• Roommate referral website does not discriminate by allowing users to list their preferences for roommate characteristics. "Holding that the [Fair Housing Act] applies inside a home or apartment ... would be a serious invasion of privacy, autonomy and security."
Fair Housing Council v. Roommate.com
• Student alleges a prank involving a bottle rocket and another student's anus backfired, causing him to fall off the deck of a frat house.
Helmburg v. Alpha Tau Omega
• 5th Circuit reinstates a jury verdict finding a man employed by an engineering firm was sexually harassed by a male supervisor. "The text message 'I want cock' could be taken as an explicit sexual proposition."
Cherry v. Shaw Coastal
• The ex-wife of a man who fatally shot himself with a gun he had stolen cannot sue the gun's owner for wrongful death. "We conclude that public policy dictates that [Charles] Milot's criminal conduct acts as a bar to recovery."
Ryan v. Hughes-Ortiz
• Pennsylvania woman alleges her former employer discriminated against her because she wore a fake penis to assist her in her female-to-male transition. "Plaintiff's use of the prosthetic device was concealed and in no way interfered with the ability of Plaintiff to do her job." Davis v. J&J Snack Foods
• Son of a woman charged with murdering her husband cannot use the proceeds from the victim's life insurance policy to fund his mother's criminal defense. "[A]llowing the distribution of these proceeds to a third party who has clear intentions to transfer part of these proceeds to her, undermines the principles underlying the Slayer’s Act and federal common law."
In Re: Estate of Michael Burkland
• Seattle judge says an actress cannot proceed anonymously in her suit against the IMDb.com website for publishing her age. "[W]hile Plaintiff may face public ridicule and embarrassment if she elects to go forward under her real name, the injury she fears is not severe enough to justify permitting her to proceed anonymously."
Doe v. Amazon.com
• Family of an 11-year-old girl who was crushed by a boulder of ice says forest ranger negligence caused her death. Rangers "did not warn users of the risk of harm associated with the dangerous, unstable snow and ice" at the Big Four Ice Caves in Snohomish County, Wash. Tam v. U.S.
• 3rd Circuit dismisses a breach of data security case against a payroll-processing company. "Appellants' allegations of an increased risk of identity theft as a result of the security breach are hypothetical, future injuries."
Reilly v. Ceridian Corp.
• Oregon judge denies First Amendment protections to a blogger. "Defendant cites no cases indicating that a self-proclaimed 'investigative blogger' is considered 'media' for the purposes of applying a negligence standard in a defamation claim."
Obsidian Finance v. Cox
• A transsexual who was fired from her government job while she was in the process of becoming a woman wins her sex discrimination suit. "[A] government agent violates the Equal Protection Clause’s prohibition of sex-based discrimination when he or she fires a transgender or transsexual employee because of his or her gender non-conformity."
Glenn v. Brumby
• New York man sues a Texas fertility clinic for wrongful insemination, alleging it failed to obtain his consent before using a sample of his sperm to impregnate his ex-girlfriend.
Pressil v. Advanced Fertility
• Nebraska judge rules that school officials may have illegally disciplined students for wearing t-shirts in honor of a slain friend suspected of gang membership. "[Q]uestions of fact remain whether Plaintiffs’ speech occurred in a context likely to provoke gang violence or other disruptions of school activities."
Kuhr v. Millard Public Sch. Dist.
 
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Officers' Silence Pays Off In Misconduct Case |
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Michael Evans
An appeal in a Chicago police misconduct case will focus on whether officers can invoke the Fifth Amendment in pretrial proceedings and then testify at trial without being impeached for their prior assertions of privilege.
A federal jury earlier this month ruled that 10 officers did not frame Michael Evans for the rape and murder of a 9-year-old girl in 1976. Evans, 47, served 27 years in prison before he was released in 2003 based on DNA tests that showed he was not the source of semen recovered from the victim.
The officers all worked at Area 2, a notorious Chicago police station where suspects were allegedly tortured. Citing a special prosecutor's investigation of Area 2, eight defendants took the Fifth at their original depositions in Evans' civil rights case.
But with the investigation winding down, all of the defendants chose to waive their Fifth Amendment rights and testify at trial. And over the objections of Evans' lawyers, U.S. District Judge David H. Coar ruled that the jury could not draw any “adverse inferences” from the prior assertions of the privilege against self-incrimination.
"The jury did not hear that eight of these police officers took the Fifth the first time they were asked about this investigation," Jon Loevy (Loevy & Loevy, Chicago), lead counsel for Evans, said.
In court documents (see below), Loevy has argued that the officers asserted the privilege to avoid pretrial discovery. By avoiding impeachment at trial, they, in effect, got to have their Fifth Amendment cake and eat it, too.
Another area of concern involves Judith Januszewski, the only eyewitness to link Evans to the slaying of Lisa Cabassa on Chicago's South Side. Evans alleged that the officers manipulated her into identifying him as one of the two men she saw struggling with the girl on a street corner.
One juror, Olaseinde Sapara, said after the trial that Januszewski came up with Evans' name, not the police, giving them probable cause to arrest him. But Januszewski testified that officers said the name “Michael Evans” before she ever identified him.
“I know one thing: Justice was not done,” Sapara admitted to the Chicago Sun-Times, going on to say that “All of us, I believe, knew a lot of police misconduct took place.”
Evans, who received the maximum $160,000 from a state compensation fund for his wrongful imprisonment, was seeking about $60 million in damages. During the trial, he rejected a $2.7 million settlement offer.
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Evans v. Chicago Court Documents
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By Matthew Heller
8/23/06
By broadly interpreting a law designed to protect the elderly from abusive caregivers, a divided California Supreme Court may have ended up punishing Good Samaritans who provide care to the elderly out of friendship.
The decision in Bernard v. Foley bars two friends of a widow from inheriting the “lion's share” of her $448,000 estate. Camille Bosco changed her will three days before she died to name both James Foley and Ann Erman as 50 percent residual beneficiaries.
A provision of the California Probate Code enacted in 1993 lists a “care custodian” of a dependent adult among those who cannot validly benefit from a will. A “catchall” provision of another statute defines “care custodian” as a “person providing health services or social services to elders or dependent adults.”
Foley and Erman, who cared for Bosco during the two months before her death, argued that the 1993 law did not apply to them because they acted as personal friends of the widow rather than in a professional or occupational capacity.
The Supreme Court split 4-3, with Justice Kathryn M. Werdegar writing for the majority that “neither the statutory language nor the legislative history supports a preexisting personal friendship exception to [the law's] presumptive disqualification of care custodian donees.”
In a dissent, Justice Carol A. Corrigan said the catchall provision of Welfare and Institutions Code Section 15610.17 should be “fairly interpreted” as covering only those who “provide care or assistance through some formal relationship.”
“In terms of public policy, it seems unwise to penalize Good Samaritans by making them less eligible to receive the gratitude of those they help, the kinder they have been,” she concluded.
By Matthew Heller
8/23/06
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Jurors' Comments Fuel New Trial Bid in Bullying Case
Jurors may have opened the door to a new trial in a Maryland school bullying case by saying they returned a verdict for the defense because they were afraid of setting a bad precedent for school systems throughout the country.
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Abuse Victim Can Sue Ex-DA Over 'Sexting' Messages
A Wisconsin judge has protected a domestic violence victim from a rogue prosecutor, finding that she can sue him for sending her text messages in which he pressured her to have sex with him.
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Four Loko Maker Says Users Knew of Health Dangers
The maker of Four Loko has previewed its defense of a slew of product liability lawsuits, arguing that the physical effects of the energy drink's mixture of alcohol and caffeine — far from being an undisclosed risk to consumers — are precisely what made it so popular.
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Mortician Sued for Speaking Ill of the Dead
In a first-of-its-kind unprofessional conduct lawsuit, a woman has sued her former boss at a Michigan funeral home for making an indecent comment about the body of a dead man in front of her.
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'Next Friends' of Orcas Bid to Stop SeaWorld Slavery
An animal rights lawsuit against SeaWorld for enslaving five killer whales at its aquatic theme parks in San Diego and Orlando may sink even though humans are representing the orcas as their “next friends.”
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Jury Finds No Harm to Boy From Wrongful Circumcision
In a blow to supporters of male “genital integrity,” an Indiana jury has ruled that a doctor did not injure a boy by circumcising him when he was an infant even though his mother wanted him to be left intact.
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Guest Can Sue Motel 6 Over Attack by Woman's Pimp
A guest who paid for sex with a prostitute at a Motel 6 did not assume the risk of being attacked several hours later by the prostitute's pimp, a Pennsylvania judge has ruled in an unusual premises liability lawsuit against the motel operator.
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Marsh v. Air Tran Airways
Subject: Roaches on a plane
Document: Complaint
Classic Media v. J.G. Wentworth
Subject: "Lassie" copyright
Document: Complaint
Kardashian v. Old Navy
Subject: Publicity rights
Document: Complaint
McKee v. Laurion
Subject: Doctor defamation
Document: Opinion
Francis v. U.S.
Subject: Bear attack
Document: Decision
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Doe v. Discovery Day Care
Court: Miami-Dade Circuit
Subject: Child molestation
Verdict: $3,000,000
Hoback v. City of Chattanooga
Court: USDC, E. Tenn.
Subject: PTSD discrimination
Verdict: $680,000
more
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Brown v. Herbert
Date: 12/16/11
Court: USDC, Utah
Hearing: Motion to dismiss polygamy case
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