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EPA Must Set Pollution Standards for Builders
Headline News |
2008/09/23 13:58
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The Environmental Protection Agency must develop pollution standards for storm water runoff from construction sites or risk violation of the Clean Water Act, the 9th Circuit ruled.
The EPA identified the construction industry as a "point-source category" of pollution in its 2000 environmental plan, but then exempted the industry from the plan in 2004, skipping a three-year deadline to develop standards after listing.
The Natural Resources Defense Council, along with the Waterkeeper Alliance, filed suit against the EPA and its administrator, Stephen Johnson, for violating their duty to "promulgate effluent limitation guidelines and new source performance standards" for toxic storm water runoff from construction sites.
The environmental groups have standing because the polluted storm water ran into waterways that the groups' members use for recreation, the appeals court ruled. The National Association of Home Builders and Associated General Contractors of America, intervening on behalf of the government, argued that even if the runoff contained pollutants, the water wasn't toxic. The 9th Circuit disagreed. "In fact, the EPA has explicitly stated that storm water runoff from construction sites includes toxic and non-conventional pollutants," Judge Smith wrote.
The Clean Water Act clearly outlines the EPA's responsibility to develop standards for polluters within three years of developing a plan, the ruling states. The Act does not give the EPA authority to remove a point-source category from its plan once it is identified, or the three-year deadline would be meaningless, the court ruled. Also, the intensive listing process, which allows for public review and comment, shows that the agency seriously considered adding the construction industry before its listing.
"The three-year delay ... is not to decide whether to list a point-source category," Smith wrote, "but to allow the EPA to consider what the substance of the (standards) should be." |
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Psychologist group bars participation in interrogations
Headline News |
2008/09/22 14:01
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The American Psychological Association announced Wednesday that it had adopted a measure prohibiting members from participating in interrogations of terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay and other military prisons where suspects have allegedly been tortured. The resolution, approved by a vote of 8,792 to 6,157 members, represents a reversal in position by the group, which last year rejected a similar ban. The measure states:
Whereas torture is an abhorrent practice in every way contrary to the APA's stated mission of advancing psychology as a science, as a profession, and as a means of promoting human welfare.
Whereas the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Mental Health and the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture have determined that treatment equivalent to torture has been taking place at the United States Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
Whereas this torture took place in the context of interrogations under the direction and supervision of Behavioral Science Consultation Teams (BSCTs) that included psychologists....
Be it resolved that psychologists may not work in settings where persons are held outside of, or in violation of, either International Law or the US Constitution, unless they are working directly for the persons being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights. The resolution will take effect by the APA's next annual meeting, in August 2009.
Last year, APA members passed a resolution stating that the group opposed the use of torture and specifying which practices it found particularly inhumane, including mock executions, sleep deprivation and sexual humiliation. The American Medical Association in 2006 adopted ethical guidelines restricting physician participation in interrogations, following the approval of a similar policy by the American Psychiatric Association. According to a report by the US Defense Department [official website], psychologists have been involved in military interrogations since 2002. Mental health specialists were also reportedly involved in prisoner abuse scandals at Guantanamo and at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. |
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O.J. Team Says Cops Were Out To Get Him
Headline News |
2008/09/19 14:12
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The defense team in O.J. Simpson's burglary and kidnapping trial on Thursday tried to paint a picture that police were out to get him. Simpson's attorney, Yale Galanter, made Las Vegas Metro police Det. Andy Caldwell read a transcript of a secret recording made by Tom Riccio, the memorabilia broker who set up the meeting at the Palace Station Hotel between Simpson and memorabilia dealers Alfred Beardsley and Bruce Fromong.
"California can't get him. Now we'll be able to blank got him," (sic) Caldwell read, quoting an unidentified civilian police employee who allegedly made the remark while questioning Riccio in his hotel room after the incident.
The person quoted seemed to be referring to Simpson's acquittal in 1995 in Los Angeles for the stabbing deaths of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ron Goldman.
Caldwell also testified Thursday in Clark County District Court that he and his crew did not immediately arrest Simpson due to "the nature of the case," and said that they chose instead to conduct surveillance on the former football star. Simpson was arrested days after the incident.
Riccio had planted a recording device in his hotel room while being questioned by police after the alleged Sept. 13, 2007 heist. He's also responsible for the seven secret recordings admitted as evidence Wednesday, dealing with events leading up to, during and after the alleged hold-up.
Riccio testified on Thursday that he often secretly records things because, as a memorabilia broker, it's his best defense to ensure that people follow through on promises.
The colorful memorabilia broker was granted full legal immunity for his cooperation in the case.
He testified that he set up the meeting after receiving a phone call from Beardsley, who told him he had some of Simpson's items.
"He said, 'Don't call O.J. up because this stuff is stolen from his trophy room,'" Riccio testified.
When District Attorney Chris Owens asked what he did next, Riccio drew laughs from the courtroom with his blunt answer: "I called O.J. up."
Also Thursday, Brent Bryson, attorney for Simpson's co-defendant Clarence "C.J." Stewart, made his daily plea to have his client tried separately from Simpson. Again, Judge Jackie Glass denied the request.
Here is a link to Clark County District Court Web site, which contains 202 pages of transcripts, dubbed the "Riccio Recordings," allegedly from Riccio's tapes (scroll down to Documents). |
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FBI anticipates review of anthrax investigation
Headline News |
2008/09/18 15:02
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FBI Director Robert Mueller told the US House Judiciary Committee Tuesday that the federal government would commission an independent review of the FBI's use of scientific evidence in its investigation of the 2001 anthrax attacks. Mueller said during a hearing on FBI oversight that officials have been discussing such a review with the National Academy of Sciences, which would assemble a panel of experts. The review, which could begin within weeks, would be funded by the federal government.
The FBI used a new method of DNA fingerprinting to trace the anthrax to biodefense researcher Bruce Ivins, but Ivins committed suicide in July before he could be prosecuted. The Department of Justice had at one point identified former US Army researcher Dr. Steven Hatfill as a "person of interest" in the investigation, but Hatfill sued the agency and this year reached a multimillion-dollar settlement. Hatfill's attorneys plan to seek counsel fees from former USA Today reporter and past JURIST student staffer Toni Locy, who was found in contempt after refusing to divulge the names of sources for her reporting on the anthrax investigation. |
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ERISA Class Action Demands Zell's Ouster From Tribune
Headline News |
2008/09/17 14:43
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A federal class action accuses Sam Zell of conspiring with directors of the Tribune Company to use employees' retirement money to fund his takeover of the Tribune, an $8.2 billion acquisition in which Zell used only $315 million of his own money. "Zell conspired with insiders and aided and abetted the breach of fiduciary duties," according to the complaint. Zell did this, in part, by claiming that the Tribune's pension plans were "overfunded by more than $200 million."
"Sam Zell's plan could not be clearer," the complaint states. "He took the Tribune Company private with the intention of breaking up and selling the assets because he saw a collection of assets worth billions of dollars that he could purchase at a bargain price with a minimal outlay of his own money.
"To accomplish his plan, Zell enticed the members of the Tribune board and aided and abetted Dennis J. FitzSimmons, among others, in breaching their fiduciary duties by paying them millions of dollars. Indeed, the Tribune Company's SEC filing of Dec. 28, 2007 indicated that Zell and the Company created a $25 million pool for a management equity incentive plan to provide money for Tribune executives to complete the going-private transaction and retain them over a transition period. FitzSimmons received about $3 million this pool and a total of approximately $17.7 million in several and other payouts.
"Now, Zell and his accessories threaten to destroy the Tribune Company and its assets, which include some of the nation's oldest and best daily newspaper, including the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Baltimore Sun, along with several other great daily newspaper. They are doing so illegally, without consideration for the employee-owners, without respect for the institution, and with a focus on liquidating company assets to line their own pockets."
Zell's so-called employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) increased Tribune's debt from $4 billion to nearly $13 billion "overnight," the complaint states.
It adds: "The Tribune Company has cut more than 1,100 employees since the ESOP acquisition and, after declaring that the employees' pension fund is 'overvalued' by $400 million, has improperly funded their severance and buyout packages with money taken from the supposedly 'overvalued' portion of employees' pension fund."
The 67-page page includes 56 pages of attachments and exhibits.
Plaintiffs want the new Tribune board removed, an accounting of the "supposedly overfunded pension plan," and declaratory judgment that the defendants violated ERISA, among other things.
Plaintiffs are represented by Joseph Cotchett with Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy. |
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Court OKs Suit in Death of Drunk Teen Left in Pickup
Headline News |
2008/09/16 14:07
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The Tennessee Supreme Court has revived a wrongful-death case against four men whose intoxicated friend died after they left him in the open bed of a pickup truck for fear he would vomit on them.
The mother of Cody Downs is entitled to a jury trial, the court said, on either of two theories of liability –- that his friends “owed him a duty to exercise reasonable care to refrain from conduct that creates an unreasonable risk of harm” or voluntarily “assumed a duty by taking charge of [him] because he was helpless.”
Downs, 18, was struck by two oncoming vehicles as he was trying to run across an interstate freeway. If the defendants put him in the bed of the truck, the duty to exercise reasonable care would apply since, the opinion said, “it is common knowledge that riding unrestrained in a vehicle can result in preventable injuries and deaths.”
An appeals court had summarily dismissed the case against Downs' roommate Ryan Britt, the pickup's owner Scott Hurdle, driver Jerry Eller, and passenger Mark Bush, citing the lack of any “prohibition against an adult riding in the open bed of a pickup truck.”
Downs and his friends initially rode in the pickup's cab as they headed home on Interstate 65 from a party in Cool Springs, Tenn., to his apartment in Nashville. After he became nauseous, they stopped alongside the freeway so he could throw up.
Someone then suggested that Downs travel the rest of the way in the bed of the pickup so he would not vomit on anybody. Several miles later, his friends realized he was no longer there but they continued on to his apartment without looking for him.
Writing for the Supreme Court, Chief Justice William M. Barker noted that “the record is unclear whether the defendants assisted Mr. Downs into the bed of the truck, physically put him there, or whether he voluntarily agreed to ride there.” The resolution of that factual issue, he said, would determine “the nature of the duty the defendants owed Mr. Downs.”
If Downs got into the bed of the truck voluntarily, the duty would be that owed under the Restatement of Torts by “One who ... takes charge of another who is helpless adequately to aid or protect himself.”
“[T]here are genuine issues of material fact with respect to whether Mr. Downs was 'helpless' and whether the defendants 'took charge of' him,” Barker said.
In a concurring opinion, Justice Janice M. Holder concluded that the defendants owed Downs a duty to exercise reasonable care and the jury should only have to decide “whether the defendants breached that duty and caused the decedent's death.”
On the causation issue, the appeals court found it was not foreseeable that “a young man who, upon all accounts was happy and showed no signs of the intention to harm himself, would run into the interstate as the result of being 'put' or 'assisted' into the bed of the pickup truck.'” |
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Reputation Battle Tied to 4th Circuit Nominee
Court Center |
2008/09/15 14:18
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American International Group conspired with its law firm, McGuireWoods, to defame a Richmond attorney to try to avoid public embarrassment while a McGuireWoods lawyer sought a seat on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, attorney Christopher Spencer claims in Federal Court.
Spencer claims the defendants conspired to defame him and abused the legal process. He says they did this by falsely blaming him for mishandling a major personal injury appeal while McGuireWoods was facing $90 million in malpractice claims.
"This case is about two men who used some of the largest insurance companies in America and abused the process of the court to trash the good name of (a) reputable lawyer," Spencer states in his federal lawsuit. "James Maddiona, a top official with one of the largest insurance groups in the world, AIG, and Patrick Regan, a Washington attorney, conspired to help AIG's longtime law firm avoid public embarrassment and to promote one of that firm's lawyer's to a seat on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals - all at Spencer's expense.
"AIG had hired McGuireWoods LLP ('McGuireWoods') and Earle Duncan Getchell Jr. to handle post-trial motions and to prosecute an appeal in a major personal injury case. Getchell and McGuireWoods certified that all the trial transcripts had been filed. The Virginia Supreme Court later found that certification was false. The appeal was dismissed as a result.
"AIG knew who was to blame. After all, the only reason Getchell and were (sic) in the case was so that they could handle the post-trial motions and the appeal. In fact, John S. Barr, inside 'general counsel' of McGuireWoods, actually admitted that Getchell and McGuireWoods were responsible. But McGuireWoods and Getchell needed a favor. As of 2005, they were looking at a total of Ninety Million Dollars ($90,000,000) in claims for malpractice against the firm's vaunted appellate team and Getchell. The law firm did not want this publicized. Getchell did not want these matters to interfere with his desire for a lifetime appointment as a federal judge.
"Maddiona and Regan joined with Barr, Getchell, McGuireWoods and others in a scheme that would make McGuireWoods and Getchell look good by making Spencer look bad. They decided to make Spencer the fall guy for Getchell's and McGuireWoods' mistake and falsely claim that the dismissal was Spencer's fault and his alone.
"They participated in a public relations campaign based entirely upon false statements. They abused the process of the courts. They did these things to help McGuireWoods and Getchell, to gratify their own feelings and to hurt Spencer."
The alleged defamation came during the appeal of an $8.3 million personal injury award to Jessica Grigg, who was injured at Wintergreen Resort, a ski area, the complaint states. |
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