http://avstop.com/news_december_2011/coast_guard_pilot_faces_negligent_homicide_charges_in_deaths_of_flight_crew.htm

This is an interesting claim of negligence. Essentially, while flying a helicopter, a Sikorsky MH-60T Jayhawk, from Oregon to Alaska the helicopter's tail hit a power cable that was unmarked while flying at around 125 knots at about 200 feet off the deck. The way the pilots were flying their helicopter was considered unsafe and the crash resulted in the death of 3 individuals. Upon review of the flight recorder it turns out that apparently the pilot and copilot were sight-seeing. However, there were conflicting witness reports and according to the defendants lawyer the lines were improperly marked.

I feel as though a claim of negligence is accurate as the crew were not paying proper attention to their jobs. However if the lines were not properly marked then some of the blame may be alleviated.

Arizona Immigration Law

The Supreme Court has announced that it will hear the case of Arizona's immigration law. This is going to be one of those cases that could potentially become a landmark decision because of what it could mean for the role states may play when it comes to passing legislation that constitutionally could be ascribed to the federal government.

To make matters more interesting, Justice Kagan has recused herself from the case. In a court that tends to lean more conservative when it comes to 5-4 decisions there is a possibility that Kagan's decision could mean victory for Arizona.

To read more visit. http://p.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/dec/12/supreme-court-will-hear-arizona-immigration-law-ca/

Email and Statute of Frauds

New York Court Holds that Email Satisfies Statute of Frauds 2/1/2005 A New York court has held that an email sent by a defendant accepting the plaintiffs' offer to purchase real property, in which email the defendant had typed his name, satisfies the requirement of the statute of frauds that contracts for the transfer of an interest in real property be evidenced by a writing. Nevertheless, the court dismissed the plaintiffs' claim because the emails the parties had exchanged failed to contain all the essential terms of a contract for the sale of real property. In Rosenfeld v. Zerneck, 4 Misc 3d 193, 776 NYS2d 458 (2004), the plaintiffs made a cash offer to purchase the defendant's house. The defendant responded by email, in which he accepted the plaintiffs' offer, set a date by which the sale must close, and stated that the offer was not subject to any financing contingences. A written contract of sale was to follow. At the bottom of the email, the defendant typed his name. On the defendant's motion for summary judgment, the court held that his email satisfied the requirements of the statute of frauds that contracts for the sale of real property be evidenced by a writing signed by the party to be charged. An open issue appears to be whether an email sent by an individual from a computer, using software programmed to automatically list his or her name and contact information in the email, would also satisfy the statute of frauds. Jere M. Webb Stoel Rives LLP jmwebb@stoel.com Although this article was from awhile ago I thought I would post it because of the subject concerning the Statute of Frauds which we are currently learning about. As we all know any contract that has to do with land or the selling/purchase of real property is required by the Statute of Frauds to be in written form and signed. It is interesting that the court found the email to satisfy this even though the email was not the actual contract. I would have thought that the signature would only matter if it was on the contract itself, not on an email communication before the final contract. However, if the email contained all of the exact information that would be included in the final contract, the signing at the end would appear to be valid. Something to take away from this case is that anything that is written form, even if it is electronic, can be evidence of a contract and we need to be careful whenever we write our names, even emails.

Pujols offer. Revocation

Since we have been discussing offers in the previous section I wanted to find a real life example. I found a good example in the Miami Marlins offering Albert Pujols a ten-year and what sources say a contract worth two hundred million dollars. The contract would be a bilateral contract with the Marlins promising to pay and Pujols promising to play. The contract would be govern under the common law because playing baseball would be considered a service. The offer though today was revoked by the Marlins. Before the offer was revoked Pujols and his agent had a few options. They could accept the offer at the terms the Marlins had provided following the mirror image rule. They could have made a counteroffear, which would terminate the original offer. They could have also rejected the offer also terminating the original offer. Let’s say Pujols accepted the offer and mailed a letter of acceptance to the Marlins. Once he places the letter into the mailbox the acceptance is considered valid. Let’s say Pujols accepted through email. Once the email enters the information processing system designated by the Marlins the acceptance is considered valid. Pujols and his agent could have exercised any of these options.

Pujols though never exercised any of these options because the Marlins revoked the offer. The Marlins exercised their right to revocation. What this means is because they are a “master of their offer” they have the right to revoke their offer at any time as long as Pujols did not enter into an option contract with the Marlins. In this instance Pujols had not entered into an option contract with the Marlins. There are other ways that an offer can be terminated. Let’s look at some hypothetical situations that could have happened in this scenario. As I mentioned before rejection or counteroffer would terminate the original offer. The counteroffer though would allow for continuing negotiations between the two parties. Another way this offer could have been terminated would be if the Marlins organization no longer existed, let’s say Major League Baseball disbanded the Marlins. This would be the same as if the offeror died; the offer would be immediately terminated. A fourth way the offer could be terminated would be if the offer were illegal. Let’s say the government banned playing Major League Baseball because of rampant steroid and HGH use. The offer would terminate because playing Major League Baseball is illegal. Finally the offer could terminate if Pujols didn’t respond within month and a month was a reasonable amount of time to decide on the offer. The offer would terminate because a reasonable amount of time has passed without a response. There are a variety of ways to terminate an offer the Marlins chose revocation in this instance. If you’re curious they revoked their offer to get Mark Buehrle.

1st Amendment Rights?

Below is a article that I forgot to post from a while back. It was relevant to me because it was a court case involving a teacher from my high school.

Facts of the case: The teacher had "inspirational banners" up in his classroom with religious connotations in it such as "One Nation Under God" and "In God We Trust" and the school district ordered him to remove them from his classroom because those sayings didn't reflect the district's image, the district didn't represent Catholicism. So the teacher sued for 1st Amendment violation of rights. He won initially, but lost at the circuit court of appeals. The final ruling being that the teacher was under the district's employment.

So the issue or question that I want to raise to you all is: what stance do you take on this issue? Should the public school teacher still have free speech rights since it is a public school or should it be limited because he is working in a educational institutional and shouldn't exhibit his beliefs on teenage students?

District to appeal ruling on classroom banners

Math teacher’s signs refer to God

By Blanca Gonzalez

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

POWAY — The Poway Unified School District will appeal a federal judge’s ruling that school officials violated the constitutional rights of a high school math teacher when they ordered him to take down classroom banners that referred to God.

The Poway school board voted last night to appeal U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez’s ruling that Bradley Johnson’s First Amendment rights were violated and that he be allowed to rehang the banners, which included the phrases “In God We Trust,” One Nation Under God” and “God Bless America.”

The district had claimed that Johnson’s banners advocated a Judeo-Christian point of view that was not appropriate given the nonreligious mission of public schools.

Board member Jeff Mangum said that while nobody on the board objected personally to the content of Johnson’s banners, allowing them in the classroom could open the door to other questionable material. “I’m religious, I’m conservative … but if this is allowed, what else can go up on the wall?” Mangum said.

Johnson, who was at the meeting but did not address the board, said he has put up banners in his math classroom for more than 20 years “to celebrate and acknowledge our heritage.” He said he is prepared to take the matter to the Supreme Court.

“The banners are inspirational to others and to me,” Johnson said. He put the banners back up in his Westview High School classroom after the Feb. 25 ruling.

In his ruling, Benitez said the district allows other teachers to post materials on a variety of topics without penalty and said the district’s action against Johnson amounted to discriminating against a particular point of view, which courts have said is not permitted.

District officials said the judge’s ruling is based on the legal test of “limited open forum,” which is usually used for student groups, not employees. “We think the judge used the wrong legal test,” said Bill Chiment, associate superintendent.

The district does not want to sanitize the environment and prohibit teachers from putting anything up, but the ruling “would open up the floodgates” of what employees could hang on classroom walls, Chiment said.

“Reasonable people can see things differently on difficult and challenging issues,” said Superintendent Don Phillips. “It’s not the posters, and it’s not Brad Johnson. If we create the forum, where do we draw the line?”

Chiment said the case will now go the 9th District Court of Appeals. “We anticipate that the 9th District will confirm that we made the right decision.”

Katie Holmes Sues Star Magazine for $50 Million

Truth rating: 10

American Media American Media Inc. Katie Holmes Star Magazine Tom Cruise

10:48 am, March 1st, 2011

(Star)

Katie Holmes just filed a $50 million libel lawsuit against American Media, Inc., owner of Starmagazine, which recently ran a cover suggesting the actress uses drugs.

Holmes is furious with the tabloid and contends the story is defamatory.

Star‘s cover featured a photo of a tired-looking Holmes below the cover line, “ADDICTION NIGHTMARE – Katie DRUG SHOCKER! The real reason she can’t leave Tom.”

The story was a total bait and switch, which Gossip Cop busted when it first came out in January.

Inside the tabloid, Star wrote that Scientologists use a device called an “e-meter,” which “emits a low-level electric charge that goes to the brain” and gives its user “a temporary feeling of euphoria, followed by a crash and a craving for more,” the way opiates do.

The article NEVER actually stated Holmes uses drugs, though the actress believes the cover clearly misleads readers to believe she does.

Star has repeatedly published pieces that claim Holmes’ and Tom Cruise‘ marriage is in trouble and that she’s miserable.

49ers' Braylon Edwards sues restaurant for slander

September 15, 2011|Eric Branch, Chronicle Staff Writer

• 
  San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Braylon Edwards (17) runs away from Seattle Seahawks defensive back Marcus Trufant (23) in the fourth quarter of an NFL football game in San Francisco, Sunday, Sept. 11, 2011.
  Credit: Marcio Jose Sanchez

Niners wide receiver Braylon Edwards has filed a $14 million slander lawsuit, claiming he lost his shot at a big-money contract due to false claims that he was directly involved in a bar fight on the early morning of Aug. 1, the Associated Press reported Wednesday.

Edwards' suit accuses a restaurant and bar in Birmingham, Mich., and three of its employees of slander, extortion and malicious prosecution. In the aftermath of the fight, the restaurant issued a statement in which it implicated Edwards, stating he was "present and involved."

The suit claims Edwards had a contract offer from an NFL team for $15 million guaranteed that was taken off the table after he was connected to the fight.

Three days after the incident, Edwards, who has not been charged, signed a one-year, $3.5 million contract with the 49ers with $1 million guaranteed.

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Last week, Edwards was fined $50,000 by the NFL for his DUI charge from last year. In January 2010, he pleaded no contest to aggravated disorderly conduct after allegedly punching a friend of NBA star LeBron James.

Crabtree, Goldson limited: Wide receiver Michael Crabtree (foot) and safety Dashon Goldson(knee) were in uniform, but were largely bystanders during the portion of practice open to the media Wednesday.

Crabtree, who jogged through one route, spent most of his time speaking with trainer Jeff Ferguson as the pair watched the quarterbacks throw to wide receivers. Goldson, who did not play in the final preseason game or the season opener against Seattle, watched secondary drills.

Both players were listed as "limited" on the team's injury report.

Briefly: The Niners signed rookie safety Colin Jones to the practice squad. Jones, a sixth-round pick who made a key block on Ted Ginn's 102-yard kickoff return in the season opener, was waived Tuesday to make room for tight end Justin Peelle on the 53-man roster.