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The Clakamas County annual Easter Eggstravaganza egg hunt is scheduled to proceed this year with 20,000 eggs, and the Easter bunny being flown in by Helicopter, just like tradition dictates. However, a recent lawsuit for $112,000 filed against the Eggstravaganza venue and organizer as a result of an injury that occurred last year is attracting attention in the lead up to this year’s event. Although the event is geared towards participants under 12, last year, an adult who was accompanying their child was injured when the crowd rushed in, knocking her over, causing her a severe knee injury....

On April 26, 2012, Jessica Jauch was pulled over in Choctaw County, Mississippi and arrested on an outstanding felony warrant for selling a controlled substance. For the next 96 days she sat in jail, without access to an attorney or a judge. The charges underlying that warrant turned out to be false, so Jauch filed a civil rights lawsuit against Choctaw County and Sheriff Cloyd Halford. While a lower court dismissed her claims based on the grand jury’s indictment, the 5th U....

What happens when you stop paying an old debt and a decade goes by? Generally, the debts are sold to debt collection companies for pennies on the dollar, who continue to come after you, sometimes using dubious tactics. The New York Times had an interesting piece on July 30 titled “FDCPA laws and out-of statute debt”. “Out of statute debt” is a debt that is too old to sue for in court due to the passage of the statute of limitations....

It turns out that 12/12/12 is a very popular day for a wedding. And why not? A date like today’s won’t come around for almost another hundred years. In a nuptial phenomenon noted every year since 2001, the number of weddings jumps whenever the day, month, and year are the same – an apparently auspicious (not to mention easy-to-remember) date combination for couples to tie the knot. It’s going to be a busy Wednesday for weddings, notes CNN....

On September 6, an off-duty Dallas police officer entered Botham Jean’s apartment and shot and killed him. That now-former officer, Amber Guyger, was originally charged with manslaughter in the shooting, but a Texas grand jury delivered an indictment last week charging Guyger with murder. The shift in charges could signal a change in evidence available to prosecutors, and will definitely mean a different level proof in Guyger’s criminal trial and more severe penalties, should she be convicted....

Supporters of gay rights and same-sex marriage were on the receiving end of mixed-messages last week when the Obama administration decided to appeal the recent DOMA bankruptcy ruling that deemed the law unconstitutional. Just days later, the Department of Justice also weighed in on a lawsuit brought by a federal employee who claims that DOMA unconstitutionally requires the federal government to deny health insurance to her same-sex spouse. In the second case, the government argued that DOMA is irrational and based solely on hate....

As the whole wide world knows, the Democratic majority in the House of Representatives managed to pass the health care bill by a majority of 210-212 on Sunday. The bill includes provisions to mandate the purchase of health insurance, and to prevent companies from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. MSNBC reports that the law would extend coverage to 32 million Americans currently without health insurance. So what happens now?...

Unpaid internships can be a boon for small businesses: you can train a whole new generations of employees and get a test run before committing to a full hire. But they can be a legal minefield as well. Warner Music just had to pay $4.2 million to settle a lawsuit for underpaying interns, while Conde Nast, NBC, and Gawker Media were also targeted by former interns. (Not even law firms are immune from the summer intern lawsuit....

With kids out of school for the summer and camps becoming increasingly expensive, you might be wondering when it’s okay for you to leave your child home alone without adult supervision. While many times you are within your legal rights to leave your child alone, there are certain situations where doing say may amount to child neglect, as it can cause the authorities to question the child’s safety. Unfortunately, there’s really no definitive answer to this inquiry, with most situations requiring an analysis of state law and the overall circumstances....

Most small business owners structure their companies and ownership interests so that the debts of the business don’t become the debts of the owner. (We’re looking at you, sole proprietors.) But what if the shoe is on the other foot? Could your personal debt or bankruptcy filing drag your business down? For entrepreneurs that already put too much of themselves into their business, it might be nice to know that personal debt isn’t one of those things....

The Australian judge presiding over a KFC poisoning lawsuit has ordered the American-owned fast food chain to pay the family of a brain damaged girl $8.3 million. In 2005, Monika Samaan, then 7-years-old, shared a Twister chicken wrap at one of the chain’s Sydney outposts. She, her brother and her parents were subsequently hospitalized with salmonella poisoning. They quickly recovered, but she remained in a coma for six months and now lives her life as a quadriplegic....

Two federal appeals courts have struck down the NLRB poster rule, a federal rule that would have required millions of businesses to put up posters informing workers of their rights to form a union under the National Labor Relations Act. The rulings by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the D.C. Circuit will impact employers across the country. Here’s what business owners need to know: The poster rule, entitled “Notification of Employee Rights under the National Labor Relations Act,” would have required more than 6 million businesses to display an 11-by-17-inch notice in a prominent location explaining the rights of workers to join a union and bargain collectively to improve wages and working conditions....

The SBA found itself between a rock and a hard place in opening up funds for small business, considering the number of unpaid loans that were still plaguing the organization. When private investors turned away from buying up the SBA loans from financing firms, the government had decided to step up in a big way. However, in light of the economy showing signs of firming up Washington has played a wait-and-see game to see if private investors would step in to pick up the slack....

It’s almost the end of the calendar year, which is a great time to assess your business and take care of legal matters for the next year. Hopefully, you had a successful holiday sales period. But with 2013 just around the corner, you can’t rest on your laurels. With a hat tip to Inc. magazine, which recently suggested a handful of year-end preparations for entrepreneurs, here are five year-end legal tasks you may want to address as you prepare for an even better next year:...

The BBC reports that a transgender teen who has gone from male to female over the course of six years has filed an employment discrimination complaint against McDonald’s with the Florida Commission on Human Relations. Ms. Zikerria Bellamy claims that the popular fast food chain denied her employment on the grounds that she is transgender. She also claims that one of the managers from this particular chain left her a message that referred to her with a gay slur....

After months of negotiating, an agreement has been reached by which Swiss Bank UBS will hand over thousands of account holders’ names and account information to the IRS. The move is the latest in attempts by US authorities to crack down on tax cheats hiding assets overseas. First of all, what’s so special about Swiss banks? In a word, privacy. Swiss banks have long reputation for guarding the privacy of account holders....

How do you schedule your employees? Do they have set hours? Do they have on-call shifts that can be cancelled as late as one hour before a shift started? A California lawsuit against Victoria’s Secret and an Attorney General’s investigation in New York may change the practice of unpaid on-call shifts. Victoria’s Secret’s On-Call Program When Mayra Casas worked for Victoria’s Secret, she would often be assign 15-20 hours of on-call shifts a week....

You may have heard of case law, but what does the term actually mean? Case law refers to legal principles developed through judicial decisions. As opposed to laws contained in statutes and enacted by the legislative process, case law comes about through the aggregation of court opinions interpreting and applying the law to individual cases. In the U.S. legal system, the rulings of higher courts are binding on lower courts. Courts also adhere to stare decisis, which generally requires that courts follow the precedent set by previous court decisions....

Depending on the type of business you run, hiring freelancers or independent contractors may be necessary from time to time, or maybe even regularly. An all too often overlooked aspect of hiring freelancers or independent contractors is the written hiring contract itself. A small business owner should, like larger businesses, take control of their contracts whenever possible. This means that contracts should be drafted by the business and not the freelancers or contractors....

When do you need a small business attorney, and what do you ask an attorney to figure out if they’re the perfect fit for your company? As a small business, costs can be something that you need to keep tabs of. And, hiring an attorney can be a major cost, especially if you’re looking to find someone reputable. Part of being a savvy business owner means that business owners should be cognizant of what to look for when hiring a small business attorney - and what they can actually handle on their own....