Pet Law

Animal lawyers are now having their jobs taken seriously. In 2007, when Michael Vick caused a ruckus with his "operation dogfight", people became outraged from the animal cruelty. In a stand against animal cruelty, law firms have been establishing niche areas of expertise in animal law, and solos are building whole practices based on it. While in 2000 only 9 law schools offered courses in animal law, now over 110 do.

Now, serious consideration is taken in determining the custody of the pets in divorce cases, estate planning for pets, and even pets are becoming heirs as billionaire Leona Helmsley's left her white Maltese $12 million in her will. Also, the Menu Foods recall resulted in a slew of class action suits filed on behalf of pet owners whose dogs or cats became ill or died as a result of tainted pet food manufactured by the Canadian based company.

The Humanity and Pets Partnered Through the Years (HAPPY) Act is in Congress, and if it makes it out, the IRS code would be amended to allow a deduction for pet-related expenses. Just as there's an IRS code that allows a deduction for child-related expenses.

Animals are becoming not only part of the family, as 80% of those with pets believe, but they are becoming comparable to humans in the eyes of the law.
How far is this going to go? Where does the boundary between pets and people as one family, subjective of species, separate back to human and dog?

It's not that I know from personal experience, considering the only pets I've ever had were goldfish that lived for all of three days, but I do know, that pets can be to people, what people can't be to people. They love unconditionally and can be a great family companion, however, pets aren't at the same intellectual level as people, and people need to remember that. Because at this rate, a law's going to be passed where you have to be a vegetarian, and that would end to the down fall of human civilizations. What would the pets be able to do about that?

After spending money on a lawyer, enduring a trial, and finally winning the case and receiving compensation, one would expect to have their winnings secured in good hands. They should be able to trust their lawyer to take care of the money they helped earn.

Arkansas lawyer, Eugene Cauley, did not follow through with these expectations. Founder of The Gene Cauley Foundation , a charity started to help all kinds of people, he seemed like a genuinely good person. Much to many peoples' surprise, Cauley pleaded guilty to stealing $9.3 million from a settlement of his. In some interviews with Wall Street Journal, Cauley makes excuses that he has had depression and learned to deal with his problems the wrong ways.

Cauley was sentenced to 86 months in prison as well as 3 years' supervised release once he is out of prison.

I think Cauley is a cowardly, selfish jerk who is making excuses for his actions and wants sympathy from the public.

Eugene Cauley is a false representative of most lawyers today. He is providing the image that lawyers are greedy, heartless pigs who only care about money and do not actually want to help and care about the good of their clients.

I think Cauley is getting off easy and should be completely ashamed of his actions.

California Sues Car Companies

In 2006 California decided to file a lawsuit against the 6 largest car manufacturers in America, General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, Honda, Toyota, and Nissan. The complaint from California is, and I quote, "Vehicle emissions are the single most rapidly growing source of the carbon emissions contributing to global warming, yet the federal government and the automakers have refused to act." Ignoring the questionable existence of global warming, as that is a can of worms I don't want to open today, lets move right to the meat of the complaint.

Vehicle emissions may be the most rapidly growing, but cows are far more harmful. Cows are only responsible for about 9% of C02 emissions, but they are responsible for 37% of methane emissions and 65% of nitrous oxide, gasses that are 37 times and 296 times more harmful then Co2 respectively according to the UN news centre. And which state has the second highest cow population in the country? Why California of course, otherwise it would be completely irrelevant. Yes according to the crop profile from 2000 California was second in cattle just behind Wisconsin, and more recent data shows that the numbers have only gone up since then. So what action has California taken against Dairy farms? None at all.

Well back to the issue at hand. According to the lawsuit motor vehicles are responsible for 30% of California's Co2 emissions. Emissions that allegedly contribute to human induced global warming. I say allegedly because i am not entirely convinced on the issue of global warming in general, but that's not important at the moment. Some sorces speculate that the lawsuit may partially be in response to a lawsuit filed by the car companies to avoid compliance with a 2005 California emissions law that would tighten regulations on exhaust emissions. In the lawsuit California wants monetary compensation for the damage the emissions are doing to health economy and government. The AAM is calling it a nuisance suit and believes it will be dismissed.
How exactly is California claiming the emissions are effecting them? Well "Human-induced global warming has, among other things, reduced California's snow pack (a vital source of fresh water), caused an earlier melting of the snow pack, raised sea levels along California's coastline, increased ozone pollution in urban areas, [and] increased the threat of wildfires." The snow pack issues can be attributed to climate change, not necessarily global warming. In other words there is enough reasonable doubt to not blame the car companies alone. Same with the raised sea levels, and the forest fires. The urban area ozone pollution is the only reasonable accusation, and even that is not something you would file a lawsuit over, more of an issue to take up with the EPA, oh wait, California's sued them too. What for? Refusing to regulate greenhouse gasses. The EPA does regulate greenhouse gasses, apparently not to California's liking. Its like suing the fire department because you didn't like the manner in which they stopped your house from burning down.
California isn't helping its cause with these lawsuits either, if they really cared about the environment they'd let the car manufacturers and the EPA use the money that's being tied up in these pointless lawsuits to help regulate greenhouse gasses and develop more economical cars respectively. In conclusion, California, calm down, back off the lawsuit trigger, and let the car manufacturers and the EPA do their job. If you don't like the way the cars work, WALK! Its like watching an environmental soap opera, whats next? Is the oil industry going to turn out to be California's evil twin?

Gender Discrimination at Hooters

A man in Texas has filed a lawsuit against the restaurant chain Hooters for not hiring him because of his gender. He says that he was not hired because the job as a server is reserved for women by an employer who only wants to exploit their sexuality for business. The vice-president of Hooters made this comment regarding the situation, "If we lose this go around, you can next expect hairy-legged guys in the Rockettes to line up and male models in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue." He's got a point. Hooters relies on women to get business. People go to Hooters expecting to get an attractive female server and if some man showed up it would hurt the image of the restaurant. Also, Hooters has an agreement in which Hooters agreed to create jobs for men limited to kitchen staff, bartender and manager, but the job of server is to be reserved for women. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 there is to be no employment discrimination on the basis of race, religion, sex, color or national origin. However, there is something called a bona-fide occupational qualification defense, BFOQ for short, which allows discrimination in certain situations. Discrimination is permissible if a certain class (women in this case) is necessary to have operations run normally. A good example of this is having airline pilots retire when they reach a certain age. So if Hooters can prove that having women only servers is necessary to normal operations of their business, which shouldn't be very hard, then this man's case will have no chance. This man knew that he wouldn't get the job as a server and did this just for the money. But was he proving a good point? I don't think so. This business relies on women servers to get business and most people know that and by not hiring men, they are not discriminating because a male server would put a damper on this business which highly advertises good looking women as your server.

Ethical Values at Best Buy

Business ethics (most commonly known as Corporate Ethics) are very important to companies. They show people's perspective's against the world on its' good and bad, its' truth and lie. They try to answer the questions like 'what actions are good?', 'what actions are bad?'. Business ethics are a form of ethics that looks at the moral and ethical problems in the business. It is applied for all business companies and the individuals working in the workplace.




It is a lot harder as a a small business to have the same ethical guidelines as a big business. This being said that does not mean you can cut all ethics out, it just means you may to have smaller guidelines. Avoiding these guidelines would put you in the worst position to were you wont go ANYWHERE! It is not possible to be ethical in a small business it is just as hard.

Best Buy has been teaching their employees important rules to follow regarding ethics. "Best Buy believes that fraud and corruption begin small and at the edge of a business relationship" A women from the Best Buy Chief Ethics Office, Kathleen Edmond, blogged about how Best Buy store employees were recently terminated for breaking the Conduct Policy. One of the employees used foul language with another co-worker during a meeting. She was told to leave and continue her business in a different area of the store. The employee complained that she was having certain 'problems' with that co-worker. In her mind, these 'problems' triggered the violent outbreak. One other problem that a customer had with Best Buy. A blogger wrote on her website that a man was at home he was checking for deals on Best Buy. He did find one and rushed to his nearest Best Buy location around his area. Once he got into the store he searched for the item and they didn't seem to have it anymore. He asked one of the employees about it, and the employee told him to check online on there computers. They didn't seem to have the same item. Meanwhile when he was on the computer he noticed that the website looked incredibly similar to the website he was at at home. They did not have the same information on either website. Best Buy quickly replied to this message and assured that the site was not mean to scam anyone, and that it was going to be replaced with the real best buy.com

"Best Buy expects all its employees to act in accordance with the highest standards of personal and professional integrity at all times, and to comply with all applicable laws, rules, and regulations."

Businesses have had a hard time dealing with ethics. For example, Wal-Mart had a problem giving out the name to one of the other employees about a wrong doing. It was also hard to tell the co-worker knowing the consequences of what has happened in the past. Without ethics, most companies would be a complete mess. Ethics make you a better role model and more responsible for what is going on. There are a few things that ethics do that are good for everyone:

• Show proper respect for authorities.


• Have a singleness of purpose.


• Use effective communication in word and deeds.


• Provide proper rest, recreation, and reflection.


• Show respect for human, life, dignity, and rights.

My opinion on Best Buys ethical policies needs to be followed by more accordingly and carefully. It seems to me that the women that was asked to leave seemed like she really didn't want to be there because if she did, she would have told somebody about her 'problem' with that one employee. She should have also acted in a calm manner. i understand her position where she just had to let out an 'outburst' but it didn't have to be in the meeting. Best Buy is a very well-known and popular electronics store. They should be known for there 100% reliability towards their customers and co-workers. Ethics provide the foundation on which this country exists. Although in America, you have the freedom of choice, if you would like to be successful, ethics are what you want to go by. The main reason for having ethical guidelines is not to provide a cookbook solution to every practice related problem, but to aid in the decision-making process for situations that involve ethical questions.

Family and Medical Leave Act

Many people have felt deprieved of their rights when it comes to Medical Leave from work. A woman got pregnent and had leave on Maternity leave. When she told her boss, the boss was very understanding and knew that it was the law that she was allowed to leave. The Family & Medical Leave Act (FMLA) guarantees the American worker 12 weeks of unpaid leave per year to care for a family member or for your own medical condition without fear of losing your job. This woman worked for a this company for five years, there were more than 1,250 hours put into work and the comany had more than 50 people employed. This law applies to the woman in every way possible. When she went on her maternity leave, which her boss gave her without question, she thought she was completely secure. However, when she was all healed and ready to go back to work, her boss had reassigned her to a new job. This would be legal, however, she was reassigned to a job that recieved two dollars of lower pay per hour. This violates the law. When she asked her boss about why she had been reassigned, her boss told her that she had to deal with it because she was gone for so long. She took the situation to court and ended up winning.
This video is another situation that has happened that violates the FMLA.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyHO0-1mmCk


Due to situations like this, a group of researchers organized information to conclude how much of neglect there is with the FMLA. They found there have been many cases that violated low wage for Americans. They gathered information based on 4,387 low-wage workers in the cities of, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City. Of these low-wage workers, 26 percent reported that their employers paid them less than their legally-mandated minimum wage. 60 percent of those same workers reported that the employers have underpaid them by over $1.00. This is a very low income that people are recieving. Many of these people didn't know their rights and did not realize what could have been done about this. Thanks to this group of researchers, many situations have been opened up and turned into a case and taken to court.



I think it is very wrong and unfair that these employers are taking advantage of their employees. Everyone needs to have an income in this world. The world works based on money. These employers have no right to take the money that these poor, minimum paid, hard working people employees are earning.
By Meaghan Eisen

http://www.google.com/reader/view/?tab=my#stream/user%2F09280629446598638201%2Fstate%2Fcom.google%2Fstarred
http://employeeissues.com/blog/labor-law-violations-abound/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EmployeeRightsBlog+%28Employee+Rights+Blog%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

http://www.mortgagefraudblog.com/index.php/weblog/two_charged_in_millon_dollar_mortgage_fraud_scheme/

District 150 Union threatens to strike

After the contract between school district 150, which is based in Peoria Illinois, and the teachers federation of Peoria, a union representing 1,100 teachers, social workers and counselors, expired on July 1st Negotiations between the school district and Union have began. The main sticking points of the negotiations include a salary proposal.
The district wants the union to sign a two year agreement, with a wage freeze next school year and a moderate wage increase during the 2010- 2011 year. The wage freeze would mean no yearly raise for the teachers. It also wants to limit tuition reimbursement and salary increases for continuing education to once a year. Additional to this is the teachers who are stuck on being able to limit class size to a reasonable level. The talks have been going on for quite some time now and it has so far not reached any solid agreements. Both sides seem to have recently hit an impasse. Meaning that no progress in the negotiations are being made. The Union, hoping to dislodge the negotiations from stagnation, have gotten approval for the teachers to strike and the news will soon be out whether they will follow through on this threat to strike.

One of the main reasons of all the raise cuts and budget cuts is that apparently the district has recently stated that they have ended the past year with a monstrous debt amounting to 8.9 million dollars. And because of this massive debt the teachers shouldn't be negotiating right now at all. It is obvious that at this point in time the school district is unable to meet there demands. The best course of action would to currently accept the terms that the school has offered them and set a date a few years in the future to renegotiate. Hopefully when this date is reached the financial situation is under control and the school has more leeway to negotiate. So the teachers shouldn't strike, they should bide their time and not act rashly. Currently the most pressing thing on both the district's and Union's agendas should be educating the students.

Subway - Trademark Infringement

Subway, which is a sandwich company that has 31,879 restaurants in 91 nations, is currently suing a restaurant in Las Vegas over trademark infringement. A trademark is a word, symbol, or phrase, used to identify a particular manufacturer or seller's products and distinguish them from the products of another. The restaurant is calling themselves "Subway Avenue" and Subway thinks that this is too close to their name. Not only is the name closely related but on the Subway Avenue website the menu looks like the one from Subway. Subway claimed that "Defendant's use of plaintiff's mark within the name of its restaurant and related services will likely cause confusion or mistake, or will likely deceive the public as to defendant's food products and restaurant as being associated or identified with or being the same as those of plaintiff". The Subway Avenue owner, Gevork Boyadzhyan, didn't want to change the name at first, but eventually gave into Subway's demands. He changed the name of his restaurant to "Sub Avenue". Not only was Subway concerned about the name of the restaurant, but they also put a charge against Subway Avenue's website saying it had a similar domain name. This charge is still pending.



I believe Subway is doing the right thing on these issues with trademarks. Subway recently sued Quiznos over creating an ad contest comparing Subway and Quiznos. These ads negatively portray Subway and Quiznos misused Subway's trademark logo in the ad. Subway shouldn't allow companies to use parts of their name that could mislead people into believing their business was a part of Subway. The ad contest misused Subway's name and used it in a negative way. Although the Subway Avenue restaurant sold different items like breakfast, fish and burgers, people could still mistake it for a branch of Subway. Subway should continue to look out for these small businesses that have similar names and make sure it is taken care of so these businesses don't make Subway look bad or try to take a percentage of their market share by copying their menu or business format.

Obama's Fair Pay Act

When the Fair Pay Act was first passed in 1963 it was created in order to equalize the wages for men and women. It states that employers can use people's merit, ability, or productivity, but not their sex, in order to decide on the salary that a person should receive.It also allows for lawsuits to be filed and provides compensation if a person has been discriminated against. However, to say that this law completely changed the way the business world works, would not be accurate.According to this study there always was a gender wage gap, and that now the ratio of women's median pay to men's median pay is on the rise again and currently it is 75 percent. In this article from CBS a study done by American Association of University Women, in 2007 is mentioned and it says that after college graduation, the gap is about 30 percent.
In 2009, the newly elected President Obama, signed his first bill into law, which was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. It provides minorities with tools to challenge discrimination. After working for a company for 19 years, Lilly Ledbetter sued the company for not paying her the same wage that men in the company received. The case went to the Supreme Court and it ruled against her. But in January, Congress approved the bill, which expanded workers' rights to sue a company, if they are being treated unfairly. Now individuals that are being discriminated against based not only on their sex, but also on race, age, and nationality, can challenge each unfair paycheck they receive.
An article in CNN discusses the controversy of the act. It says that in order for businesses to protect themselves against unrighteous suits, they will have to document reasons for why a certain person is getting the pay that he or she is receiving. This is probably not a problem for big businesses that have attorneys and other professionals that could take care of documentation of such things, but it might be a problem for small businesses, that don't have that privilege. So one lawsuit, might destroy an entire small business. One congressman who voted against the bill, said that this law will produce more discrimination suits, and that that is a negative, because right now, small businesses are crucial to the economy. However, a lot of people think that the risks are worth it. Some say that it is a good thing for businesses to look at the wages that their employees are getting, and to make them equal, if necessary. I think that men and women should receive equal wages, because I don't see a reason for them not to. At the same time, I think that the law that Obama signed will create more suits and maybe that is a huge negative, since the economy is so shaky right now.


(photo by Stephen Crowley)