Recent Updates
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Shareholder Class Action
Recent Cases 05/23/2008Shareholders sued Calpine Corp. and its directors, claiming they are selling Calpine too cheaply to NRG Energy, for $23 a share, or $9.6 billion, a 6.7% premium over market price, in Harris County Court, Houston. Shareholders clai...
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Court Says Cop's Criticism Isn't Protected Speech
Recent Cases 05/22/2008An Illinois State Police officer was not wrongfully transferred for accusing his superiors of sabotaging his investigation of a cold-case murder, the 7th Circuit ruled. Plaintiff Michale Callahan filed a First Amendment retaliation claim against his ...
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Ex-Lottery Commissioner Loses Conviction Appeal
Recent Cases 05/20/2008The 4th Circuit upheld the conviction and sentencing of ex-North Carolina lottery commissioner Kevin Geddings, who concealed the fact that he had a conflict of interest with a lottery vendor. A federal jury convicted Geddings of five counts of mail f...
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Skycaps File National Class Action
Recent Cases 05/16/2008Employers are cheating airport skycaps nationwide by paying them less than minimum wage and discouraging tipping by charging a $2 per bag "baggage fee," which customers falsely believe will be given to the skycaps, the skycaps say in a federal class ...
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Avandia Securities Class Action Dismissed
Recent Cases 05/15/2008A federal judge dismissed a shareholders' class-action complaint that accused GlaxoSmithKline of violating securities laws by withholding or manipulating information about its heart drug Avandia. U.S. District Judge Louis Stanton dismissed for failur...
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Class Claims MetLife Cheats By Assuming Kids Will Smoke
Recent Cases 05/13/2008Metropolitan Life Insurance defrauds customers by illicitly and secretively applying smokers' rates to children who don't smoke, claiming that by the time they are adults the kids will be smokers, a class action claims in Middlesex County Court. Plai...
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Inventor Of Secret Goggles Can't Sue Government
Recent Cases 05/12/2008The inventor of color-compatible night-vision goggles lacks standing to sue the government for compensation under the Invention Secrecy Act, after the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office withheld his patent for 14 years on "national security" grounds, t...
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Talk About A Jury Of Peers ...
Recent Cases 05/09/2008A woman in the jury pool for a marijuana trial failed to return from a break because she was arrested for allegedly smoking a joint outside the courthouse, the judge told the Houston Chronicle. Criminal Court at Law Judge Sherman Ross told the newspa...
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Taxpayers Challenge $7.4 Billion Prison Bond
Recent Cases 05/07/2008The State of California illegally approved issuance of $7.4 billion in "lease-revenue bonds" to build facilities for 53,000 more state and county prisoners, Californians United for a Responsible Budget claims in Superior Court. Plaintiffs CURB and in...
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Class Claims Wells Fargo Forecloses Illegally
Recent Cases 05/01/2008Wells Fargo Home Mortgage illegally forecloses on homes by falsely accusing homebuyers who have filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy of being delinquent on their mortgages, by falsely inflated amounts, by assessing "hundreds of millions of dollars" for il...
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Court Revives Suit Over New Year's Party Arrests
Recent Cases 04/30/2008The 11th Circuit reinstated their lawsuit over the events that led deputies to arrest and Taser the lead guitarist for the rock band Rush and his son during a 2003 New Year's Eve party at a Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Florida, after the father-son duo made...
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Michael Douglas Owes Him $1M, Pal Says
Recent Cases 04/29/2008Actor-producer Howard Zuker says Michael Douglas forced him out of the company the two men co-founded, American Entertainment Holding Co., owing him a promised $1 million bonus. Zuker appeared under the name Zach Norman in "Romancing the Stone," "Nig...