British drugmaker agrees payment to resolve 80,000 cases alleging cancers were linked to drug known generically as ranitidine
The British drugmaker GSK has struck an agreement to make a payment of up to $2.2bn (£1.7bn) to resolve litigation brought in the US over its heartburn treatment Zantac.
The company said it had struck agreements with 10 plaintiff law firms who represent about 93%, roughly 80,000, of the US state court product liability cases pending against it.
Continue reading...Mexico argues negligence from makers such as Colt and Glock has led to gun trafficking to drug cartels and criminals
The US supreme court said on Friday it will decide whether to block a $10bn lawsuit Mexico filed against US gun manufacturers and distributors that argues that their negligent and illegal commercial practices have unleashed bloodshed in the country.
The lawsuit, filed in Boston in August, names Smith & Wesson, Barrett Firearms, Beretta, Colt and Glock, as well as Boston-area wholesaler Interstate Arms.
Continue reading...Lawsuit seeks to hold American manufacturers responsible for trafficking of firearms to drug cartels across border
A US judge has dismissed much of Mexico’s unprecedented $10bn lawsuit seeking to hold US gun manufacturers responsible for facilitating the trafficking of firearms to violent drug cartels across the US-Mexico border.
US district judge Dennis Saylor in Boston dismissed claims against six of the eight companies Mexico sued in 2021, including Sturm, Ruger and Glock, citing jurisdictional problems.
Continue reading...Landmark verdict against Chiquita marks first time major US company held liable for funding human rights abuses abroad
A Florida court has ordered Chiquita Brands International to pay $38m to the families of eight Colombian men murdered by a paramilitary death squad, after the US banana giant was shown to have financed the terrorist organisation from 1997 to 2004.
The landmark ruling late on Monday came after 17 years of legal efforts and is the first time that the fruit multinational has paid out compensation to Colombian victims, opening the way for thousands of others to seek restitution.
Continue reading...In texts received in Spanish and translated to English, the girl tried to describe her location, though she did not know where she was
Authorities rescued a 17-year old girl after she was trafficked to Ventura county, California, from Mexico two months ago and texted 911 for help.
On Thursday, the Ventura county sheriff’s office announced that on 9 May authorities rescued the girl after she sent messages to 911. The text message correspondence began with a call taker at a 911 communication center, according to the sheriff’s office, which added that the messages were received in Spanish and translated into English.
Continue reading...Human rights experts say attack was violation of international law, and that US supplying of weapon defies 1997 Leahy law
Israel used a US weapon in a March airstrike which killed seven healthcare workers in southern Lebanon, according to a Guardian analysis of shrapnel found at the site of the attack, which was described by Human Rights Watch as a violation of international law.
Seven volunteer paramedics, aged between 18 and 25, were killed in the 27 March attack on an ambulance center belonging to the Lebanese Succor Association in the town of al-Habariyeh in south Lebanon on 27 March.
Continue reading...Jury trial against military contractor CACI over ‘sadistic, blatant and wanton abuses’ comes 20 years after scandal broke
The first trial to contend with the post-9/11 abuse of detainees in US custody begins on Monday, in a case brought by three men who were held in the US-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
The jury trial, in a federal court in Virginia, comes nearly 20 years to the day that the photographs depicting torture and abuse in the prison were first revealed to the public, prompting an international scandal that came to symbolize the treatment of detainees in the US “war on terror”.
Continue reading...Manuel Rocha, 73, will also pay a $500,000 fine after pleading guilty to conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government
A former career US diplomat was sentenced Friday to 15 years in federal prison after admitting he worked for decades as a secret agent for Cuba, in a plea agreement that leaves many unanswered questions about a betrayal that stunned the US foreign service.
Manuel Rocha, 73, will also pay a $500,000 fine and cooperate with authorities after pleading guilty to conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government. In exchange, prosecutors dismissed more than a dozen other counts, including wire fraud and making false statements.
Continue reading...New Jersey executive testified that the UK company Autonomy made millions of dollars’ worth of deals offering to fund purchases
The British technology firm Autonomy struck millions of dollars’ worth of “handshake deals” through which it paid customers to buy its software, the jury in the fraud trial of its co-founder Mike Lynch has heard.
Lynch, who co-founded and led Autonomy, has pleaded not guilty to 16 counts of wire fraud, securities fraud and conspiracy. He stands accused of orchestrating a huge fraud before Hewlett-Packard’s blockbuster takeover of the company in 2011.
Continue reading...Lewis, whose family owns Tottenham Hotspur FC, is accused of ‘brazen’ insider trading
Lawyers for the British billionaire Joe Lewis have accused prosecutors of making an “egregious” mistake, as the 86-year-old pleaded not guilty to multiple counts of securities fraud and conspiracy.
Lewis, who heads the family that owns Tottenham Hotspur FC, was arraigned on Tuesday in Manhattan federal court with 16 counts of securities fraud and three of conspiracy to commit fraud, which prosecutors called a “brazen” insider trading scheme to enrich his friends, lovers and employees, including two private jet pilots.
Continue reading...Estrella Santos-Zacaria will have another chance to seek asylum from sexual assault and death threats after being deported in 2008
The US supreme court ruled on Thursday in favor of a transgender Guatemalan woman fighting deportation on the grounds that she would face persecution if returned to her native country.
The unanimous decision in favor of Estrella Santos-Zacaria gives her another chance to argue that immigration officials were wrong to reject her bid to remain in the US.
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Continue reading...Ramon Abbas, described by FBI as one of world’s most prolific money launderers, sentenced to 11 years
A social media influencer who called himself Ray Hushpuppi and flaunted a lavish lifestyle fuelled by his efforts to launder millions of stolen dollars has been sentenced in Los Angeles to more than 11 years in federal prison.
Ramon Abbas, 40, also was ordered by a federal judge to pay $1.7m in restitution to two fraud victims, according to a statement from the US Department of Justice.
Continue reading...Judge dismisses case against British former trader Tom Hayes, who was jailed over interest rate scandal
A New York court has dismissed a criminal indictment against Tom Hayes, the British former trader at UBS and Citigroup who served five and a half years in a UK prison for rigging the Libor lending benchmark.
Prosecutors in the US filed a motion to dismiss the case against Hayes and another former UBS trader, Roger Darin.
Continue reading...Anthony Rapp alleges Spacey acted to gratify sexual desire during an encounter in 1986, when he was 14 and the Oscar winner was 26 or 27
Actor Kevin Spacey faces the first of a series of sexual abuse claims dating back decades on Thursday in New York in a trial that may come to overshadow a glittering career on stage and screen that included two Oscars and numerous other top awards.
The case against the 63-year-old American focuses on accusations by Anthony Rapp, a star of the Broadway musical Rent, who five years ago publicly accused Spacey of sexual assault when he was a teenager.
Continue reading...Appellate court ruling prevented special master from examining 100 files seized from Mar-a-Lago with classification markings
Donald Trump on Tuesday asked the US supreme court to partially reverse an appellate court decision that prevented the special master, reviewing for privilege protections materials seized by the FBI from his Mar-a-Lago resort in August, from examining 100 documents with classification markings.
The motion to vacate the ruling by the US appeals court for the 11th circuit represents the former president’s final chance to reinsert the 100 documents into the special master review – and potentially exclude some from the investigation into whether he illegally retained national defense information
Continue reading...Long-running satirical publication files legal document relating to case of man who was arrested for making fun of police
The clarion call of justice is sounding across America once again, thanks to the tireless efforts of its finest purveyor of made-up news.
The Onion, the long-running satirical publication, has filed a very real legal document with the US supreme court, urging it to take on a case centered on the right to parody. And in order to make a serious legal point, the filing does what the Onion does best, offering a big helping of total nonsense.
Continue reading...Sherri Papini’s case gained national attention when she went missing for weeks but was found staying with an ex-boyfriend
Sherri Papini, the California woman who admitted to faking her own kidnapping in 2016, has been sentenced to 18 months in prison.
Papini’s case grabbed national attention when she went missing for several weeks, prompting a frantic search and widespread media coverage. She eventually reappeared with an elaborate story of being abducted by two “Hispanic women”, chained to a pole for three weeks, beaten and branded before being released by the side of a highway.
Continue reading...Chief justice warns against linking contentious decisions with court legitimacy as vice-president attacks ‘activist court’
US supreme court chief justice John Roberts has defended his conservative-leaning bench from attacks over its decision in June to overturn federal abortion rights, as US vice-president Kamala Harris launched a fierce attack on what she called today’s “activist court”.
Roberts, in his first public appearance since the bombshell ruling to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v Wade decision, warned against linking contentious decisions with court legitimacy, saying at an event on Friday night: “The court has always decided controversial cases and decisions have always been subject to intense criticism, and that is entirely appropriate.”
Continue reading...Ty Cobb served during the ex-president’s administration and claimed it was one of his two toxic traits dictating his actions
A lawyer who served in the White House during Donald Trump’s administration, said the ex-president is a “deeply wounded narcissist”, claiming that’s one of the two toxic traits that dictate his actions and decision making.
Ty Cobb, who stepped down in 2018 because of Trump’s disapproval of his “conciliatory” approach, also said Trump is “incapable of acting other than in his perceived self-interest or for revenge”.
Continue reading...Analysis of ‘amicus briefs’ shows how closely Clarence Thomas’s wife was entwined with rightwing effort to reverse 1973 ruling
Ginni Thomas, the self-styled “culture warrior” and extreme rightwing activist, has links to more than half of the anti-abortion groups and individuals who lobbied her husband Clarence Thomas and his fellow US supreme court justices ahead of their historic decision to eradicate a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy.
A new analysis of the written legal arguments, or “amicus briefs”, used to lobby the justices as they deliberated over abortion underlines the extent to which Clarence Thomas’s wife was intertwined with this vast pressure campaign.
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