| Announcements | | 
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| | TTLA Annual Conference has moved to June 1-3 in Austin | |
| | We’ll be hosting all the events you’ve come to expect from our December conference. Between the 2-day CLE, parties, meetings, legislative update & special events, you’ll leave the live music capital of the world feeling energized, connected, and bad to the bone! Check out the CLE program agendas for Wednesday and Thursday, which include a live video presentation with David Ball plus family friendly events to make this a true vacation opportunity. Click on the headline to register! | | Share with your FB friends: Texas Watch - Reject the special interests and throw out tort reform | |
| | Alex Winslow (Texas Watch): Reject the special interests and throw out tort reform, Houston Chronicle 5-20-11. Consider these real-world horrors: A child is left in a sweltering van by inattentive, careless daycare personnel and dies. A grandmother in a nursing home is raped by a staff member with a history of sexual offenses. Now consider this: A bill shooting through the Legislature, so-called "tort reform," could force the parents of that child and that elderly rape victim to pay the legal defense of the people who shattered their lives. Click on the headline to read more. | | Products | |
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| | Honda Recalls 2012 Civic for Fuel Line Defect | |
| | Honda Motor Co. says it's recalling more than 1,000 new Honda Civics in the U.S. because they could leak fuel. The 2012 Civic went on sale earlier this spring. The recall affects 1,156 cars, many of which haven't even been sold yet. Honda said they'll be repaired while they're still on dealer lots. Honda said the Civic's fuel line could leak because of a manufacturing error. Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/7573400.html#ixzz1MuIWGgF8 Associated Press, Houston Chronicle 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: Houston Chronicle | | FDA: Avandia to be Pulled from Shelves | |
| | The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced this week that the diabetes drug Avandia will no longer be available in stores starting in November. The drug is one of the most popular diabetes drugs on the market, but came under fire in 2007 when a study was published that showed "that the drug increased heart attack risk by about 40 percent in people with type 2 diabetes." Starting Nov. 18, the drug will only be available through doctors who will be certified to prescribe it and have informed patients of the risks. Steve Sternberg, USA Today 05/18/2011 | | Read Article: USA Today | | Laws/Cases | |
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| | Parents of Dead Virginia Teen Suing Four Loko Maker | |
| | The parents of Bo Rupp, the Centreville teen who was killed last fall after he sat down in the middle of a dark road and was hit by a sport-utility vehicle, sued the maker of the alcohol-infused drink Four Loko. The parents said the 15-year-old drank two cans of Four Loko and didn’t know it would make him intoxicated and act irrationally. Tom Jackman, The Washington Post 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: The Washington Post | | Another Lawsuit Filed In Kleen Energy Plant Explosion | |
| | Massachusetts resident Christopher Robison, seriously injured in last year's deadly explosion at the Kleen Energy power plant in Middletown, has filed the latest in a series of negligence lawsuits against the $1 billion plant's operators and major contractors. Robison, 40, worked for Keystone Construction and Maintenance Services Inc. of Rowley, Mass. He and his wife, Michelle, 42, are seeking at least $6M in damages.The lawsuit names Middletown-based Kleen Energy Systems LLC; O&G Industries of Torrington, the general contactor and a minority owner; and subcontractors Bluewater Energy Solutions Inc., Siemens Energy Inc., Power Plant Management Services LLC, Worley Parsons Group Inc. and Spectra Energy Operating Corp./Algonquin Gas Transmission LLC. JOSH KOVNER, The Hartford Courant 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: The Hartford Courant | | Hearing in Va. to Determine if Whistleblower Suit Against Blackwater Goes to Trial | |
| | A judge will hear arguments on whether a lawsuit filed by two former employees against the security company formerly known as Blackwater should go to trial. Brad and Melan Davis filed the lawsuit in 2008 in federal court in Alexandria under a whistleblower law. They allege Blackwater used excessive force and submitted fraudulent bills for its work in Iraq and Afghanistan. Blackwater, now known as Xe Services, denies the allegations. A trial is scheduled for next month, but both sides have asked the judge to forgo the trial and rule in their favor as a matter of law. Associated Press, The Washington Post 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: The Washington Post | | Mother of Robber Files Wrongful Death Suit | |
| | An Oklahoma woman has filed a lawsuit against an Oklahoma City pharmacist who shot and killed her son during a robbery in May 2009. The 16-year-old boy was trying to rob the store when the pharmacist shot him in the head and five times in the body. The pharmacist is currently on trial for first-degree murder; prosecutors claim he "went too far" in his actions, The Oklahoman reports. The suit is seeking unspecified damages. Nolan Clay, NewsOK.com 05/18/2011 | | Read Article: NewsOK.com | | Issues | |
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| | Texas Politicians Knew TECQ Hid the Amount of Radiation in Drinking Water | |
| | Newly-released e-mails from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality show the agency’s top commissioners directed staff to continue lowering radiation test results, in defiance of federal EPA rules. The e-mails and documents, released under order from the Texas Attorney General to KHOU-TV, also show the agency was attempting to help water systems get out of formally violating federal limits for radiation in drinking water. Without a formal violation, the water systems did not have to inform their residents of the increased health risk. Mark Greenblatt, KHOU-TV 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: KHOU-TV | | BP Reaches $1B Settlement with Mitsui/MOEX Over Gulf Spill | |
| | One of BP’s partners in the failed Macondo well in the Gulf has agreed to pay BP $1.065B to cover its portion of cleanup costs and other liabilities related to the accident.MOEX Offshore 2007, an affiliate of Japanese conglomerate Mitsui and a 10 percent partner in the well, “has joined BP in recognising and acknowledging the findings by the Presidential Commission that the accident was the result of a number of separate risk factors, oversights and outright mistakes by multiple parties and a number of causes,” BP said in a statement BP said the money will be applied to the $20 billion trust it established to meet individual, business and government claims, as well as the cost of cleanup and restoration. Tom Fowler (blog), Houston Chronicle 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: Houston Chronicle | | Report Faults Mine Owner for Explosion That Killed 29 | |
| | In the first comprehensive state report on the 2010 coal mine disaster in West Virginia, an independent team of investigators has put the blame squarely on the owner of the mine, Massey Energy, concluding that it had “made life difficult” for miners who tried to address safety and built “a culture in which wrongdoing became acceptable.” The report named Massey as the culprit, using blunt language to describe what it said was a pattern of negligence that ultimately led to the deaths of 29 miners on April 5, 2010, in the worst American mining disaster in 40 years. SABRINA TAVERNISE, The New York Times 05/20/2011 | | Read Article: The New York Times | |
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