Georgia

Law firm can run ads targeting specific nursing home, Georgia Supreme Court rules

A Mississippi-based law firm seeking nursing home neglect and abuse cases didn’t violate Georgia trademark law by targeting PruittHealth Inc. in one of its ads, the Georgia Supreme Court has ruled. In a decision on Monday, the court lifted an injunction that had barred the ads by the McHugh Fuller…

Nov 22, 2016 12:10 PM CST

TV ad tells viewers about banned information in tort trials; civil defense bar claims tampering

Insurance defense lawyers in Georgia aren’t happy about a law firm’s TV ad that reveals information about banned testimony in car-crash cases. The Daily Report (sub. req.) has the story on the ad by plaintiffs firm Morgan & Morgan, which is running in nine states where the firm has offices.…

Oct 12, 2016 8:45 AM CDT

Software company used in faulty Georgia bar exam scoring gets hit with lawsuit

A company that designed software used to grade Georgia State Bar Exam essay answers is being sued, after a reported product glitch resulted in incorrect scores and 90 people being wrongly notified that they failed the July 2015 and February 2016 exams. The action against the California company ILG Information…

Sep 14, 2016 2:10 PM CDT

States can’t require proof of citizenship for federal elections, DC Circuit rules

State laws that require voters to show proof of citizenship for federal elections were blocked Friday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Georgia, Alabama and Kansas had the laws, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The lawsuit was filed after Brian Newby, executive director of the…

Sep 13, 2016 9:42 AM CDT

90 people who were told they failed the bar exam learn it’s not true

Ninety people who were told they failed the Georgia Bar Exam are getting some good news: They actually passed. Errors in scoring the July 2015 and February 2016 exam caused the problem, according to a statement by the Georgia Supreme Court’s Office of Bar Examiners. The Daily Report (sub. req.)…

Sep 6, 2016 3:05 PM CDT

ABA urges 11th Circuit to strike down bail schedules as unconstitutional

For the second time this year, the American Bar Association has urged a federal appeals court to strike down a bail schedule that it says unnecessarily jails indigent defendants. The ABA’s most recent amicus brief (PDF) was filed in Walker v. City of Calhoun, Georgia, in which a group of…

Aug 18, 2016 4:00 PM CDT

Suit claims ‘aggressive litigation’ against law firm drove it into bankruptcy

Two Georgia lawyers claim “aggressive litigation” against them and their firm damaged their reputations and drove the firm into bankruptcy. Lawyers Mark and Gerard Wittstadt filed suit July 11 against the law firms Gordon & Rees and Barnes & Thornburg, along with nine lawyers from the firms, for alleged abusive…

Aug 1, 2016 3:45 PM CDT

DA drops charges against publisher and lawyer who sought information on court reporter payment

A Georgia prosecutor moved to dismiss felony charges against a newspaper publisher and his lawyer last week after their controversial arrest spurred the Society for Professional Journalists to ask the state judicial ethics commission to investigate. Publisher Mark Thomason and his lawyer, Russell Stookey, spent a night in jail after…

Jul 11, 2016 7:30 AM CDT

Judge uses gay slur and challenges difficult defendant to carry out masturbation threat

A Georgia judge traded insults with a murder defendant and told the public defender: “I’m sorry you’re stuck with him” in a courtroom confrontation earlier this month. The Rome News-Tribune was first to report the “heated exchange” on June 17 between Judge Bryant Durham Jr. and Denver Fenton Allen, who…

Jun 27, 2016 7:30 AM CDT

Two lawyers and housekeeper are indicted in connection with sex tape of Waffle House CEO

Two Georgia lawyers and their client were indicted on Friday in connection with a secret sex tape of Waffle House CEO Joe Rogers and the client. Lawyers David Cohen and John Butters of Marietta were indicted along with the client, Mye Brindle, who worked for Rogers as a housekeeper and…

Jun 21, 2016 12:02 PM CDT

Lawyer takes chicken restaurant’s trademarks in lieu of $200K in legal fees, launches a new career

Representing a Southern chicken-and-biscuits fast-food restaurant was not initially a lucrative career move for attorney John Buttolph. His clients, struggling with a lack of capital, a loss of business for Atlanta-based Mrs. Winner’s Chicken & Biscuits during the Great Recession and the inability to get credit, at first resisted a…

Jun 15, 2016 4:12 PM CDT

New suits filed over sperm donor who claimed to be a neuroscientist, but wasn’t

At least two new lawsuits have filed against a Georgia-based sperm bank by families who thought they were using a sperm donor who was a neuroscientist and later found out he was a convicted felon with mental health issues. Two suits are being pursued in British Columbia against Xytex Corp.…

Jun 15, 2016 3:20 PM CDT

Appeal filed after Georgia judge rejects name change for transgender man as ‘fraud’

A Georgia man who was told by a trial court judge that he could not change his name to reflect his gender identity has filed an appeal with the state appellate court. Rowan Elijah Feldhaus, a transgender man previously known as Rebecca Elizabeth Feldhaus, filed a name change petition in…

Jun 10, 2016 2:00 PM CDT

Woman fined $1,722 and put on probation over license plate decal left in glove box has case closed

When Linda Ford was pulled over early one morning last September for having a dirty license plate, she had a license plate decal in her glove box proving she had paid her Georgia vehicle registration fee for 2015. She showed the decal to the officer, but he ticketed her anyway,…

Jun 10, 2016 9:15 AM CDT

Dog owners can recover medical costs in negligence suit against kennel, Georgia Supreme Court rules

The Georgia Supreme Court has ruled that the owners of a mixed-breed dachshund named Lola can recover the reasonable costs of her medical treatment as well as her fair market value in their suit against a boarding company accused of causing her fatal kidney failure. But the court ruled in…

Jun 7, 2016 8:14 AM CDT