| | V.A. Punished Critics on Staff, Doctors Assert | |  | | In interviews with The New York Times, a half-dozen current and former staff members — four doctors, a nurse and an office manager in Delaware, Pennsylvania and Alaska — said they faced retaliation for reporting systemic problems. Their accounts, some corroborated by internal documents, portray a culture of silence and intimidation within the department and echo experiences detailed by other V.A. personnel in court filings, government investigations and congressional testimony, much of it largely
ERIC LICHTBLAU, The New York Times 06/16/2014    | | Read Article: The New York Times | | Little-Known Treasury Fund Has Tab for VA Settlements | | | | Medical malpractice and other foul-ups from the Legionnaires' disease outbreak in the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System could cost the government hundreds of thousands — if not millions — of dollars in civil settlements, lawyers predict. Yet the Department of Veterans Affairs won't shell out a dime for payments, which would come from a little-known cash pool set aside exclusively to cover large judgments against federal agencies, according to the Treasury Department. Judgment Fund payouts for VA-related issues ranged from $89.9 million in 2011 to $189.6 million in 2012 and $100.3 million in 2013. Those payments have no effect on the VA's budget, VA officials confirmed in a statement.
Adam Smeltz , Pittsburgh Tribune-Review 06/16/2014 | | Read Article: Pittsburgh Tribune-Review | | GM Says It Has a Shield From Some Liability | | | | GM is turning to Chapter 11 to try to solve a new problem: potential liability stemming from the ignition-switch problems that emerged publicly in February. In recent weeks, the company's lawyers have argued that the 2009 bankruptcy filing, in which the debt-laden "Old GM" sold its best assets to a new, government-backed company and left the rest behind, shields it from certain liabilities stemming from its ignition-switch problems. Whether GM gets has to pay for those liabilities is now largely in the hands of U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Gerber in Manhattan.
Ashby Jones, Wall Street Journal - $$ Subscription Required 06/16/2014 | | Read Article: Wall Street Journal - $$ Subscription Required($) | | Bank Account Screening Tool Is Scrutinized as Excessive | | | | More than a million Americans who have been effectively blacklisted from the mainstream financial system because they overdrew their accounts or bounced a check — mistakes that routinely bedevil young and low-income consumers, financial counselors say. Such databases, used by Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and other big banks, were intended to weed out serial fraudsters. Now, regulators say, banks are screening out potential customers and swelling the ranks of the so-called unbanked — the roughly 10 million households in the United States that lack even a basic bank account.
JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG and MICHAEL CORKERY , The New York Times 06/16/2014 | | Read Article: The New York Times | | Parkland Psych ER is Again Scene of Patient Abuse | | | | Texas health authorities are investigating the March patient gagging incident — the first abuse in Parkland’s psychiatric ER to become public since the hospital hired a new chief executive. One nurse involved in the gagging was also involved in the 2011 restraint of a psych ER patient whose death triggered a federal investigation and virtual takeover of Parkland. Because of the gagging incident, regulators are investigating whether there have been more “significant, egregious deficiencies and a failure to correct them or an attempt to hide them,” said health department spokeswoman Carrie Williams. “It’s an open investigation, and there have been no findings in this case so far.”
MILES MOFFEIT AND BROOKS EGERTON, The Dallas Morning News 06/16/2014 | | Read Article: The Dallas Morning News | | Alabama State University Faces Retaliation Lawsuit | | | | A professor at Alabama State University has filed a lawsuit against the school alleging that he was retaliated against after complaining about racially discriminatory practices. The lawsuit contends that the plaintiff, who is white, faced retaliation by the historically black university after he and his same-sex partner filed racial discrimination complaints. The lawsuit was filed last week in U.S. District Court in Montgomery and names the university along with eight current and former university officials.
Kent Faulk, AL.com 06/14/2014 | | Read Article: AL.com | | Daycare Owners Can’t Escape Possible Abuse Damages in Bankruptcy | | | | Owners of a Delaware daycare center whose workers pushed three-year-old boys into a fistfight and then captured the event on a cell phone video can’t use bankruptcy to get out from under a possible damage award, a judge said this week. The ruling, from U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Brendan Shannon, came in the Chapter 13 cases of daycare owners Colleen M. Grosso and Teresa Perez, who filed for bankruptcy last year after being sued for damages by families of the two little boys in the video.
Peg Brickley, WSJ Blogs 06/16/2014 | | Read Article: WSJ Blogs | | |
