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6 accused in Mass. mortgage scheme
Court Watch |
2009/12/24 21:03
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| Three real estate investors, two mortgage brokers and a disbarred attorney have been indicted for allegedly participating in a complex scheme to defraud homeowners and mortgage lenders in the Boston area, authorities announced Tuesday.pThe six defendants are charged with larceny and making false or exaggerated statements./ppState Attorney General Martha Coakley, who announced the indictments at a news conference, said the scheme netted more than $2 million in proceeds./ppThose charged were: Joshua Brown, 29, of Brockton; Brian Frank, 32, of New Hartford, N.Y.; and John Sweetland, 28, of Yorba Linda, Calif., all identified as real estate investors. Mortgage brokers Linda Defeo, 28, of Springfield, and Brian Arrington, 39, of Boston, were also charged./ppFormer attorney Bruce Namenson, 47, of Walpole, was also charged. In unrelated cases, Namenson was disbarred in 2008 for converting clients' money for his own use and sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to motor vehicle insurance fraud./ppAuthorities allege that Brown, Frank and Sweetland, of Boston Equity Investments, used inflated property appraisals and other fraudulent documents to obtain approximately $12.5 million in loans from more than a dozen financial lending institutions to purchase 26 multifamily homes./ppThey allegedly arranged for the sellers to receive much less money for the sales than the maximum amount of financing that BEI was able to get from the lenders in the homebuyers' names. At closings, BEI would pocket the difference, which was usually between $50,000 and $100,000, and sometimes as much as $150,000, Coakley said./p |
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Teen charged with starting 2 California wildfires
Court Watch |
2009/12/24 21:03
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A 16-year-old Southern California boy was charged Wednesday as an adult for allegedly starting two arson wildfires in San Bernardino County earlier this year.
pRicky Sean Lukacs will be arraigned in adult court on Dec. 28 and is being held in juvenile hall, said Deputy District Attorney Karen Khim./ppHe is charged with two counts of arson of an inhabited structure for fires on Aug. 30 and 31 in the Yucaipa area, 65 miles east of Los Angeles./ppLukacs was originally arrested and charged as a juvenile, but the charges were refiled in adult court, said Susan Mickey, district attorney spokeswoman./ppThe fires did not cause serious injury or death, but one burned about 1 1/2 square miles in the community of Oak Glen, and the other threatened about 400 homes in Yucaipa before it was contained./p |
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Judge denies jury strikes motion in abortion case
Court Watch |
2009/12/22 20:59
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| A judge says a motion to prohibit the use of pre-emptory jury strikes in the trial of a man accused of killing a Kansas abortion provider is premature.pSedgwick County District Judge Warren Wilbert on Tuesday denied a defense motion to prohibit the strikes but said he would deal with such issues on a person-by-person basis during trial./ppFifty-one-year-old Scott Roeder is charged with shooting Dr. George Tiller on May 31 at the abortion doctor's Wichita church. Roeder has confessed to shooting Tiller, which he says was necessary to save unborn children./ppEarlier Tuesday, Wilbert denied a defense motion for a change of venue for the trial./p |
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La Salle settles injured player's lawsuit
Court Watch |
2009/11/30 08:44
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La Salle University will pay $7.5 million to settle a lawsuit brought on behalf of a football player who was cleared to play after sustaining a concussion at practice and later suffered a severe brain injury in a game, the attorney for the player's family said Monday.
Preston Plevretes, who was 19 at the time, was rendered severely brain damaged in 2005 because an initial concussion had not fully resolved, thereby worsening the injury from the second impact.
Plevretes, a linebacker, was covering a punt during a 56-14 loss to Duquesne in November 2005 when he sustained a hit that prompted emergency surgery at Mercy Hospital in Pittsburgh to relieve pressure on his brain. The injury halted the game with 2:24 left in the fourth quarter.
Following surgery, Plevretes was limited to movement of his eyes and some movement of his hands and fingers.
In its lawsuit, Plevretes' family claimed that substandard testing and medical attention by La Salle personnel were responsible for allowing Plevretes to play despite his earlier concussion.
A trial was to have begun Monday in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court. The settlement was announced in a statement released by attorney Shannin Specter.div style=border: 0px none ; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: absolute; top: 126px; left: 519px; line-height: normal; background-color: transparent; z-index: 99999; width: 70px; height: 46px; visibility: hidden id=rank_jit_com_maindiv style=visibility: inherit;table style=border-style: none solid solid none; border-color: -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224) rgb(224, 224, 224) -moz-use-text-color; border-width: 0px 1px 1px 0px; margin: 0pt; padding: 0px; width: 70px; height: 36px; background-color: transparent; font-family: Lucida Grande,sans-serif; font-size: 9px; z-index: 200000; border-collapse: separate; visibility: inherit cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0tbodytr style=background-color: transparenttd style=border-style: none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224); border-width: 0px 0px 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; height: 16px; background-color: transparent; text-align: center; vertical-align: middle; visibility: inherit;div style=border: 0pt none ; margin: 0pt; padding: 0pt; background-color: transparent /div/tdtd style=border-style: solid none solid solid; border-color: rgb(224, 224, 224) -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224) rgb(224, 224, 224); border-width: 1px 0px 1px 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 20px; height: 16px; text-align: center; vertical-align: middle; background-color: white; visibility: inherit colspan=2 align=centerimg id=rank_jit_pin style=border: 0px none ; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline; cursor: pointer; width: 16px; height: 16px; vertical-align: bottom; visibility: inherit; background-color: transparent; src=http://www.rankjit.com/extension/img/pin.gif/td/trtr style=border-style: solid none none; border-color: rgb(224, 224, 224) -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color; border-width: 1px 0px 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: white; visibility: inherittd style=border-style: none none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224); border-width: 0px 0px 0px 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: Lucida Grande,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 9px; font-weight: normal; text-align: center; vertical-align: middle; height: 10px; background-color: white; visibility: inherit; align=centerPage rank/tdtd style=border-style: none none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224); border-width: 0px 0px 0px 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: Lucida Grande,sans-serif; text-align: center; vertical-align: middle; background-color: white; border-spacing: 1px; font-size: 14px; width: 20px; height: 20px; color: white; visibility: inherit rowspan=2 align=center valign=middlediv style=border: 0px none ; margin: 1px; padding: 0px; width: 20px; height: 20px; background-color: rgb(132, 132, 132); visibility: inherit;div id=rank_jit_resultContainer style=border: 0px none ; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: transparent; width: 20px; height: 20px; line-height: 20px; vertical-align: middle; color: white; visibility: inherit; text-align: center5/div/div/td/trtrtd style=border-style: none none none solid; border-color: -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color -moz-use-text-color rgb(224, 224, 224); border-width: 0px 0px 0px 1px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; height: 10px; vertical-align: middle; background-color: white; visibility: inherit align=centerdiv style=border: 1px solid rgb(224, 224, 224); margin: 0px 0px 1px 1px; padding: 0px; width: 38px; height: 4px; visibility: inherit;div id=rank_jit_gradientContainer style=border: 0px none ; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 19px; height: 4px; float: left; background-color: rgb(0, 153, 51); visibility: inherit/div/div/td/tr/tbody/table/divdiv style=border: 0pt none ; margin: 0pt; padding: 0pt; overflow: hidden; z-index: 9999; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; float: none; position: absolute; left: auto; top: 39.5px; line-height: normal; background-color: transparent; visibility: inherit; width: 10px; height: 10px; right: 50pximg style=border: 0pt none ; margin: 0pt; padding: 0pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-family: trebuchet ms,arial,helvetica,sans-serif; float: none; position: absolute; left: 0px; top: 0px; line-height: normal; background-color: transparent; visibility: inherit; z-index: 99999; src=http://www.rankjit.com/extension/img/pointer.gif/div/div |
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Domain Auction Site Faces Shill Bidding Lawsuit
Court Watch |
2009/11/09 13:10
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| pA Miami lawyer has filed a class-action lawsuit against domain nameauction site SnapNames.com, after the company announced that a formeremployee was bidding against potential customers in domain nameauctions./ppAttorney Santiago Cueto filed the lawsuit Monday inMiami-Dade County Circuit Court on behalf of his brother, Carlos Cueto,and others who participated in SnapNames.com's online auctions. Thelawsuit alleges that a former vice president at SnapNames.com secretlybid on tens of thousands of domain name auctions over the past fouryears, leading to falsely inflated prices./ppSome of the SnapNamesauctions run into the tens of thousands of dollars, Santiago Cuetosaid. His brother, who owns about 3,000 domain names, has longsuspected shill bidding in some domain name auctions, he said./ppHe's been frustrated by the process for years, Santiago Cueto said. I think the entire industry needs to be cleaned up./ppSnapNames.com,a subsidiary of Oversee.net, sent out notices last week that it haddiscovered the employee bidding on domain name auctions. SnapNames,which resells expired domain names, calls itself the largest resalemarketplace for domain names. The company runs hundreds of auctions aday, it says on its Web sites./p |
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Securities Class Action Trial Starts This Week Against Vivendi
Court Watch |
2009/10/05 15:29
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The litigation equivalent of Halley's comet is about to streak into view in Manhattan federal district court. Yes, folks, when trial in the shareholder suit against Vivendi and two of its former executives begins this week before Judge Richard Holwell, it may be your once-in-a-lifetime chance to witness a so-called f-cubed securities class action trial, involving foreign investors who bought shares of foreign companies on foreign exchanges. Paul Saunders of Cravath, Swaine amp; Moore giving the opening statement for the defendants and Arthur Abbey of Abbey Spanier Rodd amp; Abrams is appearing as lead counsel for the plaintiffs. James Quinn of Weil, Gotshal amp; Manges, our most recent Litigator of the Week, is cocounsel for the defense.
Plaintiffs in the case, which has been around since 2002, are shareholders across the U.S. and Europe who allege that Vivendi--then known as Vivendi Universal--made false and misleading statements in 2001 and 2002, when Vivendi's former CEO, Jean-Marie Messier, was transforming the French water company into a media conglomerate through a mad dash of acquisitions. Plaintiffs claim that Vivendi, Messier, and former chief financial officer Guillaume Hannezo concealed a liquidity crisis, whose revelation ultimately caused the stock to drop.
a href=http://www.law.com/jsp/tal/digestTAL.jsp?id=1202434303037amp;On_y_va_Extremely_Rare_FCubed_Securities_Class_Action_Trial_Starts_This_Week_Against_VivendiRead more.../a |
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