Tag: lawsuits

New England Neo-Nazi group is SUED by Massachusetts AG over ‘violent, threatening and intimidating’ protests after they repeatedly ‘terrorized’ residents to promote white supremacist ideology

A New England neo-Nazi group is being sued over a ‘campaign of unlawful conduct’ that has ‘terrorized’ Americans they dub ‘enemies of our people’. 

The Massachusetts Attorney General has brought a civil lawsuit against NSC-131, known as the Nationalist Social Club, and its leaders, Christopher Hood and Liam McNeil, accusing them of a series of ‘violent and otherwise unlawful Club actions’.  

The lawsuit is unique in that it points to specific actions allegedly conducted by the group that go beyond their right to free speech – including storming a drag queen story time event and harassing migrants outside emergency shelter hotels. 

NSC-131 has around 30 members – thought to all be local white men – and captures its ‘violent protests’ on video to use as marketing to attract new members, as part of a growing ‘international’ white supremacist movement.  

Self-proclaimed Nazi-hunter, and founder of anti-fascist veterans group, Task Force Butler, Kristofer Goldsmith told DailyMail.com the group is motivated ‘by a deep desire to hurt people… it’s all about causing fear’.

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Court revives lawsuit over Connecticut rule allowing trans girls to compete in school sports

Opponents of Connecticut’s policy letting transgender girls compete in girls high school sports will get a second chance to challenge it in court, an appeals court ruled Friday, which revived the case without weighing in on its merits.

Both sides called it a win. The American Civil Liberties Union said it welcomes a chance to defend the rights of the two transgender high school track runners it represents. The Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented the four cisgender athletes who brought the lawsuit, also said it looks forward to seeking a ruling on the case’s merits.

In a rare full meeting of all active judges on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, judges found the cisgender runners have standing to sue and have described injuries that might qualify for monetary damages. The runners also seek to alter certain athletic records, alleging they were deprived of honors and opportunities at elite track-and-field events because they say “male athletes” were permitted to compete against them.

The case had been dismissed by a Connecticut judge in 2021, and that decision was affirmed by three-judge panel of the 2nd Circuit a year ago.

At least 20 states have approved a version of a blanket ban on transgender athletes playing on K-12 and collegiate sports teams statewide, but a Biden administration proposal to forbid such outright bans is set to be finalized by March after two delays and much pushback. As proposed, the rule announced in April would establish that blanket bans would violate Title IX, the landmark gender-equity legislation enacted in 1972.

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After Affirmative Action Win Over Harvard, Group Takes On West Point

The group that triumphed in a landmark Supreme Court case that struck down affirmative action policies at Harvard University earlier this year hopes to build on the victory with a lawsuit targeting similar policies at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) filed the lawsuit on Sept. 19 with high hopes, but the organization has strayed into a legal and political minefield as the academy and the Biden administration try to block the lawsuit on the grounds that an institution training military officers isn’t subject to the same rules as private universities and that diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies help, rather than hinder, effectiveness in combat.

Largely as a result of the perceived disparity between those standards that apply to private colleges and universities and those applicable to entities under federal oversight, the SFFA faces one of the most formidable legal challenges, the outcome of which will have implications for every school and academy in the nation.

Since President Joe Biden took office, a marked cultural shift has been underway in virtually all branches of the military.

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Alabama is sued by inmates who claim state made a staggering $450M by ‘convict leasing’ – and forcing them to work in fast food joints like McDonald’s and Burger King ‘for next to nothing’ in move ‘similar to cotton-picking’

A group of current and former prisoners are suing Alabama state alleging they made $450million by forcing them to work in fast food chains for ‘next to nothing’. 

The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday at the Middle District Court, claims the prisoners were forced into a ‘modern-day form of slavery’ by the state. 

It says they were ‘entrapped in a system of ‘convict leasing’ in which incarcerated people are forced to work, often for little or no money’ while the state kept the profits of their labor. 

The plaintiffs said they are regularly forced to work at McDonald’s, KFC, Wendy’s, and Burger King franchises, Anheuser-Busch distributors, and meat processors. 

According to the complaint, inmates, ‘live in a constant danger of being murdered, stabbed, or raped… and if they refuse to work, the State punishes them even more.’

The lawsuit accuses government agencies – including the Alabama Department of Corrections – and over two dozen state officials, including Governor Kay Ivey and Attorney General Steve Marshall, of violating the Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

Alabama makes $450 million a year from forced labor, according to the complaint, which says since 2018, 575 private employers and over 100 public employers have ‘leased’ labor from Alabama prisons.

It says the inmates work against their will in ‘unsafe work conditions’ and the ADOC takes 40 percent of gross earnings claiming it is ‘to assist in defraying the cost of his/her incarceration’.

In September 2023, the complaint says 1,374 incarcerated people were enrolled in the work program. 

One of the individuals involved in the complaint, Lakiera Walker, was imprisoned from 2007 to 2023. 

She said she was forced to perform long hours of uncompensated work ‘upon threat of discipline’.

Her jobs included housekeeping, stripping floors, providing care for mentally disabled or other ill incarcerated people, unloading chemical trucks, working inside freezers, and at Burger King. 

She said she was paid just $2 per day and was subjected to sexual harassment by a supervising officer.

When she was so ill she could not work, she said a supervisor told her to ‘get up and go make us our 40 percent’. 

She told Law&Crime: ‘Those women need help. They really need a voice. I knew I had to do something. I want justice for this forced labor.’ 

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Sound of Freedom Tim Ballard’s wife, Katherine, is added to lawsuit as victims claim she conspired with her husband to abuse victims on overseas trips where they were forced to pose as his wife ‘for financial gain’

Sound of Freedom Tim Ballard’s wife has been added to a lawsuit accusing her husband of sexual misconduct, including alleged grooming and abuse within the anti-sex trafficking organization. 

The lawsuit – which is one of several filed against Tim Ballard – now claims Katherine Ballard conspired with her husband for their financial gain and she promoted a ‘Couples Ruse’ that was used for alleged sexual grooming.

One lawsuit said the Couple’s Ruse involved women pretending to be in a relationship with Tim Ballard to go on missions to fool sex traffickers. However, a lawsuit claims Tim used the ruse to abuse the woman including requiring the women to give Tim lap dances and participate in tantric yoga. 

During a recent interview on the Rob Arquette Podcast, Katherine said she was aware of the ‘Couple’s Ruse’ that was mentioned in the lawsuit and claimed it was done with training. 

She also said the lawsuit has been difficult on her family. 

‘For some reason, when you decide to go against sex trafficking, people come out to attack you on that,’ Katherine said on the podcast and quoted in the lawsuit.

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Facebook and Instagram content enabled child sexual abuse, trafficking: New Mexico lawsuit

Facebook and Instagram created “prime locations” for sexual predators that enabled child sexual abuse, solicitation, and trafficking, New Mexico’s attorney general alleged in a civil suit filed Wednesday against Meta and CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

The suit was brought after an “undercover investigation” allegedly revealed myriad instances of sexually explicit content being served to minors, child sexual coercion, or the sale of child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, New Mexico attorney general Raúl Torrez said in a press release.

The suit alleges that “certain child exploitative content” is ten times “more prevalent” on Facebook and Instagram as compared to pornography site PornHub and adult content platform OnlyFans, according to the release.

“Child exploitation is a horrific crime and online predators are determined criminals,” Meta said in a statement to CNBC. A spokesperson said that the company deploys “sophisticated technology, hire child safety experts, report content to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and share information and tools with other companies and law enforcement, including state attorneys general, to help root out predators.”

The New Mexico suit follows coordinated legal actions against Meta by 42 other attorneys general in October. Those actions alleged that Facebook and Instagram directly targeted and were addictive to children and teens.

New Mexico’s suit, by contrast, alleges Meta and Zuckerberg violated the state’s Unfair Practice Act. The four-count suit alleges that the company and Zuckerberg engaged in “unfair trade practices” by facilitating the distribution of CSAM and the trafficking of minors, and undermined the health and safety of New Mexican children.

The lawsuit argues that Meta’s algorithms allegedly promote sex and exploitation content to users and that Facebook and Instagram lack “effective” age verification. The suit also alleges that the company failed to identify child sexual exploitation “networks” and to fully prevent users it had suspended for those violations from rejoining the platform using new accounts

“In one month alone, we disabled more than half a million accounts for violating our child safety policies,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement.

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Wyoming Cop Assaulted a Disabled 8-Year-Old, Then Deleted the Body Camera Footage, Lawsuit Claims

Last spring, a disabled Wyoming 8-year-old was assaulted by a school resource officer, who pinned the boy facedown on the floor of a school conference room seemingly unprovoked. According to a lawsuit filed by the boy’s family last week, after the incident, the resource officer deleted body camera footage showing the most egregious parts of the attack and even accessed the child’s private school records without his parents’ or school administrators’ knowledge.

Last February, an 8-year-old with a “diagnosed neurodivergent disability” was sitting in the principal’s office of Freedom Elementary School in Cheyenne, Wyoming, during the school’s lunch period. The boy, named in the suit as “J.D.,” had been doing this for days, in accordance with his Individualized Education Plan (IEP). The complaint states that Principal Chad Delbridge and another faculty member began to quietly speak to J.D. about comments he made to a school cafeteria cashier and whether he should apologize to the cashier. Deputy Benjamin Jacquot, the school resource officer, was standing nearby during the discussion. J.D. was calm during this period.

According to a report later filed by Delbridge, when J.D. stood up to return to class moments later, Jacquot grabbed J.D.’s arm. Delbridge had not asked for Jacquot’s assistance in any way. 

“J.D. was not a threat to himself or to anyone else. There was no reason at all for Deputy Jacquot to become involved with J.D. during this interaction with Principal Delbridge,” the lawsuit notes. “Deputy Jacquot, nevertheless, forcibly wrestled J.D. into a nearby conference room using an armlock where the assault grew violent.”

The suit claims that Jacquot repeatedly “slammed” J.D.’s face into the conference room floor, causing numerous lacerations and bruises. The undeleted portion of Jacquot’s body camera footage shows the 250-pound Jacquot pinned on top of 68-pound J.D.

“At this point, J.D. is bleeding from wounds on his face, and his smeared blood is visible on the video,” the complaint reads. “As shown on the video, Deputy Jacquot is out of control, pinning J.D. by his arms face down to the ground in a prone restraint position and yelling threats at J.D. J.D., meanwhile, is struggling to breathe, and is coughing.”

According to the suit, Jacquot screamed at J.D.: “Do you understand me! I should be taking you to jail!”

Eventually, Delbridge called J.D.’s father, Ishmael DeJesus, to pick him up. When he arrived, DeJesus asked Jacquot why he grabbed J.D. even though the boy wasn’t causing a disruption. 

“Because, as a law enforcement officer, that’s my primary function,” Jacquot replied.

The complaint further alleges that “immediately after his assault on J.D., Deputy Jacquot went to his vehicle, and, upon information and belief, destroyed evidence by deleting his body cam video which showed the most violent portion of the assault, as well as the footage of his improper intervention into and escalation of this situation.”

Later, Jacquot obtained J.D.’s “private and protected” school records and included excerpts of those records in the police report of the incident. An investigation from the school later concluded that Jacquot had “no need to access these records in his work with this situation.”

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NYPD ACCUSED OF FABRICATING DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SURVIVOR’S MURDER CONFESSION

A WOMAN WHO was charged with murdering her husband in 2020 sued the New York City Police Department, alleging that police officers fabricated the confession that was the basis of the case against her. The federal civil rights lawsuit also alleges that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office obtained a search warrant for an email account she created to draw attention to her case — and never disclosed it, as required by law. 

Prosecutors dropped their case against Tracy McCarter last December, citing insufficient evidence. In the lawsuit, which was filed on November 2 in the Southern District of New York, McCarter said she had “sustained serious physical and psychological harm as a result of being wrongfully arrested, charged, imprisoned, searched, and prosecuted.” 

The lawsuit names four NYPD officers who were involved with the arrest and one investigator from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office who worked on the case. All four of the police officers have previously faced civilian complaints of misconduct, though such allegations are famously hard to prove. A spokesperson for the NYPD declined to comment on whether any of the officers are being investigated in relation to McCarter’s case, citing the pending litigation. The district attorney’s office declined to comment on the allegation involving the undisclosed search warrant. 

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New York Marijuana Lawsuit Settlement Could Let Hundreds Of Dispensaries Open Soon, But Some Operators Are Wary

Hundreds of people impacted by cannabis-related criminal charges will finally be allowed to move forward with the pot-shops they had already been granted licenses for—if the terms of a settlement agreement filed Tuesday are approved.

With marijuana legalization in 2021, the state created a special class of license called the Conditional Adult-Use Retail Dispensary licenses (CAURD). The aim was to reward those most harmed by decades of harsh drugs laws with the first opportunity to enter the legal market.

That goal stalled in August, when a group of veterans sued the state, arguing that the CAURD program violated the law by not offering licenses to other social equity groups like women and veterans at the same time. An injunction preventing any new stores from opening has been in place since then.

At the time of the injunction, the state had already awarded 463 CAURD licenses, but just 23 dispensaries had opened. Thirty other licensees were close to opening dispensaries when the injunction halted their plans. Meanwhile, more and more illegal storefronts were popping up to fill the demand, as many as 8,000 by some estimates.

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Maryland Roommates File Lawsuit After Police Shot Their Dog During Alleged Illegal Home Search

“That’s what happens when you don’t answer questions,” a Prince George’s County police officer said as Erica Umana’s dog lay on the ground, paralyzed and bleeding out.

Minutes earlier, on a summer day in 2021, officers had shot Umana’s dog, a boxer mix named Hennessy, during a chaotic confrontation inside Umana’s apartment.

Now Umana and her roommates—Erika Sanchez, Dayri Benitez, and Brandon Cuevas—have filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Prince George’s County Police Department and several of its officers, saying the police had no right to enter their apartment, shoot their dog, and detain them. The lawsuit seeks over $16 million for allegedly subjecting them to excessive force, unlawful search and seizure, and false arrest.

“This case is an outrage. It is disgusting, disgraceful, and despicable,” William Murphy, an attorney representing the roommates, said in a press release Monday. “These officers outright abused and mistreated our clients, lied to unlawfully break into their house, manhandled them illegally, and shot their dog. And in utter disregard for the severity of their intolerable behavior, they laughed about it.”

The incident began on June 2, 2021, when Prince George’s County police officers arrived at an apartment complex in Landover Hills in response to a 911 call from a woman claiming two dogs had allegedly jumped on her and bit her.

Prince George’s County Cpl. Jason Ball encountered Sanchez sitting outside of the apartments, but she refused to answer any questions. Ball then threatened to arrest Sanchez for trespassing if she didn’t leave. On body camera footage, Ball said into his radio that he believed Sanchez lived in the apartment complex but that he was about to arrest her anyway because she refused to answer his questions—the first of several retaliatory threats and comments from Ball.

Sanchez walked off, and Ball and his partner went to knock on the door of the apartment where Sanchez, Umana, and the other lawsuit plaintiffs lived. No one answered.

“This would be open by now, by the way, if it wasn’t…,” Ball said to his partner, trailing off and tapping his body camera. “I used to open them all the time.” 

“Times have changed,” Ball’s partner responded.

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