Archive for January, 2010

Five African-American voters in Chester County are suing the county and its Board of Elections, alleging that their rights were violated under the federal Voting Rights Act as they stood in seven-hour-long lines to vote in their polling place in November 2008.

But the legal claims involve more than just long lines, according to the lawsuit, which was detailed in a story last week in The Legal Intelligencer.

“The suit says the precinct, which includes Lincoln University, has the highest percentage of black voters in the county – 68 percent – and that the polling place for many years was on campus,” according to The Legal Intelligencer. “But after a Lincoln professor won an election to a seat on the Oxford school board, the suit alleges, county election officials decided in 1992 to move the polling place [from a roomy gymnasium] to a less convenient,  off-campus [and smaller community center] site.”

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/jkbowers

Let’s get this straight, a professor at a renowned black university in the U.S. runs for political office and wins. And then that victory later inspires a local government to arbitrarily change the rules so something like that can’t happen again? Is this even America?

Well, that’s essentially what the five plaintiffs allege. And now it will be up to the courts to decide.

One thing is certain, though – it is unbelievable that in the year 2010 we are still dealing with voting rights issues in this country that relate to the skin color of a man or woman who is trying to cast their votes.

Because the precinct has such a high percentage of African-American voters, some local residents “warned county officials that the existing polling place could not handle the anticipated record number of voters” expected due to the candidacy of then-presidential-hopeful Barack Obama, prior to November 2008, according to The Legal Intelligencer.

Those warnings were ignored, however, and the smaller polling place wasn’t ready for the crush of voters who showed up on Election Day 2008. The result – hundreds of voters waited for up to seven hours in the rain to try to vote, according to the lawsuit. Those who couldn’t wait any longer left without being able to vote, giving up their right to casting a ballot because of conditions that had been forced upon them by a decision made by county elections officials years before.

The scary thing is that sadly, this may just be the tip of the iceberg.

Five plaintiffs are pursuing this lawsuit so far.

But many more who learn of the suit in the weeks and months to come may ask to join it because of how they were treated that day, when their voting rights were taken away from them by the actions of political leaders who wanted to thwart the political gains of anyone not meeting their own agendas.

“We think that their experiences are represented by hundreds of other people,” said Phillip E. Wilson Jr., one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs. “There were a massive number of people who stood in the rain.”

In this embarrassing case in Chester County, we hope that the clear rays of legal justice soon shine on the voters who were wronged on that November Election Day in 2008.

This should never again happen on our nation.

Hold on to your Phillies, Flyers and Sixers hats, Philadelphia sports fans — the U.S. Federal Communications Commission ruled last week that Comcast Corp. now has to start making its Comcast-only SportsNet programming available to satellite TV providers.

The FCC ruling came in a 4-1 decision to close a “terrestrial loophole” that had allowed Comcast to keep SportsNet all to itself and its customers for years, according to a story in The Philadelphia Inquirer.

In a blog post here on Blog.MyPhilly Lawyer.com last month, we described how Comcast doesn’t make Comcast SportsNet available to satellite companies such as DirecTV and Dish Network  for broadcast, due to the loophole.  That means that viewers who subscribe to the satellite services can’t get all the Phillies, Flyers and Sixers games that are broadcast solely on Comcast SportsNet.  The longtime loophole in the FCC’s regulations allowed this “monopoly,”  but the recent FCC ruling said it was no longer allowable.

Only Comcast subscribers can currently receive SportsNet broadcasts, but that could change soon. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/Fentin

The Comcast-friendly rule meant that real competition wasn’t possible between Comcast and the satellite vendors because if you wanted to receive Comcast SportsNet broadcasts, you had to stay with Comcast.  Many customers have balked at this for years.

Now that could be changing, but there’s a caveat.

Comcast will likely appeal the FCC decision, which will certainly delay final resolution of the matter.  So now we must wait patiently to see what happens.

The bottom line, though, is that this is a good decision that finally rights an old rule that may have had a place at one time, but is out of date today in a world of high-speed broadband connections, online streaming video content and HD TV.

“Consumers who want to switch video providers shouldn’t have to give up their favorite team,” FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in a statement after the Jan. 20 hearing, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

We couldn’t have said it better.

What do you get when you mix an overzealous county prosecutor, cellphone pranks and a group of teen-aged girls and boys together?

Well, in Wyoming County, Pa., in the Tunkhannock School District, you apparently get a huge controversy that brings in the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania to take on a county prosecutor who wants to try to set an example and prosecute the teens on trumped up child pornography charges involving “sexting.”

What “crimes” did the teens commit?  Three of the girls were included in two scantily-clad photos that were transmitted to others using cellphone cameras, according to the ACLU.  One of the photos shows two of the girls at age 12 from the waist up wearing white training bras, while the second photo shows a 16-year-old girl “standing outside a shower with a bath towel wrapped around her body beneath her breasts,” according to the ACLU.  “Neither of the two photos depicts sexual activity or reveals anything below the waist.”

A group of unidentified teens communicate with others using cellphones. © iStockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs

“Sexting” is the term given to sending nude or semi-nude photos of oneself to others via cellphones. The phenomenon took hold especially among teens due to the widespread use of cellphones that include built-in cameras.

The school district, in northeastern Pennsylvania near Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, learned of the photos in October 2008 after confiscating cell phones from several students. The pictures were found on the phones and then-district attorney,  George Skumanick Jr., was called in.  Skumanick, who labeled the photos “provocative,” began a criminal investigation and later told the parents of about 19 school district students that he would prosecute the students on felony charges due to their conduct if they didn’t agree to probation and undergoing a counseling program.  The counseling program was to include lessons to help the girls  learn how their actions were wrong, what it means to be a girl in today’s society and about non-traditional societal and job roles.  The parents of 16 of the teens allowed their children to go through the counseling program to avoid criminal charges, while the parents of three of the girls decided to fight the case on the grounds that the prosecutor was simply wrong in his handling of the matter.

One problem with Skumanick’s approach, according to the ACLU, was that it was aimed only at the parents of the students whose cell phones contained the photos and of the girls in the pictures.  The former boyfriend of one of the girls, the one whose breasts were visible in a photo, was the person who transmitted that photo, but his parents were not sent one of Skumanick’s letters, according to the ACLU.  Skumanick lost a re-election campaign last November and was replaced earlier this month by a newly-elected district attorney, Jeffrey Mitchell, who is continuing to prosecute the case.

Why does any of this make a difference?

Because for a stupid teen-aged prank, the teens involved are being threatened with serious felony child pornography charges which carry a possible 10-year prison sentence.  A conviction like that for a childhood prank would likely haunt them for life, in addition to requiring mandatory registration on government-kept lists of child sex offenders.

The ACLU took this case on last year and is still fighting it.

Two weeks ago, the case, Miller, et al. v. Skumanick, continued its journey through the legal system when a three-judge panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit here in Philadelphia heard oral arguments on appeal after a U.S. District Court ruling that favored the ACLU’s position  last year.   According to The Legal Intelligencer, “all three judges seemed skeptical of the prosecutor’s claim that child pornography laws are violated when a teen transmits a nude image of herself.”

And that’s really the point here. Were these goofy teens doing some of the things that goofy, immature teens do? Yes.

Should these incidents be considered cases of true child pornography that we need to combat with every powerful legal weapon we have at our disposal? No.

Stupid choices by kids who didn’t think of the consequences of their actions should not be the basis of federal charges in this case.

“I don’t know of anything that says a district attorney’s office is allowed to, in effect, play the role of teacher,” said Appeals Court Judge Thomas L. Ambro, at the hearing two weeks ago, according to The Legal Intelligencer. The three judge panel now is considering the case and can issue a decision at any time. There is no set time frame for their decision, so the families of the teens now wait as long as necessary for the case to move forward.

This is a prosecution run amok and a case that should be dropped.

The teens who “sexted” did something stupid, but in this case it certainly wasn’t criminal.

Were you or a loved one injured at work? You may be able to file a third-party claim for pain and suffering in addition to collecting workers’ compensation from your employer.

In this video blog, attorney Dean Weitzman of MyPhillyLawyer, discusses third-party injury claims. He stresses the importance of hiring a personal injury lawyer who understands the intricacies of workers’ compensation law and knows how to maximize the compensation you receive.

Jan. 26, 2010 UPDATE:  Toyota announced that it will immediately suspend production and sales of eight vehicle models bound for the U.S. market to further investigate and repair the cause of sudden acceleration that has been plaguing some Toyota vehicles since last year, according to The New York Times.

For the second time in less than four months, Toyota is recalling millions of their cars and trucks in response to incidents of sudden acceleration being reported by some drivers, which have resulted in loss of vehicle control, accidents, injuries and several fatalities.

This time, the company said the recall affects about 2.3 million vehicles to correct what is being called “sticking accelerator pedals on specific Toyota Division models.”

Last fall, about 4.2 million Toyota and Lexus vehicles were recalled in connection with similar concerns about sudden acceleration, but at that time the company said the problems appeared to come from apparent pedal entrapment by incorrect or out of place accessory floor mats.

According to Toyota, about 1.7 million of those Toyota vehicles are subject to both overlapping recalls.

The latest recall is finally beginning to at least acknowledge what many affected Toyota vehicle owners have said all along — that the sudden acceleration problems were likely caused by more than just improperly positioned floor mats in the past.

A typical vehicle speedometer in a modern automobile is shown here in this photograph. Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/fountain_of_useless_info

These recalls follow another alleged safety matter related to Toyota vehicles that occurred  last September.  In that case, the company  was sued by a former corporate attorney who alleged that Toyota illegally withheld critical information about hundreds of rollover crashes involving injuries and deaths. That case is still in its early stages.

If you own one of the affected vehicles in the recalls, be sure to contact your vehicle  dealer to schedule the required repairs as soon as possible.

And if your vehicle should be affected by a sudden acceleration episode, here’s what you need to know, based on an ABC News video report.  If your Toyota or any other vehicle should accelerate on its own, apply the brakes and shift the transmission into neutral. Then use the brakes and steering to stop and control the vehicle safely. The engine will be racing noisily, but you can shut it off safely with the ignition key once the vehicle is stopped.  Don’t shut the key off as you are still moving because that will cut off your power steering and power brakes, and will also lock your steering, which you don’t want to do.  After stopping the vehicle, have it towed to your vehicle dealer and have it repaired.

You also could have legal rights beyond the recalls and repairs for any injuries or damages that you suffer as a result of these vehicle issues.  Don’t sign anything or give up those legal rights until you have evaluated your situation and your options.

Some 1.5 million Graco brand baby strollers are being recalled due to design defects that allow children’s fingers to be caught in the sunshade hinges. Five children have already suffered fingertip amputations and two others have suffered fingertip cuts due to the design, according to the voluntary product recall announced yesterday by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

For parents and their children, this means that if you own a Graco stroller, you need to immediately check to determine if you are using one of the affected strollers. Owners are urged to stop using any affected stroller at once and to call special toll-free hotlines to find out how to get a free “cover kit” that can be installed over the injury-causing sunshade hinges.

The affected strollers are Graco Passages, Alano and Spree models, according to the company. Here is a list of the affected model numbers:

(Graphic courtesy of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission)

According to the recall, two different types of hinge mechanisms were used by Graco in these strollers. The recalled models use a “plastic, jointed hinge mechanism that has indented canopy positioning notches,” according to the recall. The affected strollers were  manufactured between October 2004 and February 2008. The model numbers and dates of manufacture can be found on a label on the lower inside portion of the rear frame, just above the rear wheels. More details and a video that shows the suspect hinge mechanisms can be found in a story in The Christian Science Monitor.

The affected strollers were sold at the following stores: AAFES, Burlington Coat Factory, Babies “R” Us, Toys “R” Us, Kmart, Fred Meyer, Meijers, Navy Exchange, Sears, Target, Walmart and other retailers nationwide from October 2004 through December 2009.

The good news is that Graco and the government are recalling the defective strollers and helping parents to repair them so they won’t injure any more children.

The bad news is that these incidents didn’t have to occur in the first place had the product been designed and built with safety in mind from the beginning.

Baby strollers have been manufactured and used for more than two centuries, dating back to 1733 when garden architect William Kent created what is considered to be the first baby carriage for use by the third Duke of Devonshire in England. Originally, such strollers were designed for the amusement of children and were to be pulled by ponies or dogs. They have come very far in their development, with elaborate folding mechanisms, built-in cup holders, thick padding and insulation and wheels that turn in all directions for handling ease.

So you’d think that  by now, some 277 years later, stroller makers would have been able to come up with stroller designs that don’t cause injuries to the babies and toddlers who ride in them.

The injuries we’ve heard of so far are just the injuries that have been reported to the government and to Graco.

If your child is injured in one of the affected Graco stroller models, be sure to contact the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission as well as getting medical attention for your child.

Product liability cases due to poor product designs that cause injuries to people are some of the most common legal actions filed in our nation. If you or someone in your family are a victim of poor product designs and are injured, then you should contact a lawyer to protect your legal rights.

Important phone numbers for parents checking on the recall:

Graco Web site: www.gracobaby.com