|
|
|
Justices unlikely to have last word on health care
Topics in Legal News |
2011/11/15 09:00
|
President Barack Obama's historic health care overhaul divided the nation from the day he signed it into law, and that seems unlikely to change no matter how the Supreme Court rules on its constitutionality.
Some legal disputes, like the 2008 presidential election, the court can settle. Others rage on, such as abortion. It may take another decade to find the balance between private and public responsibility for health care in America, a nation disdainful of big government yet historically unable to guarantee affordable basic coverage to its citizens.
Either way it rules, the Supreme Court decision will not end the debate on health care, said former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, an influential Democratic adviser. It is, and will largely remain, a debate on the role of government.
The Supreme Court's announcement on Monday that it will take up the constitutional challenge to what Republicans deride as Obamacare, sets the stage for a decision next summer in the heat of the presidential election campaign. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Russia court rejects $16 billion claim against BP
Court Line News |
2011/11/14 11:33
|
A Russian court on Friday rejected a $16 billion claim against BP PLC filed by an obscure minority shareholder in BP's Russian venture, TNK-BP.
The court victory may have softened the blow that BP sustained when Rosneft dropped it as a partner in developing Russia's untapped Arctic oil and gas riches. The multibillion dollar deal broke down after TNK-BP's Russian billionaire shareholders blocked it, claiming that BP should be pursuing it through TNK-BP.
The Arbitration Court in the Tyumen region in Siberia on Friday dismissed two motions filed by a group of minority shareholders led by Andrei Prokhorov, who owns 0.0000106 percent in TNK-BP. The lawsuits are a $13 billion claim against BP and a $2.8 billion suit against two BP-nominated directors on TNK-BP's board.
Prokhorov and other shareholders claimed that BP and its representatives damaged TNK-BP's interests by failing to include the Russian venture in the Arctic deal with Rosneft.
BP's Russian partners in TNK-BP have denied any connection to the minority shareholder's suit. The claim was the reason why Russian police raided BP's office in August, which happened just days after Rosneft teamed up with ExxonMobil to develop the Arctic. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Scott+Scott LLP Announces Securities Class Action Lawsuit
Topics in Legal News |
2011/11/14 11:31
|
Scott+Scott LLP filed a class action complaint against Human Genome Sciences, Inc., certain of the Company's senior officers and directors and GlaxoSmithKline plc in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. The action for violations of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 is brought on behalf of those purchasing the common stock of HGSI between July 20, 2009 and November 11, 2010, inclusive (the Class Period), including all persons who acquired the common stock of HGSI in the Company's July 28, 2009 public offering at $14 per share and in its December 2, 2009 public offering of common stock at $26.75.
If you purchased the common stock of HGSI during the Class Period and wish to serve as a lead plaintiff in the action, you must move the Court no later than 60 days from today. Any member of the investor class may move the Court to serve as lead plaintiff through counsel of its choice, or may choose to do nothing and remain an absent class member. If you wish to discuss this action or have questions concerning this notice or your rights, please contact Scott+Scott (scottlaw@scott-scott.com), (800) 404-7770, (860) 537-5537 or visit the Scott+Scott HGSI Pharmaceutical website for more information: www.scott-scott.com/cases/hgs.html. There is no cost or fee to you.
The complaint filed in the action alleges that, during the Class Period, HGSI issued false and misleading statements concerning Benlysta(R) (belimumab) (Benlysta), the Company's potential new drug for the treatment of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, a chronic, life-threatening autoimmune disease. Specifically, the complaint alleges that defendants failed to disclose that Benlysta was associated with suicide in clinical drug trials conducted by the Company.
The complaint alleges that when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration posted its analysis of Benlysta on the Internet on November 12, 2010, investors learned for the first time of the association between Benlysta and suicide in clinical trials of the drug, causing HGSI's common stock price to decline precipitously. Meanwhile, the complaint alleges, during the Class Period, HGSI sold to investors more than 44 million shares of its common stock in public offerings at artificially inflated prices, receiving $850 million in net proceeds.
Scott+Scott has significant experience in prosecuting major securities, antitrust and employee retirement plan actions throughout the United States. The firm represents pension funds, foundations, individuals and other entities worldwide. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Fifth guilty plea entered in Philly abortion case
Court Line News |
2011/11/13 11:28
|
A woman initially hired to clean instruments at a Philadelphia abortion clinic has pleaded guilty to two counts of third-degree murder in the deaths of a newborn baby and a woman who died after an anesthesia overdose.
As part of her plea agreement with prosecutors, Lynda Williams also agreed on Wednesday to testify against the operator of the clinic, Dr. Kermit Gosnell.
Williams was one of 10 people charged in a shocking grand jury report that alleged viable, live-born babies were routinely killed at Gosnell's clinic by having their spinal cords severed with scissors.
At the end of the hearing, a prosecutor told the teary-eyed Williams she did the right thing by pleading guilty, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
The grand jury report described filthy, inhumane conditions at the clinic, which served many poor and immigrant women.
According to the grand jury report, Gosnell hired Williams, 43, in 2008 to clean instruments at his Women's Medical Center in West Philadelphia. But her duties soon increased to include performing ultrasounds and administering anesthesia. Authorities said it was Williams who administered a lethal mix of drugs that killed Karnamaya Mongar in November 2009. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Norway killer claims mantle of resistance leader
Lawyer Media News |
2011/11/12 11:28
|
The anti-Muslim extremist who confessed to a bombing and shooting massacre that killed 77 people in Norway tried to declare himself a resistance leader Monday at his first public court hearing but was quickly cut off by the judge.
Anders Behring Breivik was escorted by guards into an Oslo court room packed with dozens of reporters and spectators, including survivors of his rampage at a youth camp near the capital who were seeing him in person for the first time since the July 22 attack.
I am a military commander in the Norwegian resistance movement, Breivik said before the judge interrupted him and told him to stick to the issue at hand — his further detention.
The court extended his custody 12 more weeks until Feb. 6, but decided to gradually lift the restrictions on his media access, visitors and mail. Breivik is being held pending his trial on terror charges.
If found guilty, he could be sentenced to 21 years in prison. An alternative custody arrangement — if he is still considered a danger to the public — could keep him behind bars indefinitely.
At the end of Monday's hearing, the 32-year-old Norwegian asked Judge Torkjel Nesheim if he could address survivors and victims' relatives but was turned down. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Court likely to overturn Calif. law on livestock
Court Line News |
2011/11/11 09:46
|
The Supreme Court seemed ready Wednesday to block a California law that would require euthanizing downed livestock at federally inspected slaughterhouses to keep the meat out of the nation's food system.
The court heard an appeal from the National Meat Association, which wants a 2009 state law blocked from going into effect. California barred the purchase, sale and butchering of animals that can't walk and required slaughterhouses under the threat of fines and jail time to immediately kill nonambulatory animals.
But justices said that encroached on federal laws that don't require immediate euthanizing.
The federal law does not require me immediately to go over and euthanize the cow. Your law does require me to go over and immediately euthanize the cow. And therefore, your law seems an additional requirement in respect to the operations of a federally inspected meatpacking facility, Justice Stephen Breyer told a California lawyer. |
|
|
|
|
|
Legal News RSS Feed
