Georgia
Fund sued over grant program for Black women enlists prominent civil rights lawyer to fight back
Attorneys for an Atlanta-based venture capital firm being sued over a grant program for Black women vowed Thursday to fight back against the lawsuit, calling it misguided and frivolous.
At a New York news conference, the attorneys also announced that prominent civil rights lawyers, including Ben Crump, would join the defense for the Fearless Fund, which was founded in 2019 by three Black women.
The lawsuit, filed last week in U.S. District Court in Atlanta, was brought by a nonprofit founded by anti-affirmative action activist Edward Blum, the man behind the Supreme Court cases that led to the dismantling of race-conscious college admissions programs across the U.S.
The complaint could be a test case, as the battle over considerations on race shifts to the workplace. Last month, thirteen Republican state attorneys general sent a letter to 100 of the biggest U.S. companies arguing that the court ruling on affirmative action could also apply to private entities, like employers.
In its lawsuit, American Alliance For Equal Rights argues the fund's Fearless Strivers Grant Contest, which awards $20,000 to Black women who run businesses, violates a section of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 prohibiting racial discrimination in contracts. It claims it has members who are being excluded from the program because of their race and said it's entitled to relief.
The venture capital firm was established to address barriers that exists in venture capital funding for businesses led by women of color. It runs the grant contest four times a year. To be eligible, a business must be at least 51% owned by a Black woman, among other qualifications.
“Today, the playing field is not level — that is beyond dispute,” Alphonso David, a civil rights attorney who serves as president & CEO of The Global Black Economic Forum, said at the news conference. “Those targeting Fearless Fund want to propagate a system that privileges some and shuts out most. They want us to pretend that inequities do not exist. They want us to deny our history.”
Crump said he was grateful to be able to defend the women who run the Fund against “the enemies of equality.”
Blum “thought they would be the easiest ones to pick off. Oh, was he wrong,” Crump said.
Blum said Thursday his organization is still awaiting a formal reply to the lawsuit from the fund's attorneys.
“So far, all that has been asserted in defense of this racially exclusive and illegal program are meaningless cliches,” he said.
Arian Simone, CEO and co-founder of the Fearless Fund, said the fund has invested in more than 40 businesses over the past four years. She said it has deployed over $26.5 million in investments and awarded hundreds of grants that total more than $3 million. It is backed by J.P. Morgan Chase, Mastercard and other companies.
The prominent law firm Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher will also take part in the defense, along with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the National Women's Law Center, which have been enlisted as consultants.
Arizona
Trump adviser arrested in 2021 after groping complaints at club
PHOENIX (AP) — Boris Epshteyn, a longtime aide to former President Donald Trump, was arrested in 2021 after he was accused of repeatedly groping two women in an Arizona nightclub, according to police records.
Epshteyn pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct charges in Scottsdale city court after prosecutors dropped charges of attempted sexual abuse, assault-touching and “harass-repeated acts.” He paid a fine and served probation, and his conviction was set aside earlier this year.
The arrest was first reported Thursday by The Arizona Republic. Epshteyn, who is advising Trump's 2024 presidential campaign, declined to comment when contacted by The Associated Press.
A club security guard flagged down police early in the morning of Oct. 10, 2021, and told officers that women had complained Epshteyn touched them inappropriately, according to a police report and body-worn camera footage released under Arizona's public records law.
One woman told officers Epshteyn was especially aggressive toward her 23-year-old sister.
“All night he's been like touching me and my sister, especially my sister,” she said over loud music during an interview captured on the officer's body camera. “He kind of cornered her and grabbed her and like (was) just making her super uncomfortable. Touching her after we repeatedly told him to stop touching her.”
She said club security told her they couldn't kick out Epshteyn because he was a big spender, though security guards eventually led him out of the bar to police.
“We have a high tolerance of people being weird, but that was above and beyond,” the older sister told one officer.
Epshteyn denied wrongdoing but said little else about the incident to police as he sat on a curb outside the bar.
“I have no idea what's going on. I have no idea who these women are,” Epshteyn told officers.
Epshteyn was also charged in 2014 with assault-touching following a fight at another Scottsdale bar, court records show. He reached a plea deal with prosecutors and the conviction was later set aside.
A longtime Trump adviser, Epshteyn was a principal surrogate in the 2016 presidential campaign, making frequent television appearances and briefly serving as a senior White House adviser before becoming an analyst for Sinclair Broadcast Group.
He's also been a main figure in Trump's ongoing legal battles, both as an adviser and a participant.
After Trump's loss in 2020, Epshteyn worked with former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani — another of Trump's lawyers — on efforts to overturn the election results by organizing fake electors. Last year, he was subpoenaed by the House panel probing the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol and testified before a Georgia special grand jury probing Trump's efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in that state.
It's anticipated that a possible indictment in that case could come against the former president next week.
He also accompanied Trump to Washington last week for his first appearance in federal court on charges related to attempts to overturn his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.
Earlier this year, Epshteyn appeared alongside the former president as Trump was arraigned in New York on 34 felony counts as part of a hush money case — the first time in U.S. history a former president had faced a criminal indictment.
New York
Jury awards family of man who died after being beaten by police $35M
ISLIP, N.Y. (AP) — The family of a Long Island, New York, man who died after being beaten by police with flashlights and fists during a 2008 traffic stop was awarded $35 million in damages by a federal jury on Thursday.
Frederick K. Brewington, attorney for the family of Kenny Lazo, said “justice has been served,” Newsday reported. Lazo's family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Suffolk County Police Department, Suffolk County and five police officers in 2009.
“It was absolutely appalling how the Suffolk County police physically abused and humiliated Mr. Lazo, then tried to cover it up,” Brewington said, “No family should have to go through what Mr. Lazo's family had to.”
Jurors awarded Lazo's family $13.5 million in compensatory damages and $21.5 million in punitive damages.
Lazo was 24 when he was pulled over by police on a ramp to the Southern State Parkway in Bay Shore. Marc Lindemann, an attorney representing the police, said Lazo, who was suspected to have made a drug sale and committed various traffic violations, was belligerent. He said Lazo struck an officer in the head with his elbow and reached for an officer's gun, calling the chain of events “life-threatening” for the police.
“They used force that was reasonable, appropriate and justified in this situation,” he said.
Brewington accused the officers of fabricating a reason to pull over Lazo and using their authority to beat and humiliate him, including stripping off his clothes and shoes and beating him when he attempted to flee. Lazo, who was initially taken to a nearby police precinct instead of a hospital, had 36 injuries throughout his body, Brewington said.
Lindemann said Lazo had superficial injuries that did not require hospitalization.
Lazo was later found unresponsive on the floor of a holding cell and taken to a nearby hospital where he was pronounced dead. An autopsy determined he died from cardiac arrest “following exertion associated with prolonged physical altercation with multiple blunt impacts.” Obesity was also determined to be a factor in his death.
Washington
Supreme Court blocks, for now, OxyContin maker bankruptcy deal
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday temporarily blocked a nationwide settlement with OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma that would shield members of the Sackler family who own the company from civil lawsuits over the toll of opioids.
The justices agreed to a request from the Biden administration to put the brakes on an agreement reached last year with state and local governments. In addition, the high court will hear arguments before the end of the year over whether the settlement can proceed.
The deal would allow the company to emerge from bankruptcy as a different entity, with its profits used to fight the opioid epidemic. Members of the Sackler family would contribute up to $6 billion.
But a key component of the agreement would shield family members, who are not seeking bankruptcy protection as individuals, from lawsuits.
The U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee, represented by the Justice Department, opposes releasing the Sackler family from legal liability.
The justices directed the parties to address whether bankruptcy law authorizes a blanket shield from lawsuits filed by all opioid victims.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had allowed the reorganization plan to proceed.
Lawyers for Purdue and other parties to the agreement had urged the justices to stay out of the case.
“We are confident in the legality of our nearly universally supported Plan of Reorganization, and optimistic that the Supreme Court will agree,” the company said in a statement following the court's action Thursday. “Even so, we are disappointed that the U.S. Trustee, despite having no concrete interest in the outcome of this process, has been able to single-handedly delay billions of dollars in value that should be put to use for victim compensation, opioid crisis abatement for communities across the country, and overdose rescue medicines.”
Ed Neiger, a lawyer representing individual victims of the opioid crisis who would be in line for a piece of the settlement, said it was a disappointment that they would have to wait longer for any compensation but also praised the court for agreeing to hear the case so soon. “They clearly see the urgency of the matter,” he said.
Another group of mostly parents of people who died from opioid overdoses has called for the settlement not to be accepted.
Opioids have been linked to more than 70,000 fatal overdoses annually in the U.S. in recent years. Most of those are from fentanyl and other synthetic drugs. But the crisis widened in the early 2000s as OxyContin and other powerful prescription painkillers became prevalent.
