Verdicts & Settlements

Isiah Thomas Liable for Harassment, But Not Punitives

Updated: A federal jury has found that New York Knicks coach Isiah Thomas sexually harassed a team executive. Jurors also found that Madison Square Garden was liable for the harassment and will have to pay punitive damages, the New York Times reports. Jurors could not decide whether Thomas should pay…

Oct 2, 2007 5:50 PM CDT

OJ Simpson Book, ‘If I Did It,’ a Best-Seller

It couldn’t have been O.J. Simpson’s plan, since he doesn’t get any of the profits. But the former superstar’s arrest earlier this month has helped launch his new book, If I Did It, to the top of the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list. It is now No. 2, according…

Sep 28, 2007 4:13 PM CDT

Five Firms in Attorney Fee Free-for-All

After fighting together to win a settlement in a class action over mortgage lender closing costs, a group of Illinois plaintiffs lawyers squared off for a new battle—fighting with each other about how to divide the $1.6 million attorney fee. It appears that a badly drafted attorney fee letter agreement…

Sep 27, 2007 9:23 PM CDT

Small Firm, Big Litigation

In more than 30 years of mass torts practice, Mark Robinson has helped his small Calfornia law firm make a big mark. Founded in 1978 after Robinson won a $128 verdict for a 13-year-old plaintiff with burn injuries in a Ford Pinto gas-tank case, Robinson, Calcagnie & Robinson had evolved…

Sep 27, 2007 7:48 PM CDT

Life for 48 Murders, So Why Me?

The notorious Washington state killer who murdered 48 women didn’t get the death penalty. And Robert Yates Jr. didn’t, either, when he confessed in a Spokane County plea deal to murdering 13. But two of the killings about which he gave information wound up being prosecuted in a separate case…

Sep 27, 2007 6:25 PM CDT

Cuban Dad Gets Girl Over FL’s Objection

A hard-fought child custody case pitting a 5-year-old girl’s Cuban father against Florida officials and wealthy foster parents has ended with a ruling upholding the dad’s parental rights. Although the Florida Department of Children & Families said Rafael Izquierdo abandoned his daughter after her mother brought her to South Florida…

Sep 27, 2007 5:50 PM CDT

State Backs Down in Jena 6 Case

The prosecution in a controversial case against one of the so-called Jena Six defendants has accepted a Louisiana appellate court ruling that he should be tried as a juvenile. Mychal Bell, who was 16 at the time that he and five other black high school students allegedly attacked a white…

Sep 27, 2007 12:50 AM CDT

Court: Lawyer Lied in Firm Fight ... But Which One?

A recent ruling by the Ontario Court of Appeal offers a startling view of the hard-hitting office politics at a venerable Toronto law firm. When attorney Benjamin Moss trudged back to Pinkofskys from a criminal trial on May 14, 2004 and reported to his colleagues that the firm’s client had…

Sep 26, 2007 9:35 PM CDT

Mistrial as Phil Spector Jury Deadlocks

Updated: A mistrial has been declared in the second-degree murder trial of Phil Spector, after the judge polled the jury, who all agreed they were deadlocked. The foreman said the panel was split 10-2, in a live broadcast of the trial. But, at the judge’s request, he did not say…

Sep 26, 2007 8:46 PM CDT

Sprint’s 30-Day Settlement Total Nears $150 M

With a $57.5 million Kansas class action settlement just announced by Sprint-Nextel Corp., the company’s settlement agreements in three cases during the past month now total nearly $150 million. If approved by the judge in the case, the latest settlement would amount to only a small fraction of the $1.3…

Sep 25, 2007 11:41 PM CDT

Plaintiff Dies, Future Pain Award Stands

A jury award of $150,000 for future pain and suffering must stand even though the slip-and-fall plaintiff died the day after the verdict, an appeals court has ruled. The New York Appellate Division ruled that no statutory provision requires the award to be set aside, the New York Law Journal…

Sep 24, 2007 12:47 PM CDT

Judge: Gov’t Lied, Must Pay Attorney Fees

In more than 30 years of practice, New Hampshire lawyer Steve Gordon says he’s never before tried to get a judge to award attorney fees against the federal government due to bad faith. But that’s the approach that he’s taken—successfully—in a tort case over a murdered government informant whose identity…

Sep 21, 2007 6:26 PM CDT

1000s Protest in Jena (and Elsewhere)

In a protest largely launched by bloggers that some are calling the dawn of a new 21st century civil rights movement, more than 15,000 people from around the country reportedly marched on a tiny town in Louisiana today. Their goal: to protest what many see as an unfair justice system…

Sep 21, 2007 3:58 AM CDT

Simpson Sidelight: Offshore Accounts??!!

A lawyer for the family of a man O.J. Simpson was acquitted of murdering more than a decade ago was electrified by a minor detail in the current armed robbery case against the former football superstar. In a tape reportedly made shortly after the Las Vegas casino hotel room incident…

Sep 21, 2007 1:09 AM CDT

US: Milberg Weiss Firm Was ‘Racketeering Enterprise’

Updated: In a stunning series of body blows today in an ongoing battle between the government and one of the country’s most powerful plaintiff firms, federal prosecutors in California announced enhanced charges against the firm itself, the indictment of its co-founding partner and the latest plea deal with a former…

Sep 20, 2007 10:10 PM CDT