Rants And Raves | InjuryBoard Northern Virginia

A former dentist from Pennington Gap has been found guilty by a federal jury of 10 felony charges, including racketeering and fraud.According to officials with the office of U.S. attorney John Brownlee, 51-year-old Roy Shelburne has agreed to a forfeiture of a total of $200,000 to the federal government because of the conviction.Shelburne is now facing a maximum penalty of a prison sentence of...

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All of the lawyers who read this blog will really enjoy this short musical video.

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The Virginia General Assembly has started its 2008 session and one are of controversy is whether so-called "Pay-Day" loan rates should be capped.House Bill 12 proposes limiting the annual rate of these loans to 36%. This is a bad idea.A "pay-day" loan is a short term unsecured loan, usually of only a few hundred dollars, that generally carries a rather high rate of interest, especially when...

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There is an article in today's Wall Street Journal about the bit that 'subrogation' can take out of your personal injury case. The WSJ blog has a good discussion going and I have contributed to it. The bottom line with personal injury cases today is that the plaintiff and her lawyer need to figure out, in advance, whether the health benefit plan will be seeking reimbursement. If so, this has to...

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In an extraordinary public rebuke of a sitting judge for one of his decisions, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has formally apologized to the parties for the cost and delay that the judge's action caused. The case is Calderon v IBEW Local 47.The plaintiff started a lawsuit and served one party but initially failed to serve a second party. The judge, Manuel L. Real, issued an order to "show...

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In a highly unusual proceeding, the Supreme Court of Virginia has dismissed a Juvenile Court judge who (1) decided a custody matter by flipping a coin;(2) had a mentally disabled woman pull her pants down to show an alleged wound;(3) made and ex parte call to a local hospital to attempt to verify/discredit the woman's story about being wounded.What (else) is unusual is that the Supreme Court,...

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Here we go again. New laws being floated in Virginia to cap profits a business can earn. Those businesses making "payday" type loans are in the riskiest of lending businesses. They are taking a huge risk, and should be allowed to charge whatever they want as long as1. Loan terms are fully and fairly described2.The rules of the loan terms are followed.After that, no one is forcing these folks to...

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I'm so glad to learn that upon searching, there are no dangerous dogs in Fairfax County.Now I can sleep at night.I'm sorry. This is idiotic. Who is going to go here to search. How much did Virginia spend on this?Oh, I get it now.The state is requiring liability insurance for dangerous dogs. Wonder who is insuring that?Here's the code section:Virginia Code § 3.1-796.93:1. Control of dangerous or...

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The Virginia State Bar is again considering the issue of forcing lawyers to buy malpractice insurance. Complete waste of time.Their own statistics show that 90% of lawyers who deal with the public have malpractice insurance.I think that lawyers should carry malpractice insurance but its not the business of the bar to force any business owner to carry insurance any more than it could force the...

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"Unarmed" with good information, that is. Alaska personal injury attorney Michael Schneider has a great example today of how an injured victim's trust ended up costing him. According to Mike, the Allstate rep "earned" the victim's trust with their "you don't need a lawyer, you'll do just fine with us" mantra.The problem is that in dealing with an adjuster, the information is usually flowing only...

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Think technology is good for tracking speeders and red light runners?How about this story out of our own Fairfax County: Seems the tollbooths on the Dulles Toll road malfunctioned over several months. Drivers reported paying the toll, but not getting a green light. Since many of the tollbooths are unmanned, there was no one to fix the error. Meanwhile, drivers backed up at the tollbooth start...

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MSNBC has pretty good video on this silly 1-800 Flowers lawsuit. Now he's complaining about all of the negative publicity he's gotten and the 'mental anguish" from the public feeback he's getting from his lawsuit.So let me get this straight. He cheats on his wife and buys flowers for his mistress. Then he complains when his wife finds out about the affair. Then he files a lawsuit that somehow...

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Seems a Houston man used 1-800 Flowers to send his love interest flowers and a card. Problem was, it wasn't his wife. So, to be careful, Leroy Greer told the flower delivery company to not send him a receipt. They didn't. But they did send a thank you card to his home later.Guess what happened next?Yes. His wife, curious, calls the flower company and gets receipt faxed over. Then she files for...

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Mid way through training for the Marine Corp Marathon, there's a terrific race this Sunday in Leesburg. Brian and I will be running, and we'll be joined by Herndon attorney Doug Landau and his better half, Melissa. Apparently we'll be hanging out with 1300 other runners at the 19th annual Leesburg 10K/20K Race along the W&OD Trail.This Fall I'll be running with Caitlin and Brian in the Marine...

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The District of Columbia Court of Appeals issued an opinion this week in a case called to Viola J. Scott v. Crestar Financial Corporation. Nothing particularly esoteric or difficult about the decision. Footnote 15 of the decision however sad "the court sincerely regrets the unusual delay in issuing this opinion." You see, the case was argued over seven years before was decided.In a time...

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