Understand Your Rights. Solve Your Legal Problems
Houston attorney James Lassiter has criticised American rapper Travis Scott as he denies allegations, including negligence, in lawsuits filed against him over the Astroworld Festival tragedy.
Speaking to CNN, Houston attorney James Lassiter, said, "Travis Scott's attempt to escape responsibility for creating a deadly situation from which his fans could not escape is shameful and, sadly, true to form.”
"While he continues using social media to present a public image of someone who is grieved by the catastrophic loss of life that his actions caused, he is quietly paying celebrity lawyers to argue his victims deserve nothing more than symbolic help with funeral costs."
Lassiter represents Bharti Shahani, a 22-year-old university student who died in the Astroworld stampede, as well as several of the Astroworld attendees who suffered significant injuries.
A second Houston attorney, Brent Croons, who represents 1,547 festival attendees, is demanding that Scott pay $10 billion to settle litigation from the disaster.
“What happened at Astroworld was an unconscionable tragedy and it is important that justice is served for all those impacted,” said Coons. “We will roll over every rock in this matter. Everyone associated with these types of events has the power to halt conduct that is resulting in injury to attendees. It has been terribly disappointing that some defendants have already gone public misstating and down-playing their responsibilities that attach to events such as this.”
A hearing is scheduled for December 13.
The US Justice Department says Microsoft asked job applications for unnecessary immigration documents to prove they could work for the company without requiring its sponsorship for work visas.
It was found in an investigation that Microsoft discriminated against at least six lawful permanent residents by requesting that they show a Permanent Resident Card to prove they were allowed to work in the US without employer sponsorship.
Microsoft is set to overhaul parts of its hiring process under the settlement to ensure the company is acting in line with US law, which prohibits employers from asking for documents unnecessarily.
In a statement, a Microsoft spokesperson said, “We hire and confirm employment eligibility for tens of thousands of people, and a handful were mistakenly asked for extra information or documentation.”
"We appreciate we need to prevent these mistakes and have worked to address these issues and improve our internal processes as part of our commitment to compliance.”
Former investors in the now-defunct company have testified at the trial that Holmes had led them to believe that Theranos’ technology had been adopted by the US military. As Holmes’ testimony in defence against fraud charges nears its end, she denied making such statements to investors.
Holmes also said she did not recall telling an investor that Theranos was anticipating revenues of $990 million for 2015, a claim that prosecutors have deemed to be false.
Holmes did, however, acknowledge that she regularly communicated with Theranos’ financial controller and had ultimate responsibility for the startup’s finances as its CEO. Holmes testified that she believed Theranos could have been successful in its goal of a miniature device that would revolutionise blood testing by making it more affordable and more accessible.
Holmes’ attorneys have characterised her as a young entrepreneur who underestimated the major obstacles faced by the company. They have argued that Theranos’ failure was not a crime.
Holmes is on trial for charges of fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud. If convicted, the Theranos founder faces up to 20 years in prison. Her testimony is expected to conclude on Wednesday.
Rohingya refugees from Myanmar are suing Meta Platforms Inc, formerly known as Facebook, for $150 billion over claims it failed to act against anti-Rohingya hate speech that fueled violence in the country.
On Monday, a US class-action complaint was filed by law firms Edelson PC and Fields PLLC, alleging that Meta’s failures to monitor content and its platform’s design contributed to the violence faced by the Rohingya community in Myanmar. Lawyers in the UK also submitted a letter of notice to Facebook’s London office in a coordinated action.
Facebook has admitted it was "too slow to prevent misinformation and hate" in Myanmar and says it has since started to work towards cracking down on platform abuses in the country.
In 2018, UN human rights investigators found the use of Facebook had played a key role in spreading anti-Rohingya hate speech that contributed to the violence. Between January and November 2018 alone, over 14,500 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh to escape ongoing persecution in Myanmar.
On Tuesday, Moscow’s Tagansky District Court said that Russia has fined Alphabet’s Google 9 million roubles in the latest chain of penalties against the tech giant for failing to delete content deemed illegal by the Russian government. Moscow’s Tagansky District Court cited legislation that said this may include posts containing child pornography, extremist activities, or the promotion of drug use.
Pressure on foreign tech companies operating in Russia has increased this year, with Moscow demanding that 13 foreign tech companies set up in Russia by January 1 or face possible restrictions or full-fledged bans. It's a campaign that critics are calling an attempt to exert tighter control over the internet, which they say threatens corporate and individual freedom.
Both Google and Meta Platforms face court cases this month for repeatedly violating Russian legislation on content. The tech giants could be fined a percentage of their annual Russian revenue.
This year, Google has already paid over 32 million roubles in fines and has significantly reduced the number of posts prohibited by Russian legislation.
New York law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell is hoping to move on from a 2-year-old lawsuit filed by Kaloma Cardwell, a Black former associate of the firm, who claims he was fired in 2018 because of his race.
In a memorandum filed in Manhattan federal court on Friday, Davis Polk asserted that the facts produced thus far demonstrated that Cardwell was fired because he “was not able to perform at the level expected of a Davis Polk associate.” The firm said “race played no part in that decision” and that Cardwell missed deadlines and failed to research articles and client documents during his time at the firm’s corporate department. Davis Polk claims that during a deal he was assigned to work on in 2017, Cardwell was absent for over ten hours, forcing the M&A group to source replacement staffing.
Cardwell claims the racial discrimination he faced at the firm led to his negative performance evaluations.
Davis Polk is asking US District Judge Gregory Woods to award the firm summary judgement on the lawsuit brought by Cardwell. This comes just over two months after Woods abandoned parts of Cardwell’s lawsuit against Davis Polk and sanctioned Cardwell’s attorney after Cardwell failed to answer the law firm’s interrogatories and produce documents.
On 19 November 2021 the Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill passed its second reading in the House of Commons, marking further progress in a long campaign to raise the minimum legal age for all marriage in England and Wales to 18.
The Private Member’s bill, introduced by Pauline Latham MP and which has cross-party support, seeks to bring an end to the increasingly anachronistic and unsustainable position that allows young people aged 16 and 17 to be legally married, even though they are still legally considered to be children.
The current law dates back to the Marriage Act 1949, which specifically refers to the marriage of a child requiring the consent of the child’s parent or guardian. The minimum age at which a person could marry was previously set at 16 years old under the Ages of Marriage Act 1929, but children aged 16 and above could legally marry.
Both pieces of legislation would undoubtedly have been seen as, and intended to be, progressive and introducing safeguards for children at the time but, as the former Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, Robert Buckland, speaking in the debate in support of the current bill said: “the mechanism of parental consent, which we all thought was a good safeguard, has sadly become a vehicle for abuse.”
In 2008, with the Educations and Skills Act, the government legislated to increase the age at which young people could leave learning to age 17 and, with effect from 2015, to age 18, recognising the importance of educational and vocational training for young people’s life chances. Campaigners to end child marriage highlight that the reality for many young people who are married from the age of 16 is that they lose those intended opportunities for education, employment and personal independence, with some also suffering physical and mental health issues, often connected to domestic abuse and early pregnancy. Organisations working with children who have been entered into child marriages report the survivors as experiencing life-long harm.
The provision for parental consent within the Marriage Act 1949 legitimises many child marriages in England and Wales at this time.
There is existing legislation to criminalise forced marriage, where the child (or indeed adult) does not consent, but this requires evidence of coercion or undue pressure to marry and fails to take account of the power imbalances in parent-child relationships, which may prevent the child from either being able to voice their unwillingness to marry or in some cases to recognise that they are entitled to have that voice. If a 16- or 17-year-old does not openly object to their marriage, and their parent or guardian consents, then it is legal.
The existing laws, however, apply only to registered ceremonies. There is no current legislative provision to restrict unregistered, religious marriages to any age limit, the only available prohibition against such marriages being they must not be forced. While it is known that the legal marriages of 125 children under the age of 18 were registered in 2019, there is no way of knowing how many children are entered into unregistered, religious marriages, but estimates suggest the figures are significantly greater.
It is for this reason that the Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill, in addition to amending existing legislation in relation to registered marriages, proposes to make it an offence for a person to aid, abet or encourage any child under the age of 18 to enter into any form of marriage, and will also make it an offence for a responsible person to fail to protect a child from entering into any form of marriage. Either offence would be punishable by up to seven years imprisonment.
While the proposed law to raise the minimum age of marriage to 18 will only apply to England and Wales, the Bill crucially aims to deter parents who may consider taking their child abroad to be married by extending the criminal offence of child marriage to marriages performed abroad by treating them as having taken place in England and Wales.
In addition to the criminal sanctions the bill would enact, it also makes provision for family courts to make child marriage protection orders, similar to forced marriage protection orders, by amendment to the Family Law Act 1996.
UNICEF defines child marriage as “any formal marriage or informal union between a child under the 18 and an adult or another child”. In 2016, UNICEF and the UN population fund launched a joint initiative to tackle the problem of child marriage globally. The UK government provides support and funding to the programme, and as recently as the 16th of November 2021, the Foreign Secretary announced a further £18 million of new funding to the programme as part of a pledge to drive global initiatives to end violence against women and girls, including an end to child marriage. And, yet some point out the inconsistency and double standards in the UK government’s position in seeking to lead the way on the issue in the circumstances when its own laws still allow children aged 16 and 17 to be exposed to the consequences of child marriage at home.
While the UK has also committed to achieving the UN’s sustainable development goals by 2030, one of which is to ‘eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage’, it undoubtedly weakens its own authority to champion and progress this outcome until it is no longer possible for a child to be legally married, at least in England and Wales (it will fall to the devolved governments in Scotland and Northern Ireland to decide whether to introduce similar legislation). It is hoped that the enactment of the Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill will address this anomaly.Having passed its second reading, the bill will now progress to the Committee stage for further consideration.
About the author: Nicky Hunter is a Partner at Stowe Family Law.
Electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla has asked a San Francisco federal court to affirm an arbitrator’s November 3 decision dismissing a former engineer’s claims that she was fired and defamed by Tesla for expressing concerns over contracting practices and defective floor mats in Tesla’s Model S.
In a statement received by the Huffington Post, Tesla claimed Balan was fired for using company time to work on a personal project and that Balan illegally recorded conversations with colleagues.
In a petition filed on Thursday, Tesla said an arbitrator recently found that former Tesla engineer Cristina Balan’s claims were untimely. Balan alleged that Tesla accused her of criminal conduct in response to a Huffington Post article from 2017 about her dismissal.
It was ruled by a California appeals court in March that Balan was required to arbitrate the defamation claims because they were directly linked to her employment with Tesla.
On Thursday, Tesla asked the San Francisco federal court to confirm the arbitrator’s decision. Balan said she would seek to vacate the arbitration award in an email sent Friday.
The proportion of complaints regarding barristers’ conduct in their personal lives doubled, forming 16.9% of cases, up from 7.9% in the previous year. This is partly related to inappropriate content on social media. The number of cases rose from just 2 in 2016-2017 to 49 in 2020-2021.
Last year, 11 investigations related to inappropriate use of social media. This figure sat at 6 the year before.
"Although small in overall number it does equate to almost a doubling in the number of investigations in this area,” the report stated. “The rise is part of an ongoing trend that has also seen a large increase in the number of reports to CAT about inappropriate use of social media [...] A relatively low percentage of reports result in investigations (approximately 20%). Examples of cases investigated were comments that were considered to be discriminatory and using Twitter to gratuitously insult others. There was also one case of an unregistered barrister holding out as practising on Twitter.”
In the old west, a Texas rancher would brand all of his cattle so that they could be identified if a question of ownership arose. Over the past couple of decades, the Texas judicial system has seen the rise of a different kind of branding: the overloading of defendants with conditions under which they must comply - some at great expense - after they are released on bond. In effect, these individuals are stigmatised before they have even been found guilty of a crime.
Four years ago, the commonly-heard mantra was that criminal justice reform was needed because the existing system was unconstitutional. After various courts determined this to be a false claim, the refrain changed to one of fairness. Now, as crime continues to rise across the United States, law enforcement is pointing to these bad bail reform practices that have effectively tied the hands of judges and allowed crime to increase without defendants being held accountable.
In its most recent legislative session, Texas passed a major criminal justice reform bill - Senate Bill 6 - that addressed bail with a renewed focus on accountability. In the state, courts set the amount of bail and then impose any mandatory or discretionary conditions to which a defendant must comply after release on bond to ensure public safety or the safety of the victim. A portion of Senate Bill 6 sought to address the overuse of conditions placed upon a defendant after they are released on bond. Notably, it called for courts to apply "the least restrictive conditions" to a defendant after release.
Reference to "least restrictive conditions" can be traced to the Federal Bail Reform Act Of 1984 wherein judges use a release or detain approach. The statute sets out a laundry list of possible conditions that may be imposed upon a defendant's release.
In the years since the passage of the Bail Reform Act, the federal system on average detains more than 70% of defendants arrested.
Since states are charged with prosecuting a far greater number of crimes, this high detention rate would not be practical or cost-effective in state jurisdictions because of the certainty that severe jail overcrowding would result.
Texas is not a release/detain jurisdiction. Only certain crimes set forth in the state's Constitution authorises a trial court to deny bail and its Code of Criminal Procedure requires trial courts to set an amount of bail unless it is denied pursuant to the constitution. Therefore, a trial court establishes a bail amount to ensure appearance.
In the late 1980s, Texas began authorising trial courts to set certain conditions with which a defendant must comply after being released on bond. Many of these conditions are imposed at a defendant's expense; some conditions are permissive, while others are mandatory.
In 1989, the State Legislature authorised a trial court to impose home curfew and electronic monitoring upon a defendant released on a personal bond. Four years later, it mandated certain conditions for defendants released on bond who had been charged with "stalking." It then added a requirement for motor vehicles to have ignition interlock devices installed as a condition after release on bond for certain intoxication crimes. In 1999, trial courts were granted general authority to impose conditions upon a defendant after their release on bond, related to the safety of the victim and the community. Home curfew, electronic monitoring and drug testing were expanded subsequently to be used on any type of bond.
In 2001, advances in forensic technology led to Texas courts being authorised to require certain defendants to provide a specimen for the purpose of creating a DNA record. Over the next two decades, possible conditions were expanded, first to include offences involving family violence, then later to defendants charged with certain trafficking or prostitution-related offences.
Accordingly, when a defendant is released from jail awaiting trial or entering a plea, they face a seemingly infinite laundry list of conditions under which they must comply with after being freed on bond. Depending on the charge, some of the conditions may be discretionary, while others may be mandatory.
Under Senate Bill 6, a magistrate is required to set an amount of bond not more than 48 hours after a defendant is arrested. Additionally, the court is authorised and required in some situations to impose conditions on the defendant's release. In setting these conditions the judge must now "impose the least restrictive conditions, if any, to protect the safety of the community, law enforcement, and the victim of the alleged offence."
The amount of bail is set pursuant to factors set forth in article 17.15 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure. Conditions applied to a defendant after release on bond now must adhere to this new standard of "least restrictive conditions, if any." This language is meant to make clear that these conditions are in addition to and separate and apart from any cash amount or type of bond required. This language was also intended to stop the practice of placing numerous and materially restrictive conditions of release upon an accused as additional conditions of release, some of which come at great expense to defendants, both monetarily and as a constraint upon personal freedom. This interpretation of the new language is underscored because Senate Bill 6 also requires that any condition of release must be set forth in an order from a trial court and notice given to certain parties.
Senate Bill 6 represents a new direction for criminal justice reform in Texas. It is based upon accountability, while also seeking to end the practice of overloading defendants with unnecessary conditions of release. Such conditions have had the effect of branding these individuals as guilty before they have even been tried by a jury.
This legislation rejects earlier reforms that have tied the hands of judges and often allowed career criminals to take advantage of the criminal justice system. There is reason to believe that Senate Bill 6 may represent the path for truly successful criminal justice reform moving forward, both in Texas and across the US.
About the author: Ken W. Good is the Board of Directors, Professional Bondsmen of Texas. He graduated from Hardin Simmons University in 1982 with a Bachelor of Arts Degree. He received a Master of Education Degree in 1986 from Tarleton State University, a part of the Texas A&M System. In 1989, he received his law degree from Texas Tech School of Law, where he was a member of the Texas Tech Law Review. Mr Good has argued cases before the Supreme Court of Texas and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, along with numerous courts of appeals, including the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He is the author of "Good's on Bail", a practice guide created for bail industry professionals. In addition, he has written numerous articles on the subject of bail reform, including, "What Successful Bail Reform Looks Like." Mr Good is married and has two daughters.
