Houston

Lawsuit: Teen Expelled for Sitting for Pledge of Allegiance

A lawsuit says a Houston student’s Constitutional rights were violated when she was expelled for not standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. Randall Kallinen, an attorney for 17-year-old India Landry’s family, said the civil lawsuit was filed Saturday against the Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District and a high school principal. The lawsuit says Landry, who’d been sitting …


Houston’s Panhandling, Camping Ordinances Violate Rights, Lawsuit Says

The ACLU of Texas announced Monday that it has filed a lawsuit on behalf of three homeless Houston residents asking a federal judge to halt the city’s new ordinances limiting panhandling and camping in public. City Council passed the two ordinances last month. The encampment rule forbids tents or other structures for living in public areas and requires that all of a person’s belongings fit into a three-foot cube; it took effect Friday. …


Overseas Litigation Funder Taps Texas Lawsuit Market, Houston Attorney to Head Office

One of the most successful litigation funding companies in the world has widened its U.S. reach, establishing a base of operations in Texas. On Feb. 21, Bentham IMF announced attorney Eric Chenoweth, a commercial and intellectual property litigator formerly of Yetter Coleman, will head the Australian-based company’s new Houston office. “I believe there are many funding opportunities …


Lawsuit Seeks to End Housing Voucher Discrimination

In 2015, Texas became the only state in the country to pass a law protecting a landlord’s ability to refuse to accept housing vouchers. A new federal lawsuit filed last week alleges that law is unconstitutional and violates the Fair Housing Act.


Opinion: A 2017 Food-Court Resolution: End Regulation-Through-Litigation Crusade Against Trans Fat

In 2016, class-action lawsuits alleging that a processed food product or its labeling violated state consumer-protection laws continued to clog the federal courts, especially in California. The number of new food-related consumer class actions filed last year nearly equaled the number filed in 2015, according to a report in Food Navigator USA . It’s unclear whether these trends will hold in 2017, but there is one set of blatantly frivolous claims that should disappear this year: those that seek judicial regulation of products that contain partially hydrogenated oil (PHO), the main source of trans fat. A December 13, 2016 Southern District of California decision should …


Federal Civil Rights Lawsuit Filed Against City of Houston, Officer

A Houston man has filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city of Houston and an officer, saying he is permanently injured because the officer slammed his head into a jail cell wall, causing him to bleed profusely. You need Flash to watch this video. Sorry, your browser doesn’t support Flash , needs a Flash update , or has Flash disabled.


All Parties Settle Lawsuit Involving Airbag Fatalities

The parents of 17-year-old Huma Hanif, who filed a lawsuit in April after their daughter’s death from a malfunctioning airbag subject to a historic recall, have settled with all parties. The Fort Bend County teen was the second person in the Houston area and the 10th nationwide to be killed by an airbag in a car crash. The family’s product liability case filed in Harris County focused on the use of the explosive, ammonium nitrate, which is used in the airbag inflators. Defendants in the lawsuit included Japanese airbag maker Takata Corp., American Honda Motor Co. and a local car dealer, Westside Hummer. Hanif, who was driving …


Texas Pastoral Group Upset Over Request for Sermons in Lawsuit

A Texas-based group that once called Houston’s first openly-gay mayor a “sodomite” has decided to get involved with a Georgia preacher and doctor suing over religious discrimination. Eric Walsh’s sometimes fiery sermons came to the attention of Georgia public health officials after he was conditionally offered a job in May 2014. During his time there, one of Walsh’s supervisors asked for links to a few sermons. That’s what outraged …


Houston Lawyer Brings EpiPen Lawsuit

Lawyers in Houston are representing consumers in the Midwest who have sued Mylan, the pharmaceutical company, for “deliberate and reprehensible price gouging” …


Families File Lawsuit for ‘Mismanaged’ Labor and Delivery

Tatyana Phillips never imagined she would have to talk about her baby boy’s death. “I have nightmares regularly so I don’t get any sleep, sometimes I stay awake for days at a time,” said the young woman through tears. On Friday, Phillips sat in the office of her attorney, and recounted that how last fall, her baby boy lived for just minutes after being born.