Court

Legal News Feb 21, 2017

8th Cir. Holds Trial Court Did Not Err in Using ‘Percentage of the Benefit’ Over ‘Lodestar’ in TCPA Class Fee Award Dispute

In an appeal involving the settlement of four separate class actions under the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit recently held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by electing to use the “percentage-of-the-benefit” method to calculate class counsel’s fee award, as opposed to the “lodestar” method. The Eighth Circuit …

News Feb 20, 2017

Lawsuit Filed Against Seizing Tax Returns for Traffic Camera Fines

A new lawsuit seeks to stop the city of Des Moines from garnishing the state income tax refunds to pay traffic camera violation fines. The city has seized refunds for such fines for three years. Attorney Jim Larew, of Iowa City, said in the lawsuit filed last week that officials are misusing the program.

Class-Actions Feb 20, 2017

[Opinion] Eighth Circuit Undoes Target Data Breach Settlement Class

Today, we at Class Action Countermeasures are proud to post an analysis of the recent Target litigation appellate opinion by members of our class action and data privacy groups: Laura A. Lange, Shawna J. English, and Bethany Lukitsch. The $10 million settlement class in the Target data breach case was unraveled by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in a recent decision that will force the …

Lawsuits Feb 20, 2017

Ground-Breaking Voting Rights Lawsuit Challenges Judicial Orthodoxy

Do We Have the Right to Vote for President? The Supreme Court Says “No!” In Bush v Gore (2000) the Supreme Court said when the State Legislature vests the right to vote for President in its people, the State can take it back at any time. A lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Portland, Oregon, asserts in a new, straight-forward interpretation of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution that Section 2 of the amendment grants the right to vote for President to all qualified citizens of the United States. In 1875 the Supreme Court ruled that Section 2 only exists to allow states to deny the right to vote to their “colored populations,” a ruling the court has never contradicted. …

Lawsuits Feb 20, 2017

Lawsuit Filed to Stop Major Changes to State’s Collective Bargaining Laws

DES MOINES, Iowa–Protests didn’t do it. Neither did a marathon debate. Union workers hope a lawsuit will now be the solution to prevent Republicans from stripping most of the issues nearly 184,000 have a right to bargain in contract negotiations. …

Legal News Feb 20, 2017

Texas Sanctioned by Federal Judge for Dragging Its Feet Providing Documents in Lawsuit

Texas was sanctioned and its attorney general, Ken Paxton, reprimanded as deficient on Friday by a federal judge for ignoring court orders to hand over documents related to a lawsuit over the state’s voter registration practices, according to a published report. The Austin American-Statesman reported that U.S. District Court Judge Orlando Garcia of San Antonio has complained the …

Lawsuits Feb 20, 2017

GOP Leaders Renew Push to Block Lawsuit Over Election Spat

Mississippi House Republican leaders will appeal a court ruling in a dispute over an election that tied, went to a drawing of straws and was later flipped. The disputed election gave House Republicans a three-fifths supermajority by changing a seat from Democrat Bo Eaton to the GOP’s Mark Tullos. The lawsuit was filed by five voters whose ballots were discarded.

News Feb 20, 2017

An Ingenious European Lawsuit Could Finally Provide a Realistic Way to Stop Brexit

Jolyon Maugham doesn’t mind a tough fight. He was rejected from one of his first jobs after university for being a man, instead of a woman named Joleen that the employers thought the temp agency was sending. He filed a sex discrimination case and won. And now Maugham seems to be taking on the majority of Britons who voted to leave the European Union (EU). Along with some politicians, he has filed a case that could allow the UK parliament to reverse Brexit if they so wish. He now regularly gets online hate messages from what he calls “a small group of angry and loud individuals”—but that’s not going to stop him from the pursuit. …

News Feb 17, 2017

Buzzfeed Has a List of Reasons Why It Shouldn’t Lose Lawsuit Over “Bullsh*t News”

On Thursday, in a court of law, BuzzFeed fought for the right to verify what’s true and what’s fake. The digital news hub, partly owned by NBCUniversal, is defending an $11 million defamation lawsuit over an Aug. 24, 2015 story headlined, “The King of Bullsh*t News.” The subject of that story was the wacky reports from Michael Leidig’s Central European News, including a story about a woman in …

Legal News Feb 17, 2017

Federal Judge Sanctions Texas in Voter Registration Lawsuit

A federal judge has ordered sanctions against the state of Texas for blowing past deadlines and ignoring a court order to hand over thousands of pages of documents in a lawsuit challenging its voter registration practices. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office’s “months-long delay” in producing the documents “has been disruptive, time consuming, cost consuming” and has burdened plaintiffs …