Warner Brothers suing CBS for $49 million for costs of producing “Two and a Half Men”

Time Warner Inc.’s Warner Bros. Television department is suing CBS Corp., claiming that it is owed $49 million from the Charlie Sheen hit comedy “Two and a Half Men.”

A licensing agreement provides Warner, which produces the show, more benefits in the fifth and sixth season, if the show was deemed to be a hit, to recover expenses taken on in the first four seasons, according to a complaint filed yesterday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

“CBS has reaped the benefits of the tremendous success of ‘Two and a Half Men’ but wants to deny Warner Bros. the right to its agreed-upon share,” the studio said in a statement. “It should not be permitted to do so.”

The half-hour situation comedy is currently in its sixth season and is the “crown jewel” of CBS’s Monday night prime time lineup, Warner said. The studio took on a $61.1 million deficit during the first four seasons because CBS paid less under the licensing agreement than the cost of producing the show, according to the complaint.

Apple being sued over iPhone technology

Apple Inc is the object of a civil suit that claims technology used by the iPhone that allows it to view certain sites infringes on a patent filed by Los Angeles real estate developer Elliot Gottfurcht and his partners.

The suit states that the technology the iPhone utilizes to negotiate and display some websites that are specifically designed for small phone screens infringes on a patent that EMG secured last month.

Susan Lundgren, a spokesperson for Apple, declined to release an official statement on the lawsuit, saying that the California-based company does not discuss pending legal claims.

EMG has not looked into suing companies such as HTC Corp, creator of the G1 Google phone, and Research in Motion Ltd, maker of the BlackBerry, which also carry devices that can display mobile websites, according to Gottfurcht’s lawyer.

King of Pop sued for $7 million dollars by Arab prince

The son of an Arab monarch brought a suit against the King of Pop on Monday, alleging that Jackson accepted $7 million as an advance for an album and an autobiography that he never authored.

The claim that Sheikh Abdulla bin Hamad Al Khalifa’s legal team presented was their client paid for Jackson’s expenses as an advance on the book and a joint recording deal with the sheikh, who is an amateur songwriter. Jackson holds the position that the money was a gift.

A lawyer for Al Khalifa said the his client first spoke on the phone to Jackson, 50, while the singer was on trial in California after his 2003 arrest for child molestation. Attorney Bankim Thanki said that Al Khalifa wanted to help Jackson get his career back on track. Jackson’s finances dwindled after his arrest.

Al Khalifa’s first payment of $35,000, went to paying off the utility bills at Neverland Ranch, Jackson’s 2,500-acre ranch home and park in California, Thanki said. When Jackson was found innocent of the molestation charges in June 2005, Al Khalifa paid out $2.2 million in legal bills, according to the sheikh’s attorney.

According to lawyers, Jackson and the sheikh became close and at one time both were living in a palace in Abu Dhabi owned by Al Khalifa’s father, Bahrain’s king. The singer lived for nearly a year in Bahrain as a guest of the son, but the relationship went south when Jackson defaulted on a business deal the sheikh claims they had agreed upon.

Actress Charlize Theron sued for $20 million

Charlize Theron has reached a $20 million settlement in a lawsuit with the luxury watchmaker that accused her of breach of contract.

Executives at Swiss company Raymond Weil claimed they paid Theron the sum to wear its watches exclusively between October 2005 and December 2006.

According to court documents, Theron violated the agreement when she “was actually photographed wearing a watch from the Christian Dior line” at a press event in Austin on March 14.

A month later, Theron modeled a Montblanc watch on a sign at a Swiss trade show.

Company executives said the breaches “demonstrate a total disregard by (Theron) for any of her obligations under the agreement.”

The settlement follows her lawyers’ unsuccessful tries to have the case thrown out.

New documents filed in Manhattan Federal Court reveal the suit will be tossed when it is finalized within 30 days.

Merck faces more lawsuits as states file suit for Vioxx related deaths

Even as Merck is sending out checks in its monumental settlement with Vioxx users, the company is still combating new legal battles over the drug.

Florida’s attorney general said yesterday that he’s filing suit against Merck for its “allegedly deceptive marketing and promotion” of Vioxx, which was pulled from the market in 2004 because of its links to increased risk of heart attack and stroke.

Florida’s Medicaid program spent $80 million on the drug between 1999 and 2004. According to the attorney general “the company’s repeated failure to disclose the adverse effects” of Vioxx “directly violates Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.”

Eight other states have lawsuits pending as well. “We believe the company has acted responsibly, and we intend to defend against the complaint filed by Florida,” a company spokesman said.

On top of the state actions, Merck is facing a shareholder lawsuit that was revived last month by a federal appeals court.

Texas attorney general files suit against hotels for price gouging in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike

The Texas attorney general filed suit against a hotel and a motel Thursday, accusing them of price gouging during September’s evacuation of more than 1 million Gulf Coast residents ahead of Hurricane Ike.

Attorney General Greg Abbott is suing the Hotel Nacogdoches in Nacogdoches and the Super 8 Brookshire Motel near Katy, accusing them of illegally hiking room rates after Gov. Rick Perry had issued a declaration of disaster on September 8.

“Although Texas law clearly prohibits profiteering during declared disasters, these defendants are charged with increasing room rates for evacuees during Hurricane Ike,” Abbott said in a press release. “The law imposes strict penalties on vendors that attempt to increase their profits after the governor issues a disaster declaration.

“Despite today’s price-gouging charges, the vast majority of Texas businesses complied with the law and are to be commended for working with authorities to provide crucial assistance to hurricane victims.”

In Texas, the state attorney general can sue, however they cannot file criminal charges. A district attorney would need to file any such charges.

An estimated 1.2 million Gulf Coast residents followed officials’ recommendations that they move inland until the storm had passed.

According to the statement Hotel Nacogdoches, located north of Houston along a major evacuation route, charged evacuees more than double its usual rate, citing complaints from guests whose receipts showed the hotel charged $99.99 for a room that had cost $49.99 two days before Ike.

Reports were similar about the Super 8 Brookshire Motel, west of Katy, which also housed evacuees. The motel charged up to $125 for a room that ordinarily cost $99, according to the statement.

The businesses also charged state and local hotel and motel taxes, in spite of the fact that the governor had issued a declaration waiving them, according to the statement.

The office of the attorney general is seeking civil penalties of up to $20,000 per violation and up to $250,000 per violation for victims over the age of 65.

1.5 Million Dollar Settlement Awarded to Truck Accident Victims

Attorneys from Heygood, Orr, Reyes, Pearson & Bartolomei representing two men in Austin announced that an Ellis County jury has awarded the men a $1.5 million settlement as compensation after suffering injuries they received in an 18-wheeler wreck two years ago.

On July 2, 2006, Ronny Martinez, 37, and Kenneth O’Neal, 50, were driving northbound on Interstate 35E in Waxahachie when a northbound 18-wheeler veered into their lane and collided with their car, causing it to roll numerous times. Mr. Martinez suffered a fractured vertebra and Mr. O’Neal sustained a serious injury to his right knee, which required several reconstructive surgeries as well as suffering a mild traumatic brain injury and damage to his collarbone.

The men filed a personal injury lawsuit against the Indianapolis, Ind.-based Celadon Trucking Services Inc., which operated the tractor trailer, asserting that the company was negligent in hiring the truck driver, Michael Wade, and that Wade was negligent in his actions which resulted in the crash. The jury award includes $750,000 for medical bills as well as an additional $750,000 for other actual damages such as pain and suffering, physical impairment and disfigurement.

“These two men were driving down the road, minding their own business, when the Celadon driver changed their lives forever,” says attorney James Craig Orr, Jr. of Heygood, Orr, Reyes, Pearson & Bartolomei in Dallas, who along with attorney Luis Bartolomei represented Martinez and O’Neal. “The jury did the right thing here. This decision will help them put their lives back together, and we hope it serves as an important warning to other trucking companies to hire only qualified drivers and follow the rules of the road.”

The trial was heard by Judge Gene Knize’s in the 40th Judicial District Court in Waxahachie. Jurors deliberated for approximately four hours before presenting their verdict.

The Law Offices of Heygood, Orr, Reyes, Pearson & Bartolomei based in Texas and specializes in civil litigation representing businesses and individuals in matters such as personal injury claims, contract disputes, business torts, professional negligence and more.

Personal injury lawsuit against major pharmaceutical companies

A man from Virginia has filed a personal injury lawsuit against drug manufacturer Amylin Pharmaceuticals and its co-marketer Eli Lilly & Company for their injectable diabetes drug Byetta(R), in San Diego Superior Court. This type of personal injury lawsuit may be the first of its kind against the manufacturer of a pharmaceutical product.

Amylin negotiated with the FDA back in 2007 to make the risks of acute pancreatits known to patients by adding it to the “precautions” on the ByrettaR warning label provided to physicians and patients. The warning was added to the label as a result of 30 cases of acute pancreatitis from using the drug being reported.

The personal injury lawsuit alleges the manufacturer “failed to adequately warn prescribing physicians of the risk of pancreatitis, of measures needed to properly assess the appropriateness of prescribing the drug to certain categories of patients, and of measures doctors and patients could and should take to minimize the risk.”

The plaintiff was hospitalized in December, 2007 for pancreatitis, or inflammation of the pancreas after being prescribed the drug for his diabetes. Pancreatitis can lead to bleeding and even death. The plaintiff’s attorney, Thomas M. Moore of Moore Labriola LLP, states “it is pretty obvious that the label change in 2007 was not adequate.”

Incidentally, just days after the lawsuit was filed, the FDA reported that six cases of hermorrhagic or necrotizing pancreatitis in patients who were prescribed ByettaR and two out of those six victims died. Also,  yesterday Amylin and Lilly reported that four more people have died from taking ByettaR.

Metrolink Accident Lawsuits

If you or a loved one were injured in the Los Angeles Metrolink accident (also referred to as the “Chatsworth train accident”) you have legal rights. Already, the first legal claim has been filed in Friday’s deadly Metrolink crash. The family of Aida Magdaleno, a 19 year old women who was killed in the devastating train accident, has filed suit. Magdaleno was one of the 25 people who died in the Los Angeles train accident that occured between a Metrolink passenger train and a Union Pacific freight train on September 12, 2008.

Her family said the collision could have been avoided had Metrolink installed a collision avoidance system called positive train control. 

A spokesman for Metrolink declined to comment on the claim. A claim is a precursor to a lawsuit and it is expected that hundreds of lawsuits against Metrolink will be filed.

The president of the California Public Utilities Commission said he will ask the Federal Railroad Administration to require automatic train stop systems on all freight and passenger trains that share tracks in the state. 

“I will also urge the FRA to approve the implementation of positive train control, a more complex form of automated train control. These safety measures are especially important in Southern California, which has a very high number of commuter trains that share tracks with freight trains,” said Michael R. Peevey. 
      
Magdaleno’s brother, Miguel, said she usually sat in the last car of the train, but authorities believe she was a passenger in the first train car on Friday. The family waited for 12 hours after the crash to hear news about the youngest of the five Magdaleno children.  “We were expecting the worst, and that’s what they gave us,” said Miguel Magdaleno.

If you or a family member were injured or lost a loved one in the Chatsworth train accident and you are considering filing a lawsuit against Metrolink, you should contact an attorney immediately.  The statute of limitations is a law which places a time limit on pursuing a legal remedy in relation to wrongful conduct. After the expiration of the statutory period, unless a legal exception applies, the injured person loses the right to file a lawsuit seeking money damages or other relief. Metrolink is operated by the Southern California Regional Rail Authority. This is significant because actions brought against a government agency are much shorter than normal. In this case, you have just a few months to file a claim against Metrolink. In most cases, you have 2 years to file a claim but not in this one.

Overtime Pay Battle

A battle over whether some of the larger high-tech companies have been withholding overtime pay from highly skilled employees is raging in the Silicon Valley. A typical workweek for programers and engineers tends to be much longer than 40 hours, and companies like IBM, Electronic Arts, Cisco Systems, Siebel Systems, and Oracle have already settled class-action lawsuits on this issue totaling more than $150 million. Now the high-tech industry is seeking legislation that would clarify the law that exempts tech companies from paying their highly skilled employees. The California Labor Federation opposes the measure, however, viewing it as potentially harmful to other classes of workers.

If you’re looking for an employment lawyer, visit www.ilawyersource.com

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