Tag Archives: legal

Blog, Civil Rights, Family, Legal News

Family sues condo board, claim swim diaper ban violates baby’s civil rights

Add swim diapers to the list of issues that can get turned into a federal case.

A Florida family is suing their condo board over what they say is a rule barring children from using the community pool while wearing swim diapers.

Swim diapers are a snug-fitting lightweight alternative to disposable or cloth diapers, which become heavy like anchors when wet.

According to the website SwimOutlet.com, swim diapers are “meant to be used only in the pool or ocean to make sure that your little one’s bum is covered and contained.”

But if banning them in a community pool prevents a child from using that pool, swim diapers can also become a symbol of the fight against discrimination.

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Blog, International, Legal News, Supreme Court

Trump legal team vows to fight on, starting with fresh lawsuit Monday in Pennsylvania

President Donald Trump’s legal team repeated its vow Sunday to bring a wave of new lawsuits contesting Joe Biden’s win of the presidency, starting with a federal suit to be filed Monday alleging that Philadelphia and Pittsburgh were awash in vote fraud.

Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, elaborated on the pending suits in an interview on Fox News in which he leveled allegations that, in several cases, the GOP had already argued without success in previous court challenges.

However, the Trump legal team did cite at least one case from Pennsylvania in which it appears the vote of a dead woman from the Pittsburgh area was received and marked as “recorded” by election officials.

In his Sunday remarks, Giuliani contended the suits could reverse the electionoutcome, at least in Pennsylvania.

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Blog, Business Law, Criminal, International, Legal News, Organized Crime

Pandemic Puts the Screws to New York’s Mafia. In Italy, the Mobs Are Thriving.

Traditional organized-crime rackets like betting and construction are bleeding the New York mafia dry. But in Italy, the mobs are stronger than ever.

ROME—The New York mafia is taking a hit from the novel coronavirus pandemic after many of its money-making outlets have been shuttered.

Gambling halls, sporting events, and construction projects have long fed the Empire State gangs, but now that they are taking an “historic” blow, a law-enforcement source told the New York Post. “There’s never been a time when they weren’t making money through gambling,” the source said.

The American mafia families are also losing out on the extortion racket after restaurants and other entities close their doors under New York City’s “shelter in place” order. A halt to non-essential construction jobs, which includes transportation and port entry, has also put a dent in the U.S. mob’s profits.

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Blog, Business Law, Drug Companies, Legal News

BIG PHARMA PREPARES TO PROFIT FROM THE CORONAVIRUS

AS THE NEW CORONAVIRUS spreads illness, death, and catastrophe around the world, virtually no economic sector has been spared from harm. Yet amid the mayhem from the global pandemic, one industry is not only surviving, it is profiting handsomely.

“Pharmaceutical companies view Covid-19 as a once-in-a-lifetime business opportunity,” said Gerald Posner, author of “Pharma: Greed, Lies, and the Poisoning of America.” The world needs pharmaceutical products, of course. For the new coronavirus outbreak, in particular, we need treatments and vaccines and, in the U.S., tests. Dozens of companies are now vying to make them.

“They’re all in that race,” said Posner, who described the potential payoffs for winning the race as huge. The global crisis “will potentially be a blockbuster for the industry in terms of sales and profits,” he said, adding that “the worse the pandemic gets, the higher their eventual profit.”

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Blog, International, Legal News

China has censored the Archive of Our Own, one of the internet’s largest fanfiction websites

China has taken the beloved Hugo-winning site offline amid stringent new internet laws.

By Aja Romano  

The Archive of Our Own (AO3), the Hugo-winning fanfiction website, is the latest casualty of Chinese censorship, amid a continued crackdown in the country on queer content, sexually explicit content, and websites based abroad.

Reports surfaced on February 29 that AO3 was no longer accessible through the national Chinese web, and the site appears to be blocked from view within the country, according to Comparitech, a service that allows users to check whether China has blocked a website. In a tweet confirming the ban, the Organization for Transformative Works, the non-profit group that runs AO3, seemed surprised. It’s unclear whether the OTW was contacted by Chinese authorities before the site was blocked. (Vox has reached out to the OTW for comment.)

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