News & Media
RLG Defeats ‘Judicial Error’ Defense in Legal Malpractice Case
RLG attorney Trey A. Rothell secured a victory recently in a Las Vegas legal malpractice case, overcoming a proposed affirmative defense where the defendants tried to blame a judge’s error—instead of their own actions —for a poor outcome. The case stems from a defamation lawsuit filed in 2019. A real estate agent sued a home buyer who made a complaint to the state’s real estate board. Complaints to the state real estate board are privileged, and even if they are false, can not be the subject of a lawsuit. However, the complaint also was simply based on opinion, which rendered it doubly un-actionable. RLG represented the defendant and filed an Anti-SLAPP Motion, but both the trial court and the Nevada
These Pro-Lifers Don’t Love Abortion Bans
Audra Worlow thinks of herself as pro-life. A 32-year-old, married stay-at-home mom in Ohio, Worlow takes her Catholic faith seriously. She’s against both in vitro fertilization (IVF), which she calls “another form of eugenics,” and surrogacy. She thinks abortion is not only harmful to babies but also “psychologically damaging to women.”
Randazza Legal Group Shuts Down Scam Website
Consumer Opinion, LLC runs the website www.pissedconsumer.com. A scam artist copied the website and registered the domain <pissedconsumercomplaints.com> in an attempt to scam users into believing that his website was affiliated with Pissed Consumer, and siphon off not only web traffic, but it may have also been used to unethically gather information about its users. Led by RLG Partner Ron Green, assisted by Partner Marc Randazza, the firm filed a complaint before the World Intellectual Property Organization (“WIPO”) seeking to shut down the scam website as a form of cybersquatting. Attorney Green was the pioneering attorney for domain name litigation in Nevada, and Attorney Randazza studied WIPO practices and procedures while earning his advanced law degree in International
Marc Randazza quoted in Worcester Telegram regarding his appellate arguments in the ‘Canton 9’ First Amendment case
Randazza – a colorful Las Vegas attorney whose work has involved Satanists, neo-Nazis, porn websites and rights to the Klingon language – complained that First Amendment rights are nonnegotiable. “We don’t ask the government where we can speak or assemble. We presumptively can, and it’s up to the government to show why we can’t.” “Are you flatly saying that you’re unwilling to have any discussion with Canton?” Lynch asked. “I can’t think of anything more constitutionally uncomfortable than saying you have to have a discussion with the government before having a protest,” he answered.
Courthouse News Covers Marc Randazza’s Appellate arguments in First Amendment case for Karen Read protesters
BOSTON (CN) — Police in Canton, Massachusetts — already under fire for supposedly framing Karen Read for the death of her police officer boyfriend — came under further attack in the First Circuit Wednesday for arresting citizens who peacefully protested about the case. But the judges seemed disinclined to rule on the issue and instead used the oral argument to urge the parties to resolve their dispute out of court.
(PAYWALL) Health supplement company accuses former COO of trade secret theft
International Health Brands takes aim at former COO alleging trade secret theft of ingredients in immunity gummies | Accusations include deceptive marketing strategies, infringement, unfair competition, and misappropriation of trade secrets.
Silly Banana “Art” Case Highlights Serious Copyright Legal Issues
If you ever wonder why court cases take so long to resolve, maybe it is because sometimes the courts are bogged down in really silly lawsuits like this one. But, silly as it is, it is a great opportunity to learn some fundamental copyright issues. In this case, Joe Morford duct taped a banana and an orange to a wall and called it “art.” See right. Some time later, Maurizio Cattelan much more famously, for some reason, duct taped a banana to a wall, called it “art” and got paid $100,000 by some imbecile. Morford sued Cattelan for copyright infringement and lost, and now the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed that loss. See Morford v. Cattelan (11th Cir. Unpub.
Marc. J. Randazza Quoted by Fox News on Telles Trial
A Las Vegas attorney weighed in as the start of the trial of the former Las Vegas-area politician accused of killing an investigative journalist began on Monday with jury selection. Robert Telles, a former Democrat Clark County administrator of estates, has remained jailed since his arrest in September 2022, days after Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter Jeff German was found slashed and stabbed to death outside his home over Labor Day weekend.
FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION WIN FOR A MOTHER SEPARATED FROM HER SON!
In Foy v. Florida Commission on Offender Review, Attorneys Carrie Goldberg, Andrew Greenlee, and Marc Randazza prevailed when seeking a court order that a mother could communicate with her formerly incarcerated son. Ms. Foy’s son was a drug addict who, while under the spell of this evil, committed heinous crimes against her. Foy’s maternal instincts and religious conviction eventually compelled her to find forgiveness for her son. Ms. Foy and her son are close now. Her son has been released from prison after 13 years, and both he and his mother were looking forward to being reunified. But, the government would not so much as allow her to speak to her son. The Court granted our request in this order: For
Randazza Legal Group Secures First Amendment Victory in First Circuit
Randazza Legal Group has secured a significant victory for free speech rights in the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. The case, Berge v. School Committee of Gloucester, No. 22-1954, sets a crucial precedent protecting citizen journalists and public speech. In a rare application of the obvious unconstitutionality exception to the qualified immunity doctrine, the First Circuit denied qualified immunity protection to public officials who threatened legal action against a citizen journalist for publishing a video of their interactions. The First Circuit’s opinion stated, “If the First Amendment means anything in a situation like this, it is that public officials cannot … threaten a person with legal action under an obviously inapt statute simply because he published speech
Foy v. Florida Commission on Offender Review
CASE OVERVIEW UPDATE – ON 25 JULY, THE COURT GRANTED OUR MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION, ALLOWING MS. FOY TO COMMUNICATE WITH HER SON! ORDER HERE This is a case about the right to forgive. This “Right to Forgive” is an admittedly novel First Amendment theory, but we believe in it wholeheartedly. This case could also be characterized as a right to due process for crime victims case. This right to forgive resides at the confluence of the free association and free exercise rights found in the First Amendment. Further, the Florida Constitution protects a crime victim’s rights, which must also include the right to forgive. The government deprived Plaintiff Teena Foy of her rights by barring her from any contact
Journalist Suppression Case on Appeal – McBreairty v. Brewer School Department
Brewer, Maine: A group of students circulated a petition pertaining to bathroom policies at Brewer High School. The school shut down the petition, threatening the students with discipline if they continued circulating it. The students also report that they were threatened that the petition was a “hate crime.” (The school denies this). Shawn McBreairty is a journalist who wrote about the story, and included a photograph that was widely circulating on social media. The school district sent a threat to McBreairty. The DrummondWoodsum law firm, on the district’s behalf, sent a threat telling McBreairty that if he did not remove certain material from the article, including the photograph, they would take “further action” against him. In that threat, they cited
The Right to Protest – Condemned in the Same Courthouse as Sacco and Vanzetti
The Karen Read case is, to put it lightly, high profile in Massachusetts. Many believe that she is being framed for a murder. Others find that ridiculous, and think those who believe it are conspiracy theorists. The New York Post has a good primer on the case, here. I am agnostic about Karen Reed’s guilt or innocence. Nevertheless, in the prosecution, the First Amendment has been under attack by the Government, and as of the date of this post, the Massachusetts courts have supported that attack. I initially leaned toward thinking that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts wouldn’t ever frame a murder suspect, even if that case was taking place in the exact same courthouse where Sacco and Vanzetti
Spearmint Rhino sues competitor over ‘South Park’-inspired name
A pair of Las Vegas strip clubs are in court to decide whether one’s parody-based name is too close to the other’s. Spearmint Rhino, a chain of adult entertainment clubs since 1992 with a Las Vegas location near the Strip, alleges that competitor Peppermint Hippo infringes on the club’s trademark because the names are “confusingly similar,” according to a complaint filed in the U.S. District Court of Nevada.
Protester Case – The Canton Four
In 1927 the Commonwealth of Massachusetts executed Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. History has shown that they were framed, and the Commonwealth has at least acknowledged that they did not get a fair trial. Nearly a century later, in the same courthouse where the Commonwealth gave itself an indelible stain of shame, there is another trial that has many hallmarks of government impropriety and corruption. Citizens have a right to call attention to that fact. Citizens have a right to protest. Citizens have a right to stand on the side of the road holding a sign that says “JUSTICE” without being harassed or prosecuted. In Canton, MA a group of people wanted to protest. The government didn’t want them to,
GOP rep sues House speaker after newsletter critical of lawmakers, Whitmer is blocked
Lansing — Republican state Rep. Matt Maddock has filed a federal lawsuit against Democratic House Speaker Joe Tate and House Business Office employees for refusing to use taxpayer resources to pay for the printing and mailing of a constituent newsletter that criticized Tate and Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
The FDNY and Elon Musk Really Need to Recognize Free Speech
Firefighters booed Attorney General Letitia James. SpaceX employees wrote a scathing letter about Elon Musk. They have every right to do so.
Job Posting – Transactional Lawyer Needed
We are known for our First Amendment advocacy, but that’s not all we do. We have a lot of business needs for our clients. However, we are not (nor will we ever be) a “form churning farm.” Businesses and individuals come to us because they need creative solutions to problems, and out of the box thinking for how to prevent them. A lot of our clients come to us after speaking to a number of other lawyers, all of whom say “I just don’t know how to handle this.” We’ve represented Nevada brothel operations to national religious organizations, journalism start ups, and big companies (that we can’t disclose) on major issues that nobody else felt comfortable handling. You might do an
Privacy vs. First Amendment Right to Publish
Well, we made a promise we swore we’d always remember No retreat, baby, no surrender Like soldiers in the winter’s night With a vow to defend No retreat, baby, no surrender -Bruce Springsteen BREWER, Maine: In the case of McBreairty v. Brewer, the federal court ordered the parties to brief the issue of whether a journalist can publish a photograph if the photo had been created in violation of a privacy statute. It is not good form to take an absolute position in a legal debate. We should always leave some room to fall back, somewhere we can retreat to if we are proven wrong. But sometimes, we do not do that. This is one of those times. If
City Violates First Amendment and Due Process Rights
Gloucester, Mass., Plaintiff is an elected official, dedicated to community service, who discussed a volunteer program with a constituent who happens to be a high school student. Defendants, seeking political advantage, mischaracterized the encounter as something nefarious. Defendants unfairly maligned Plaintiff and barred him from entering a school premises or attending school sponsored events, in an attempt to smear him. In a meeting with the City Attorney, the Plaintiff was told that he “may feel as though [his] due process rights have been violated, and I would likely agree with [him], but that this is a much better result than the alternative.” The implication here was never clarified, but the threat was palpable. RLG filed suit on behalf of the
