Tort Law

2 NY Lawyers Sued, 1 Disbarred re Their Claimed Roles in Convicted Developer’s $92M Mortgage Fraud

A New York title attorney who is awaiting sentencing for his role in a Long Island real estate developer’s $92 million mortgage origination fraud in Nassau County was disbarred last week. Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is suing Ted Doumazios along with a closing attorney allegedly involved with him in arranging…

Oct 24, 2011 6:00 PM CDT

Neighbors’ Tombstones and Haunted Houses Scare Up Halloween Lawsuits

Halloween can be fertile ground for lawsuits. There have been suits over neighbors’ Halloween displays, suits over haunted house injuries, and suits claiming sexual harassment due to remarks about Halloween costumes, according to an article in the New York State Bar Association Journal (PDF). Cases from the last several years…

Oct 24, 2011 10:30 AM CDT

Outside Lawyer Censured for ‘Intimate Contact’ with Detroit Mayor While Monitoring City Police

A Washington, D.C., lawyer has been censured for having “intimate contact” one night with Detroit’s then-mayor while she was serving as independent police monitor for the city. Sheryl Robinson Wood said during a disciplinary hearing that she considered the incident a moral and personal lapse and later realized it also…

Oct 22, 2011 1:11 AM CDT

Top Mich. Court to Decide If Mom Who Saw Biker Son’s Fatal Crash Can Collect on Her Own Auto Policy

Insurance companies write the policies under which they contract to cover customers for automobile accidents and related injuries. So it is a general rule of interpretation that any ambiguity in the policy should be resolved in the customer’s favor. But a Michigan appellate court went too far when it decided…

Oct 21, 2011 6:30 PM CDT

Cooley Dismissal Motion Says Misleading Stats Suit Reads ‘Like a Free-Form Rant’

The Thomas M. Cooley Law School comes out swinging in a motion to dismiss a lawsuit that claims students were misled by the school’s job statistics. Cooley’s motion (PDF) claims the plaintiffs’ complaint is so deficient that it violates Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. “The complaint…

Oct 21, 2011 1:59 PM CDT

Poker Players File Clawback Claim Against Cozen O’Connor, Seek $2M in Legal Fees

Some 200,000 poker players are seeking $2 million that Cozen O’Connor allegedly earned in legal fees from clients related to an online company now said by the feds to have been involved in a Ponzi scheme. The plaintiffs contend the law firm should disgorge the money because it knew or…

Oct 20, 2011 10:50 PM CDT

Suit by Nutrition Group Claims Fruit Roll-Ups Are Improperly Promoted as Healthy Snacks

A group promoting better nutrition claims in a potential class action lawsuit that consumers are being misled by claims about Fruit Roll-Ups. The Center for Science in the Public Interest filed the federal suit against General Mills on behalf of a California mother, according to a press release and the…

Oct 20, 2011 11:00 AM CDT

PI Shop Sues 3 Ex-Employee Attorneys, Seeks $4.5M, Says They Set Up New Firm With 32 Slocumb Clients

An Alabama-based personal injury law firm has sued three attorneys formerly employed in its Washington, D.C., office in federal court there. Zeke Roeser, Morgan Whitlock and Kevin Gracie allegedly used confidential information obtained at the Slocumb Law Office, it contends, to set up their own Roeser & Whitlock firm with…

Oct 18, 2011 11:56 PM CDT

Top Mass. Court Offers Suit Options for Buyers of Property Won in Dubious Foreclosure Cases

What’s a good-faith buyer to do if a foreclosed property purchased from a financial institution turns out to have been seized in a questionable court case? That was the issue that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court addressed today in litigation brought by a real estate developer who converted a foreclosed…

Oct 18, 2011 10:54 PM CDT

Lawyer Sued Over Shooting by Elderly Client; Complaint Alleges He Should Have Warned Authorities

A Florida lawyer has been named as a defendant in a personal injury lawsuit seeking damages over a shooting in another state by an elderly client. Attorney David Gilmore should have anticipated that his client, Thomas Kyros, 81, posed a danger to Georgia Smith and her young adult daughter, Promethea…

Oct 18, 2011 6:21 PM CDT

Suit Claims ‘Hangover II’ Is Based on Actor’s Script About Real-Life Incident

A pro se lawsuit filed by a Bollywood actor claims The Hangover Part II was based on his difficult honeymoon in Asia. Michael Alan Rubin says the script was based on his honeymoon with a Japanese woman who refused to share a room with him after they argued about finances,…

Oct 18, 2011 1:12 PM CDT

Judge Slashes $4.7M Fee Request in Prius Headlight Case, Calls Amount ‘Highly Unreasonable’

Lawyers who obtained a class-action settlement valued at more than $3.8 million in a Prius headlight suit won’t get anywhere near the $4.7 million they requested in attorney fees, according to the federal judge presiding in the case. U.S. District Judge Manuel Real of Los Angeles called the request “highly…

Oct 18, 2011 12:07 PM CDT

New Del. Chancery Chief Awards $1.26B in Stock Suit, Raps Wachtell Ex-Partner re ‘Unfair’ Valuation

Saying that a special committee used “a series of economic contortions” to justify a Delaware corporation’s plan to pay a premium $3.1 billion price to purchase a company owned by a majority shareholder, the new chief judge of the state’s chancery court has awarded $1.26 billion to the purchaser, Southern…

Oct 17, 2011 10:55 PM CDT

Supreme Court Accepts Two Cases Involving Reach of Liability Laws for Overseas Human Rights Abuses

The U.S. Supreme Court has accepted two cases seeking to hold corporations and organizations accountable for overseas human rights violations. One case considers whether subsidiaries of Royal Dutch Shell can be held liable under the Alien Tort Statute, according to SCOTUSblog, the Associated Press, Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal…

Oct 17, 2011 4:49 PM CDT

Lawyer for New York Law School Says Misleading-Stats Suit Is Baseless and Part of a Crusade

Updated: A suit claiming New York Law School lured students to enroll with misleading job statistics is baseless and should be dismissed, the law school argues in a motion filed last week in state court in Manhattan. The motion was filed by Venable lawyer Michael Volpe, a New York Law…

Oct 17, 2011 3:04 PM CDT