Information about legal issues affecting small businesses, including big business. The latest news, videos, and discussion topics on Legal Issues involving business and money.
The U.S. government’s bankruptcy watchdog objected on Monday to a Caesars Entertainment Corp subsidiary’s proposal to exit Chapter 11, threatening to derail a largely consensual plan to slash $10 billion of debt.
The Caesars subsidiary, Caesars Entertainment Operating Co Inc (CEOC), filed an $18 billion bankruptcy in January 2015 amid allegations by creditors that its private equity-backed parent had looted the unit of its best assets and stripped debt guarantees.
Feuding parties made a peace deal in September that included a $5 billion contribution by Caesars to the unit’s reorganization plan in exchange for releases from billions of dollars in potential legal claims.
In a filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Chicago, the U.S. Trustee objected to the releases and the exculpation of “a wide array of parties for acts far beyond the plan or the Chapter 11 cases.” The U.S. Trustee called the releases “blanket immunity.”
Some people will try anything to make a million. Ever thought of suing someone because they look like you? Check out this and other frivolous lawsuits for a laugh, but don’t try them yourself! Frivolous lawsuits very rarely make it through the courts, and usually wind up costing the plaintiff.
Do Beautiful Women Really Come to Life When You Drink Bud Light? 1991, Richard Overton sued Anheuser-Busch for false and misleading advertising under Michigan State law. The complaint specifically referenced ads involving, among other things, fantasies of beautiful women in tropical settings that came to life for two men driving a Bud Light truck. In addition to two claims of false advertising, Mr. Overton included a third claim in his complaint in which he claimed to have suffered emotional distress, mental injury, and financial loss in excess of $10,0000 due to the misleading Bud Light ads. The court dismissed all claims. For more information about this lawsuit, click here.
If you can’t sue the system, sue yourself. 1995, Robert Lee Brock sued himself for $5 million. He claimed that he had violated his own civil rights and religious beliefs by allowing himself to get drunk and commit crimes which landed him in the Indian Creek Correctional Center in Virginia, serving a 23 year sentence for grand larceny and breaking and entering. What could he possibly have to gain by suing himself? Since being in prison prevented him from having an income, he expected the state to pay. This case was thrown out.
Criminals need not bear the responsibility for their crimes alone when the real money is in Hollywood.1996, the family of Patsy Ann Byers sued Oliver Stone, Warner Brother, and others involved in the making and distribution of the movie Natural Born Killers for an unspecified amount. They claimed that the movie caused Sarah Edmondson and Benjamin Darrus to go on a crime spree which resulted in Edmonson shooting Byers during a robbery, leaving her paralyzed from the chest down. The lawsuit was originally filed in 1995, against Edmonson and Darrus, the actual perpetrators of the crime spree. Stone and the others involved with the film were added in 1996. The portion of the case aimed at Stone and his associates was dismissed in 2001.
Since when were haunted houses frightening? 2000, Cleanthi Peters sued Universal Studios for $15,000. She claimed to have suffered extreme fear, mental anguish, and emotional distress due to visiting Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights haunted house, which she said was too scary.
When kids commit heinous crimes, who is responsible? The makers of every video game they’ve ever played, of course. 2001, Linda Sanders and other family members of Columbine High School shooting victims sued 25 movie and video game companies for $5 billion, in a class action lawsuit.They claimed that were it not for movies includingThe Basketball Diaries and videos games including Doom, Duke Nukem, Quake, Mortal Kombat, Resident Evil, Mech Warrior, Wolfenstein, Redneck Rampage, Final Fantasy, and Nightmare Creatures, the massacre would not have occurred, and that the makers and distributors of the movies and games were partly to blame for their loved ones’ deaths. The case was thrown out and the plaintiffs were ordered to compensate the video game and movie companies for their legal fees.
Negligent security is a legitimate claim, when you’re the victim, not the perpetrator! 2002, Edward Brewer sued Providence Hospital for $2 million. He claimed that the hospital was negligent because it had not prevented him from raping one of its patients. The judge ruled that any damage Brewer suffered due to his crime was his responsibility for choosing to commit the crime, and that the hospital had no legal duty to protect him from that choice.
Read The Rest – http://www.the-injury-lawyer-directory.com/ridiculous_lawsuits.html
Gov. Jerry Brown signed off on a variety of bills in September that aim to protect patients and health care consumers.
The following laws are set to go into effect in 2017.
AB 72: “Surprise medical bill” legislation by Assemblyman Rob Bonta (D-Oakland) was among the most-talked-about measures of the year in Sacramento. It promises to better protect consumers against unexpected medical bills.
Patients can receive such bills when they use a hospital or clinic considered in-network by their insurance plan but are treated by a provider who does not contract with the insurer such as radiologists, anesthesiologists and pathologists. With the goal of keeping patients out of the fight between providers and insurers, the new law essentially sets a reimbursement rate requiring insurers to pay out-of-network doctors 125 percent of the amount Medicare pays for the service or the insurer’s average contracted rate, whichever is greater.
“With his signature, Governor Brown has enacted some of the strongest patient protections in the nation against surprise medical bills. This issue has been debated but has gone unresolved for decades,” Bonta said in a statement.
SB 482: Amid a national opioid epidemic, Brown approved legislation that requires doctors to check a patient’s prescription history in a state database before prescribing any potentially addictive drugs.
The bill, by Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens), calls for doctors to consult California’s prescription drug monitoring database when prescribing controlled substances. Failure to do so under the new law could result in disciplinary action, although there is no way to ensure that doctors actually use this tool before prescribing.
The new law is meant to put a stop to “doctor shopping” — the practice of visiting multiple doctors to obtain prescription for opioids.
SB 586: The legislation, a compromise between the Department of Health Care Services and children’s advocates, aims to slow down and improve plans to overhaul the way the state’s most medically fragile children receive care.
Currently, severely ill children with conditions like cancer or cerebral palsy receive care through an 89-year-old state program known as California Children’s Services. The Department of Health Care Services announced its plan last year to move these children into Medi-Cal managed care plans to streamline their care. Parents and child advocates argued that the transition was too quick and poorly planned, and could interrupt care for these children. The bill adds changes demanded by parents and advocates to improve case management and coordination for children affected by the transition.
The bill, introduced by the head of the state’s Senate Health Committee, Sen. Ed Hernandez (D-West Covina), allows DHCS to implement the transition to 21 counties by July 2017. The remaining counties will follow. The full transition of the state’s 190,000 children should be complete by 2022.
Ann-Louise Kuhns, president and CEO of the California Children’s Hospital Association, said the new law “both protects the high quality of care assured by the California Children’s Service program and promotes a careful, phased integration with managed care.”
SB 908: This bill will allow consumers to learn when their health insurance premium rates have been considered “unreasonable” by state officials. Current law requires that unreasonable rate hikes be posted online by one of the two state agencies that regulate insurers — the Department of Managed Health Care or the California Department of Insurance. But consumers don’t check online, the bill’s supporters argued.
The new law will require insurers to notify individuals and small businesses directly in writing — at least 60 days before the rate changes — so that consumers can shop around if they choose.
“This law will discourage unjustified health plan rate hikes and empower consumers to make informed decisions about the coverage they are choosing,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California, a Sacramento-based consumer advocacy group.
SB 1076: This law, sponsored by the California Nurses Association, was designed to protect hospital patients in “observation” care. It requires that observation units meet the same staffing standards — nurse-to-patient ratios — as those in the emergency room.
Outpatient services are not covered by the same patient protection regulations as inpatient units, and many times patients are left in an observations status for a long period of time, according to supporters of the law. In addition, such treatment is not counted toward the three days of hospitalization that Medicare requires for a patient to be covered for nursing home care once they are discharged from the hospital.
The new law will also require that hospitals report summaries of the care they provide during observation status to the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development for data collection.
Sourced From – http://californiahealthline.org/news/california-governor-signs-flurry-of-health-laws/
We’re so used to complicated problems that we occasionally overlook the obvious. Like fiddling around with some gadget, trying to get it to work when all you needed to do is plug it in.
Could the solution to the “problem” of Hillary running for president be just that simple? Did she really break the law — and would the penalty for breaking that law disqualify her from being president? The answers to those two questions are “yes,” and “yes.”
If someone were to ask you if there is a law that Hillary has broken that should end her campaign for president right now, you’d probably answer that the laws broken by Hillary are innumerable. But could you mention a specific law? Well, now you can, and it was hidden in plain sight. If we laypersons can figure it out, it sort of makes you wonder what the FBI was doing when investigating Hillary’s email server.
Apparently, the FBI forgot to visit the Cornell Law Library. Word for word from the Cornell Law Library Former United States Attorney General Michael Mukasey tells MSNBC that not only is Hillary Clinton’s private email server illegal, it “disqualifies” her from holding any federal office. Very specifically points to one federal law, Title 18. Section 2071.
So here’s the one law you need to know that should terminate her presidential campaign:
For those of us who do not have United States Codecommitted to memory, here’s what it says:”(a) Whoever willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, or destroys, or attempts to do so, or, with intent to do so takes and carries away any record, proceeding, map, book, paper, document, or other thing, filed or deposited with any clerk or officer of any court of the United States, or in any public office, or with any judicial or public officer of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both. (b) Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States. As used in this subsection, the term “office” does not include the office held by any person as a retired officer of the Armed Forces of the United States.”
Yes, it explicitly states “shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States.”
So, yes, it really is that simple. Hillary is “disqualified from holding any office under the United States.” So the only question left really should be, who is going to replace her on the Democrat ticket?
