Subject: Civil Trials

• ADA Lawsuit Factory in SF

  July 25, 2007

• CNET/H-P Suit: Good Personal Privacy v. Bad Personal Privacy VIolator

  August 16, 2007

• THE SF Bay Guardian's SHAKEDOWN HITS A SNAG

  January 17, 2008

• Ka-Ching!

  March 5, 2008

• Smashing Pumpkins File Lawsuit Against Virgin Records

  March 25, 2008

• Back In Court

  July 8, 2008

• Class Action Lawsuit Sticks It To Kaiser For Allegedly Double Charging on Co-Pays

  A Contra Costa County woman has filed a class action lawsuit against Kaiser Permanente in federal court in San Francisco, claiming the health care provider double-charged her co-pay in a case that her attorney says could affect "hundreds, potentially thousands" of policyholders who've recovered money from third-party settlements.   When looking at just the lead plaintiff's case, it looks like small beans. Nicole Glaus of Concord paid a $20 co-pay on $517.20 total medical costs at

  May 29, 2009

• Oops, Chase Did it Again (Allegedly)

  Last week, we wrote about how San Francisco was greeting Chase Bank -- poised to take over 700 WaMu banks in California by the end of March -- with a federal class action lawsuit claiming that the bank defrauded its credit card customers by jacking up the interest rates on "blank check" loans. (Read the post here.) Well, the warm welcome slap just turned into a warm welcome whack with class action complaint No. 2 in the period of three weeks. Marin County resident Eugene Reede Stockton filed a s

  February 11, 2009

• On the Waterfront

  Pier 39's management dismisses Joe Abuzaid as a wingnut, but this wingnut may be a real whistleblower.

  October 22, 2008

• Building Racism

  Segregation and racism are used to pit black and Latino carpenters against each other at a low-income-housing site

  March 26, 2008

• Ka-Ching!

  The Guardian hits the jackpot — but don't count the money yet, Bruce.

  March 12, 2008

• Vexatious Litigant Burton Wolfe Fighting Eviction After Threatening More Lawsuits

  February 20, 2008

• Frankovich: 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Disables Wheelchair Access Attorney

  September 26, 2007

• Chinatown Power Players Behind Ed Jew Smokescreen, Source Says

  September 26, 2007

• Wheelchairs of Fortune

  July 25, 2007

• Amazonian Quagmire

  Big Oil, the rainforest, and sticky legal issues are stuck in a San Francisco courtroom

  November 15, 2006

• Troubled Order

  October 4, 2006

• Misc. Reviews

  February 22, 2006

• Tilting at Political Windmills

  Some people, like attorney Paul Melbostad, just don't know when to quit. Bully for him.

  January 4, 2006

• House of the Accused

  When priests within the Salesian order based in San Francisco were accused of sex abuse, the leaders chose to keep quiet.

  January 4, 2006

• Nailed?

  Lawyers for hundreds of sex-abuse victims have California's Catholic dioceses in a dire financial bind. Can church leaders finagle an escape, or are they ...

  June 25, 2003

• Soft Firm

  Too often, the S.F. law firm of Lieff, Cabraser, Heimann & Bernstein strikes settlements that give the firm millions of dollars in legal fees -- and its class action clients too little

  May 29, 2002

• Family Fortunes

  Contractors accuse the Examiner's owners of not paying their bills

  September 26, 2001

• Hospital, Heal Thyself

  The rebuilding of the Laguna Honda nursing home is already three years behind schedule and millions over budget -- and the final plans aren't even finished yet

  August 15, 2001

• Old Wounds

  News reports about the lawyers whose dog killed Diane Whipple have stirred unpleasant memories among a few of their former clients

  March 14, 2001

• Pants on Fire

  How the San Francisco Fire Department turned a manageable house fire into a lethal disaster -- and then tried to cover up its firefighting mistakes

  July 26, 2000

• Slave Wages

  Those forced to labor for Japan in World War II are now suing in California courts

  July 5, 2000

• School of Hard Knocks

  State laws regulating vocational schools have been gutted. Disadvantaged students are paying the price.

  April 26, 2000

• Battle Belli

  The international soap opera that surrounds the crumbling San Francisco landmark that was center stage for the incomparable "King of Torts," Melvin Belli

  April 12, 2000

• Mom & Pop Crackdown

  March 29, 2000

• Little Victories

  Tenderloin residents win a lawsuit, lose a neighborhood store

  January 12, 2000

• South to the Future

  Mexican Families to File Class Action Lawsuit Against U.S. Drug Consumers

  December 8, 1999

• Pirates at the Dock

  Sony, Electronic Arts sue, alleging Bay Area residents were part of international video game piracy ring

  September 15, 1999

• WEB PREVIEW

  Pirates at the Dock

  Sony, Electronic Arts sue, alleging Bay Area residents were part of international video game piracy ring

  September 8, 1999

• Smoke and Mirrors

  Hype over the Laguna Honda bond issue hides some ugly facts

  September 1, 1999

• Tender Box

  Inflamed by crime, drugs, and rising rents, Tenderloin residents are now launching lawsuits to clean up the city's dumping ground

  July 21, 1999

• Drug Warfare

  A Marin pharmacist sticks up for the little guys, and gets run over

  May 12, 1999

• Sex and the Singular Swami

  March 10, 1999

• Midway to Nowhere

  September 16, 1998

• Baseball's Orphans

  Why are 74 old-timers -- players who helped create the multibillion-dollar business called Major League Baseball -- still without pensions?

  April 15, 1998

• The Great Bank Thievery

  The city and state say the Bank of America stole hundreds of millions -- even billions -- of dollars from the government. But didn't San Francisco finance officials know what was going on? And shouldn't B of A executives be under criminal investigation?

  December 31, 1997

• The Black Hole of San Francisco

  This jail is a filthy, unhealthy, decrepit, barbaric nightmare. This jail will probably collapse and kill hundreds if there is a significant earthquake. The city of San Francisco keeps using this unconstitutional hellhole because people who call themselve

  August 27, 1997

• Where Crime Pays

  Is the DA's Office bungling the biggest pollution case in Bay Area history?

  October 23, 1996

• The Grid

  August 28, 1996

• The Family Jewels

  September 20, 1995

• Thanks For Staying In San Francisco Levi's! Here's a Lawsuit.

  Is that a lawsuit in your pocket? On the very day iconic San Francisco-born dungaree empire Levi Strauss said it was staying put in the city, the company received a legal kick in its 501s several hundred miles down the road. On July 13, a class-action lawsuit was filed in Los Angeles against J.C. Penney and Levi's concerning the pants company's subsidiary, Dockers. The plaintiffs claim harks to a 2007 cross promotion in which customers who bought $125 worth of Dockers at Penney's during Father's

  July 16, 2009

• City Attorney Dennis Herrera Ups Ante in S.F.-Minnesota Credit Card Credit-Hogging Dispute

  Don't worry, hypothetical Michigan Tech alum Chris L. Martin! Dennis Herrera has got your back.​When Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson hogged credit last month for attacking a loophole companies use to prevent consumer lawsuits, observers said San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera was getting the short end of the stick. A July 17 settlement between Swanson's office and the National Arbitration Association upended the U.S. credit card industry by making it harder for companies to avo

  August 13, 2009

• Disgruntled Showbiz Parents File Suit Against Kiddie Talent Agency

  ...But not for free​Not everyone can have the glamorous life of Lindsay Lohan or Macaulay Culkin. A mob of angry parents this week filed a federal class action lawsuit in San Francisco district court claiming  a talent agency called Be Productions -- which used to have an office location in Emeryville -- unlawfully charges for its services, publishes misleading information on its brochures and Web site, and, most importantly, didn't make their kids into stars. The lawsuit claims that Be P

  August 19, 2009

• Lawsuit Says Sony PS3 Needs to Update Its Updates

  ​In a federal class action lawsuit filed in the San Francisco court Friday, thousands of Sony PlayStation 3 video game owners who downloaded a required software update claim that instead of helping the system run better, the update caused their system to crash -- and actually damaged hardware in some cases. Sony first released the update, called "Firmware 3.0," in September, claiming it would add "a number of great new features," none of which included complete system failure.The lawsuit also

  October 5, 2009

• Fishermen, Seafood Company File $10M Suit Against Oil-Spilling Dubai Star Ship

  An duck soaked with oil by the 2007 Cosco Busan spill​What happens when two incensed fisherman and a seafood company owner walk into a lawyer's office? The answer is no joke, but the intuitive -- a lawsuit. Crab fisherman Mark Russo, herring fisherman Ron Alioti, and seafood company owner Russell Robinette on Friday filed a $10 million class action suit against the leaky Dubai Star ship and the shipping firms that run it. The defendants "were negligent and spilled toxic diesel fuel and or bunk

  November 2, 2009