National Roundup

Illinois
Judge: Federal courts will look ‘quite different’
CHICAGO (AP) — The chief judge of federal courts in Northern Illinois says things will look “quite different” as some operations resume at courthouses in Chicago and Rockford.

Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer said in a video message released Monday that a task force has been planning for how courts can proceed safely during the coronavirus pandemic. She said the court will issue an order Tuesday outlining details.

Federal courthouses have been largely empty since mid-March. One emergency judge has been on duty at the Dirksen Federal Building in downtown Chicago each day, but most court proceedings have been conducted by paper filings, telephone or video. Under a court order, most hearings were rescheduled for after June 1 and trials were ordered rescheduled for June 29 or later.

Pallmeyer said in her video message that the task force has been working with public health officials to determine the safest way to screen visitors entering the courthouse, sanitize facilities and eventually resume jury trials. She didn’t say when jury trials will be resumed, but said the focus will be on scheduling criminal trials that have been delayed the longest amount of time.

Pallmeyer said emergency judges have handled over 500 motions since the pandemic started in Illinois. Since March 18, attorneys have filed more than 7,200 motions, judges have entered 34,200 orders and more than 1,350 new civil cases have been filed, she said.

Oregon
Judge dismisses lawsuit against  grill company
SALEM, Ore. (AP) — A district court judge has dismissed a proposed class action lawsuit against barbecue grill manufacturer Traeger Pellet Grills, deciding the defendants failed to establish the court has jurisdiction.

U.S. District Court Judge Bruce Jenkins of Utah dismissed without prejudice the suit filed by plaintiffs Michael Yates and Norman Jones that alleged Traeger Pellet Grills doesn’t use the wood advertised in its pellets and instead uses cheaper woods flavored with oils, the Statesman Journal reports.

Additionally, Jenkins found it was premature to present the case to the court.

“No class has been certified here,” Jenkins wrote in his opinion. “Accordingly, this suggestion is premature in the sense that there is no class presently before the court.”

Because the case was dismissed without prejudice, it could be refiled in another court.

Pellet grills work differently than normal wood or charcoal burning grills as they heat wood pellets to create smoke to cook food.

The Traeger family of Mt. Angel, which developed the first pellet grill in 1985 and patented it in 1986, sold the company to a venture capitalist in Florida in 2006 for $12.4 million, court records show.

The company was purchased by Jeremy Andrus and private equity firm Trilantic Capital Partners in 2014 and moved its headquarters to Utah from Oregon in 2015. But the company is a Delaware limited liability company headquartered in Salt Lake City, according to the ruling.

The proposed class action in Utah district court alleged Traeger sells 14 different types of wood in the pellets it sells as the Traeger Brand.

The suit alleged the pellets the company sells as apple, cherry, pecan, mesquite and hickory contain less than 1/3 of the advertised wood and the oak and alder pellets contain varying amounts of the advertised woods depending on where they are manufactured.

It alleged the wood used was flavored with oils to create the flavor of the advertised woods.

Traeger has used its same production process the past 16 years, according to the company.

Traeger’s advertising says it uses “100% natural, food-grade hardwood” in pellets, with small amounts of food-grade soybean oil added as a lubricant for its machines in the pellets.

The pellets sold under the Traeger brand state “All Natural Harwood” on the packaging.

The Yates case purported that consumers who purchased Traeger pellets were financially harmed by paying over the actual market value of the products.

West Virginia
Man charged in fatal crash involving newlyweds
PRINCETON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia State Police have charged a man in a head-on fatal crash involving a newlywed couple.

The crash on Sunday in Montcalm killed Corey McKinney and injured his wife, Sabrina McKinney, who was airlifted to a hospital for treatment, Sgt. A.P. Christian with the West Virginia State Police Princeton detachment told the Bluefield Daily Telegraph. The McKinneys were married Saturday, Christian said. An updated condition on Sabrina McKinney wasn’t available.

Ricky Lynn Olivo Jr., 40, of Woodstock, Virginia, was charged with DUI with death and DUI with serious injury, Christian said. He was taken to the Southern Regional Jail on Monday after being released from a hospital following the crash.

A preliminary investigation found that Olivo was left of the center when the vehicle he was driving hit the sport utility vehicle the newlyweds were in, Christian said. The crash is being reconstructed and the investigation continues.

“It’s tough on the family, but here they’re celebrating the height of happiness and here they go from one extreme to the other,” the trooper said.

 Online jail records don’t say whether Olivo has an attorney.

Tennessee
Couple arrested after child’s remains found buried in yard
KINGSTON, Tenn. (AP) — A Tennessee couple is facing charges after skeletal remains of a child were found buried in their yard.

Michael Anthony Gray Sr., 63, and his wife, Shirley Ann Gray, 60, were arrested Monday, 9th Judicial District Attorney General Russell Johnson said in a statement to news outlets. The Roane County couple is charged with aggravated child abuse, especially aggravated kidnapping, aggravated child neglect and abuse of a corpse, the statement said.

Roane County authorities originally responded Friday when someone found one of the Grays’ children walking alone along a road near their home, Johnson said.

The girl’s remains were found Saturday. Officials don’t know yet how she died. An autopsy was planned.

Three children, ages 11 to 15, were removed from the couple’s custody by the state Department of Children’s Services, Johnson said. They are not the couple’s biological children, but the couple had legal custody of them, he said.

The Grays remained in custody. It wasn’t immediately clear whether they have an attorney.