Attorney Odis Williams on Pro Bono Work: I Had to Help

December 13th, 2010. By BrendaC

LawyersandSettlements.com has a new column that looks at a side of lawyers you don’t hear too much about—the side that gives back…pays it forward..and shares the love. We’ve found quite a number of attorneys who log non-billable hours helping others—simply because they believe it’s the right thing to do. Their stories are inspiring, and hey, who knew lawyers were so…good? If you’ve got a story to share about an attorney who’s doing the right thing, let us know—we’d love to let others know, too. Today, we talk with Attorney Odis Williams of The Law Offices of Odis Williams PC…

Attorney Odis Williams: “The cases I take on are the really ugly, nasty ones, where people find themselves in a very bad position.”

Attorney Odis Williams says he still has student loans to pay off—and he has a fiancé. “Yes, those are both expensive!,” says Williams as he tries to grab lunch during another busy day. Although most of his practice is devoted to civil litigation and small business corporate law, he finds the harrowing stories of some people, especially women, so compelling that he makes time to do pro bono work for them.

“Right now I am trying to secure support payments on behalf of a woman who was abandoned by her husband,” says Williams. “She has had six surgeries and she’s been fighting for her life after a kidney transplant—while her husband of 20 years lives comfortably with a younger woman.”

“She’s a very sick woman who has put up with a series of infidelities. She broke down and cried as she told me the story,” says Williams. “I had to help.”

As young lawyer, Williams says, it wasn’t long before he realized how many people there are who have no resources and are struggling to handle legal problems. “I realized how fortunate I was,” says Williams. “We didn’t have much money when I was growing up, but my parents gave us support, stability and love. We all went to college and I know I am lucky, even blessed.”

“So as my practice grew and I could sustain an office, a home and everything else, I just felt an obligation to step up when I can,” says Williams. “The cases I take on are the really ugly, nasty ones, where people find themselves in a very bad position.”

Williams is also working on a complex child custody case on behalf a young woman whose husband was falsely accused of molestation. “The child’s biological father seized the opportunity to leverage the accusation and the woman has not been able to see her child for months,” says Williams. “The husband was exonerated, there are no problems in the home and the situation is completely unfair.”

The woman is a stay-at-home mom with little education and few skills. “She didn’t have a driver’s license or even know how to drive,” says Williams. So he helped her find a job, get a new apartment and reorganize her life to make a better impression on the courts. “We wanted to show she was a fit mother,” says Williams. “You end up being a psychologist and a counsellor and everything else when you take these cases.”

Williams could spend all of his time doing pro bono, but of course, that isn’t possible. “I have to consider what else I have going on—how much time I have to give to pro bono work and I have to consider the obligations I have to my paying clients,” he says. “I don’t want to let anybody down.”

“I have another lawyer who works with me and a paralegal and it is a busy office,” says Williams.

Williams is currently litigating against a number of banks on behalf of homeowners in foreclosure disputes.

Odis Williams is a graduate of the Georgia State College of Law. He also holds an MA in public administration from the University of South Carolina. The Law Offices of Odis Williams, located in Decatur, Georgia, handles business law and civil litigation.

Asbestos News Roundup: 12.10.10

December 10th, 2010. By LucyC

A roundup of recent asbestos-related news and information that you should be aware of. An ongoing list of asbestos hot spots from the Asbestos News Roundup archive appears on our asbestos map. 

Asbestos Lawsuits

Charleston, WV: Eighty-two defendant companies have been named in an asbestos claim made by Rick Reed and Ruth Reed, co-executors of the Estate of Willie Oliver Reed.

Willie Oliver Reed was diagnosed with asbestosis and died November 12, 2009, according to the lawsuit. 

The defendants are being sued based on theories of negligence, contaminated buildings, breach of expressed/implied warranty, strict liability, intentional tort, conspiracy, misrepresentations and post sale duty to warn.

The 82 defendants include: 3M Company; A.W. Chesterton Company; Ajax Magnethermic Corporation; Allied Glove Corporation; Alloy Cast Steel Company; Amchem Products, Inc.; Aurora Pump Company; Beazer East, Inc.; Borg Warner Corporation; Brand Insulations, Inc.; Bucyrus International, Inc.; Buffalo Pumps, Inc.; BW IP, Inc.; Certainteed Corporation; Cincinnati Gasket Packing & Manufacturing; Cleaver-Brooks Company, Inc.; Crane Co.; Crown, Cork & Seal USA, Inc.; CSR, Limited; Dezurik, Inc.; Durabla Manufacturing Company; Eaton Corporation; Elliott Turbomachinery, Inc.; F.B. Wright Company; Flowserve Inc.; Flowserve US, Inc.; Foseco, Inc.; Foster Wheeler Energy Corporation; General Electric Company; General Refractories Company; George V. Hamilton, Inc.; Gordon Gasket & Packing Co.; Goulds Pumps, Inc.; Graybar Electric Company, Inc.; Grinnell Corporation; Honeywell International; I.U. North America, Inc.; IMO Industries, Inc.; Industrial Holdings Corporation; Ingersoll Rand Co.; Insul Company, Inc.; ITT Corporation; J.H. France Refractories Company; John Crane, Inc.; Lockheed Martin Corporation; McJunkin Corporation; McNally Industries; Melrath Supply and Gasket Company; Met-Pro Corporation; Metropolitan Life Insurance Company; Nagle Pumps, Inc.; National Service Industries Ventures, Inc.; Nitro Industrial Coverings, Inc.; Oakfabco, Inc.; Oglebay Norton Company; Ohio Valley Insulation Company, Inc.; Owens-Illinois, Inc.; P&H Mining Equipment; Pneumo-Abex Corporation; Premiere Refractories, Inc.; Rapid American Corporation; Riley Power, Inc.; Rockwell Automation, Inc.; Schneider Electric USA, Inc.; State Electric Supply Company; Stockham Valves & Fittings; Tasco Insulation, Inc.; the Gage Company; the William Powell Company; Thiem Corporation; Trecco Construction Services, Inc.; Tyco Flow Control Company LLC a/k/a Crosby Valve, Inc.; Tyco Flow Control Company LLC a/k/a Lunkenheimer Valves; UB West Virginia, Inc.; Uniroyal, Inc.; United Conveyor Corporation; United Engineers & Constructors, Inc.; Viacom, Inc.; Vimasco Corporation; Warren Pumps, Inc.; Weil-McLain Company; West Virginia State Electric Supply; and Zurn Industries, Inc. (wvrecord.com) 

Asbestos Hot Spots

New York, NY: The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration Read the rest of this entry »

Wal-Mart Class Action Classless? wait and see…

December 9th, 2010. By LucyC

Wal-Mart’s making employment news again. Seems like they’re never really out of the news. You have to hand it to them—at least they’re consistent—consistently at odds with their employees, that is.

This time Wal-Mart has the auspicious honor of facing what could be the largest sex-discrimination case in US history, if the US Supreme Court, which agreed on Monday to examine the class-action at Wal-Mart’s behest, says the lawsuit can proceed as a class action.

But this story started almost a decade ago, when the suit was originally filed. The allegations are that Wal-Mart paid its female employees less than its male employees and gave them fewer opportunities for promotion. Not very original, but also not very surprising, given the retailer’s track record.

Wal-Mart objects to the case being allowed to go forward as a class action because of its size, and because the women involved reportedly worked at thousands—yes thousands of different stores—with potentially different issues.

However, all this hinges on the definition of a “class”. The larger issue at play here, and one which is being watched closely, is how a “class” is defined. Wal-Mart’s petition is being supported by other large players including Bank of America Corp, General Electric Co. and Microsoft Corp. According to a piece in the Wall Street Journal, these companies say that an earlier ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which essentially authorized the class action suit to proceed, could, if allowed to stand, “expose other companies to staggering liability by allowing unrelated discrimination claims to proceed as class action suits.”

Wal-Mart claims the Appeals Court misapplied the standards for defining a class, and as a result has left it exposed to punitive damages when it should be liable only for back pay. (WSJ) 

So the Supreme Court has agreed to review whether the potential plaintiffs in the class have enough in common to warrant a ‘class action’—that their claims can be fairly decided in a single action.

Just as an aside, and for those of us not up on the ins-and-outs of class actions—this particular type of lawsuit combines multiple claims against a common defendant or defendants, into a single claim. This enables the courts to provide redress for large-scale ‘wrongdoing’ where it might not be possible on a case-by-case basis. We have a very comprehensive FAQ on class actions.

Back to Wal-Mart. Lawyers representing the ‘class’ allege that the retailer victimized its female employees through a ‘centralized corporate culture’ and are, therefore, entitled to be represented in a class.

If the Supreme Court finds against Wal–Mart in its review of the case, and allows the suit to proceed as a class action, the class could involve as many as 1.5 million plaintiffs. The potential pay out could be billions in damages and back-pay. And there’s the rub. 

BTW—this wouldn’t be the first time Wal-Mart has faced a discrimination class action. They were recently sued over workplace discrimination involving Latino employees at a Sam’s Club in Fresno, California, alleging a hostile work environment. The plaintiffs claim they were verbally harassed, including having derogatory words used against them. The lawsuit was filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which, according to Al Norman, writer with The Huffington Post, “does not file a suit unless it has given up trying to work out a voluntary agreement with a company.”

So, the Supreme Court justices will make a ruling on the class action issue—which will determine how the suit—or suits—proceed. But the arguments likely won’t be heard until the spring, and a ruling not made until the summer of 2011. Not to seem dark in any way, but some plaintiffs could be dead by the time this matter is finally settled. 

And Wal-Mart does have the motivation and the bucks to drag this out. According to a report in the Wichita Business Journal “Wal-Mart Stores Inc. reported a profit of $3.4 billion, or 95 cents per diluted share, on sales of $101.2 billion for the quarter ending Oct. 31. That compares to income of $3.1 billion, or 82 cents per diluted share, on revenue of $98.7 billion for the same quarter last year.” 

Wal-Mart, in addition to being an employer of ill-repute—also seems to be recession proof—on the backs of its employees.

The Darvon Recall—What Took So Long?

December 8th, 2010. By janem

Darvon is over 50 years old—long enough to do some serious damage. Reports of adverse events, such as destroying people’s lives, were pouring in since 1979—back in the day when Ralph Nader was banging on FDA’s door to ban the painkiller, when Darvon was cited in 589 overdose deaths in 23 US cities. Nader’s Health Research Group called Darvon the “deadliest prescription drug in the United States” and Sidney Wolfe, M.D., director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group, said “Propoxyphene [Darvon] has one of the worst benefit-to-risk ratios I have ever seen for a drug,” yet the FDA did nothing.

What took the feds so long to recall Darvon and its evil cousin Darvocet? Rather than a recall, FDA just required that the manufacturer conduct an “educational campaign” to limit Darvon’s use. As if that would do any good: pharmaceutical companies aren’t educators, they are profiteers. Why didn’t the FDA slap a black box warning on the drug in ’79? I wonder if any of those decision-makers have any pangs of guilt, knowing how many OD’s they could have prevented. And now Darvon side effects have become as serious as a heart attack.

It wasn’t until a recent study confirmed that Darvon and Darvocet were associated with heart problems that the meds were yanked from North America’s shelves (the UK and other countries were way ahead—the UK started withdrawing Darvon in 2005 and again in 2009).

I think that one reason the FDA sat on it laurels for so long was because up until a few years ago, most people were prescribed Darvon for depression and overdoses were regarded as accidental suicides. Nothing wrong with the drug, just the patient. Then it become popular as a pain killer; so popular that by 2009, 10 million people had been prescribed some form of Propoxyphene, either Darvon or Darvocet.

Guaranteed there will be a lot of lawsuits now. And perhaps those families who lost a loved one to an “accidental overdose” (like victims of the Fentanyl Patch) will also come forward.

Elective Surgery Risks Include Wallet Suction

December 8th, 2010. By Hunter West

Medical credit cards… 

Charge it…but more than the fat may be missing post-op

Have you heard about these things? 

They’re designed for those elective procedures not covered by health insurance or Medicaid. It might even be a procedure you don’t even really need, such as laser eye surgery, or cosmetic dentistry. A facelift. 

You may not have the money for it. And you may not have the room on your existing credit cards. But now you can apply for a medical credit card issued by a number of providers with the express use of funding medical procedures. 

But buyer beware… 

As a recent article in The New York Times points out, medical credit cards can dig you into an even deeper financial hole if you’re not careful. The other problem, according to the November 26^th issue of Patient Money in The New York Times, is that such cards have been designed, Read the rest of this entry »