Court Digest

Alabama
City’s elections hit by fight over chemical lawsuits
DECATUR, Ala. (AP) — Contamination from a chemical plant in north Alabama is tainting something else — elections in the city of Decatur.

Three City Council members seeking reelection tell The Decatur Daily that Mayor Tab Bowling and a lawyer are trying to influence August elections by recruiting and funding opponents to the incumbents.

The lawyer, Barney Lovelace, represents the city in lawsuits over chemical contamination from 3M Co.’s Decatur plant. The city is being sued alongside 3M because plaintiffs allege that chemical compounds commonly known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances are discharged from the city’s wastewater treatment plant and are leaching from its landfill. 3M and the Alabama Department of Environmental Management announced a deal Friday for further cleanup of PFAS, but the lawsuits continue.

Lovelace and Council President Paige Bibbee are at odds after Lovelace said she should recuse herself from discussions of the lawsuits because she’s friends with environmentalists and lawyers suing the city or 3M.

On Wednesday, Bibbee played an 82-minute recorded conversation from May in which Lovelace threatens her, saying “I will burn you down” after she offers to make public an email that Lovelace sent regarding the council elections.

The Daily obtained a copy last week of the Jan. 15 email that Lovelace sent to lawyers in his firm discussing finding City Council candidates.

Lovelace wrote that the election is “critical for the future of Decatur” and that he told two Decatur-Morgan County Chamber of Commerce officials that he “could not be publicly involved in this effort, but very deep behind the scenes I would help as needed.”

He asked that the email not be shared outside the firm “for obvious reasons — we represent the city in the PFAS litigation and other governmental entities.”

Qualifying for the Aug. 25 election ended Tuesday. District 1 incumbent Billy Jackson is the only unopposed council candidate. Bibbee faces three opponents in District 3. District 4 incumbent Charles Kirby has one opponent.

Bibbee, Kirby and Jackson accused Bowling of inviting people to run for City Council.

They said the mayor wants to find candidates who will be more favorable toward him. Bowling has admitted his frustration with the council and its unwillingness to go along with his ideas. Bowling is running for reelection and has six opponents.

Kirby, who has a long history of being critical of Lovelace and even calling for termination of his work on behalf of the city, said he doesn’t accept Lovelace’s denial.

“It’s clear that Tab and Barney are one and the same,” Kirby said. “Tab and Barney were working to find opposition for Paige and myself, which is very questionable ethically because Barney gets paid to represent the city.”

So far, Lovelace’s firm has been paid almost $200,000 in legal fees in the PFAS cases. City Attorney Herman Marks said 3M agreed in mediation to pay the city’s legal expenses.

Lovelace denied to Bibbee in the recorded phone call and again to The Daily on Wednesday that the email said he was seeking an opponent to run against her.

Bowling denied recruiting council candidates, but he did say he met with almost every person considering running.

“I probably met with 15 people, but they came to me,” Bowling said.

Bowling said it’s a coincidence that his campaign consultant is also running the campaigns of three council candidates, including challengers to Bibbee and Kirby.

Jackson, Bibbee and Kirby refused to sign confidentiality agreements regarding the 3M lawsuits. They’ve also questioned how slow the cases are moving.

Virginia
Lawyer: Justice Department must provide papers from white nationalist case
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP) — The U.S. Justice Department must provide documents used in its criminal case against a white nationalist, who with others is being sued in a civil rights complaint over the violence in 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia, the lawsuit’s plaintiffs say.

Community members who filed the lawsuit against prominent white supremacists, neo-Nazis and hate groups contend DOJ lawyers have without explanation wrongly denied their request for evidence in the investigation of James Alex Fields Jr.

Fields is serving life in prison after pleading guilty last year to federal hate crimes. Fields drove a car into a group of people, authorities said, killing 32-year-old counterprotester Heather Heyer and injuring more than two dozen others. Fields is among the lawsuit defendants accused of engaging in a violent conspiracy to violate the rights of the counterdemonstrators. The lawsuit is set to go to trial in October.

In a motion filed on Friday, the plaintiffs’ lawyers want a judge to force the government lawyers to provide in part documents the FBI collected from Fields’ computer and cellphone, as well as recordings of his phone calls while in federal custody. The lawyers filed subpoenas for the documents last September. A month later, according to Friday’s filing, the Justice Department wrote that it “would not be in the best interests of the United States” to provide the information requested.

The plaintiffs tried to locate the documents through other sources, with only limited success. DOJ repeated the denial last month, Friday’ motion said.

“Plaintiffs understand the government’s apparent hesitation to release evidence it has collected in a criminal investigation,” the motion signed by lawyer David Mills reads. “But it cannot arbitrarily refuse to comply with a lawful request for documents, and this is neither a routine case nor a generalized request.”

None of the evidence requested is grand jury material, implicates confidential sources, or jeopardizes federal institutional concerns, Mills added. “The material is plainly relevant and important to a significant pending civil rights case.”

U.S. Magistrate Judge Joel Hoppe late this week ordered two other defendants to appear for video depositions in the lawsuit . One of the two, Elliott Kline, was jailed briefly earlier this year after being held in civil contempt for failing to comply with court orders.

New York
ProPublica posts NYPD records, bypassing judge’s blockade
NEW YORK (AP) — Days after a federal judge paused the public release of New York City police disciplinary records, a news website has published a database containing complaint information for thousands of officers.

ProPublica posted the database Sunday, explaining in a note to readers that it isn’t obligated to comply with Judge Katherine Polk Failla’s temporary restraining order because it is not a party to a union lawsuit challenging the release of such records.

Deputy Managing Editor Eric Umansky said ProPublica requested the information from the city’s police watchdog agency, the Civilian Complaint Review Board, soon after last month’s repeal of state law that for decades had prevented the disclosure of disciplinary records.

Unions representing police officers and other public safety workers sued the city on July 15 to block Mayor Bill de Blasio from making good on a pledge to start posting misconduct complaints on a government website. The unions argue that allowing the public to see unproven or false complaints could sully officers’ reputations and compromise their safety.

A state judge who first handled the case had issued a narrower restraining order that temporarily blocked the public disclosure of records concerning unsubstantiated and non-finalized allegations or settlement agreements.

ProPublica said it excluded allegations that investigators deemed unfounded from the material it published. In all, the searchable database contains 12,056 complaints against 3,996 active NYPD officers.
“We understand the arguments against releasing this data. But we believe the public good it could do outweighs the potential harm,” ProPublica Editor-in-Chief Stephen Engelberg said. “The database gives the people of New York City a glimpse at how allegations involving police misconduct have been handled, and allows journalists and ordinary citizens alike to look more deeply at the records of particular officers.”

Failla’s ruling Wednesday  blocks the CCRB, the police department and other entities from disclosing disciplinary records until at least Aug. 18, when she’ll hear arguments in the case. In issuing the temporary restraining order, Failla also barred the New York chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union from publicly releasing records it had already obtained.

The organization said it requested officer misconduct complaints from the CCRB under the state’s open records law and received them before the union’s lawsuit was filed. Like ProPublica, the NYCLU argued it was not a party to the lawsuit.

“The federal court has no authority to bar us from making it public, and we will contest this unprecedented order as quickly as possible,” NYLU legal director Christopher Dunn said.


West Virginia
Attorneys seek names of babies born exposed to drugs
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A group of West Virginia attorneys are asking a judge to force the state to release the names of babies born exposed to drugs as part of the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy case.

The lawyers want the names so they can send families a notice of pending litigation and seek compensation for them, The Herald-Dispatch  reports. They filed a complaint in Kanwaha County Circuit Court seeking the names.

The deadline for individuals and entities to file a claim against Purdue Pharma in the bankruptcy case is July 31, according to Booth Goodwin, of Goodwin & Goodwin LLP in Charleston. Attorneys are concerned that many may not know they qualify for compensation because the bankruptcy court is not allowed access to their information. That includes families with babies that were born diagnosed with neonatal abstinence syndrome, Goodwin said.

“Children born with NAS are the most innocent victims of the drug crisis,” he said. “These children and their families deserve to know about legal proceedings that could provide them resources to help them throughout their lives.”

Attorneys believe a state registry identifies about 4,000 West Virginia children diagnosed with the syndrome.


New Jersey
Gym owners who defied closure order now face charges
BELLMAWR, N.J. (AP) — The owners of a New Jersey gym that has repeatedly defied Gov. Phil Murphy’s executive order to remain closed during the COVID-19 pandemic were arrested Monday on contempt charges.

Ian Smith, 33, of Delanco Township, and Frank Trumbetti, 51, of Williamstown, were also charged with obstruction and violating the Disaster Control Act. They operate the Atilis Gym in Bellmawr, a suburb of Philadelphia.

The two men were processed at police headquarters and released later Monday morning. They and their attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

A state judge had ruled Friday that New Jersey authorities could shut down a gym, and authorized the state health department to put locks on the doors or put up barriers to ensure compliance.

The gym opened its doors in May, starting a legal battle over whether Murphy’s order for non-essential businesses to remain closed was constitutional. It continued to operate despite receiving summonses each day for violating the state order. Crowds of people often showed up to show their support for the gym.

Last week, Murphy allowed outdoor drills for contact sports to resume, as well as one-on-one indoor martial arts and yoga instruction. But gyms have remained ordered closed.

The gym owners have said they have taken steps to ensure social distancing, including taping off workout stations and operating at 20% of the building’s capacity, meaning about 44 patrons at a time.
They also were requiring patrons to wear masks unless they were in the middle of lifting weights, and taking patrons’ temperature at the door.

Maine
Woman to be sentenced for killing elderly woman
ROCKLAND, Maine (AP) — A Maine woman who pleaded guilty to the bludgeoning death of an elderly woman in Owls Head is due to be sentenced this week.

Sarah Richards, of South Thomaston, pleaded guilty in April to murder in the killing of 83-year-old Helen Carver, who was found unresponsive in her home. The killing happened in February 2019.
The sentencing is set for Wednesday in Knox County Superior Court.

The two women knew each other because Richards had been hired to shovel Carver’s driveway and walkway during the winter.

Carver’s sons said their mother suspected that Richards had stolen a debit or a credit card from her. They said Carver reported the alleged theft to police before her death.

Carver was found dead by one of her sons on the day before police were to interview her about the theft.