It is with a broken heart that I write about the untimely death of Justice Harris Hines, former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia. Below is a wonderful obituary by Katheryn Tucker of The Daily Report.
Justice Harris Hines was a walking example of how we, as lawyers, should conduct ourselves both professionally and personally. He had a wonderful sense of humor and could tell a story better than Mark Twain. Our family enjoyed a close relationship with him and his beautiful wife, Helen, and I will be eternally grateful for the times we had together. They knew our daughter was a soccer goalkeeper in high school and often compared it to being the parents of a football field goal kicker, as they were with their son, Hap. We connected knowing that your child, as goalkeeper or as field goal kicker, could end up being the the MVP of a win or could be the blame for a heartbreaking loss. We enjoyed many dinners and State Bar trips together. One of my favorite moments was riding back to Jekyll Island on the bus from Jacksonville after UGA had beaten Florida and calling Justice George Carley to share the victory with him on the speakerphone. We sipped Woodford Reserve bourbon together on an Executive Committee trip to Lexington, Kentucky and often shared that fond memory with each other. I am thankful that just two weeks ago Bill and I enjoyed dinner with him and Helen at the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA) dinner and we once again got to experience Harris’s sparkling sense of humor and laughter. He was proudly a Georgia Bulldog, and referred to The University of Georgia as simply “The University.” When we told him that our daughter, Alex, had just been admitted to the University of Georgia Law School, he was as proud and as happy for her as if she were his own grandchild.
I think the mark of a man can be summed up in one of my favorite scriptures, 1 Corinthians 13:1, that begins Love is patient, Love is kind. I believe we can easily substitute “Harris” for “Love” in that scripture , and that should give you the essence of Harris Hines: Harris was patient, Harris was kind, Harris was not jealous, Harris did not brag, Harris was not arrogant, Harris was not easily angered, Harris did not keep a record of wrongs, Harris did not rejoice in unrighteousness but rejoiced in truth.
Posted in: Appellate Law, Independent Judiciary, Public Service, State Bar of Georgia and The Legal Profession
I have been following the talc trials against Johnson & Johnson regarding the claims that their powder product gives women ovarian cancer and lung cancer. I hope you have been, too. They are, obviously, very interesting. I can’t look at the Johnson & Johnson powder of bottle sitting on the vanity of the locker room where I work out without thinking about the cases and the many women who have died of these cancers allegedly from years and years of use of Johnson & Johnson powder. The most recent trial in California was just recently declared a mistrial by the trial judge, Judge Margaret Oldendorf. The case is Weirick v. Brenntag North America, BC656425, California Superior Court for Los Angeles County (Pasadena). It involved a claim that use of Johnson & Johnson powder had caused the plaintiff’s mesothelioma, a specific type of lung cancer. The Plaintiff, Weirick, 59, is a school counselor who said she’s been using J&J’s talc products, such as baby powder and the company’s former Shower-to-Shower line, for more than 40 years. She was diagnosed with mesothelioma in 2017 and said her only exposure to asbestos came from use of talc products. Previous juries had come out with verdicts of $25.75 million and $117 million for the plaintiffs, a defense verdict and two mistrials.
This latest trial in California was particularly interesting due to the alleged misconduct of one juror, now scandalously known as “Juror No. 7.” (By the way, if you are ever on a jury and in the course of the trial become known by your Number, it is never a good thing). Juror No. 7, apparently, refused to deliberate with the other 11 jurors, to the point that the foreman asked the judge to replace the juror with an alternate. The defense objected and asked for a mistrial. The plaintiff’s counsel agreed to the substitution. This is interesting because it was never disclosed what side Juror No. 7 was holding out for; Juror No. 7 could have been a juror favorable for the defense and yet defense counsel objected and moved for a mistrial. In fact, it was never disclosed which side the entire jury was leaning in favor of, only that at the time a mistrial was called by the trial judge, the vote was 8-4. At that time, neither side knew which side had the 8 jurors. Since then, it has come to light that the 8 jurors favored the Plaintiff. George Chen, a 30-year old computer analyst and one of the eight who favored a plaintiff verdict, said he was “a little frustrated” and “really wanted to push this through.” He said the four members who voted for the defense seemed to have ”the mindset of … business people” concerning what a responsible company should do.
Even if there were mere traces of asbestos, J&J should have provided warnings, Chen said, because “people have a right to know.” Moreover, he noted, J&J for decades has offered a baby powder made with corn starch, and could have retired the talc version to eliminate any risk.
What is the role of a trial judge? This question may often be debated among lawyers and between lawyers and judges themselves and maybe even by law students in school, but rarely is it a hot topic discussed in the public by non-lawyers. Until now. You may be following the Paul Manafort trial, in which the trial judge has been both criticized and congratulated for his conduct in presiding over that trial. As I write this, the jury is out. By most news accounts, that trial judge, Hon. T.S. Ellis, has often made known his likes and dislikes to the jurors and the prosecution seems to be taking the brunt of the abuse. So much so, that the prosecution has filed at least two motions requesting the trial judge apologize and make it clear to the jury that his remarks are not to be taken as commentary on the strength or weakness of the prosecution’s case. Things seem to have finally boiled over when, one morning, the trial judge did just that, he essentially admonished himself to the jury for his comments and said “Put aside any criticism. I was probably wrong in that,” and Ellis said, concluding, “Any criticism of counsel should be put aside — it doesn’t have anything to do with this case.” “This robe doesn’t make me anything other than human.”
“This robe doesn’t make me anything other than human.” Think about that for a second. Who else wears a cape at work? A Super Hero? Every word that comes out of a trial judge’s mouth in front of a jury has some persuasion attached to it…some hidden meaning. Jurors often take their cues from the trial judge. If the trial judge doesn’t seem to like a certain attorney, well, guess what? The jury probably won’t like that attorney, either. Jurors may be thinking: “Who does the judge think should win? He’s the expert, he knows. Does he like the defense attorney better than the plaintiff’s attorney? Does she think the plaintiff is exaggerating? He was rude to the female lawyer…maybe he thinks she is incompetent? What will he think of us if we find for the plaintiff? And return a large verdict? Maybe he thinks that shouldn’t happen in his courtroom?” As one trial lawyer said about Judge Ellis. “He can be very dominating,” said Jim Brosnahan, a California trial lawyer who defended John Walker Lindh in the American Taliban casebefore Judge Ellis. “The interesting question is: Is it aimed fairly at both sides, or is it particularly at one side?” Also, keep in mind how extraordinary it is that Judge Ellis essentially apologized to the jury for his own comments, recognizing they may have sent the wrong signal to the jury. This is a very rare occurrence for a judge to do that.
First, let me say, that we are blessed with many wonderful trial judges in Georgia. I have tried nearly 75 jury trials in the last 30 years of practicing law, all in Georgia, and with the very blatant exception of one Superior Court judge (she knows who she is), I have always been treated with the utmost respect and courtesy by our trial judges. Even when we may disagree, we do so with civility, not taking personal shots at one another. That is not to say that some aren’t demanding, or controlling, or picky, or even temperamental. Many trial judges are all of those things, because they are human and sometimes the stress of a trial gets to them the way it gets to everyone involved or they simply see their role as being in command of their courtroom. It has been my experience that our Georgia trial judges treat all those who come before them with the civility expected out of someone who wears a robe, has her name on a courtroom and has been given the authority by the State to preside over a trial, which is often one of the most important moments in a citizen’s life.
Posted in: Constitutional rights, Georgia Trial Lawyers Association, Independent Judiciary, Jury Duty, The Legal Profession and Trial
In a series of blogs I wrote last summer on distracted driving, I laid out some of the problems with the advancing technology we have readily available to us at our fingertips. The use of social media apps like Snapchat and Instagram while driving has led to many fatal or injurious car wrecks, and texting while driving, which is known as a “combination distraction” – one that averts our attention manually, visually, and cognitively – has caused thousands of deaths and injuries in accidents in the last few years. Last summer, one of my distracted driving blogs was about a bill that the Governor of Washington was signing into law banning hand-held usage of cellular devices. I wrote that Georgia had yet to sign such a bill into its own laws, but one year later, this subject matter needs an update.
This legislative session, the Georgia Legislature worked to pass House Bill 673, which Georgia Governor Nathan Deal signed into law a few months ago and will become effective July 1, 2018. The bill is known as the “Hands-Free” or “Distracted Driving” law, which by name alone may sound self-explanatory but with further inspection can be a little confusing. Allow me to lay out the need-to-knows of Georgia’s newest cell-phone driving law.
This bill, which has now become an Act, amends Title 40 “Motor Vehicles and Traffic” of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated. The main change in the Code will be located in O.C.G.A. §40-6-241, which explains a driver’s responsibility to exercise due care, specifically regarding usage of a wireless telecommunications device. The first parts of the bill change the penalties within the license point system. First violation of Code Section 40-6-241 will result in 1 point added to the license; second violation results in 2 points added; and third results in 3 points. There are other – and potentially worse – penalties a driver could face if convicted of violating the Code section.
One of the first questions many of my clients have after they have been in a car wreck is whether they can accept the insurance company’s pay-off for their totaled car. Most people need the pay-off money to be able to buy substitute transportation as quickly as possible. Some people accept the insurance company’s pay-off well before they even think about hiring a lawyer, and well before they have even spoken to a lawyer about representing them in a car wreck case. This is certainly understandable and normal human conduct when your car has been totaled in a wreck that isn’t your fault. But can there be a problem with accepting the insurance company’s pay-off for your car and, in return, releasing ownership of it to that insurance company for salvage value?
Typically, in a car wreck that has resulted in some personal injuries due to the negligence of the at-fault driver for say, running a stop sign, or rear-ending the car in front, the answer for at least 30 years has been no. In the past, no insurance carrier ever really cared about preserving the car in a plain ordinary negligence car wreck case where there is no evidence of any mechanical failure of the car or any evidence that the car itself was, somehow, defective. In the last 5 years or so, however, that has changed. Now, in an increasingly scorched-earth tactic by defense lawyers, they often file a motion to dismiss even run-of-the-mill car wreck cases for the plaintiff’s failure to preserve or keep the car that was involved in the wreck, even if that car was totaled by the insurance carrier. This motion is referred to as a “spoliation motion” and they are becoming more and more popular as a “gotcha” tactic by defense attorneys who really have no defense for their insured’s actions in actually causing the wreck in the first place. They have to admit their insured was negligent and caused the wreck, but maybe they can get out of the whole thing by arguing that without the car to be examined by an expert, hypothetically, we can never know whether something was wrong with the brakes or the windshield wipers (yes, I have really had that argued by defense counsel in a case) or the seat belts or any of a number of made-up potential problems, even if there exists no evidence that anything about the car caused or contributed to the wreck. At a minimum it is frustrating…at the worst, it can cost a plaintiff her entire case.
Posted in: car wrecks, Highway safety, Motor Vehicle Accidents, Personal Injury, Products Safety, Trial and Wrongful Death
Every day as I travel down Edgewood Avenue in Downtown Atlanta in the middle of Georgia State University, some pedestrian, without fail, decides to take a risk and walk out in front of either my car or another car as I watch. The only time this doesn’t happen is when Georgia State is on Spring Break. It is a stressful trip, knowing that in addition to the numerous cars all around me that I have to be aware of, I have to be ready to slam my breaks in a nanosecond to avoid hitting a pedestrian walking out in front of my car when I have the right-of-way. I am aware of the plentiful crosswalks available for pedestrian use, but they are mostly ignored. I am talking about students who ignore the crossing signals and walk across a street either not in a crosswalk at all, or in a crosswalk but cross when the signal is telling them to stop. This typical daily occurrence with pedestrians has me thinking about just exactly what are the laws in Georgia pertaining to pedestrians? Is it just me or are the pedestrian signals getting more complicated? What do they actually mean? When does a pedestrian have the right-of-way to cross the street? Can a driver of a vehicle just mow down a pedestrian if the pedestrian is not in the crosswalk? How about if the pedestrian is in the crosswalk but the flashing hand has started with a stopwatch ticking down, telling the pedstrian how many seconds he or she has to cross the street before the signal turns? Is a pedestrian required to know how fast they can walk and how many seconds they typically take to cross a street? Does it depend on how many lanes the street is? And whether there is a headwind or tailwind? My drive today has me thinking about all of this. Hmmm….
First, we can easily find the Georgia Rules of the Road as they pertain to pedestrians on the Georgia Highway Safety website. The Official Code of Georgia provides: § 40-6-91. Right of Way in Crosswalks:
(a) The driver of a vehicle shall stop and remain stopped to allow a pedestrian to cross the roadway within a crosswalk when the pedestrian is upon the half of the roadway upon which the vehicle is traveling, or when the pedestrian is approaching and is within one lane of the half of the roadway on which the vehicle is traveling or onto which it is turning. For the purposes of this subsection, “half of the roadway” means all traffic lanes carrying traffic in one direction of travel.
It seems to be in vogue with some trial judges currently to allow jurors to ask questions of witnesses after both sides of the litigation are finished asking their questions. This is currently a hot topic due to the Tex McIver trial, currently being tried in the Fulton County Superior Court in front of Judge Robert McBurney. Judge McBurney, rather famously, permits jurors to ask questions of witnesses after questioning by the prosecution and the defense counsel. Presumably, Judge McBurney allows this practice in civil cases as well as criminal cases, although Superior Court doesn’t see as many civil cases as criminal. All felonies in Georgia must be tried in Superior Court. The practice of Judge McBurney allowing witnesses to ask their own questions was discussed extensively before the trial in a podcast produced by the AJC called Breakdown. It is hosted by veteran legal affairs journalist Bill Rankin and I highly recommend it. In that podcast, defense counsel Bruce Harvey gives his opinion on why it is not only a bad practice to allow jurors to ask questions, but, also, why it is probably unconstitutional. For example, we all know that the 5th Amendment of the Constitution gives a criminal defendant the right to remain silent, even throughout the trial, so that the government must prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt without any assistance from the defendant. Harvey, rightfully, preposes the hypothetical of a juror asking “Why didn’t the defendant take the stand to tell us what happened?” Of course, the judge is not going to permit that question to be answered, but the jurors (or at least the one juror who asked that question) will know the judge didn’t approve it and wouldn’t permit it to be answered, and the bias that answers “why” is naturally because the defendant must be guilty. So simply by denying that juror’s question, the 5th amendment constitutional right is implicated and violated because it was allowed even to be raised in court.
There has lately been alot of discussion in social media about this among lawyers, too. You can find some of this discussion on Twitter at #texmciver and in the comments on Facebook where WSBTV is livestreaming the trial. If I were to take a poll, I think the vast majority of trial lawyers is against the practice for the reasons stated above. Also, other websites are livestreaming the same WSBTV feed, like wildabouttrial and lawandcrime. Both of these websites have a comments section where viewers can post their comments about the trial. It is pretty fascinating, especially for court enthusiasts like me. On Facebook, there have been some thought-provoking comments about allowing jurors to ask questions of witnesses. Below are just some of the comments I have seen:
“I think there are two questions that judges should ask themselves before considering this. 1). Why would I allow jurors to ask questions? Whatever the answer is (to help the jurors clarify any issues that the holder of the burden of proof has not clarified, etc). 2). If I am am being a neutral, unbiased referee, should that matter to me?”
Posted in: Constitutional rights, Judiciary, Jury Duty, Personal Injury, right to jury trial and Trial
ACP - Trends in OMI NO2 observations over the United States: effects of emission control technology and the economic recession
Trends in OMI NO2 observations over the United States: effects of emission control technology and the economic recession
Received: 11 May 2012 – Discussion started: 18 Jun 2012 – Revised: 11 Dec 2012 – Accepted: 12 Dec 2012 – Published: 21 Dec 2012
Abstract. Observations of tropospheric NO2 vertical column densities over the United States (US) for 2005–2011 are evaluated using the OMI Berkeley High Resolution (BEHR) retrieval algorithm. We assess changes in NO2 on day-of-week and interannual timescales to assess the impact of changes in emissions from mobile and non-mobile sources on the observed trends. We observe consistent decreases in cities across the US, with an average total reduction of 32 ± 7% across the 7 yr. Changes for large power plants have been more variable (−26 ± 12%) due to regionally-specific regulation policies. An increasing trend of 10–20% in background NO2 columns in the northwestern US is observed. We examine the impact of the economic recession on emissions and find that decreases in NO2 column densities over cities were moderate prior to the recession (−6 ± 5% yr−1), larger during the recession (−8 ± 5% yr−1), and then smaller after the recession (−3 ± 4% yr−1). Differences in the trends observed on weekdays and weekends indicate that prior to the economic recession, NO2 reductions were dominated by technological improvements to the light-duty vehicle fleet but that a decrease in diesel truck activity has contributed to emission reductions since the recession. We use the satellite observations to estimate a 34% decrease in NO2 from mobile sources in cities for 2005–2011 and use that value to infer changes in non-mobile sources. We find that reductions in NO2 from non-mobile sources in cities have been both more modest and more variable than NO2 reductions from mobile sources (−10 ± 13%).
Of course, all that beautiful work means nothing if it’s shrouded behind bad landscaping, so all of the dead shrubs, mulch and debris were next to go. “We took out all of the random plants in the yard and replaced everything with grass to really put a focus on the architecture of the home,” she says. “All of the hostas were relocated to the built-in planters that run down each side of the house.”
Before. Neglect of the home’s architectural features and landscaping resulted in a dilapidated curb appeal.
After. Fresh paint, a new door and smart landscaping choices emphasize the original beauty of this Michigan ranch.
To finish off their freshened-up midcentury home, the Vandermaases focused on small details. From cleaning up the classic “lollipop” yard light by the curb and adding classic house numbers to swapping out the old generic door for a period-style replacement, no aspect was left untouched. “A mailbox seems like such a small detail, but it really completes the look,” Aletha says. “We inherited a plastic mailbox, which we replaced with a new-issue orange Modbox.”
This is part one of a three-part series of home facelift stories, originally published in the 2016 edition of the Atomic Ranch Renovation Guide.
Megan Fealy is a successful REALTOR® that excels in marketing and negotiation to ensure that her clients opportunely buy or strategically sell in the competetive Chicago real estate market. She has a genuine sense of caring for the interests of each client and provides uncompromised customer service. She specializes in residential sales & luxury leasing with a focus on buyer and listing representation, investment properites, first time homebuyers, short sales, and foreclosures. Neighborhoods of experise include Lincoln Park, Old Town, Gold Coast, Lakeview, Roscoe Village, Bucktown, Wicker Park, Ukrainain Village, West Loop, and the South Loop. Her strong work ethic and extreme attention to detail provide her clients with a REALTOR® who is always willing to go above and beyond to exceed your expectations.
Megan graduated from the Metropolitan State University of Denver and moved to Chicago in 2006. She immediately fell in love with the spectacular architecture, incredible energy, and amazing restaurants that Chicago has to offer. She has lived in Lincoln Park, Old Town, South Loop, and the West Loop neighborhoods over the past ten years and loves to explore everything about this inspiring city. Prior to joining @properties, she worked in Finance and Client Support Services within the IT and mobile tech industry where she developed invaluable expertise in the sales process, negotiation, and customer satisfaction.
In addition to providing her clients with the highest quality of service and professionalism, she is an active mentor with CAR (Chicago Association of Realtors) and YPN (Young Professionals Network). She also is a member of the Launch U nonprofit organization that connects underserved, extremely motivated high school seniors with mentors to guide them towards achieving their collegiate and post-secondary goals.
Her enthusiasm is contagious and her commitment to your unique needs will give you the confidence to make one of the most important decisions of your life. To be an influential factor in such special milestones continues to be the most gratifying moments of her career.
"We were so thrilled to have met and worked with Megan Fealy throughout the home buying and selling process. She is everything you would want in a broker and more: strategic, detail-oriented, hard-working, knowledgeable, transparent, patient, responsive and extremely kind. She genuinely took an interest in our family and made sure that our needs were taken care of every step of the way. Every vendor and service she recommended were top notch from our attorney and inspector to plumbers and electricians. She made herself available to answer any questions and proactively reached out to see how we were doing. She went to bat for us and helped us gracefully navigate what can obviously be a very stressful and arduous process. We highly recommend Megan!"
"We are so grateful to have worked with Megan in buying our first home. We looked at one property, had our offer accepted and closed within 30 days! Megan went above and beyond just being our realtor. She educated us on all aspects of owning a home. Megan was our financial consultant, city expert and someone that we counted on and trusted during the ups and downs in buying a home. Megan had the BEST referrals when it came to the home inspector, real estate attorney, mortgage lender and even movers! Megan Fealy is a rockstar realtor!"
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"Selling a house can be a painful and stressful process, but Megan's excellent customer service made our sale process as smooth as possible. From start to finish she understood our concerns/desires, provided valued strategic advice, and was extremely responsive in all communication. We absolutely loved working with Megan!"