Category Archives: Supreme Court

Supreme Court – The latest news about Supreme Court from the Lawstarz Blog – Latest news and coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Blog, Criminal, Drug Companies, Legal News, Supreme Court

2 Arrested in Sweeping Designer Drug Bust After Overdose Death; Synthetic Lab Operated Out of Luxury Long Island City High-Rise, Investigators Say

A 34-year-old Queens man and a 29-year-old New Jersey woman were arrested in connection with the alleged conspiracy

By Joe Valiquette

“”

A Queens man and a New Jersey woman have been arrested for allegedly conspiring to distribute dangerous designer drugs, including a synthetic opioid several times more potent than morphine that has been blamed for at least one overdose death, authorities said Tuesday.

The arrests stem from an ongoing investigation that culminated with a huge raid at a luxury waterfront high-rise in Long Island City, thought to be the site of a synthetic drug lab, earlier in the day. Another raid was simultaneously conducted in Farmingdale, New Jersey, where the female suspect lives.

According to a criminal complaint, 34-year-old Brian Parker allegedly manufactured and distributed controlled substance analogues, drugs that are “substantially similar” to controlled substances, and other illegal chemicals through two internet-based companies he controlled. The substances sold through his websites were linked to a 2016 overdose death in Wisconsin.

An autopsy revealed the 37-year-old man who overdosed died of acute intoxication due to the combined effects of a substance called U-47700, a synthetic opioid, and Etizolam, a synthetic, fast-acting depressant.

Source: 2 Arrested in Sweeping Designer Drug Bust After Overdose Death; Synthetic Lab Operated Out of Luxury Long Island City High-Rise, Investigators Say – NBC New York http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Raid-Long-Island-City-New-York–442103943.html#ixzz4rAveXuTH
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Blog, Criminal, International, Legal News, Organized Crime, Supreme Court

Suspended Milwaukee lawyer faces FBI investigation into alleged international fraud scheme

, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The FBI is investigating a suspected international fraud scheme said to involve a suspended Milwaukee lawyer, $16.2 million from China, an English bank, a man who claims to be an English solicitor and … John Hancock’s signature.

At the center of the probe is veteran Milwaukee lawyer Michael Krill, whose law license was suspended by the state Supreme Court on Wednesday. The court employed a rarely used rule that allows emergency temporary suspensions before the Office of Lawyer Regulation files a formal complaint.

“Krill’s repeated acts of dishonesty, delay and contempt for the judicial process” makes his “continued practice of law … a threat to the public and the administration of justice,” Karl Wyler, an OLR investigator, wrote in a June affidavit urging the immediate suspension.

The FBI and the Racine County Sheriff’s Office are also investigating the 59-year-old attorney. The Racine investigation centers around $300,000 belonging to ex-clients that Krill received but has not turned over despite a court order that he do so.  Since May, Krill has been fined $500 a day for contempt for failing to turn the money over to the clients’ new lawyers, court records show.

Krill was ordered Monday to come up with about $350,000 — the $300,000 in client funds plus the accrued daily contempt fine — in two weeks or spend 30 days in jail.  Krill has repeatedly promised in court to produce the money in 14 days — and he repeated that pledge Monday during a brief hearing before Racine County Circuit Judge David Paulson.

Full Read – http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/crime/2017/08/28/suspended-milwaukee-lawyer-faces-fbi-investigation-into-alleged-international-fraud-scheme/595890001/

Blog, Business Law, Civil Rights, Criminal, Drug Companies, International, Legal News, Organized Crime, Supreme Court

How Anti-Mafia Laws Could Bring Down Legal Pot

By Amanda Chicago Lewis

RICO laws were written to combat organized crime kingpins – but now they’re being used against state-legal marijuana businesses

Most people have strong feelings about marijuana’s distinctive dank odor. Suspicious landlords sniff for it. High-school hot-boxers roll down all the windows of their cars and drive around for hours trying to get rid of it. Mainstream candle and soap companies seek to recreate it for high-end, non-psychoactive mood settings. And now, it’s quietly becoming clear that the powerful smell of legal cannabis could become its ultimate undoing ­– the thing that causes the entire legalization experiment to disappear in a poof of smoke.

Earlier this summer, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Colorado decided that the “noxious odors” from a pot farm could be lowering nearby property values and creating a nuisance. The decision came out of a civil suit by the farm’s neighbors under federal racketeering law, and could set a landmark precedent. Marijuana remains illegal under federal law, and this decision makes clear that private citizens can now circumvent state law and do what Attorney General Jeff Sessions wants but has yet to do: challenge the legitimacy of states and businesses participating in legalization. Next year, the suit will go back to district court, and unless other appeals courts issue contradictory rulings and the Supreme Court decides to take up the case, the 10th Circuit decision will stand – providing a road map for people who hate marijuana to initiate the collapse of legal weed in America.

Everything about this case is important, from its far-reaching implications to the mysterious, well-funded organization behind it. But before we get into the details, the key thing to realize here is this neighborly dispute is a microcosm for what’s wrong with America’s tangled marijuana policy: The commercialization of cannabis has had real consequences for people and places that want no involvement with the drug. Attempting, as we have, to cordon off the states and businesses and entrepreneurs and government agencies that interact with pot is delusional.

Legal weed cannot be neatly contained. Markets and odors don’t work that way. Neighbors know this. Interstate pot traffickers know this. Attorney General Jeff Sessions knows this. The question is: when will we change federal law to reflect reality?

Full Read – http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/how-anti-mafia-laws-could-bring-down-legal-pot-w499585

Blog, Business Law, Supreme Court

Warner Bros. Can’t Dodge Sylvester Stallone’s Fraud Lawsuit

Sylvester Stallone has scored an early and significant ruling in his lawsuit against Warner Bros. over profits from the 1993 science-fiction film Demolition Man. Not only has a Los Angeles Superior Court judge rejected the studio’s bid to throw out breach of contract and fraud claims, but the actor is being permitted to bring a potentially big claim that Warners’ accounting practices are likely to deceive the public, including others in Hollywood with profit participation agreements.

Through his loan-out company Rogue Marble, Stallone filed his lawsuit in April.

“The motion picture studios are notoriously greedy,” stated the complaint. “This one involves outright and obviously intentional dishonesty perpetrated against an international iconic talent. Here, WB decided it just wasn’t going to account to Rogue Marble on the Film. WB just sat on the money owed to Rogue Marble for years and told itself, without any justification, that Rogue Marble was not owed any profits.”

According to the lawsuit, Warner Bros. initially asserted that nearly $67 million was unrecouped on Demolition Man and therefore nothing was owed to Stallone, who was to get 15 to 20 percent of defined profits on the film. After being challenged, the studio sent Stallone a check for $2.82 million. The actor wasn’t satisfied.

There are many legal actions targeting “Hollywood accounting,” including the must-watch one from Frank Darabont over The Walking Dead. What makes Stallone’s case provocative — besides an A-list actor suing the same studio that distributed 2015’s Creed, which earned Stallone an Oscar nomination — is a claim of unfair business practices.

Full Read – http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/warner-bros-cant-dodge-sylvester-stallones-fraud-lawsuit-1026520

Blog, Business Law, Civil Rights, Family, International, Legal News, Supreme Court

Disney Accused of Illegally Tracking Children Via Apps in New Lawsuit

A San Francisco mom says her child was illegally tracked while using the Disney Princess Palace Pets app.

Amanda Rushing, on behalf of her child referred to as “L.L.,” is suing The Walt Disney Company, Disney Electronic Content and others in a proposed class action filed Thursday in California federal court.

Rushing claims an advertising-specific software development kit is surreptitiously embedded in the code for the app, and that’s how Disney is collecting personal information and tracking online behavior.

“App developers and their SDK-providing partners can track children’s behavior while they play online games with their mobile devices by obtaining critical pieces of data from the mobile devices, including ‘persistent identifiers,’ typically a unique number linked to a specific mobile device,” writes attorney Michael Sobol in the complaint. “These persistent identifiers allow SDK providers to detect a child’s activity across multiple apps and platforms on the internet, and across different devices, effectively providing a full chronology of the child’s actions across devices and apps. This information is then sold to various third-parties who sell targeted online advertising.”

Full Read – http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/disney-accused-illegally-tracking-children-apps-new-lawsuit-1026881