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Website asks high court to throw out lawsuit
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2014/10/22 20:14
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A lawyer told the Washington Supreme Court on Tuesday that a lawsuit filed by three young girls who were sold as prostitutes on a website should be thrown out because the website didn't write the ads, so it's not liable.
But the victims' lawyer said the website, Backpage, doesn't have immunity under the federal Communications Decency Act because the website markets itself as a place to sell "escort services" and provides pimps with instructions on how to write an ad that works, making them a participant in the largest human-trafficking website in the U.S.
The justices plan to rule on the case at a later date.
Before the hearing several dozen people stood in the rain on the court steps with signs that read: "People's bodies are not commodities," ''End Child Slavery" and "Stop Buying Our Girls."
"No one has the right to sell a kid for sex," said Jo Lembo, with Shared Hope International. "That's why we're here. Someone has to speak up for them. They're kids."
A similar case was filed last week in federal court in Boston, but a previous case in Missouri was dismissed, said Yiota Souras, a lawyer with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. "The Washington state case has gone further than any previous case," she said. |
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$15 SeaTac minimum wage challenged in court
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2013/12/16 18:37
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A King County Superior Court judge declined Friday to immediately rule on a challenge to the voter-approved $15 an hour minimum wage requirement for airport workers in Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
Judge Andrea Darvas said she'll issue a ruling with reasoning after Christmas Day but before January 1. Parties in the case had been expecting a ruling Friday.
The measure is scheduled to go into effect on January 1.
Last month voters in the city of SeaTac narrowly approved the measure, which would require a $15 minimum wage, a handful of paid sick days and other standards to around 6,000 workers at the airport and related industries, like hotels and rental car companies.
However, the legal fight over the measure is not expected to end with Darvas' ruling. An eventual appeal to the state Supreme Court could come from either side, depending on her ruling.
The challenge to the newly approved measure is being led by Alaska Airlines Group and other businesses. They say that an initiative approved by city residents doesn't have power over the airport, which is operated by the Port of Seattle. The Port of Seattle, a public entity, agrees.
Alaska Airlines Group also says state law prohibits initiatives from packaging laws. So they're arguing that the multiple requirements in the measure, such as the minimum wage and paid sick days, constitute packaging multiple laws into one initiative. |
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Court: Exec guilty over faulty French implants
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2013/12/12 21:10
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A disgraced French businessman was convicted of fraud and sentenced to four years in prison on Tuesday for filling tens of thousands of breast implants with industrial grade silicone. But he left the courthouse freely after lodging an appeal, and thousands of women will have to wait longer to discover if they will receive damages.
The ruling in the criminal case by a court in Marseille, which all the trappings of a class-action lawsuit, ordered up to 40 million euros ($55 million) in damages paid to a fraction of the 125,000 women worldwide who received the implants.
However, that sum for Jean-Claude Mas' company, Poly Implant Prothese, was largely theoretical because it is bankrupt, and because the appeal froze any efforts to find alternate sources. It will be months, if not years, before any women see money many say they need to remove the faulty, leak-prone implants.
In addition to his prison sentence, the French businessman was fined 75,000 euros ($103,000).
His lawyer promised to appeal immediately, and Mas left the courthouse without comment. The appeal freezes the jail term, fine and any damages.
Four managers in the now-defunct Poly Implant Prothese received lesser sentences.
The decision established a complex system of damages for about two-thirds of the 7,100 women who joined the case, with a potential total of 40 million euros ($55 million) to be paid by those convicted. But, like Mas' fine, it was not clear where that money would come from. |
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Man pleads guilty in hole-in-one prize case
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2013/11/18 23:58
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Man pleads guilty in hole-in-one prize case
A businessman charged with failing to pay golfers for hole-in-one prizes insured by his company has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge and agreed to pay a Montana man $10,000 of a promised $18,000 prize.
Kevin W. Kolenda of Norwalk, Conn., didn't attend Thursday's hearing before Justice of the Peace Karen Orzech in Missoula. His attorney, Brian Tipp, entered a guilty plea on Kolenda's behalf to acting as an insurer without a license. In exchange, prosecutors dismissed a felony insurance fraud charge. Kolenda was given a six-month suspended jail sentence.
Kolenda is the former president and CEO of hole-in-won.com, a company that collects premiums and agrees to pay cash prizes to winners of hole-in-one contests. He has been charged with failing to pay prizes in several states. Last month, he pleaded guilty in Seattle to two felony counts of selling insurance without a license and one count of first-degree theft. He has not been sentenced.
Complaints of Kolenda's company failing to pay prizes have been filed in several other states, and he has been sanctioned by regulators in Alabama, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Nevada, North Carolina and Washington. Connecticut officials fined Kolenda $5.9 million in 2009 for illegally offering insurance without a license.
Kolenda was charged in Montana after Troy Peissig was denied an $18,000 prize after hitting a hole-in-one during a 2010 golf tournament in Missoula. |
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