Court Digest

Florida
Parents sue Catholic school, question its teachings
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — A Florida couple is suing a Catholic school and demanding the return of a large donation, saying it isn’t adhering to Catholic values because of the way it’s handling issues like race and accepting the LGBTQ community.

Anthony and Barbara Scarpo filed their lawsuit against the Academy of the Holy Names last month after one of their daughter graduated and a second transferred to another school, the Tampa Bay Times reported.

The lawsuit comes four years after the couple pledged $1.35 million to the school, which named its theater for the family.

The couple claims the school has “lost its way” by distancing itself from mainstream Catholicism and embracing a “woke culture” where priority is given to “gender identity, human sexuality and pregnancy termination among other hot button issues.”

The suit also takes issue with a blackboard in a common area that explains how to be an ally to the LGBTQ community, as well as how the school takes on the issue of race, saying white students are made to feel guilty.

The Scarpos paid $240,000 toward the pledge as of 2018, the lawsuit said.

The school didn’t discuss details of the suit, but spokeswoman Emily Wise told the Times in an email that the school’s curriculum is based on Catholic values.

Oregon
Man sentenced in multimillion fraud schemes involving grass seed
ALBANY, Ore. (AP) — A Washington man has been sentenced in multimillion fraud schemes that involved grass seed at facilities in Albany and Jefferson, Oregon.

Christopher Claypool, of Spokane, was sentenced Wednesday to three years in federal prison and three years of supervised release, the Albany Democrat-Herald reported. Claypool under the terms of his plea deal already has paid almost $8.3 million in restitution and agreed to forfeit nearly $7.8 million in criminally derived proceeds from his schemes.

Claypool pleaded guilty in March to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering.

Acting U.S. attorney Scott Erik Asphaug said in a news release from his Portland office that Claypool engaged in schemes to defraud the J.R. Simplot Co. and its customers while Claypool was the general manager of Jacklin Seed Co., then owned by Simplot.

Claypool oversaw grass seed sales to distributors in his role at Jacklin, which contracted with growers in Oregon and packed orders at a distribution facility in Albany.

Federal prosecutors said Claypool’s schemes from 2015-1019 included packaging seed varieties with false and misleading labels, embezzling $12 million while posing as a foreign sales partner and conspiring with a travel agency in Spokane to inflate costs of his international travel.

Simplot has since refunded or credited more than $1.5 million to defrauded grass seed buyers.

Washington
Jurors award $1.5M to man run over by Tacoma police officer
TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — Jurors have awarded $1.5 million to a man who was run over by a Tacoma police officer.

Emanuel Andrade sued the Police Department, the city and Officer Luke Faulkner, the News Tribune reported. Andrade alleged the officer in 2014 was messaging a coworker on his computer about meal plans when he slowly rolled over Andrade, who had been lying in the street after drinking.

Jurors returned their verdict earlier this month after several days of deliberation and a more than two-week trial in Pierce County Superior Court.

They awarded $3.5 million, but reduced that by 50% because they found Andrade 50% responsible in the incident.

The City Attorney’s Office said in a statement that the city was hoping for a different outcome and will evaluate the results to determine if further steps are necessary.

Dan Hannula, an attorney who represented Andrade, said Wednesday: “I thought it was a fair result, and our client is pleased with the verdict. ... I think it’s a case where clearly our client should not have been drinking.”

He said Andrade, a former soldier, suffered from PTSD and had been self-medicating. Since then, Hannula said, the 30-year-old has been getting treatment through the Veterans Administration and has earned a two-year degree.

He still suffers pain from his injuries, Hannula said, which included head injuries and broken bones.

Washington
Giuliani’s DC law license suspended until New York case resolved
WASHINGTON (AP) — The District of Columbia Court of Appeals suspended Rudy Giuliani’s D.C. law license Wednesday pending the disposition of his New York suspension.

In a two-page order the court cited the action last month by a New York appeals court and said Giuliani is “suspended from the practice of law in the District of Columbia pending final disposition of this proceeding.”

Giuliani, former President Donald Trump’s lawyer throughout his efforts to have the 2020 election overturned, was suspended from practicing law by the New York court because he made false statements while trying to get courts to overturn Trump’s loss in the presidential race.

An attorney disciplinary committee had asked the New York court to suspend Giuliani’s license on the grounds that he had violated professional conduct rules as he promoted theories that the election was stolen through fraud.

The court made the action immediate, even though disciplinary proceedings aren’t complete, because there was an “immediate threat” to the public.

Giuliani called the New York court’s opinion a “disgrace,” saying it was based on hearsay and “could have been written by the Democratic National Committee.”

The practical impact of the D.C. court ruling is questionable, since Giuliani’s law license in Washington was already inactive.

Florida
Judge says no mercy to ex-deputy who used excessive force
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A judge denied a former sheriff’s deputy’s request for mercy for using excessive force during the 2015 arrest of a belligerent man outside a gas station.

Justin Lambert, 40, who was convicted two years ago, told Broward Circuit Judge Daniel Casey on Wednesday he was having trouble finding meaningful work and supporting his family because he has to admit he is a felon when he fills out job applications, the South Florida SunSentinel reported.

He wanted the judge to remove the adjudication of his conviction, which would allow him to truthfully answer “no” if asked on a job application if he had ever been convicted of a felony. He also wanted the judge to lift the requirement that he spend one weekend in jail every year for four years close to the Feb. 18 anniversary of his confrontation with victim Daniel Gonzalez.

“For eight years, I’ve relived that day,” Lambert told the judge. “I’m sorry about what happened. I wish it had not happened that way. I’m sorry.”

Lambert told the judge he had applied for multiple jobs only to be told he’s not employable, the newspaper reported.

“I haven’t done food stamps. I haven’t collected unemployment. I want to work,” he said.

Assistant State Attorney Chris Killoran said that is the same situation faced by defendants who come into the courthouse daily. “What makes you special?” Killoran asked.

The judge did not allow Lambert to answer the question, the newspaper reported. He instead noted he had already shown mercy to Lambert during his August 2019 sentencing hearing.

Gonzalez, 51 at the time of the arrest, had been accused of stealing beer from a gas station convenience store, according to testimony during the trial. The lead deputy who responded to the scene was prepared to let Gonzalez go with a warning. But obscenities were exchanged and a grainy surveillance video showed Gonzalez approach the deputies.

While the video was not clear as to whether Lambert pushed or punched Gonzalez, jurors later said it was excessive force either way, the SunSentinel reported. Gonzalez fell to the ground. He was left with a swollen black eye and multiple facial fractures.

Lambert, a 15-year Broward Sheriff’s Office veteran, faced three years in prison. The judge converted it into four years’ probation and the token jail sentence.

Lambert’s attorney, Eric Schwartzreich, appealed the conviction and the sentence, but the Fourth District Court of Appeal found no reversible errors.

The judge said Lambert will be expected to report to jail in mid-February for one weekend.

Virginia
Man gets seven life sentences for teen slayings
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (AP) — A federal judge has handed down seven life sentences to a Virginia man convicted in the 2015 deaths of three teenagers, one of them a 13-year-old girl who was an innocent bystander at a birthday party.

Xavier “BJ” Greene, 26, of Newport News was convicted nearly two years ago of being one of the four men who showed up outside the birthday party and began firing at people standing outside, The Daily Press of Newport News reported Wednesday.

Authorities said the shootings killed a member of a rival gang in addition to the 13-year-old girl. Jurors also convicted Greene of killing 18-year-old Dwayne Leroy Parker one month earlier.

Greene’s seven life sentences, four of which will run consecutively, make him the most heavily punished among the seven defendants convicted at a massive seven-week federal gang conspiracy trial in 2019.

Greene received life sentences for racketeering conspiracy, life terms for each of the three counts of using a firearm resulting in death, and life terms to run concurrently for each of the three counts of murder in aid of racketeering conspiracy.

The judge also sentenced Greene to 10 years for an attempted murder in a convenience store shooting. The sentences were handed down last Thursday.


Massachusetts
Man who accidentally killed coworker gets probation
WORCESTER, Mass. (AP) — A Massachusetts man who accidentally shot and killed a coworker at a moving company using a shotgun he found while unloading a truck has received a suspended sentence with probation.

Yaimel Rosario-Rosado, 23, of Webster, was sentenced Wednesday after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter stemming from the September 2019 death of Michael Fontaine, The Telegram & Gazette  reported.

The men, who were friends, were unloading a truck at the New World Van Lines warehouse in Auburn when Rosario-Rosado came across a 12-gauge, pump-action shotgun, prosecutors said.

Thinking the gun was unloaded, he pointed it at Fontaine in “jest” and pulled the trigger, prosecutors said.

Fontaine, 38, of Hopkinton, Rhode Island, died of a shotgun wound to the chest.

The prosecution asked for a five-year jail sentence.

But Rosario-Rosado’s attorney asked for probation, saying her client is a law-abiding person with no criminal record who was devastated by what happened.

The victim’s brother told the court that Rosario-Rosado is a “good person” who did not deserve jail time.

The judge sentenced Rosario-Rosado to 2 1/2 years in jail, all of it suspended for three years of probation. He could be sent to jail if he violates his probationary terms.


Washington
King County ordered to pay $900K to worker over retaliation
SEATTLE (AP) — A federal jury has ordered King County to pay about $900,000 to a Black senior Metro transit worker who said he was retaliated against after alleging racial discrimination.

The verdict by a jury in U.S. District Court in Seattle in June came after a seven-day jury trial before U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly, The Seattle Times reported.

The panel rejected Claude Brown’s allegations of discrimination, but concluded his bosses retaliated against him after he went to the King County Office of Civil Rights alleging he was passed up for promotion and removed from a training position because he is Black.

Brown, 71 and still working as a transit operator, was hired by King County Department of Transportation in 1997, became a transit operator in 2000 and transferred to light rail as an operator in 2009, according to his lawsuit filed in 2016.

He alleged he was passed over for promotion and removed from a technical training position — which was given to a younger white man — just eight days after the job had been assigned to him.

Brown also claimed his Metro supervisors repeatedly rejected his application to be a Rail Supervisor in Training, despite high test scores.

Jeff Switzer, public information officer for King County Metro, said the agency “is committed to equity and offers strong protections against discrimination and retaliation.” He said Metro is reviewing the case and considering whether to appeal.