Suits and Litigation (Civil)

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      Trump’s Huge Civil Fraud Penalty Draws Skepticism From Appeals Court

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      A five-judge New York appellate panel questioned both the size and validity of a judgment of more than $450 million against Donald J. Trump at a hearing.A New York appeals court expressed skepticism on Thursday about a civil judgment of more than $450 million that a trial judge had ordered former President Donald J. Trump to pay after finding that he had fraudulently inflated his wealth.At a hearing in Manhattan, members of a five-judge panel questioned both the size of the judgment and the validity of the case, which New York’s attorney general brought against the former president and his family business two years ago.While some of the judges appeared to acknowledge the substance of the attorney general’s case, several of the panel’s questions suggested concern about whether the office had exceeded its jurisdiction. And the tenor of many of their questions indicated the possibility that the court could whittle down the huge judgment and potentially deal a blow to the attorney general, Letitia James.Justice Peter H. Moulton, who seemed unswayed by many of the arguments by Mr. Trump’s lawyers, nonetheless said that “the immense penalty in this case is troubling.”The trial judge in the case, Arthur F. Engoron, found Mr. Trump liable for civil fraud last year, concluding that he had lied about his wealth to secure favorable loan terms and other financial benefits. The judge imposed the judgment against the former president in February after a lengthy bench trial.Judith N. Vale, New York’s deputy solicitor general, had barely begun addressing the court before one of the judges, David Friedman, interrupted her to cast doubt on the lawsuit. Other members of the panel inquired about possible “mission creep” by the attorney general’s office. They also questioned what “guardrails” might have ensured that Ms. James did not overstep her authority by second-guessing the net worth estimates that Mr. Trump had provided to lenders.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Alex Jones’s Infowars Will Be Auctioned Off to Pay Sandy Hook Families

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      A sale of the Infowars website and other property is set for November, and could determine the conspiracy theorist’s fate as a broadcaster.A Houston bankruptcy judge ruled on Tuesday that assets from the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’s Infowars empire can be auctioned off to help pay families of the Sandy Hook mass shooting victims the defamation awards he owes them.The auction, set for mid-November, will include Infowars’ website, social media accounts, broadcasting equipment, product trademarks and inventory owned by Free Speech Systems, Infowars’ parent company.Mr. Jones’s fate as a broadcaster most likely depends on who buys his business. Though the Infowars name and assets are potentially of interest to a range of entities on the far right, under the terms of the sale anyone can bid.Mr. Jones spent years spreading lies that the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., that killed 20 first graders and six educators was a hoax aimed at confiscating Americans’ firearms, and that the victims’ families were actors complicit in the plot. The families suffered online abuse, personal confrontations and death threats from people who believed the conspiracy theory.Relatives of 10 victims sued Mr. Jones in 2018 for defamation and were awarded more than $1.4 billion in damages in trials in Texas and Connecticut. But the most the families are likely to ever see is a small fraction of that, and they have been divided over how to equitably distribute the money.As the cases headed to court in 2022, Mr. Jones’s company declared bankruptcy. Mr. Jones declared personal bankruptcy soon afterward.Since then, the families have been wrangling in bankruptcy court over assets and revenue that are far less than they originally envisioned. Mr. Jones’s personal and business assets combined are worth less than $10 million, according to independent valuations presented in court. His lawyers and other bankruptcy professionals will be paid first, leaving even less for the families.The Connecticut and Texas sides divided sharply over how to go after Free Speech Systems. Lawyers for the families who sued Mr. Jones in Connecticut — the relatives of eight victims — favored shutting down the company and liquidating its assets, with the money distributed among the family members.Lawyers for families who sued Mr. Jones in Texas favored a settlement in which he would pay them a percentage of his income over the next decade, most likely netting more money for each relative. As a condition of the latter deal, Mr. Jones would have had to agree never to mention the shooting again.The asset sale is probably the least lucrative option for the family members, though its potential for shutting down Infowars appealed to some. Juries in the two lawsuits awarded individual relatives widely varying amounts, and lawyers from the Connecticut and Texas sides have been dueling over how to fairly allocate the money.The situation is further complicated by the fact that a jury has yet to decide how much in damages Mr. Jones must pay Lenny Pozner and Veronique De La Rosa, whose son Noah Pozner died in the shooting. More

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      California Sues Exxon Mobil Over Plastics Pollution and ‘Myth’ of Recycling

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      The lawsuit, seeking ‘multiple billions of dollars,’ opens a new front in the legal battles with oil and gas companies over climate and environmental issues.The attorney general of California, Rob Bonta, sued Exxon Mobil on Monday alleging that the oil giant carried out a “decades-long campaign of deception” that overhyped the promise of recycling and spawned a plastic pollution crisis.The suit, filed in superior court in San Francisco, argued that people were more likely to buy single-use plastics because of the false belief, promoted by Exxon Mobil, that they would be recycled. Mr. Bonta said the company is a leading producer of a key component used to make single-use plastics. The suit seeks unspecified damages that Mr. Bonta estimated would amount of “multiple billions of dollars.”In an interview, Mr. Bonta said that plastic pollution was “fueled by the myth of recycling, and the leader among them in perpetuating that myth is Exxon Mobil.”The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday.The case opens a new front in the legal battles against oil and gas companies over climate and environmental issues. More than two dozen state and local governments, including California, have sued the companies for their role in the climate crisis, making claims that the companies deceived the public in a quest for profit. None have gone trial yet.The California suit filed on Monday alleged that Exxon Mobil promoted the widely used “chasing arrows” symbol on plastic products, which led buyers to believe that their bottles and other products would, in fact, be recycled if disposed of properly. But only about five percent of the plastic waste in the United States is recycled, according to Mr. Bonta’s office, citing an estimate by the advocacy group Beyond Plastics, which looked at 2021 data. At the same time, the amount of plastic manufactured, much of it single-use, grows yearly.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      NYPD Unwilling to Impose Discipline for Stop and Frisk, Report Says

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      The department’s discipline for illegal street detentions is lax at every level, according to an extraordinary review ordered by a federal judge.At every level, the New York Police Department has failed to punish officers who have violated the rights of people stopped on the street, according to a new report — a failure that reaches all the way to the top of the force.The report, the most comprehensive independent review of discipline since a landmark court decision in 2013, found that police commissioners during the past decade have routinely reduced discipline recommended for officers found to have wrongly stopped, questioned and frisked people, undermining efforts to curb unconstitutional abuses. The report, by James Yates, a retired New York State judge, was ordered by Judge Analisa Torres of Manhattan federal court and made public on Monday.Mr. Yates was assigned by the court to conduct a “granular, step-by-step analysis” of the department’s policies and discipline governing stop and frisk, a tactic of detaining people on the street that was being used disproportionately against Black and Latino New Yorkers.The 503-page document that resulted paints a picture of an agency unwilling to impose discipline on an abusive practice that has prompted criticism that the department oppresses many New Yorkers.The commissioners “demonstrated an inordinate willingness to excuse illegal stops, frisks and searches in the name of ‘good faith’ or ‘lack of malintention,’ relegating constitutional adherence to a lesser rung of discipline,” Mr. Yates writes.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      In Lawsuit, MrBeast Reality Show Contestants Allege ‘Dangerous Conditions’

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      A group of people who participated in the reality competition show this summer are suing MrBeast’s production company.A group of contestants who participated in “Beast Games,” the reality competition show hosted by Jimmy Donaldson, better known online as MrBeast, are suing Mr. Donaldson and the production companies behind the show, accusing them of exposing participants to “dangerous circumstances and conditions.”The suit, filed by five anonymous contestants in Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday, made wide-ranging allegations about what occurred in July during the filming of “Beast Games,” when Mr. Donaldson’s production team and Amazon MGM Studios invited about 2,000 contestants to a football stadium in Las Vegas.In addition to including complaints about inadequate food and medical care — accusations that were first reported on by The New York Times — the heavily redacted suit also claims that the defendants provided false information to state officials in Nevada to obtain “unearned tax credits,” and that contestants had not been appropriately compensated for their participation.“I was really excited to be part of something that was going to be really big,” one of the plaintiffs, identified in the suit as Contestant 4, told The Times on Wednesday. “In the end, I just left feeling really insignificant and mistreated and traumatized. I still haven’t gotten paid. I just hope that no one else ever has to go through this.”Since her time on the show, Contestant 4 added, she has sought mental health treatment for anxiety. Another contestant in the suit, Contestant 5, said she felt “embarrassed and degraded” by the experience.A representative for MrBeast declined to comment on the lawsuit. A representative for Amazon MGM Studios did not respond to a request for comment.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Justice Department Files $100 Million Suit in Fatal Baltimore Bridge Collapse

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      The crash of the Dali into the Francis Scott Key Bridge killed six people. The federal government says the owner and the operator were “grossly negligent” and “reckless.”The U.S. Justice Department filed a legal claim on Wednesday against the owner and operator of the container ship that collapsed the Francis Scott Key Bridge last March, killing six workers and paralyzing the Port of Baltimore for weeks.The lawsuit asserts that the companies’ actions leading up to the catastrophe were “outrageous, grossly negligent, willful, wanton, and reckless.”The government is seeking more than $100 million in damages to cover the costs of the sprawling emergency response to the disaster and the federal aid to port employees who were put out of work. “Those costs should be borne by the shipowner and operator, not the American taxpayer,” said Benjamin Mizer, a deputy associate attorney general who is in charge of the Justice Department’s civil division. He added that the department would be seeking punitive damages as well, “to try to keep this type of conduct from ever happening again.” The action on Wednesday did not name an amount for the punitive damages the department was seeking.Filed in federal court in Maryland, the Justice Department’s action lays out in detail what investigators have learned about the ship’s short and catastrophic journey that night, describing a cascade of failures onboard and multiple points when the disaster could have been prevented.Because of poor maintenance or “jury-rigged” fixes to serious problems aboard the ship, known as the Dali, “none of the four means available to help control the Dali — her propeller, rudder, anchor, or bow thruster — worked when they were needed to avert or even mitigate this disaster,” the suit asserts.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More