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In an action claiming that the Secretary of Health and Human Services improperly excluded the labor costs of certain types of hospitals from her calculation of Medicare reimbursements due to plaintiffs, summary judgment for plaintiffs is reversed where the Secretary’s exclusion of the costs was based on a reasonable interpretation of her statutory authority. Read Anna Jaques Hosp. v. Sebelius, No. 08-5407 Appellate Information Argued May 8, 2009 Decided September 11, 2009...

In an action arising from claimant’s removal for unlawfully accessing computer databases while serving as a criminal investigator for the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), a decision of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) denying claimant’s petition for review of an AJ’s decision dismissing his case under a settlement agreement with the TIGTA is vacated in part, affirmed in part and remanded where: 1) MSPB’s denial of petition for review is vacated and remanded because the Board improperly conflated the issue of timeliness with the ultimate decision on the merits of petitioner’s claim; and 2) MSPB’s decision with respect to its compliance decision is affirmed as it correctly concluded that petitioner abandoned any appeal from the AJ’s separate decision that his employing agency, the TIGTA, had not breached the settlement agreement....

Pinellas County sheriff’s deputies say they have never seen anyone use a pedal boat in a getaway. Suspect Christopher Schaumburger opted for this unusual mode of transportation after burglarizing two homes and trying to flee. According to the St. Petersburg Times, witnesses saw Schaumburger, 20, burglarize two homes. The police report says one victim caught Schaumburger ransacking his home. Deputies said Schaumburger fled down a street with a dead end at Lake Tarpon....

Law enforcement continues to get battered in the court of public opinion. In general, law enforcement could really use a boost of good press. Well, don’t look to California. As if the state didn’t have enough of its plate already, the now infamous Orange County jailhouse informant scandal threatens to shake law enforcement even more. So much for good press. Orange County’s Snitch System It’s been about two years since noted public defender Scott Sanders exposed Orange County’s expansive informant networking culture that has resulted in multiple overturned convictions by local sheriffs’ and prosecutors’ violations of inmates’ constitutional rights....

While the rest of the country is covered in snow, the sun is shining in the Golden State, and legal controversies and news are going at a non-stop pace. There’s a lot to talk about, here are some highlights. Justice Joyce Kennard Retiring Justice Joyce Kennard, Associate Justice on the California Supreme Court announced that she will retire, effective April 5, 2014, giving Governor Jerry Brown a second chance to fill a seat on the California Supreme Court, reports The Sacramento Bee....

A California Appellate Court ruled last week that a patient who relies on medical marijuana for pain management does not have standing to challenge a city’s decision to close a medical marijuana dispensary. Plaintiff Malinda Traudt filed suit to obtain a court declaration that Dana Point (City) zoning ordinances that did not expressly recognize California medical marijuana dispensaries as permitted uses constituted a zoning ban on dispensaries and that state law, specifically the Compassionate Use Act and the Medical Marijuana Program Act, preempts cities from adopting zoning bans on dispensaries....

After years of fighting for their freedom in U.S. courts, Fadi al-Maqaleh and Amin al-Bakri, who had been detained at Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan for at least a decade, were repatriated to Yemen earlier this week. The timing of the release was curious: not only is al-Bakri is suffering from leukemia, but both al-Maqaleh and al-Bakri were named parties seeking certiorari from the U.S. Supreme Court in an appeal of the D....

The general counsel for Midas’s parent company (TBC Corp.) recently received a two year stayed suspension as a result of another former in-house colleague tipping off authorities in two states. It was alleged and eventually admitted that the TBC GC engaged in the (accidental) unauthorized practice of law. Interestingly, while the GC lives and works in Florida, the suspension was issued from the Supreme Court of the state of Ohio....

In plaintiff’s petition for a writ of mandate seeking to invalidate a new contract between defendant-city and its competitor and to compel city to award the contract through competitive bidding, trial court’s grant of defendant’s anti-SLAPP motion is reversed and remanded as, even if plaintiff’s claims involve a public issue, they are not based on any statement, writing, or conduct by the city in furtherance of its right of free speech or its right to petition the government for the redress of grievances....

It’s Bret vs. Conchita in a battle in battle over control of the family fortune. A Chihuahua named Conchita was left millions of dollars by Heiress Gail Posner and her son Bret Carr is now fighting for his share of his mother’s multimillion-dollar estate, the Miami Herald reports. Gail Posner’s pooch was left with a $3 million trust fund and an $8.3 million Miami Beach mansion. Her bodyguards, handlers, housekeepers and a personal trainer received 27 million....

Two stretches of Arizona’s Santa Cruz River are still legally “navigable” much to the chagrin of a home builders agency after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Environmental Protection Agency. The National Association of Home Builders and its two Arizona affiliates had tried to challenge the EPA’s recent designation of the two river sections. The designation is important to home builders because streams that are legally navigable fall under the federal Clean Water Act, which imposes restrictions on any discharges into water that leads to those streams....

We’ve talked before about the importance of mentors. They give you advice, they give you experience, and hey, if you play your cards right, they just might point you toward a job opening. The reality, though, is that once you’re out of law school, your mentors will be practitioners, and they’re very busy – too busy, it would seem, to take a green lawyer under their wing. As it turns out, though, you can even get those busy lawyers to pay attention to you....

The State of Michigan is considering passing a bill that would remove protections for police officers that have sexual intercourse with sex workers during prostitution investigations and stings. The bill was unanimously passed by the state senate, and now must pass through the house and be signed by the governor. Support for the bill is rather strong, particularly as Michigan is the last state in the country to still have this type of immunity for officers on the books....

This just in: Roundup, the weed killer, is also not good for humans. Or as a California appeals court explained in Monsanto Company v. Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, Roundup contains a chemical that is “probably carcinogenic to humans.” It is not exactly news because state health officials concluded glyphosate is a potential carcinogen last year. However, the court decision is big news to an industry that fought against the official taint on the widely used herbicide....

South African Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius has been acquitted of murdering his girlfriend following a six-month trial. The judge presiding over the trial said that Pistorius had been “negligent” in firing a gun four times through a bathroom door at what he claims he thought was an intruder. Ultimately, however, the judge said she was not convinced that he had intended to kill Reeva Steenkamp, reports the Los Angeles Times....

Princo Corp. v. Int’l Trade Comm’n, 07-1386, concerned a challenge to the International Trade Commission’s decision that the doctrine of patent misuse does not bar intervenor-U.S. Philips Corporation from enforcing its patent rights against defendant, in plaintiff’s patent infringement suit related to two types of digital storage devices, recordable discs (CD-Rs) and rewritable compact discs (CD-RWs), claiming that defendant was violating section 337(a)(1)(B) of the Tariff Act of 1930 by importing CD-Rs and CD-RWs that infringed its patents....

Been to jail or prison lately? How would you rate your experience behind bars? Prison Yelp reviews are becoming more popular, and reading them can be a guilty pleasure, as shown recently on “The Colbert Report.” Many reviewers complain about (or laud) the quality of the food, housing, and treatment by guards, but there are also some potentially incriminating statements being posted as well. If you’re planning on writing a Yelp review about a prison or detention center, you may want to consider these do’s and don’ts:...

Die Hard. Live it. Love it. Or Numb It. Sears, on the other hand, just wants to get rid of it–it being DieHard “sexual enhancement” spray, a desensitizing product that shares its unfortunate name with the retailer’s line of DieHard car batteries. Of Course there’s now a trademark lawsuit. Sears filed suit last week in federal court against the pleasure hawking RockHard Industries over their DieHard spray, which is marketed as a desensitizing agent that will enhance a man’s sexual stamina....

Teaching your bird to talk can be funny but Lynne L. Taylor wasn’t laughing when she got slapped with a $15 fine after her cockatoo learned to swear. Taylor lives in Warwick, Rhode Island where a local ordinance makes it illegal for residents to let pets make habitual noise. She was sued by her neighbor who complained that Taylor’s cockatoo repeatedly called the neighbor a whore. The judge agreed and fined Taylor for the nuisance her bird caused....

By now, it’s clear that law schools are admitting students whose bar exam chops aren’t what they should be. Law schools and lawyers have certainly seen better days. However, at least one school has been trying a novel new way of surviving the rough waters: Gonzaga University School of Law. For a number of years now, it appears that Gonzaga has been systematically offering buyouts to all tenured faculty. With fewer mouths to feed, the school has dodged (so far) the need to implement the law school equivalent of No Child Left Behind....