National Roundup

Washington
Google rejects DOJ antitrust claims in filing
Google is pushing back in court this week on antitrust claims brought against it by the Justice Department two months ago.

In a legal filing with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Google denied or partially rejected almost 200 specific complaints against it. On only one count, that Google was “founded in a Menlo Park garage 22 years ago,” did the company side with the Justice Department.

It said that people use its search engine “because they choose to, not because they are forced to or because they cannot easily find alternative ways to search for information on the Internet.”

In October the Justice Department sued Google for abusing its dominance in online search and advertising — the government’s most significant attempt to protect competition since its groundbreaking case against Microsoft more than 20 years ago.

And last week U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta set a tentative trial date of Sept. 12, 2023 for the landmark case.

Google has fiercely denied government allegations that it has illegally struck a series of deals to thwart competition in the search market to help give it a stranglehold on a digital advertising market that has brought in more than $100 billion in revenue to the company during the first nine months of this year alone.

The company’s insistence that it has done nothing wrong makes a pre-trial settlement seem unlikely.

Washington
Ex-team owner sentenced in rape case in 1 of several probes
SEATTLE (AP) — The former owner of a Seattle professional indoor soccer team has been sentenced to 33 months in prison for a Kirkland rape and faces additional prison time when he’s expected to plead guilty to orchestrating a federal tax fraud scheme.

A change-of-plea hearing for Dion Earl has been set for Jan. 11 in the tax fraud case, The Seattle Times reported.

It should bring to an end three major criminal investigations into Earl that so far have resulted in over 14 years of prison time. The former owner of the Seattle Impact is serving a 12-year prison term in Arizona for sexually assaulting two women there. Earl pleaded guilty in September to a charge of felony rape in Kirkland, dating back to September 2009.

A massage parlor attendant told Kirkland police she’d been raped after-hours by a customer not previously known to her but who was later identified as Earl.

Earl initially denied raping the woman and then claimed they’d had consensual sex. Police let the case lapse and then closed it, citing a lack of evidence, before reopening it shortly after Earl’s arrest in Arizona.

King County prosecutors had recommended the 33-month term as part of a plea agreement reached with Earl. He also must register as a sex offender and pay financial restitution to the woman.

Earl came under scrutiny in 2014 when he became owner of the Impact team in the Major Arena Soccer League. After just one regular-season game, 22 of his players walked out on him when two members of the Impact’s all-female dance team accused Earl of sexually assaulting them.

The King County Sheriff’s Office dropped that case for a lack of evidence, though the two dancers and four other former team staffers later won almost $1 million in damages and court fees from Earl in a civil lawsuit alleging sexual assault, harassment and unfair treatment by him.

In the tax case, he’s accused of bilking the government of $1.1 million by misstating revenues from the Impact, other businesses and interest he paid on mortgages.

Ohio
Judge blocks fees set by tainted nuclear bailout law
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A central Ohio judge on Monday blocked the subsidies from a $1 billion nuclear bailout law at the center of a $60 million bribery probe, as state lawmakers scrambled to decide the fate of a repeal effort and nominees were chosen to succeed a utility regulator who resigned amid the investigation.

Franklin County Judge Chris Brown sided with Republican Attorney General Dave Yost and the cities of Cincinnati and Columbus in granting a preliminary injunction that would block the subsidies that were set to be added to every electric bill in the state starting Jan. 1.

The ruling came as lobbying intensified on all fronts on legislation seeking to repeal the bailout law, as well as several competing proposals, with just a day left in the lame duck legislative session.

The potential for legislative inaction before the session ends influenced his decision, Brown said. Fees collected under the law, which was passed in July 2019, amount to more than $150 million a year through 2026.

Yost filed the state’s lawsuit in September against Energy Harbor, a former subsidiary of FirstEnergy Corp., the state’s largest utility.

Also Monday, a nominating council forwarded four names to Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine to fill a seat on the powerful Public Utilities Commission of Ohio to replace its former chairman, Sam Randazzo, who resigned days after the FBI searched his Columbus townhome.

DeWine has 30 days to select Randazzo’s replacement. Randazzo resigned as PUCO chair Nov. 20, four days after the FBI search and the day after FirstEnergy said in a quarterly earnings report that top executives had paid about $4 million to end a consulting contract in early 2019 with the firm of an Ohio state official matching Randazzo’s description.

DeWine selected Randazzo to head the commission and the Ohio Power Siting Board within a few days of receiving a similar list of nominees in February 2019. Republican insiders told The Associated Press recently that they warned DeWine  about Randazzo’s previous work with FirstEnergy beforehand.

The FBI, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and Ohio Secretary of State are investigating FirstEnergy’s role in the alleged bribery scheme. Federal prosecutors allege then-Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder used the money to win the speakership, elect political allies and pass the bailout bill. Householder and four others were arrested in July and subsequently indicted on racketeering charges.

Former commissioners Ashley Brown, J. Michael Biddison and Todd Snitchler — a Democrat, independent and Republican, respectively — recommended hiring an outside firm to investigate Randazzo’s interactions with FirstEnergy, its affiliates and lobbyists to determine whether the company was shown any favoritism in decisions by the commission.

They also said the commission may want to re-examine FirstEnergy electric rates.

A third-party review similar to what the three former commission members requested is already underway, said PUCO spokesman Matt Schilling, and legal filings are pending that would open Randazzo’s voting history to scrutiny.