Court Digest

Washington
Suit: Transgender teenager’s health insurance violated ACA
TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — A lawsuit brought by a Bremerton family says an insurance company violated the Affordable Care Act by failing to cover gender-affirming health care for a transgender teenager.

Pattie Pritchard sued Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois on behalf of her 15-year-old son, The News Tribune reported.

“My son needs the medical care that will allow him to live, be healthy, and to thrive,” Pritchard said in a news release. “However, because he is transgender, I have to fight and jump through hoops for him to have access to the care that he needs, is legally entitled to and that he deserves. This denial also sends a message to my son and all transgender people, that their health care needs aren’t real or they’re not worthy of care. I won’t accept that.”

Pritchard works for St. Michael Medical Center. She and the teen are both insured through her employment there. The facility is part of the Catholic Health Initiatives Franciscan Health System, which after a 2019 merger is known as CommonSpirit Health.

One of the family’s attorneys, Eleanor Hamburger, said in a news release that the insurance company can’t hide behind a defense that it was just following orders when Pritchard’s employer told the insurance company to apply “the illegal exclusion.” She said the insurance company has a separate legal, contractual and fiduciary duty to C.P. and others in the health plans it administers, to comply with anti-discrimination law.

A Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois spokesperson said she could not comment on pending litigation. CHI Franciscan, which is not a party to the lawsuit, also declined to comment.

The complaint, filed Nov. 23 in U.S. District Court in Tacoma, seeks unspecified damages. It says C.P.’s parents have more than $10,000 in out-of-pocket expenses.

C.P. has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, which is “a feeling of clinically significant stress and discomfort” a person experiences when there’s “an incongruence between their gender identity and sex assigned at birth,” the lawsuit says.

C.P. started getting “gender-affirming care” three years ago which can include counseling, hormone replacement therapy, surgical care or other treatment. The insurance company covered some of his treatment, but other procedures weren’t covered, even though health care providers found them medically necessary to treat C.P., according to the lawsuit.


Virginia
Woman who had 100 dead, sick animals sentenced to jail
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (AP) — A Virginia woman who pleaded guilty to animal cruelty after more than 100 dead and sick animals were found in her home was sentenced to jail.

Lisa Hokaj-Ross was ordered on Tuesday to spend 24 days at a jail in Virginia Beach — a day for each of the 24 animal cruelty charges against her, The Virginian Pilot reported. She was charged one count for each of the 23 sick cats and one dog found in her Virginia Beach home in March 2019.

“If this was your first time getting in trouble like this then I might see it differently,” Circuit Court Judge Kevin Duffan said. “But this isn’t the first time. This is at least the third time you’ve been in this position.”

Animal Control officers executing the most recent search warrant at her house in 2019 had discovered dead animals during similar searches in the past, court records said.

In the most recent case, 23 cats had to be euthanized because they had a contagious virus. Dozens of other dead animals, including kittens, squirrels, possums, rabbits and a duck were found in her garage.

Most of the dead cats were stored with notes telling them how much they were loved, the newspaper reported. Defense attorney Bassel Khalaf said Hokaj-Ross was trying to give them a “fighting chance,” and prevent the city from taking and euthanizing them.

She told the judge Tuesday that a roommate had actually owned the cats but disappeared after the officers took the animals. The judge said he didn’t believe that statement.

Hokaj-Ross, 53, said during the sentencing that she takes responsibility for what happened, but is only guilty of caring too much. It’s been difficult to deal with the animal cruelty convictions, she said.

“It’s completely the opposite of who I am,” she added. “If anyone can accuse me of anything it’s that I have too big a heart.”

She is set to undergo mental health counseling, and isn’t allowed to own animals for the next 10 years. She must also pay more than $6,000 in restitution to animal control.

New Jersey
Feds: Mail order firm used stamp scam to rip off government
NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — Two New Jersey men used their e-commerce company to defraud the government out of more than $6 million by altering U.S. postage stamps, a criminal complaint released Tuesday alleged.

Jack Koch and Steven Koch were charged with theft of government property and postage stamp fraud and were scheduled to make an initial court appearance in Newark on Tuesday.

The most serious charge, theft of government property, carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years

Jack Koch, formerly known as Ismail Yilmaz, and Steven Koch, formerly known as Selim Memis, own an e-commerce company based in Wood-Ridge called Fresh N Clear that sells items through Amazon, according to the criminal complaint. Jack Koch resides in Elmwood Park and Steven Koch lives in Pompton Lakes.

The complaint alleges that since the beginning of this year, the company bought more than 240,000 U.S. Postal Service labels and altered them so they could ship larger items such as bottled water, laundry detergent and cases of soda, while still paying a lower, flat rate meant for smaller shipments under 70 pounds.

The company sent about 30,000 packages per month through Amazon Marketplace, according to the complaint.

Raymond Levites, an attorney representing the defendants, wrote in an email Tuesday, “this is about using the wrong mailing labels on packages at the Post Office.

“Postal inspectors are a great service, but the Post Office’s idea of being careful is to throw the boxes marked ‘fragile’ underhanded,” he added.

Texas
Thomas Reavley, oldest active federal judge, dies at 99
HOUSTON (AP) — Thomas M. Reavley, the oldest active federal judge who served for 41 years on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has died. He was 99.

Reavley died on Tuesday in Houston, the Texas Supreme Court announced. His health had been in decline during the past year, said Bryan A. Garner, one of Reavley’s former law clerks.

He had served nine years on the Texas Supreme Court, the state’s top civil court, before being appointed to the appeals court by President Jimmy Carter in 1979.

Reavley took senior status in 1990 but maintained a mostly full caseload until 2019. His legal career spanned more than six decades.

“He was a towering figure in Texas and a true champion of justice for the state and the country,” said Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan L. Hecht.

Garner, an attorney and law professor, said Reavley typified the very best qualities of “our federal judiciary: complete integrity, a commitment to fairness, incisive intellect and human kindness.”

A lay Methodist minister and Sunday school teacher, Reavley’s nickname was “Pope of the Fifth Circuit.”

Reavley is survived by his wife, Carolyn Dineen King, who is also a judge on the 5th Circuit, and four children.

He had been married to his first wife, Florence Wilson Reavley, for 60 years. She died in 2003. He married King in 2004 and the couple had said that before Florence Reavley died, she told them to get remarried.

Reavley grew up in Nacogdoches, graduated from the University of Texas in Austin in 1942 and then enlisted in the U.S. Navy. He was a lieutenant who drove President Franklin Roosevelt to Roosevelt’s meeting with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at Yalta, where the post-World War II fate of Germany was discussed.

He earned his law degree from Harvard in 1948 and served as a prosecutor, local judge and state government official before serving on the Texas Supreme Court and 5th Circuit.

Funeral services in Houston are pending.

Oregon
Man sentenced for phoning in bomb threat to courthouse
BEND, Ore. (AP) — A Bend resident has been sentenced to federal prison for crafting a hoax bomb and phoning in a threat to blow up the Deschutes County Courthouse in 2019, federal prosecutors said.

U.S. Attorney Billy J. Williams said Kellie Cameron was sentenced Tuesday to nearly two years in federal prison and three years’ supervised release. Cameron was also ordered to pay more than $43,000 in restitution.

Court documents say Cameron and co-defendant Jonathan Allen conspired to shut down the courthouse in Bend by planting a fake bomb and calling in a bomb threat. Cameron and Allen placed a hoax device on a ramp near the courthouse on July 29, 2019. Cameron called 911 twice, telling the operator two bombs were in and around the courthouse.

As a result, the Deschutes County Courthouse, the Deschutes County District Attorney’s office, a bank, and other nearby businesses were evacuated while first responders rushed to the scene and investigated. When the device was discovered, a bomb squad used disabling techniques to prevent an explosion. The device was later dismantled and found to be a hoax.

In 2019, Cameron and Allen were charged with conspiring to make a threat to damage property and conveying false information and hoaxes. Cameron pleaded guilty in federal court in August to using a telephone to make a threat to damage a building by means of an explosive.

Allen, who pleaded guilty to the charge in June, was sentenced in September to 18 months in federal prison and three years’ supervised release, along with being ordered to pay over $43,000 in restitution.


Hawaii
Ex-Honolulu police officers sentenced in corruption case
HONOLULU (AP) — A judge sentenced a former Honolulu police lieutenant on Tuesday to three-and-a-half years in prison and a former officer to four-and-a-half years for helping a now-retired police chief and his now-estranged ex-prosecutor wife frame a relative as part of a wide-ranging conspiracy aimed at preserving the couple’s lavish lifestyle.

Derek Wayne Hahn, 48, was less culpable in the plot than former Chief Louis Kealoha, who was sentenced Monday to seven years in prison, U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright said in giving Hahn a more lenient sentence.

But former Minh-Hung “Bobby” Nguyen, 46, was more culpable than Hahn, even though he had a lower rank, Seabright said.

Kealoha’s wife, former high-ranking Honolulu prosecutor Katherine Kealoha, was the mastermind behind the scheme to frame her uncle for the theft of the couple’s home mailbox to hide fraud that included stealing from her own grandmother, Seabright said Monday in sentencing her to 13 years in prison.

The plot would not have been possible without Louis Kealoha’s underlings at the Honolulu Police Department, Seabright said, describing Hahn as a soldier carrying out the chief’s requests.

Hahn was a lieutenant in an elite unit of officers hand-picked by Louis Kealoha. He was also Katherine Kealoha’s partner in a solar business.

Nguyen was married to Katherine Kealoha’s niece and had lived in the Kealohas’ pool house.

“It reached the highest levels of government,” leading to the public’s distrust in the police department, the judge said of what’s considered Hawaii’s biggest corruption case.

While the Kealohas were motivated by greed and maintaining their lifestyle, it’s not clear whether Hahn participated out of loyalty or because he thought it would be good for his career, Seabright said.

Nguyen’s attorney, Randall Hironaka, tried to argue that his client played a smaller role because he was a footman who followed orders — and couldn’t question the chief because of his status in the family.

Michael Wheat, a special federal prosecutor, said Nguyen was the only footman in the elite unit because of his family ties: “He’s not just a rank-and-file footman who’s subservient to the chief. He’s family.”

Hahn and Nguyen declined to speak at their separate sentencing hearings.

Charlotte Malott spoke on behalf of her brother, Gerard Puana — Katherine Kealoha’s uncle — and mother Florence Puana — Kealoha’s grandmother — who died in February at 100 years old.
“You helped the Kealohas carry out their evil scheme of revenge,” Malott told Hahn in court.

Seabright called Nguyen a willing participant in the scheme who arrogantly thought he could get away with it.

A jury previously convicted the Kealohas, Hahn and Nguyen of conspiracy.