As an employer, jury duty can be a hassle. It can make you miss work if you get called to serve. Not to mention it could make a key employee absent from their post if the government chooses them to sit for jury duty. What are the legal ramifications if an employee gets called away on jury duty? What should you know as an employer? Jury duty pay is not required under federal law....
Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion is set to include more Americans in many states. Many of those in need of health care, however, remain in the dark about Medicaid. Like Medicare, Medicaid is a federal health care program for those who often have issues getting coverage. But Medicaid eligibility and coverage are vastly different from Medicare. How will the unique contours of Medicaid look under Obamacare? MORE FROM THIS SERIES: What Is Obamacare?...
The EEOC has announced that storage and security product manufacturer Justrite will pay $418,000 to settle claims of disability discrimination. In an EEOC press release issued Wednesday, the agency noted that this settlement was the result of years of investigation into disability discrimination complaints at Justrite, based in Mattoon, Illinois. It resulted in some troubling findings about how the company treated employees seeking reasonable accommodations. What three lessons can your business learn from this Justrite settlement?...
The stock market’s loss of over half its value in just over half a year devastated many people’s 401(k) plans. 401(k) plans represent the retirement hopes of many small business owners and their employees. With values having plummeted and more employers deciding to stop matching plan contributions, small businesses should make sure they understand their fiduciary duties in administering 401(k) plans. Unfortunately, many people have found out that their 401(k) plan wasn’t quite as conservative as they believed....
Ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich will not get the trial delay he was hoping for as a federal appeals court turned down his request. Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s impending corruption trial is scheduled to begin on June 3 and will not be postponed while the U.S. Supreme Court resolves challenges to the federal honest services fraud law, the Associated Press reports. His lawyers want the trial pushed back five months until November....
A golf cart injury lawsuit that sought $5 million in damages from a raceway has been settled, as the brain-injured victim prepares for trial against the cart’s manufacturer. Roderick Jenks, 53, of Wilder, Vt., was doing volunteer work for charity at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway in 2006, when he was thrown from a golf cart driven by a speedway employee, the Concord Monitor reports. Jenks’ head slammed into the pavement....
When done right, having unpaid interns at your business can be a wonderful, mutually beneficial experience. Done wrong, however, it could land you in court. How can you be sure to stay on the positive (and legal) side of the internship experience? By making sure that you follow the rules. Here are five do’s and don’ts for employers dealing with unpaid interns this summer: DO make sure the internship is an educational experience....
For many pet owners, “cropping” or surgically snipping a dog’s ears can be a big decision. Opponents of the practice argue that it’s unnecessary and inhumane, but is cropping a dog’s ears illegal? Unlike many other countries, the U.S. government has not passed any law regulating the practice of cropping a dog’s ears. Most laws regulating the treatment of animals as pets (i.e., not as livestock or research subjects) are left to the states....
Elexecia Martin claims police officers should have known her young daughter wasn’t involved in a fight back in April. After all, there was video of the incident, and not only is Martin’s daughter not on it, but she can allegedly be heard off-camera, begging kids to stop. But that didn’t stop police officers from arresting the girl at her elementary school in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, putting her in the back of a patrol car, and driving her to juvenile detention....
Johnson & Johnson is facing a lawsuit for secretly conducting a “phantom recall.” In early 2009, Johnson & Johnson used private contractors to purchase stocks of suspect Motrin from convenience stores and gas stations. According to the FDA, McNeil, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, said it was only sampling Motrin tablets from the stores for quality control. However, “secret shoppers” were allegedly buying out all of the Motrin, without announcing a recall to the FDA, the Oregon complaint alleges....
Among the numerous bills signed into law was one restricting the sale of handgun ammunition in California. Here are some quick facts about the new legislation: The law will require licensed dealers to keep ammunition behind the counter. Gun dealers can only sell less 50 rounds per month to a particular buyer. Gun dealers must record information about the ammunition sale including: date, buyer’s birthdate, name, address, driver’s license, thumbprint, signature; amount, brand, and type of ammunition sold; salesperson it was sold by....
New York City will soon join the growing list of places where jobless and unemployment discrimination is illegal. Over a mayoral veto, city lawmakers passed the nation’s toughest law prohibiting discrimination against out-of-work job seekers. NYC’s jobless-discrimination law is the first to allow applicants to sue employers for damages over a rejection based on their unemployed status, The Associated Press reports. Unemployed status will join legally protected characteristics like race and sex as factors a prospective employer cannot consider in New York City....
Six-year-old George Roberts died at Knoebels Amusement Park in Pennsylvania. He was found in the Crystal Pool swimming pool at Knoebels, reports The Times-Leader. The Crystal Pool is a concrete pool with a deep end and diving boards, as well as a shallower end that has two slides. There is also a play area for children. Roberts’ parents, Anne Marie Howey and Daniel Howey, took to Facebook to express their grief and thanks to the Knoebels staff, reports The Times-Leader....
As news of yet another school shooting scrolls across our news feeds, the usual questions come to mind. What was school security like? Where did the shooter get the guns? Could it have been prevented? Sadly, mass shootings have become far too common, so we’ve covered some of those issues before. Here’s a roundup of legal questions regarding school shootings, along with some of the pertinent laws and tips for student safety....
A new report on bicyclists killed by cars on U.S. roads shows that a disproportionate number of these fatal accidents occur in just a handful of states. The report, issued Monday by the nonprofit Governors Highway Safety Association, found that biking accident deaths increased 16 percent nationwide between 2010 and 2012, while motor vehicle accident fatalities increased by just 1 percent. Which states saw the highest number of bicyclists killed in motor vehicle accidents, according to 2012 figures?...
Football season kicked off nationwide this month, but the focus hasn’t solely been between the lines. Off-the-field controversies – from political protests to paying college players – have garnered just as much attention as teams’ on-field clashes. And one issue that’s been in football fans’ and players’ minds recently have been concussions, and the role leagues, athletic associations, and even doctors play in handling head injuries. But those aren’t even the only injuries football players and fans need to worry about....
As a small business owner, should you hire a tax lawyer? You may feel like the answer depends on the complexity of your tax filing, or the size of your business. But because the IRS makes almost no room for errors, the benefits of hiring a tax attorney will almost certainly outweigh the costs. Here are five reasons to hire a tax lawyer for your small business needs: Time is money....
A Kentucky-area veteran is suing a hospital that treated him nine years ago claiming that the medical provider misdiagnosed him with HIV in 2004. Bobby Russell, 43, has been taking medication to combat HIV ever since a doctor at the University of Kentucky Medical Center (UKMC) diagnosed Russell as HIV-positive, despite the fact that other tests had come up negative, reports the Huffington Post. Misdiagnosing someone with a life-threatening disease is not only an appalling medical mistake, but most likely medical negligence....
A fire department in New Haven, Connecticut, has had no job promotions in a long, long time and it has nothing to do with the recession or tight government budgets, the New York Times reports. No, promotions at the New Haven Fire Department have been on hold since 2003 because that was when the test used for promotions was thrown out by the city “because none of the 19 African-American firefighters who took it qualified for promotion....
Working out a custody and visitation schedule with your ex was hard enough – the least they could do is abide by it. Unfortunately, when one parent is interfering with custody or visitation, there are no easy answers to such a complex emotional and legal problem. But there are some better and worse things to do if your ex is denying visitation time. Many parents’ first reaction is to deny child support, if possible....
