ABA Journal Top Stories

• Authorities Reel Over Parolees’ Stunning Alleged Crimes in 2 States

  As a report released today harshly criticized those in charge of monitoring the California parole of convicted sex offender and alleged child-kidnapper Phillip Garrido, who is accused of kidnapping an 11-year-old and keeping her at his home for nearly 20 years, observers are also asking questions about a stunning Ohio [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 8:24pm EST
  

• Top Pa. Court Axes $3.5M Libel Verdict Due to ‘Judicial Impropriety’

  Because of questionable conduct of the Luzerne County judges who oversaw the case, a Pennsylvania newspaper must get a new trial in a defamation lawsuit that resulted in a $3.5 million bench verdict in 2006, the state's top court ruled today. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court did not find that lawyers' [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 7:38pm EST
  

• Law Prof Dismisses Privacy Suit Against Tabloid Above the Law Blog

  A law professor at the University of Miami has seemingly changed his mind about the federal invasion of privacy suit he filed only last week against the publisher of Above the Law over a 2007 post on the self-described tabloid law blog. Plaintiff Donald Marvin Jones today voluntarily dismissed the [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 5:20pm EST
  

• Plaintiffs Lawyers to Earn Up to $28M in Risky Wal-Mart Wage & Hour Litigation

  Although Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has agreed to pay as much as $85 million to settle 39 consolidated wage-and-hour class action lawsuits involving more than 3 million employees, it wasn't at all clear when the litigation began to unfold that the case would be a big winner. Now a hot litigation' [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 3:26pm EST
  

• Associate Makes Supreme Court Debut in Prosecutor Immunity Case

  Lawyer Steve Sanders made his U.S. Supreme Court debut today arguing on behalf of prosecutors accused of conspiring to frame two murder suspects. Sanders is an appellate litigator with Mayer Brown, but in an unusual twist, he is an associate rather than a partner. And it’s a paying case; a [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 3:23pm EST
  

• Prosecutors Wrestle Unsuccessfully With a Bear of a Misdemeanor Case

  Was it a bear den, or wasn't it a bear den? That was a central question in an unusual trial of a mentally ill man, who won an acquittal this week in a misdemeanor zoo trespassing case. Although, in fact, Kenneth Herron did enter the San Francisco Zoo's grizzly grotto' [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 2:25pm EST
  

• Suspended Louisville Lawyer Liable for $3.2M for ‘Reprehensible’ Conduct

  A suspended Louisville, Ky., lawyer and a financier have been found liable for $3.2 million as a result of “inexcusable” conduct in a bankruptcy case. The judgment against lawyer Bruce Atherton and financier Randall Scott Waldman includes $2 million in punitive damages, the Louisville Courier-Journal reports. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Joan [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 1:59pm EST
  

• UK Lawyers Set to Stock Supermarket Shelves for Client, Delaying Case

  Lawyers with the British law firm Pinsent Masons will be stocking supermarket shelves at Asda, delaying a trademark dispute involving the U.K. supermarket chain. Asda's counsel, Hugh Cuddigan, asked the High Court to push back a January trial date because Pinsents lawyers were going to be busy stocking shelves over [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 12:33pm EST
  

• Italian Court Convicts 23 Americans in CIA Kidnapping Case

  Twenty-three Americans tried in absentia in Italy have been convicted of kidnapping an Egyptian terror suspect as part of a CIA extraordinary rendition program. Judge Oscar Magi sentenced 22 of the Americans to five years in jail and sentenced former Milan CIA station chief Robert Seldon Lady to eight years [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 11:52am EST
  

• NY AG Claims Intel Used ‘Bribery and Coercion,’ Violated Antitrust Laws

  New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Intel that alleges the company paid kickbacks disguised as rebates to keep computer companies from using competitors’ chips. Cuomo maintains the rebates were accompanied by threats, according to stories in the New York Times and the Wall Street [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 11:29am EST
  

• Lawyers Say Malpractice Suit by Mall Dynasty Heir Is ‘Study in Sensationalism’

  Lawyers responding to a malpractice suit filed in Chicago by mall dynasty heir Mary Bucksbaum Scanlan questioned jurisdiction and criticized the complaint in responses filed last week. The suit by Scanlan claims Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg is to blame for more than $300 million in her trusts’ investment losses. The [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 11:11am EST
  

• Lawyer Says Televangelist’s No-Divorce Policy May Have Led to Killing

  A lawyer says he needs to depose televangelist Joyce Meyer to determine whether her ministries could have prevented the slaying of a woman and her two sons. Lawyer Enrico Mirabelli represents the family of the victims in a lawsuit against the woman’s husband, Christopher Coleman, the former security chief for [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 10:19am EST
  

• Ex-DLA Lawyer Accused of Faking Payroll Docs to Boost Salary at Duane Morris

  A former partner at DLA Piper is being tried on charges that he forged a payroll statement in hopes of getting a higher salary at his new law firm, Duane Morris. The trial began Monday in Singapore for Rudy Lim, the American Lawyer reports, relying on a story from the [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 9:41am EST
  

• Justice Scalia Delivers Lesson on Word Usage

  A lawyer for a company that sells tax-free cigarettes over the Internet got a lesson on word usage from Justice Antonin Scalia on Tuesday. The problems began for lawyer Randolph Barnhouse soon after he described an opportunity to collect tax money as an "inchoate" interest—an interest that is not yet [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 9:09am EST
  

• Lawyer in Ponzi Probe Returns from Morocco After Hinting of Suicide

  A Florida lawyer facing accusations that he may have looted as much as $500 million from investors in legal settlements has returned to Florida after hinting of suicide in a text message. Scott Rothstein sent the text four days ago to the five partners in his firm, Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler, [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 8:36am EST
  

• Report: Electronic Discovery Should Be Proportionate to Controversy

  How can lawsuits be resolved more quickly and at less cost? Two groups offering solutions suggest that discovery—including electronic discovery—needs to be proportionate to the amount in controversy and importance of the issues. The groups devised proposed rules for experiments in civil justice reform after a survey of the American [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 7:52am EST