REPOST: Pushed Out of a Job Early

Age discrimination claims are on the rise as members of the post-World War II generation enter their 60s. This year, one of the most notable age discrimination lawsuits was filed against Rutgers University by four of its long-time administrators. Michael Winerip of The New York Times discusses these lawsuits and their implications on workplace settings today.

If there is one thing older workers fear in this economy, it’s losing their jobs as they approach retirement. But that is exactly what happened in March to Richard L. White, who was the director of career services at Rutgers University for 22 years.

From left, Mark Kerr, Dorothy Kerr, Chrystal McArthur and Richard White,
who were longtime administrators at Rutgers.
Image Source: nytimes.com

Mr. White, 63, had received positive annual reviews from 1990 to 2011. In 2009, the supervising administrator wrote that his work was “conducted at the highest possible level!” 

He was considered a leader in the field, winning a Fulbright grant in 2005, the first year it was offered for career services directors. Rutgers, the biggest public university in New Jersey, was ranked 21st nationally in 2010 by The Wall Street Journal for placing undergraduates; in 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked the business school 33rd in the nation for M.B.A. pay. 

But none of this information was included when Gregory S. Jackson, now the university president’s chief of staff, wrote Mr. White’s performance appraisal for the first time in April 2012. Mr. Jackson, who had recently taken oversight of career services, wrote that Mr. White had failed to meet standards in every category. 

Soon after, Mr. White was removed as director; within a year, he was fired. 

In January, shortly before leaving, Mr. White filed an age discrimination lawsuit against Rutgers. Three other longtime administrators who were also terminated joined the lawsuit, bringing into the open an increasingly contentious workplace issue. 

Age discrimination claims are on the rise as members of the post-World War II baby boom enter their 60s. Last year, 22,857 people filed age-related complaints with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, compared with 16,548 in 2006. 

Mr. White, as well as two other career services administrators fired from Rutgers — Dorothy Kerr, 60, and Chrystal McArthur, 64 — had received positive job reviews until Mr. Jackson became involved in 2012. (The fourth who sued, Ms. Kerr’s husband, Mark, 58, did not receive formal appraisals because he was not a supervisor.) 

According to Ms. Kerr, who had spent more than 40 years at Rutgers, Mr. Jackson “kept asking us when we were going to retire.” 

In the view of the fired administrators, Mr. Jackson wanted to bring in his own people, most of whom were younger, and instead of offering them other positions, dismissed them without cause. 

In an email, Peter J. McDonough Jr., a Rutgers spokesman, said that university officials believed the lawsuit was “without merit” and that they would “vigorously defend our practices.” He noted that the new career services director, Richard Hearin, 64, is older than Mr. White. University officials also said that an investigation by Rutgers’s Office of Employment Equity found no policy violation. 

A lawyer for Rutgers, John Bennett, said he was unable to go into further detail because of an Oct. 10 court order restricting the release of personnel documents. 

(Before that order, however, both the university and the fired administrators provided The New York Times with copies of job assessments that indicated they met all standards in 2011, but none in 2012.)

Once older workers lose their jobs, many never regain their former standard of living. On average, those who do find work make 20 percent less than they had in their previous positions, the biggest income loss for any age group, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. 

While Mr. White has found part-time employment at another university, the position does not include benefits and he is spending $2,400 a month for his family’s health coverage. None of his former colleagues have found full-time work either. 

Winning an age discrimination case in a federal court has become particularly difficult since a 2009 Supreme Court ruling requiring an employee to prove that age was the determining factor for a layoff. In a few states, however, including New Jersey, the standard of proof is lower, requiring only that workers show that age was one factor. 

The lawsuit against Rutgers and Mr. Jackson represents a third instance of high-ranking officials facing public claims of abusive or discriminatory behavior since Robert L. Barchi became president last year. It has received much less publicity than the others, which revolve around the athletic department and the firing of Mike Rice, the men’s basketball coach, after a video surfaced that showed him shouting homophobic slurs and throwing balls at players.

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Atty. Craig Seldin’s broad law practice includes employment law. Read more about his career here.

REPOST: Ex-prosecutor surrenders law license

Ken Anderson, a former Texas judge and prosecutor, was sentenced to license revocation and nine-day imprisonment. He was proven guilty of withholding exculpatory evidence that led to the 25-year imprisonment of a man whose wife's murder turned out to be the doing of another man. Read the full report from The Columbian.

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A former Texas judge and prosecutor agreed to serve nine days in jail and surrender his law license Friday for withholding evidence in his prosecution of a man who was exonerated in 2011 after serving 25 years in prison for his wife's murder.

The hearing took place at the same courthouse north of Austin where Ken Anderson once heard cases as a district court judge.

Anderson agreed not to contest a judge's criminal contempt order after he was arrested in April on a felony charge of tampering with evidence, a misdemeanor charge of tampering with a government record, and the contempt finding that as a prosecutor he lied to a judge during a pretrial hearing for Michael Morton, who was eventually convicted and sentenced to life in prison.

"This is a big day for a lot of reasons. We have never heard of any prosecutor being punished for deliberately refusing to turn over exculpatory evidence," said Barry Scheck, one of Morton's attorneys and a founder of the Innocence Project in New York.

Prosecutors are granted immunity and rarely prosecuted for alleged misconduct, including withholding exculpatory evidence favorable to the defense.

The case against Anderson was spearheaded by attorneys for Morton, who was freed after DNA tests implicated another man in the murder of Morton's wife, Christine, who was found beaten to death in the bedroom of their Williamson County home in 1986. Mark Norwood was convicted of the murder in March and received a life sentence.

Morton was in court Friday and celebrated after the hearing.

"I said the only thing that I want, as a baseline, is Ken Anderson to be off the bench and no longer practicing law — and both of those things have happened, and more," Morton said.

As part of Friday's agreement, the judge dismissed the two charges against Anderson, who agreed to complete 500 hours of community service and pay a $500 fine.

There are many people in the world who are wrongly accused of crimes. Unable to get sufficient criminal defense services, they suffer long years of imprisonment, life-long social stigma, and execution at worst. Craig Seldin is a criminal defense attorney who represents clients charged with state misdemeanors and federal crimes. Follow this Twitter page to keep abreast of the latest updates in criminal law.

REPOST: N.Y. Task Force seeks laws to fight 21st-century crimes

The 'city that never sleeps' gets a lot busier as it seeks to update state laws to fight digital age crimes.  Bloomberg.com reports:

New York needs to update state laws dating from 1986 to better prosecute white-collar criminals, according to a special task force report released by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.

Current laws predate the Internet, social media and e-commerce and can’t keep pace with increasingly sophisticated frauds, Vance said today at New York University’s Center for the Administration of Criminal Law. Proposals include expanding the definition of larceny to cover the theft of software and personal identifying information, and eliminating a requirement that schemes to defraud target more than one victim.

Image Source: www.topnews.in

“The Internet has become our 21st-century crime scene,” Vance said, noting that the most recent overhaul of New York’s penal code dates from the invention of Xerox Corp.’s first fax machine.

For example, old definitions of larceny don’t cover theft by duplication, a common means of stealing computer code, Vance said. The task force recommends expanding the definition of “computer material” to let prosecutors target hacking into another person’s private e-mail or webcam, and combat using computers to spy on unwitting victims.

Criminal law in New York State has been mostly unchanged since 1965, and the last notable alterations to white-collar crime enforcement were made in 1986, leaving fraud and corruption laws antiquated, Vance’s office has said.

Image Source: www.nytimes.com

State Legislature

The task force, convened almost a year ago, includes district attorneys, academics and defense lawyers. Their recommendations will be presented to the governor and the state Legislature for consideration in the 2014 January session. Aside from cybercrime, today’s report targets four main areas: fraud, elder fraud, public corruption and procedural reforms.

Punishment guidelines for fraud should be graduated so that more serious schemes are tied to longer sentences, according to the report. Under current law, a criminal who attempts to defraud victims of $2 will be punished the same as someone who attempts to swindle them of $2,000.

Some of the changes would help combat what the Securities Investor Protection Corp. estimates is $10 billion to $40 billion a year in U.S. investment fraud.

Because New York is home to the third-largest elder population in the U.S., new laws should make it harder for criminals who get “technical consent” to take assets from elderly victims in poor physical or mental health, according to the report.

Image Source: www.madhyamam.com

‘Meaningfully Consent’

Prosecutors should be able to make a case that victims may have been unable to “meaningfully consent,” said Frank. A Sedita III, Erie County district attorney and the task force’s co-chairman.

Public corruption should be subject to stronger anti-bribery measures and a new law of “undisclosed self-dealing by public servants,” according to the task force. That would make it a crime for a public servant to have a secret interest in a government business above a certain threshold, such as owning property through a shell company that’s involved in public business.

Based in Houston, Texas, Craig Seldin is an attorney with a diverse practice that handles civil, business, and criminal cases.  He is a member of the State Bar of Texas, and was the recipient of the 2011 Wow Attorney of the Year Award.  Visit this Facebook page for more updates on his practice.

REPOST: Pledge of Allegiance challenged in Massachusetts Supreme Court

A family in Boston claims that the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance violate the state’s equal rights laws. Sophia Rosenbaum of NBC News explains more of the case in the report below:

A family in suburban Boston hopes to change the phrasing of the Pledge of Allegiance to remove two words they claim violate students' rights.

The family is challenging the pledge, which students recite daily in U.S. public schools, claiming the words "under God" violate the state's equal rights laws.

The plaintiffs, who have requested anonymity through their lawyers, are taking an unconventional approach to challenging the pledge. Past cases argued the words “under God” violated the Constitution’s separation of church and state.

Congress added “under God” to the pledge in 1954.

Image Source: www.nbcnews.com

This case, however, makes a different argument. 

David Niose, former president of the American Humanist Association, and the plaintiffs' representative, opened his arguments Wednesday saying the pledge’s use of “under God” violates the Equal Rights Amendment of the Massachusetts Constitution and is an issue of discrimination.

Niose said the pledge’s repetitiveness in the public school system is indoctrinating and alienating to atheists.  

“It validates believers as good patriots and it invalidates atheists as non-believers at best and unpatriotic at worst,” he said.

Eric Rassbach, deputy general counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, intervened on behalf of a family in the Acton-Boxborough Regional School District, the defendant in the case, who would like to have their child continue reciting the pledge as it is presently written.

“Most people do not view reciting the Pledge of Allegiance as saying a prayer,” Rassbach said. “It would be terrible to enshrine in the law this kind of allergy to God that the plaintiffs have.”

Rassbach added that it has been illegal to force someone recite the pledge since 1943. The landmark U.S. Supreme Court case West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette ruled that students could not be forced to salute the American flag or say the pledge in school. It was considered a huge victory for Jehovah’s Witnesses, who cannot salute or pledge to symbols, according to their religious beliefs.

Both Noise and Rassbach said a decision will likely come within six months. Since this case is an appeal, there is no testimony and the panel of seven Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court judges will decide the case based on court briefs.

Rassbach is worried that if the state Supreme Court rules in favor of the plaintiffs, the case would spur copycat lawsuits in other states with similar equal rights’ laws.

“If they succeed in their goals here,” he said, “they will attempt to replicate it elsewhere.”

Atty. Craig Seldin’s broad law practice includes civil cases, such as equal rights issues. Receive regular updates on law and other social issues from this Facebook page.

Out-of-court settlements: When going to court is too much trouble

When two parties have a case, the usual resolution to the conflict that led to it isn’t always a drawn-out trial in a court of law. At times, a long drawn-out legal battle would be a considerable effort on the part of the plaintiff and defendant, and they may -- if they choose to agree on certain terms -- settle the dispute out of court.

Image source: ecba.com

Out-of-court settlements are agreements settled by parties of a pending lawsuit done to resolve the dispute without the supervision of a judicial entity. In these agreements, the dissenting parties usually agree to hold no more interventions from a judge or other supervising entity afterward. In some places, some resolution must be sought before a trial can even begin.

Image source: worldbank.org

These settlements are usually seen as an alternative to a costly litigation, providing the dissenting parties with the compensation that resolves both their issues without resorting to an arduous trial in the courts. This is doubly so if the plaintiffs are uncertain if their case would stand in a court of law; a case that isn’t valid stands to act only to waste their time in court.

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Settlements are also preferable to trials in cases where the parties would not get as much from their case in court, particularly if the costs of the trial do not justify the awards one might get from a trial.

For further details on out-of-court settlements, visit this webpage.

Lawyers, like Craig Seldin, are often sought out to help facilitate out-of-court settlements. Visit this website for more information.

The Wineville Chicken Coop Murders, Reverend Gustav Briegleb, and the LA police’s moribund reputation in the ‘20s

It was the late ‘20s and the Los Angeles police department’s reputation was not in good light.

There were allegations of unfair treatment and police brutality, as publicly and blatantly decreed by Reverend Gustav Briegleb, a Presbyterian minister and radio evangelist who led the publication of many causes in the city in the ‘20s and ‘30s. One of the famous cases that shook LA police at that time was the series of abductions and murders of young boys in California, an event now popularly known as The Wineville Chicken Coop Murders.

Image Source: chickenmurders.blogspot.com

In 1926, ranch owner Gordon Stewart Northcott sent his 13-year-old nephew Sanford Clark from his home in Canada to his farmstead in Wineville, California. Northcott physically and sexually abused Clark, which soon came to the attention of the former’s sister, Jessie, during the day she visited the ranch. At the night of her visit, she learned of the murders that had taken place at Northcott’s place, and immediately reported it to the American Embassy in Canada. At once, the news became known to the entire Los Angeles and entire America after the LA police came to gather evidences against Northcott, leading to his arrest. But this did not leave the LA police unscathed.

Image Source: infoczarina.blogspot.com

Reverend Gustav Briegleb’s social activism was essential to the reformation of the LA police, following the futile attempts of the police department to find the missing son of a single mother named Christine Collins. Reverend Briegleb castigated the police department’s duplicitous acts to close the Collins case instantly and refusal to accept that it was related to the Wineville murders.

Image Source: chickenmurders.blogspot.com

After Northcott’s capture and execution, the LA police went to several reforms, in the hopes of finally creating a good name and gaining back the public’s trust.


Atty. Craig Seldin’s broad law practice includes civil rights-related cases. Learn more about his legal expertise here.

Unlike: The dark side of social media

The deaths of teenagers Rehtaeh Parsons and Audrie Pott has put the spotlight back again on social media just a few weeks after the Stubenville rape case judge warned teens to watch what they tweet.

Image source: salon.com

The suicides of Parsons and Pott, and the Stubenville case highlight how crimes linked to the use of social media sites have increased remarkably since 2008, when the phenomenon of social networking crime was comparatively minor. These days, however, social media has revealed its “dark side,” as perpetrators have used sites such as Facebook and Twitter to further torment their victims.

Image source: feministing.com

Rebecca Campbell, a professor of psychology at Michigan State University wrote for CNN, “The ubiquity of cell phones with cameras and the power of the Internet make for faster, farther-reaching gossip, name-calling, character assassination, and ultimately, despair for the victim.” This became very clear in the cases of Parsons and Pott when evidence of their alleged sexual assault went viral, pushing the teens to end their own lives.

Image source: vimeo.com

The tragic deaths of Parsons and Pott have prompted calls for more stringent measures to curtail cyberbullying and other social media-related crimes. But since laws are not yet in place to protect young people from such acts, the best action for now is to educate the youth about the benign use of social media.

A member of the State Bar of Texas, Craig Seldin was voted Texas’ Wow Attorney of the Year for 2011. Learn more about his practice and areas of specialization here.

The rules of structural encroachment

This is the quandary: You have decided to rent a place near your new office because it was too far from your home. Now, two years have gone by, and you decided to go home, only to find out that somebody has invaded your place, or precisely, a part of your ownership. Your neighbor has just extended his backyard to yours.

This circumstance is called encroachment, or when another person builds a structure that meddles on your property, be it just an awning, or any physical structure for that matter.

Image source: alexandercitylandsurveying.com

Like any other civil case, you can just ignore it. You can also settle it with the offender democratically. However, if things went irreparable through these two constitutional processes, you can always take it to court.

In court, you just have to prove that you own the property, which is legally called as “quiet title action,” and that your neighbor is without doubts using your land, which lawyers call an “ejectment action.”

Image source: economictimes.indiatimes.com

However, reducing litigation length can be done in two ways: through adverse possession and prescriptive easements. In order to win in a claim for adverse possession, you just have to prove that you own your land legally by presenting important documents—titles, deed of sale, tax records—that would establish your claim. Conversely, one of the most popular methods of prescriptive easements is by just easing your accusation to “claiming” instead of “possessing.” In this way, your neighbor would end up paying for the taxes that encompass the entire period of his intrusion, making him appear as a renter, not as an intruder.

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Atty. Craig Seldin’s broad law practice includes civil cases, such as different encroachment issues. This website provides additional information on Atty. Seldin’s practice.

Irreconcilable differences: A staple ground for divorce

Image source: skelton.co.za

In a country that is administrated through a federal government, laws and their respective implementations may differ from one state to another—including the divorce law.

Nonetheless, though each has its own unique tenet about divorce, the states share a very strong probable cause to nullify a marriage: irreconcilable differences.

“Irreconcilable differences”—as ground for divorce—becomes valid when it is already impossible for a married couple to live together normally and harmoniously, or when a wedded male and a female can no longer agree with basic and fundamental issues involving the entire family or the marriage itself.


Image source: telegraph.co.uk

The good thing about using “irreconcilable differences” as grounds for divorce is that there’s no such thing as “trifle” when it comes to determining its weight of validity. A simple difference in choosing what particular bed sheet color would be used for the week or disagreeing on each other’s political view or a plain annoyance on hearing the other party’s loud snorting when sleeping can be enough to nullify a marriage. Any matter, as long as it becomes a hindrance to a couple’s harmonious living, can be a solid cause and foundation to push for a marriage’s revocation.

At some point, both parties have to agree

Divorce, however, will not come to a conclusion if both parties would not agree that their marriage can’t be saved due to their differences in opinion. If this is the case, it would not arrive to its final stage, to irrevocability.


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Atty. Craig Seldin has several years of experience in handling divorce case. This website provides more information about his practice.

Criminal minds: When neuroscience takes the stand

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It is a type of defense that is seen more often in movies and television shows than in real life, but these days, lawyers are increasingly using brain scans and other neurological evidence to defend their clients, a study reveals.

Duke University researcher Nita Farahany asserts that the number of cases in which judges have mentioned neuroscience evidence in their opinion increased from 112 in 2007 to more than 1,500 in 2011. Farahany believes that the actual number of cases in which neuroscience evidence is presented is likely much higher as many lawsuits are settled outside of court.

Some scientists believe that neuroscience can explain—if not predict—criminal activity based on brain scans. Neurocience—the science of the brain and how it works—is taking the stand and beginning to challenge society’s notion on crime and punishment.

Image source: ncdistrictattorney.org

The advances in science have put on center stage new technologies, like structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), positron emission tomography (PET) scans, and DNA analysis which criminal defense lawyers use to explain their client’s mental makeup as the reason for their criminal behavior.

A series of recent studies has established that psychopathic rapists and murderers have distinct brain structures that show up when their heads are scanned using MRI.

The new technologies, however, leave unanswered the issue of whether criminal courts are the right place to use this new information. Nevertheless, as science continues to improve, neuroscience will continue to be used by both criminal attorneys and prosecutors. And questions, such as to what degree a brain injury can make someone commit a crime, will only become harder to answer.

Image source: stanford.edu

Atty. Craig Seldin has several years of experience in criminal defense. This website provides more information about his practice.

Consumer protection: Deceptive trade practices

From consumerprotection.uslegal.com

Federal legislation and statutes in every state prohibit employment of unfair or deceptive trade practices and unfair competition in business. The Federal Trade Commission regulates federal laws designed to prohibit a series of specific practices prohibited in interstate commerce. Several states have established consumer protection offices as part of the state attorney general offices.

The Federal Trade Commission Act (FTCA), originally passed in 1914 and amended several times thereafter, was the original statute in the United States prohibiting “unfair or deceptive trade acts or practices.” Development of the federal law was related to federal antitrust and trademark infringement legislation. Prior to the enactment in the 1960s of state statutes prohibiting deceptive trade practices, the main focus of state law in this area was “unfair competition,” which refers to the tort action for practices employed by businesses to confuse consumers as to the source of a product. The tort action for a business “passing off” its goods as those of another was based largely on the common law tort action for trademark infringement.

Because the law governing deceptive trade practices was undefined and unclear, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws in 1964 drafted the Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act. The NCCUSL revised this uniform law in 1966. The law was originally “designed to bring state law up to date by removing undue restrictions on the common law action for deceptive trade practices.” Only eleven states have adopted this act, but it has had a significant effect on other states. Most state deceptive or unfair trade practices statutes were originally enacted between the mid-1960s and mid-1970s.