Basketball Wives’ Jennifer Williams Sues Woman for Slapping Her

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Filed under “No, She Didn’t!” Basketball Wives’ Jennifer Williams sues Nia Crooks for slapping her across the face on a recent episode of the reality show.

Read the full story from US Weekly here.

Basketball Wives’ Jennifer Williams can’t believe Nia Crooks slapped her on the April 16 episode of the VH1 hit — and she’s taking Crooks all the way to court to settle their beef.

Filing a civil complaint alleging assault and battery Wednesday, Williams argues that Crooks — who serves as Basketball Wives star Evelyn Lozada’s personal assistant — was “negligent, reckless and careless” when slapping Williams across the face during an altercation that took place January 21.

“Someone needs to put a number on this bitch and let her race around the track because she’s acting like an animal,” Williams fumed of Crooks on Monday’s episode of the VH1 series, which documented the fight that took place in a VIP suite at the Gulfstream Park racetrack in Florida.

According to court papers obtained by Us Weekly, Williams sustained “serious injuries” and “suffered pain, shock [and] mental anguish” after being slapped by Crooks as their cast mates and VH1 crew members tried to break up the fight.

Williams is seeking unspecified monetary and punitive damages from Crooks. In addition to the suit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court, Williams’ attorney, Sanford Rubenstein, tells Us his client also filed a criminal complaint in Florida.

Read the rest of the story here.

Miami Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen suspended for Fidel Castro comments

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A timely article on Free Speech and Ozzie Guillen’s comments regarding Fidel Castro. While the First Amendment protects against government intrusion restricting free speech, the same does not apply for private companies. Should it?

Read the full Washington Post Blog article here.

By Joy Freeman-Coulbary

While the All-American football star Tim Tebow is as widely admired for his religious displays and social conservatism as he is for his athletic prowess, baseball great Ozzie Guillen’s foray into political free speech has not been as well received.

Guillen, a former Major League Baseball player and current manager of the Miami Marlins — who was once fined by the Chicago White Sox for making a homophobic slur — received a five-game suspension without pay for professing his admiration for Fidel Castro in a recent Time magazine interview. He returns to his ballclub Tuesday even though some critics have called for his dismissal.

The Venezuelan-born Guillen told the magazine that he “loves” Castro. He said he admired the way the dictator had survived in power for almost 60 years, despite U.S. opposition and numerous death threats. Unlike his slur; which was abhorrent, Guillen’s recent political comments epitomize the very essence of what freedom of speech is supposed to protect — dissent and controversial political opinions.

There’s a legacy of professional athletes being publicly cannibalized for their “radical” political views. For instance, heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali was banned for a number of years from boxing for his avoidance of the draft and expressed opposition to the Vietnam War.

Controversy followed Tommie Smith and John Carlos for their black power salute at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City. And more recently, NFL star Rashard Mendenhall, at 23, lost his million-dollar championship endorsement for questioning on Twitter whether the exalted celebration of Osama bin Laden’s death was indeed dignified.

While the First Amendment grants constitutional protection from governmental restriction of free speech, private companies can constitutionally intrude on their employees’ freedom of speech inside and outside the workplace. Courts have held that however chilling, private companies can curtail employee freedom of expression.

Yet, in maintaining our free society, even without an express constitutional mandate, private companies can and should uphold the First Amendment. Tebow’s trademark genuflection after he scores a touchdown has been dubbed by fans as “Tebowing,” reflecting his express devotion to Jesus Christ, Lord and Savior, according to Sean S. O’Neil for Religion Dispatches.

In his best-selling book, “Through My Eyes,” Tebow shares his family’s pro-life story while making his Christian faith the cornerstone of his football success. Tebow’s public celebration of Christianity, which has made him a wholesome role model to many while unsettling others, is expressly protected by the First Amendment. And it did not cause him to skip a beat in terms of lucrative endorsement deals, which include contracts with Nike, Jockey International and FRS Health Energy.

The disparate treatment of Tebow and Guillen raises the question of whether highly public, powerful corporations should be able to shape and mold public discourse by selectively censoring employee speech.

Given the benefits derived from private industry’s almost unfettered ability to lobby the public sector and sheer ubiquity in our everyday lives, it seems only fair that these large, often multinational corporations have a reciprocal obligation to respect the constitutional rights and freedoms of the public they serve and from whom they clearly derive great benefit.

Read the rest of the blog post here.

Gabrielle Union: I’m No Homewrecker!

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Dwyane Wade’s girlfriend, Gabrielle Union, has finally put rumors to rest saying in a recent interview that despite her silence, she was not the cause of his failed first marriage.

Dwyane Wade and his ex-wife Siohvaughn Funches engaged in an ugly divorce that included accusations that Union was “detrimental” to the children and that she caused the split. The courts dismissed the case.

Read the full story from Perez Hilton here.

Think what you may about her, but Gabrielle Union wants you to know that she wasn’t the cause of a broken marriage!

Back in 2009, the actress started hooking up with Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade, sparking rumors that she broke up his marriage with now ex-wife Siohvaughn Funches!

Years later, Gabrielle is FINALLY speaking out in a recent interview, saying:

“I think people mistook me taking the high road as an admission of guilt. Dwyane and I made a decision very early to not react to the negativity. And I kept feeling like the truth would come out. The problem is, when it did, nobody cared. What I discovered on social media is that people don’t read the entire story.”

In the past, Dwyane’s ex wife originally had it out for Gabby — filing a suit claiming Gabby was “detrimental” to her and Wade’s two children.

Gabrielle, who remained confident during this time, says:

“I did a lot of talking with girlfriends and sorting through my feelings about the madness. This kind of love is a gift. It’s so consistent. There’s no way that I would trade it for people who refuse to simply acknowledge the truth.”

The case was eventually dismissed after the courts concluded Funches was being less than truthful.

Read the rest of the story here.

Profane tweet puts student in legal no man’s land

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Filed under Think Before You Tweet. Does being suspended from school for dropping an F-bomb on Twitter in your free time constitute a violation of your First Amendment Rights?

Read the full story here.

By Charles Wilson Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS — Austin Carroll, 17, was fighting insomnia in the middle of the night when he turned to Twitter for relief and casually dropped the F-word multiple times, apparently to demonstrate to his followers that the expletive would fit almost anywhere in a sentence.

But a few days later, the Indiana teen was expelled from high school over his foul-mouthed lapse, even though the word wasn’t directed at anyone, and he says the tweet didn’t involve his school.

Now, the senior is at the center of a debate over how closely school officials may monitor students’ online activities when they aren’t in class or even on school property, an issue that has frustrated administrators and confounded courts.

Carroll insists he made the tweet on his own time using his own computer, making it none of the school’s business. But school officials in the small city of Garrett, about

20 miles north of Fort Wayne, insist that the teen used either his school-issued computer or the school network.

School officials say they cannot discuss a student’s disciplinary record and will not say why Carroll was expelled on March 19 from Garrett High School, a 600-student school where younger students are given iPads and older ones are sent home with MacBooks.

His mother, Pam Smith, believes it was in retaliation for her son’s previous misbehavior, which included a suspension earlier in March for violating the dress code by wearing a kilt to school and a suspension last fall for using the same expletive on a school computer.

Carroll told a Fort Wayne television station that he was just trying to be funny and that he was on his personal account.

“Because it’s my own personal stuff, and it’s none of their business,” he told the station.

He posted on his Facebook page that he “shouldn’t have done it” but said the punishment was too harsh.

First Amendment and students’ rights experts agree. If Carroll was using his own computer and network to send the tweet, the school’s action was “an incredible overreach and overreaction that arguably raises not only First Amendment but Fourth Amendment issues,” said David Hudson, a scholar at the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee. The Fourth Amendment protects citizens against unreasonable searches and seizures.

Since 1969, the U.S. Supreme Court has generally ruled that students have free-speech rights, and schools can prohibit their speech only if it is vulgar or disruptive to schoolwork or other people. But that power doesn’t reach far beyond school property.

Read the rest of the story here.

Feud between grandsons of Florida citrus baron ends

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A settlement has ended a legal battle between two grandsons of a Florida citrus baron regarding the management of the family run company.

Read the full Miami Herald story here.

By GARY FINEOUT
Associated Press

BARTOW, Fla. — A legal battle that pitted two grandsons of a Florida citrus baron against one another is coming to an end for now.

A settlement reached Sunday ended a lawsuit that former State Rep. Baxter Troutman filed more than three years ago against State Sen. J.D. Alexander and his father over how they had run the family company.

J.D. Alexander is the powerful budget chairman of the state Senate who is behind a push to break off a branch campus of the University of South Florida in Lakeland. The bill to create the state’s 12th public university is expected to be sent to Gov. Rick Scott later this month.

Troutman’s lawsuit filed in October 2008 contended that Alexander – along with his father John R. Alexander – had mismanaged the family company Alico Inc. by pursuing a potential merger with another family-owned company.

Under the terms of the settlement Troutman agreed to drop the lawsuit, but he received no payment for doing so.

Alexander’s attorney said the settlement proved the lawsuit was frivolous and that J.D. Alexander had been “vindicated.” He noted the settlement was reached on the eve of a hearing in the case.

That was echoed by Sen. Alexander.

“It makes it clear that there were just no basis to the claims,” Alexander said.

Troutman, who was in the Florida House from 2002 to 2010, said he dropped the lawsuit to protect the interests of the shareholders of Alico, the agriculture and land management company once controlled by the late Ben Hill Griffin Jr.

Griffin was a wealthy citrus magnate and cattle rancher whose name is on the University of Florida stadium.

Troutman said settlement negotiations started months ago and that he told family members he would drop the lawsuit if J.D. Alexander gave up his post as president and chief executive officer of Atlantic Blue Group, which is the controlling shareholder of Alico. Alexander gave up that post last month after he was named full-time president and CEO of Alico.

He disputed the notion that the settlement had vindicated his cousin.

Read the rest of the story here.

Analysis: If Trayvon Martin family pursues civil case

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Interesting analysis from Reuters should Trayvon Martin’s family pursue a civil case against the Retreat at Twin Lakes Homeowners’ Association–as the “Stand Your Ground Law” also protects Zimmerman from civil action.

Read the full Reuters story here.

By Andrew Longstreth

NEW YORK | Wed Mar 28, 2012 7:08pm EDT

(Reuters) – As uncertainty swirls around any criminal prosecution of George Zimmerman, the shooter of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in an Orlando suburb, one option that remains open to Martin’s family is a civil case.

Zimmerman could be shielded from prosecution under Florida’s 2005 “Stand Your Ground Law,” which gives immunity to people who use deadly force in their own defense without clear evidence of malice. The same law also says a person who uses such force is immune from civil action.

However, given certain conditions, the Martin family could bring a wrongful death case against Retreat at Twin Lakes Homeowners’ Association, Inc, the homeowners association for the central Florida gated community where the killing took place, legal experts said.

Such a lawsuit would likely allege that the association was negligent in overseeing Zimmerman’s activities, and could seek a judgment in the seven-figure range, said Philip Gerson, a Miami trial lawyer and founder of the law firm Gerson & Schwartz.

Ben Crump, an attorney for the Martin family, told reporters Monday that there were no plans to file a lawsuit now. But a wait-and-see strategy is common with alleged crime victims and their relatives. Often they wait until a criminal proceeding concludes to pursue a civil case in an effort to avoid appearing to be motivated by money.

A civil lawsuit in the Martin case, legal experts said, would be predicated on establishing a relationship between Zimmerman and the Retreat at Twin Lake association, as well as establishing a relationship between Twin Lakes homeowners and a crime watch group that Zimmerman led.

The homeowners association acknowledged Zimmerman and the neighborhood crime watch in a February newsletter, according to the Associated Press. The newsletter encouraged residents to contact Zimmerman in case of an incident, it said.

“If you’ve been the victim of a crime within the community, after calling the police, please contact our captain, George Zimmerman … so we can be aware and help address the issue with other residents,” the newsletter said.

That relationship is likely to come into play, said Donna DiMaggio Berger, a founding partner at the law firm Katzman Garfinkel & Berger, which represents community associations in Florida.

“It’s not as if the association can say we had no idea … that Zimmerman held himself out as a neighborhood watch captain,” she said.

Efforts to reach board members for Retreat at Twin Lakes Homeowners’ Association were unsuccessful.

WHAT COVERAGE?

A crucial factor in such a lawsuit would be the insurance Twin Lakes carries and whether it would cover any payout stemming from litigation over the Martin shooting.

Most homeowner associations have policies with at least $1 million in coverage, according to insurance attorneys, but it is unknown what kind of insurance, if any, Retreat at Twin Lakes carries.

The vast majority of homeowner associations do not have insurance policies that cover the acts of their volunteers, according to Berger.

If that is the case with Retreat at Twin Lakes, the residents could be responsible for satisfying any judgment against the association, said Berger, the community associations lawyer not involved in the case.

Such a scenario would not be unprecedented. In the mid-1990s, a Tarmac, Florida, homeowners association was hit with a $1.2 million judgment in an age-discrimination case. The group was unable to pay and had to file for bankruptcy. That left individual residents to pick up the tab, which came to more than $7,000 for each homeowner.

Read the rest of the analysis here.

Supreme Court Refuses Tobacco Firm Appeal in Smoker Case

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The U.S. Supreme Court said it will not hear an appeal by R.J. Reynolds in a Florida case in which it was ordered to pay $28.3 million to a woman whose husband died of lung cancer after decades of smoking its cigarettes.

Read the full Reuters story here.

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON | Mon Mar 26, 2012 11:39am EDT

(Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court said on Monday it will not hear an appeal by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co in a Florida case in which it was ordered to pay $28.3 million to a woman whose husband died of lung cancer after decades of smoking its cigarettes.

The justices refused an appeal by the Reynolds American Inc unit, which argued that its constitutional due process rights had been violated and that the issue could affect thousands of pending cases in Florida against tobacco companies.

In 2009, a state trial court in Pensacola, Florida, ordered Reynolds to pay more than $3.3 million in compensatory damages and $25 million in punitive damages to Mathilde Martin.

Her husband, Benny Martin, died in 1995 of lung cancer that she blamed on his long-time smoking of Reynolds’ Lucky Strike cigarettes.

The jury found that Reynolds was 66 percent responsible for his death and that Martin, who started smoking in the 1940s before cigarette packages had health warnings, was 34 percent responsible.

The lawsuit stemmed from the so-called “Engle progeny” cases filed against tobacco companies by sick Florida smokers or their relatives. A class-action lawsuit filed in 1994 by a pediatrician, the late Dr. Howard Engle, produced a $145 billion judgment against cigarette makers six years later.

Read the rest of the story here.

Fired For Wearing Orange?

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14 workers at a South Florida law firm were fired for wearing orange. The former employees claim that they would wear orange on pay day so they could be easily recognized during happy hour after the workday was over. Or were they wearing their shirts in protest?  Florida is an “at will” state for employment, which means that an employer can fire an employee for any lawful reason if there is no contract.

Read the full Sun-Sentinel story here.

14 fired at law firm for wearing orange shirts, workers report
By Doreen Hemlock, SunSentinel

Were they wearing orange shirts on Friday to protest management? Or to get psyched for happy hour?

Either way, orange-shirted workers no longer have jobs at the Deerfield Beach law firm of Elizabeth R. Wellborn P.A.

A spokeswoman said the law firm had “no comment at this time.”

Four workers tell the story this way: For the past few months, some employees have worn orange shirts on pay-day Fridays so they’d look like a group when they went out for happy hour.

This Friday, 14 workers wearing orange shirts were called into a conference room, where an executive said he understood there was a protest involving orange, the employees were wearing orange, and they all were fired.

The executive said anyone wearing orange for an innocent reason should speak up. One employee immediately denied involvement with a protest and explained the happy-hour color.

The executives conferred outside the room, returned and upheld the decision: all fired, said Lou Erik Ambert, 31, of Coconut Creek, a litigation para-legal who said he was terminated.

“There is no office policy against wearing orange shirts. We had no warning. We got no severance, no package, no nothing,” said Ambert. “I feel so violated.”

Meloney McLeod, 39, of North Lauderdale, said her choice of shirt puts her in a tough spot: “I’m a single mom with four kids, and I’m out of a job just because I wore orange today.”

Janice Doble, 50, of Sunrise,said she wore orange Friday because she was looking forward to happy hour with colleagues after a busy work week.

“Orange happens to be my favorite color. My patio is orange,” said Doble. “My lipstick was orange today.” She said she supervised 12 people who scanned, copied and mailed documents for the firm.

Now she’s worried for relatives employed at the law firm. “I have four kids who work there,” said Doble. “I don’t want them to retaliate and fire my kids.”

Yadel Fong, 21, of Miami, wonders where he’ll find work after losing his job in the mail room. He was not aware of anyone in the group involved in a protest.

Read the rest of the story here.

Whitney Houston’s Will Was Far From Perfect

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Whitney Houston’s will was made public last week, and her daughter Bobbi Kristina is the sole beneficiary. According to Forbes.com, Whitney Houston should have had a living trust beyond a simple will. What do you think?

Read the full article here.

Danielle and Andy Mayoras

Last week, Whitney Houston’s will was revealed, after it was filed with the probate court to open her estate, in Atlanta, Georgia. As expected, it named Bobbi Kristina as Whitney’s sole beneficiary. Beyond that, it was surprising for several reasons.

First, the fact that Whitney relied on a will — signed back in 1993 no less — instead of a living trust is troubling. We’re talking about the woman who signed the largest recording contract in history! If anyone should have thorough estate planning, including a living trust, it was Whitney.

Why? Wills have to pass through probate court to be effective, which makes them public record. That’s why information about the contents of her will is all over the internet. Inside Edition, for example, posted a copy of the will, here. In addition to be public, probate can be expensive, time-consuming, and a breeding ground for family fights.

Living trusts, on the other hand, when properly-used, keep matters private and outside of probate court. Most people with even modest estates are better served using living trusts, instead of a will. It’s frankly rather shocking that Whitney only had a will.

After signing her will in 1993, Whitney made one change, at least. She signed at least one codicil (an amendment to the will), dated April 14, 2000. There have been reports of a second codicil in 2004, but that has not been made public. The Order from probate court which admitted the will only refers to a single codicil, not two codicils, which would normally be the case if there were in fact multiple codicils.

When Whitney signed the codicil, she named her mother, Cissy Houston as the executor, replacing the person named in her original will, the attorney who prepared that will. When the attorney who created a will also is named as an executor, it sometimes raises red flags. Whitney obviously had second thoughts about who she wanted in control of her estate, and that’s not a bad thing. Interestingly, Cissy Houston did not end up serving as executor, however. Instead, Whitney’s sister-in-law, Pat Houston, was appointed by the probate court.

So what else is surprising about the will? It did create a trust, but not a living trust as most people would do. Rather, the will calls for Whitney’s assets to be held in trust for her daughter, Bobbi Kristina, but Whitney did not create an actual trust while she was alive. This is called a testamentary trust, because it is created by the will, not during life. A testamentary trust can still function like a living trust, but it doesn’t have the advantages of avoiding probate court and privacy, which a living trust would have.

But, you certainly have to give Whitney credit for thinking that aspect of her estate plan through. As we wrote previously, without employing a trust, Whitney’s daughter would stand to inherit all of the money immediately, because she is 18 — legally, an adult. By using a trust — even a testamentary trust — Whitney was able to space out the distributions. So Bobbi Kristina will inherit 10% at age 21, another one-sixth at age 25, and the rest at age 30. There are provisions to allow for the money to be spent by independent trustees (Whitney’s brother and sister-in-law) for Bobbi Kristina’s benefit, for things like education, buying a home, starting a business, having a child, and more.

Read the rest of the article here.

Hulk Hogan’s breach of contract lawsuit against ex-wife thrown out of court

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A lawsuit filed by Hulk Hogan against his ex-wife claiming that as his business manager, she did not obtain enough insurance coverage to protect his family’s assets was thrown out of court. Read the rest of the Fox News story here.

By Hollie McKay

Terry “Hulk Hogan” Bollea and wife Linda called it quits in 2007, yet the two have continued to battle it out in court over a number of issues.

Now Linda Bollea’s attorney tells Fox411 that his client just scored a major victory.

“We just won a final judgment against Hulk Hogan in his claims that Linda Hogan breached her fiduciary duties as his wife and business manager because he claimed she did not obtain enough insurance coverage to cover Nick’s accident,” Linda’s Florida-based attorney, Raymond Rafool, told Fox411’s Pop Tarts column on Wednesday.

Last year the wrestling champ filed a lawsuit Pinellas County Court, Florida claiming that the Wells Fargo branch he frequented should have advised him that he needed an advanced level of insurance to protect his assets. Hogan revised the suit to also name his ex-wife as a defendant, alleging that as his business manager at the time, she should have “adequately protected” the family’s assets and that she has a “fiduciary duty under Florida law” to educate herself on potential liabilities.

The suit was in relation to his son Nick Hogan’s 2007 accident, in which he crashed one of Hogan’s cars, leaving passenger John Graziano in a vegetative state. The Graziano family later sued Hogan for negligence and direct liability, and although the terms and finances of Hogan’s settlement with the Graziano family were not disclosed, his automobile insurance was limited at $250,000 per injured person.

Hulk claimed that the excess settlement money paid out-of-pocket was a result of the other parties not fulfilling their duties adequately.

Rafool claimed that Hulk was seeking millions from Linda, but the judge granted their request to have the case against her dismissed. We’re told the judge recognized and accepted that the marital settlement agreement signed by Hulk during divorce proceedings clearly released Linda from any associated liabilities.

“The parties’ Confidential Marital Settlement Agreement (CMSA), dated July 29, 2009 and the release provided is clear and unambiguous,” reads the Final Judgment Summary. “The Court does not know how the releases in the CMSA and the Graziano Related Settlement Agreement and Release could be any more comprehensive than they were.”

Read the rest of the story here.