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PG&E starts pipeline shutdown under court order
Topics in Legal News |
2013/10/07 10:24
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Pacific Gas & Electric Co. says it will comply with a judge's order and shut down a natural gas pipeline after safety issues were raised.
The utility said Sunday it believes the pipeline is safe despite an engineer's email questioning the safety of the 83-year-old line's welds. PG&E said it could take until Tuesday to safely shut down the line and seamlessly switch its customers to another line.
A judge ordered the line shut down after San Carlos city officials discovered the email and declared a "state of emergency."
The email said PG&E's records incorrectly show the line containing a newer, more reliable weld than it actually has.
PG&E said state-of-the-art tests show the line is safe and that it was shutting the line only because of the court order.
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Military high court to hear Kan. HIV exposure case
Topics in Legal News |
2013/09/30 14:32
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The highest court for the U.S. armed forces has agreed to hear the appeal of a Kansas airman convicted of assault for exposing multiple sex partners to HIV at swinger parties in Wichita, his attorney said Friday.
David Gutierrez was a sergeant serving at McConnell Air Force base in Kansas when he was sentenced in 2011 to eight years in prison and stripped of his rank in an aggravated assault case. Prosecutors told the trial judge that a stiff sentence would send a message that the military values the integrity of its service members, saying Gutierrez played Russian roulette with his sexual partners' lives.
The defense on appeal has won a rare opportunity to present before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces an argument that his attorney says could set a far-reaching precedent across the military.
"It will set the table for the entire military services as to what kind of evidence is necessary to find that someone can cause grievous bodily injury after testing positive for HIV," said Kevin McDermott, one of his defense attorneys.
In addition to the HIV issue, the military appeals court agreed Tuesday to decide whether the evidence was sufficient to find Gutierrez committed adultery. The defense contends Gutierrez can't be guilty of adultery because his wife participated with her husband in the "swinger's lifestyle." |
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Adoption case returns to SC from US Supreme Court
Topics in Legal News |
2013/07/02 10:23
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The U.S. Supreme Court is pushing South Carolina courts to quickly take up a custody case that will decide whether a Native American girl's life will be with her biological father in Oklahoma or the South Carolina couple who adopted her.
A divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that federal law doesn't require that the girl named Veronica stay with her biological father, but also doesn't give her adoptive parents immediate custody of the now 3-year-old child.
The high court issued an order Friday speeding up the case being sent back to South Carolina's Supreme Court.
Melanie and Matt Capobianco of James Island had lost in South Carolina courts before the nation's highest court ruled the Indian Child Welfare Act didn't apply because the biological father never had custody of the child and abandoned her before birth.
Dusten Brown, a member of the Cherokee Nation, invoked the federal law to stop the adoption arranged by the girl's non-Indian mother when she was pregnant. The Capobiancos were was present at Veronica's birth in Oklahoma. Brown had never met his daughter and, after the mother rebuffed his marriage proposal, played no role during the pregnancy and paid no child support after Veronica was born.
But when Brown found out Veronica was going to be adopted, he objected and said the law favored the girl living with him and growing up with tribal traditions.
South Carolina courts sent Veronica back to Oklahoma at the end of 2011, even though she had lived with the Capobiancos for the first 27 months of her life. |
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Probe of well-connected truck stop chain may widen
Topics in Legal News |
2013/05/30 10:26
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The federal investigation into the truck stop chain owned by the family of Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam led to its first convictions this week and threatens to widen against employees at Pilot Flying J.
Court documents allege that sales teams were being trained on how to scam the company's customers out of rebates and get away with it.
Pilot's regional sales director and regional accounts representative both pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiracy to commit mail fraud. The pleas were entered in U.S. District Court in Knoxville. Prosecutors have offered to recommend a much lighter sentence for both employees provided they cooperate with federal investigators and reveal the extent of how many people in the company knew about the fraud.
The Knoxville-based chain is run by CEO Jimmy Haslam, the brother of Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam. Pilot Flying J, the country's largest diesel retailer with annual revenues of $31 billion, was founded by their father.
Jimmy Haslam has denied any wrongdoing and has suspended several members of the sales team, but he has declined to identify exactly who has been suspended. An affidavit unsealed last month shows that a Pilot employee was secretly recorded saying Jimmy Haslam knew what sales people were doing, though he has denied knowing of any fraud.
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High court uphold WV congressional districts
Topics in Legal News |
2012/09/29 14:53
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld West Virginia's congressional redistricting plan against a challenge that small population variations among its three congressional districts violate the Constitution.
The justices, in an unsigned opinion, reversed a lower federal court ruling that struck down the plan because of the population differences.
The high court said the West Virginia plan easily passes muster and said the population variations are too small to trigger constitutional concerns about the principle of one person, one vote. In addition, the court said the plan adopted by the West Virginia legislature served other legitimate goals, including keeping counties intact and not pitting incumbents against each other.
"It is clear that West Virginia has carried its burden," the high court said.
The justices had previously blocked the ruling to allow the state to conduct elections under the map approved by state lawmakers.
The lower court still can consider challenges to the plan under the state Constitution.
Both the state House and Senate passed the map with bipartisan and nearly unanimous margins. The difference between the smallest and largest districts was about 4,900 people.
The Jefferson County Commission, encompassing Charles Town and Harpers Ferry, challenged the redrawing, which moved one county from one congressional district to another. |
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Ohio man pleads guilty to scamming storm victims
Topics in Legal News |
2012/08/31 11:08
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A man accused of ripping off storm victims in Ohio and Kentucky has pleaded guilty to nine counts of theft.
Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said Joshua Salyers entered the guilty pleas in Hamilton County court in southern Ohio Tuesday. He admitted stealing more than $43,000 from the victims.
DeWine spokesman Mark Moretti said the 39-year-old Salyers ran a storm damage restoration business and took money from homeowners in Butler, Hamilton and Stark counties in Ohio and in Campbell County, Ky., to repair their homes after storms in 2010 and in 2011.
But Moretti said Salyers never began the work and refused to refund the money. |
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