Day: October 12, 2010

Latest on BP oil spill litigation – the Mississippi Litigation Review reports

Phillip Thomas, the blogging attorney of the Mississippi Litigation Review (MLR) has two excellent posts up on the BP oil spill litigation.   MLR is linked to SLABBED under Law Blogs in the right sidebar; and, if you visit there you will find Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee for BP Oil Spill MDL Dominated by Lawyers from Large Firms and BP Oil Spill Update: It’s a Gusher for Feinberg Rozen as Plaintiff Lawyers Head for the Exits

Thomas’ post on the Steering Committee links Judge Barbier’s Order that names the members of the Steering Committee:  Brian H. Barr, Jeffrey A. Breit, Elizabeth J. Cabraser,Philip F. Cossich, Jr., Robert T. Cunningham, Alphonso Michael Espy, Calvin C. Fayard, Jr., Robin L. Greenwald, Ervin A. Gonzalez, Rhon E. Jones, Matthew E. Lundy, Michael C. Palmintier, Paul M. Sterbcow, Scott Summy, and Mikal C. Watts:

Want to be on an exclusive MDL plaintiffs’ steering committee? Then you need to be an attorney in a large plaintiffs firm—the type that generally does not exist in Mississippi. That’s my take away from reviewing the list of attorneys on the Plaintiffs’ steering committee in the BP Oil Spill MDL.

Here is Judge Barbier’s Order rendered Friday with the names of the fifteen lawyers on the plaintiffs’ steering committee. Most of the lawyers appointed to the committee practice with large plaintiff firms. The even more exclusive executive committee is composed of four lawyers: James Roy, Russ Herman, Brian Barr and Scott Summy.

My interpretation of the Order is that the steering committee will run the entire litigation. Lawyers who represent victims—but who are not on the steering committee—appear to be getting squeezed out of the litigation.

The only Mississippi lawyer on the steering committee is Continue reading “Latest on BP oil spill litigation – the Mississippi Litigation Review reports”

BREAKING: Anne Marie Vandenweghe files suit against Jefferson Parish

Team AMV evidently has problems with nonresponsive public records requests with the gang over at the Yenni building. She would like her work computer back and a copy of her work emails.  I’ll add such should be relatively straightforward as the Parish uses Microsoft Exchange to handle their email system.

Following is the suit itself courtesy of Scribd. It has been assigned to Judge Ross LaDart. ~ sop Continue reading “BREAKING: Anne Marie Vandenweghe files suit against Jefferson Parish”

Allow me to more properly introduce the Slabbed Nation to President Obama and Mayor Mitchmo’s guy Cedric Richmond, a true sack of shit in the finest tradition of Dollar Bill Jefferson.

But hey don’t take my word for it. Here is what the Louisiana ODC had to say about ol’ Ced:

The board found that respondent knowingly violated duties owed to the public and the legal system. Respondent made a false statement in an affidavit when he signed the 2005 Notice of Candidacy form stating that he was domiciled at 8701 Lomond Road. Respondent refused to acknowledge or correct this misrepresentation during the civil trial that challenged his candidacy. Instead, he tried to blame other parties or twisted his testimony to suit the circumstances. Furthermore, respondent is an elected official, representing the 101st legislative district in the Louisiana House of Representatives. He refused to acknowledge the qualifying rules regarding domicile in the election for Council District D. The resulting civil trial challenging respondent’s candidacy burdened the legal system unnecessarily. Under the ABA’s Standards for Imposing Lawyer Sanctions, the board found the baseline sanction for respondent’s misconduct is a suspension from the practice of law……….

We find respondent’s statement of domicile in the 2005 qualifying form was false, and that after his candidacy for office was challenged, he made similarly false statements regarding his domicile in pleadings and oral testimony in the election contest. Moreover, we accept the hearing committee’s factual finding that respondent’s misconduct was knowing……

Here is the whole doc from which I quoted. I guarantee the fix was in on the related civil case from the CDC to the 4th Circuit. Continue reading “Allow me to more properly introduce the Slabbed Nation to President Obama and Mayor Mitchmo’s guy Cedric Richmond, a true sack of shit in the finest tradition of Dollar Bill Jefferson.”

Of opinions and wet kisses: Everyone has one and everyone gets ’em. The Times Picayune calls for an expanded looksie at the River Birch landfill. A Jefferson Parish Corruption Scandal Update.

Over the past couple of days I’ve saved links to several stories pieces from the Times Picayune, two from the opinion page and one from the news department. Our readers will recall last week we had a bit of fun with T-P columnist Stephanie Grace, who evidently has never met a politician, crooked or otherwise she failed to like so I guess it was natural I was tickled when T-P columnist/editor Drew Broach entered the fray from the perspective of the school board races in a column that is well worth featuring here on Slabbed.  Here is a snippet:

Don’t tell me that Jefferson Parish is fed up with its School Board. Not when four of every five voters skipped the election. If anything, turnout would suggest that Jefferson Parish doesn’t much care about the governance of public education.

But, yes, the few who did vote Oct. 2 demonstrated they are indeed fed up and aren’t going to take it anymore. “That” being a school system ranked one of the worst in Louisiana.

Yep, and I bet just like the schools in Orleans Parish back in the day, the system in Jefferson Parish is being systematically looted by the folks charged with running it. Once back in the day when I audited public school systems, I compared the per pupil expenditures of a district I was auditing in Mississippi to the one in Cleveland Ohio. There were no similarities as the racially mixed district I was auditing scored around the national average in standardized test scores while the Cleveland Ohio system was in the bottom quartile despite spending over $12,000 more per pupil. Like Orleans Parish, meaningful change will not come to the Jefferson system IMHO until someone from the outside such as the state takes it over and cleans house. Continue reading “Of opinions and wet kisses: Everyone has one and everyone gets ’em. The Times Picayune calls for an expanded looksie at the River Birch landfill. A Jefferson Parish Corruption Scandal Update.”