandering case currently working its way through a federal court in New York, then a second time after hearing about the citizen redistricting of California.
"So this is what it comes to," I thought to myself with a slow, self-confirming nod. "Some things never change."
You see, as a young journalist plying my trade at a weekly newspaper, I had a front row seat for the original drawing of the legislative district lines that are now a point contention in a pair of lawsuits in Nassau County, a suburb of New York City.
It all started with federal lawsuit that few but political junkies paid much attention to; a group of minority voters sued Nassau County and its Board of Supervisors, claiming that the political system that had been in place since the county was formed in late 19th century effectively preventing them from voting for and having a reasonable expectation of being represented by the elected official of their choice.
At the time, the Board of Supervisors was comprised of six members representing the county's primary political subdivisions -the supervisors of the Towns of North Hempstead and Oyster Bay, the mayors of its two nominal cities, Glen Cove and Long Beach, and because it was so populous, the supervisor and deputy supervisor of the Town of Hempstead.
In due course, Judge Arthur D. Spatt found the Board of Supervisors unconstitutional on the grounds that its configuration and the weighted-voting system it employed to make decisions violated the principal of "One Person-One Vote" and significant portions of the Federal Voting Rights Act of 1964.
That fateful decision was only the beginning of an extraordinary - and eye-opening remediation process, one that began in the Fall of 1993 with the formation of the Nassau County Commission on Government Revision, and culminated a year later with voter approval of a referendum that established the current 19-member legislature and putting in place several significant governmental reforms.
It was about mid-way through this process, in March 1994, that I received a call from a neighbor whose home was diagonally adjacent to mine.
"We're issuing our report tomorrow night," Francis X. Moroney, executive director of the commission said. "You might find it interesting. Why don't you come down?"
The meeting was held in a conference room adjacent to a popular county golf course, and around a long conference table sat the commission that would rewrite the county's rules - the primary subject of the report - and create the legislative districts themselves.
Strangely, I thought, given the fact the group was about to issue "its" work product, tension remained in the room. Several of those at the table were attorneys, but beyond, it quickly became clear that they represented different "factions".
There were those, of course, to make sure the minority plaintiffs - all of them African-American - were done right by the process, there was at least one hardcore independent, and then there were clearly the Republicans and Democrats, who seemed to eye each other warily regardless of what was being said.
But it was the drawing of the legislative district map itself that was to prove the most fascinating aspect of all.
"The primary thing that had to be resolved was the constitutional requirement," Moroney told me after that first meeting.
Before they did anything else, the commissioners had looked at where the vast majority of African-Americans lived, which turned out to be the central corridor of the county. Then the commission began to consider several options - one for nearly every commissioner in the room and, it seemed for every political boss who was judiciously standing outside of it.
The early issue was whether proposed districts were instances of "packing" - putting too many people of one voting block in a single district - or "cracking" - in essence diluting the voting power of any one segment of the voting population in proposed districts.
"Eventually we decided 19 was the optimum number of districts," Moroney said.
The preliminary map created two minority-majority districts, areas where African-Americans and Hispanics made up the bulk of registered voters.
The next concern was keeping smaller communities, villages and unincorporated areas largely defined by school district lines, whole. In the end 52 of the county's 64 villages were wholly within one single district or another -- the exceptions where those, like my home village of Westbury, which needed to be divided in order to create the minority-majority districts.
In the case of Westbury, the line between districts 2 and 11 was literally the yellow line done the middle of the village's main street, Post Avenue.
But not everyone was happy.
Democratic County Chairman Stephen J. Sabbath insisted the map had been designed to perpetuate the Republican's longstanding domination of Nassau politics. At the time, Republicans enjoyed a 3-2 enrollment edge over the Democrats, and had been in power, with just two or three year's exception, for nearly a century.
"This map is a partisan blueprint for one-party control of county government for the foreseeable future," Sabbath said.
Moroney took offense, saying that statements like Sabbath's -statements that had gotten a lot of play in the local newspapers - where merely the statements of a leader "whose job it is to be political."
"Cut away the press releases and what you arrive at is a process that has taken place with political blinders on," he said.By DAN MCCUE
(That's me!) For The Courthouse News Service
It isn't... more
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The New York attorney general is moving to block a proposed $8.5 billion settlement struck in June by Bank of New York Mellon and Bank of America over troubled loan pools issued by Countrywide. A lawsuit filed late Thursday accuses Bank of New York of fraud in its role as trustee overseeing the pools for investors.
This is a major allegation. Schneiderman is saying that the game-playing with securitizations, which has been well-documented, represent violations of securities law on the part of the trustee and the originator of the loans. They knowingly sold junk to investors and violated their own agreements. And now they’re trying to whitewash it through a settlement where the bank and the trustee are colluding with one another. As Schneiderman says, “the Trustee stands to receive direct financial benefits under the Proposed Settlement.”
http://tinyurl.com/3zk5el4The New York attorney general is moving to block a proposed $8.5 billion settlement... more
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LOrion
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It, as they say, is on. Google's Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer, David Drummond, made an appearance on the company's official blog today with a post not-so-subtly-titled "When patents attack Android," which directly addresses what he calls a "hostile, organized campaign against Android by Microsoft, Oracle, Apple and other companies, waged through bogus patents." Drummond then goes on to cite a number of examples of this "organized campaign" from those trying to "strangle" Android, including Apple and Microsoft teaming up to buy Novell and Nortel's old patents "to make sure Google didn't get them," Microsoft seeking $15 licensing fees for each Android device, and lawsuits against the likes of Barnes & Noble, HTC, Motorola, and Samsung.
According to Drummond, those efforts amount to a "tax" that makes Android devices more expensive for consumers and manufacturers alike, and that "instead of competing by building new features or devices, they are fighting through litigation." He further goes on to bemoan the "anti-competitive strategy" that's "escalating the cost of patents way beyond what they're really worth," and closes things out by noting that he's encouraged by Justice Department investigations into the aforementioned Novell and Nortel patent issues. Hit the source link to read the full post yourself.It, as they say, is on. Google's Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer,... more
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Two national civil rights groups and a Minneapolis law firm filed a federal lawsuit Thursday against the Anoka-Hennepin School District on behalf of five current and former students who say they were bullied at school because of their perceived or actual sexual orientation.
Outside a Champlin middle school Thursday morning, the Southern Poverty Law Center, National Center for Lesbian Rights and Faegre & Benson law firm announced that the suit had been filed in U.S. District Court against Minnesota's largest school district.
It seeks to end the district's sexual orientation curriculum policy, also known as the neutrality policy, and seeks compensation for the students who say they were repeatedly bullied because they were gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, or perceived to be GLBT.
"The Anoka-Hennepin School District, where we stand today, has refused to take a stand against harassment and bullying," said Mary Bauer, the legal director at the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center. "This policy sends a message to kids that who they are is not OK. Our plaintiffs have stood up and said no more."
The announcement comes a day after the school district released a statement acknowledging that federal authorities have been investigating the district since November after a compliant or complaints of student bullying. In the statement Wednesday, the district also said it wanted to work with the two national civil rights groups to resolve concerns about the policy instead of going into costly litigation.
"We feel that it would be better to put our energy and resources into materials for training students and all staff that would be more effective than what we're doing," district spokeswoman Mary Olson said Thursday.
Sam Wolfe, an attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center, said they met with the school district once after their May request. But refusal by the school board to get rid of the policy is a "nonstarter" for further discussions, he said.
"There is a great sense of urgency that this problem needs to be addressed," Wolfe said. "We can't really wait for the federal government to go through their process. It's important with school starting again ... that we really need to move forward now."
The sexual orientation curriculum policy allows teachers to discuss issues related to sexual orientation in the classroom but requires them to maintain neutrality -- the only local school district known to have such a policy.
District leaders maintain that the policy is appropriate because the community is split on GLBT issues.
Bullying has been a high-profile issue in the district over the past year.
Last fall, after a number of student suicides in the 38,000-student Anoka-Hennepin district, GLBT advocates argued that some deaths stemmed from bullying because of real or perceived GLBT orientation. In December, the district said an investigation into six teen suicides had found no links to bullying.
http://www.startribune.com/local/north/125958688.htmlTwo national civil rights groups and a Minneapolis law firm filed a federal lawsuit... more
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Imzadi
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