Arkansas
Suit says state’s U.S. House map is unconstitutional
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A group of voters and a coalition of religious leaders asked a federal court on Tuesday to strike down Arkansas’ 2021 U.S. House map as unconstitutional, saying it dilutes the influence of Black voters in the Little Rock area.
The lawsuit by three Pulaski County voters and the Christian Ministerial Alliance is the third that’s been filed since 2021 challenging the Republican-led Legislature’s decision to divide a portion of the Little Rock area among three House districts.
“The 2021 redistricting plan is but the latest effort by Arkansas officials to limit Black voters’ access to representation and otherwise the political process,” the lawsuit filed by the Legal Defense Fund said.
The lawsuit challenges the decision to move thousands of predominantly Black voters out of the 2nd District in central Arkansas by splitting up heavily Democratic Pulaski County, where Little Rock is located. The voters were split between the state’s 1st and 4th congressional districts.
In October, a three-judge federal panel dismissed portions of a similar lawsuit challenging the new U.S. House map but allowed plaintiffs in that case to file an amended lawsuit with remaining claims that the new map violates the Constitution and the federal Voting Rights Act
“This latest suit simply regurgitates those same failed claims,” Republican Attorney General Tim Griffin said in a statement. “I look forward to defeating these allegations in court for the second time.”
Earlier this month, a Pulaski County judge dismissed the other lawsuit challenging the House map, ruling that the complaint should have been filed with the state Supreme Court.
Republicans hold all four of the state’s U.S. House seats, and the 2nd District has been GOP-held since 2011. Republicans hold a majority of both chambers of the state Legislature, as well as all of Arkansas’ statewide partisan offices.
Oklahoma
State lawmakers sign off on $1M settlement over inmate’s death
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma lawmakers on Tuesday signed off on a $1.05 million settlement with the family of a state prison inmate who died of appendicitis in 2018 despite five visits to the prison’s medical staff in the week before his death.
Attorneys for Joshua England’s family say the 21-year-old citizen of the Choctaw Nation reported severe abdominal pain and classic appendicitis symptoms that worsened during his five separate visits with medical clinic staff in May 2018.
England’s mother, Christina Smith, filed a federal lawsuit against prison officials in 2019, alleging that medical staff at the Joseph Harp Correctional Center in Lexington, Oklahoma, also falsified records after his death. Despite rapid weight loss and worsening symptoms, England was given acid reflux medicine and a laxative but was never given a proper abdominal exam or sent to a nearby medical facility for a surgical evaluation, the lawsuit alleges.
England “was to be released in a few months, and he died alone in agonizing pain on the concrete floor of his cellblock, caused by an entirely treatable and preventable condition,” Smith’s attorneys said in a statement on Tuesday.
Kay Thompson, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, declined to comment on the case, citing the pending litigation. In response to the lawsuit, attorneys for the state claimed the defendants were acting within the scope of their employment and were therefore improper parties to the claim.
England had been sentenced to 343 days in prison after convictions in 2017 on multiple charges, including taking oil field equipment, fourth-degree arson, contributing to the delinquency of minors and conspiracy, prison records show. England and another man, along with a juvenile, damaged oil field equipment and set some hay bales on fire after a night of drinking, court records show.
“If the state of Oklahoma is intent on locking up so many of its citizens for nonviolent offenses, the state needs to devote far more resources and attention to its correctional system to fulfill its constitutional obligation to provide basic medical care for people in its custody,” Smith’s attorneys said.
The Oklahoma Senate approved a resolution on Tuesday authorizing the settlement agreement. That measure now heads to the House for final approval. Such approval is required under state law for any litigation settlement expenditures of more than $250,000.
Arizona
States sue telecom company over robocalls
PHOENIX (AP) — Attorneys general across the U.S. joined in a lawsuit against a telecommunications company accused of making more than 7.5 billion robocalls to people on the national Do Not Call Registry.
The 141-page lawsuit was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Phoenix against Avid Telecom, its owner Michael D. Lansky and company vice president Stacey S. Reeves. It seeks a jury trial to determine damages.
The lawsuit arises from the nationwide, bipartisan Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force of 51 attorneys general and the District of Columbia. It was formed last year to investigate and take legal action against telecommunications companies routing volumes of robocall traffic.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes said nearly 197 million of the robocalls were made to Arizona phone numbers between December 2018 and January 2023.
“Every day, countless Arizona consumers are harassed and annoyed by a relentless barrage of unwanted robocalls — and in some instances these illegal calls threaten consumers with lawsuits and arrest,” Mayes said in a statement. “More disturbingly, many of these calls are scams designed to pressure frightened consumers, often senior citizens, into handing over their hard-earned money.”
The lawsuit said Avid Telecom used spoofed or invalid caller ID numbers, including more than 8.4 million calls that appeared to be coming from government and law enforcement agencies as well as private companies.
The company also allegedly sent or transmitted scam calls about the Social Security Administration, Medicare, Amazon and DirecTV, as well as auto warranties, employment and credit card interest rate reductions.
“Americans are sick and tired of their phones ringing off the hook with fraudulent robocalls,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement. “Seniors and vulnerable consumers have been scammed out of millions because of these illegal robocalls.”
The lawsuit alleges Lansky and Reeves violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, the Telemarketing Sales Rule and other federal and state telemarketing and consumer laws.
“Contrary to the allegations in the complaint, Avid Telecom operates in a manner that is compliant with all applicable state and federal laws and regulations,” said Neil Ende, the company’s outside legal counsel. “The company has never been found by any court or regulatory authority to have transmitted unlawful traffic and it is prepared to meet with the attorneys general, as it has on many occasions in the past, to further demonstrate its good faith and lawful conduct.
“In this context, the company is disappointed that the attorneys’ general chose not to communicate their concerns directly before filing the lawsuit,” Ende added. “While the company always prefers to work with regulators and law enforcement to address issues of concern, as necessary, the company will defend itself vigorously and vindicate its rights and reputation through the legal process.”
Robocalls have also been an issue during elections in recent years. During the 2020 election, voters across the U.S. received anonymous robocalls in the weeks leading up to Election Day telling them to “ stay safe and stay home.”
Two conservative hoaxers were convicted of fraud for making over 85,000 robocalls to Black voters in five states.
The calls falsely stated giving information in mail-in ballots could lead to arrest, debt collection or forced vaccination. Their sentence included spending 500 hours registering voters in low-income neighborhoods of Washington, D.C.
New York
JPMorgan Chase defends lawsuit by blaming U.S. Virgin Islands for Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes
NEW YORK (AP) — JPMorgan Chase defended itself on Tuesday against a lawsuit by the U.S. Virgin Islands accusing it of empowering Jeffrey Epstein to abuse teenage girls by arguing in court papers that it was the islands, not the bank, that enabled the financier to commit his crimes.
Lawyers for the bank said in the Manhattan federal court filing that the government of the Virgin Islands was complicit, letting high ranking officials be bought off by Epstein and actively working with him while “reaping the benefits of his wealth.”
“He gave them money, advice, influence, and favors. In exchange, they shielded and even rewarded him,” providing lucrative tax breaks worth millions of dollars, they wrote.
Most troubling, they said, was that officials from the islands “protected Epstein, fostering the perfect conditions for Epstein’s criminal conduct to continue undetected.”
The lawyers added: “For two decades, and for long after JPMC exited Epstein as a client, the entity that most directly failed to protect public safety and most actively facilitated and benefited from Epstein’s continued criminal activity was the plaintiff in this case — the USVI government itself.”
The Virgin Islands, where Epstein had an estate, sued JPMorgan last year, saying its investigation revealed that the financial services giant enabled Epstein’s recruiters to pay victims and was “indispensable to the operation and concealment of the Epstein trafficking enterprise.”
“JPMorgan Chase facilitated Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse, and should be held accountable for violating the law,” a spokesperson from the U.S. Virgin Islands attorney general’s office said in an email Tuesday. “This is an obvious attempt to shift blame away from JPMorgan Chase, which had a legal responsibility to report the evidence in its possession of Epstein’s human trafficking, and failed to do so.”
In their filing Tuesday, the bank’s lawyers said Virgin Islands officials looked the other way when Epstein went through its airports with girls and young women as he donated generously to political campaigns. The lawyers said officials were lenient with requirements that he register as a sex offender, doing inspections of his residence that were “cursory at best.”
“In sum, in exchange for Epstein’s cash and gifts, USVI made life easy for him,” the lawyers said. “The government mitigated any burdens from his sex offender status. And it made sure that no one asked too many questions about his transport and keeping of young girls on his island.”
Portions of the filing were heavily redacted. It asked Judge Jed Rakoff to reject the islands’ attempts to prevent the bank from using defenses at trial that would expose the islands’ role in Epstein’s dealings.
The lawyers wrote that “alleged damages must be balanced against the considerable benefits that USVI reaped from its facilitation of Epstein’s crimes.”
Epstein was 66 when he took his life in August 2019 in a Manhattan federal jail where he was awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. He had pleaded not guilty to charges of sexually abusing dozens of girls, some as young as 14 years old.
