The VLW Blog

The newly sworn U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Virginia says he hopes to still handle a few cases, despite his administrative role as the top federal lawyer west of the Blue Ridge. Meeting with reporters today, Tim Heaphy said he hopes his management responsibilities won’t keep him out of the courtroom entirely.  “To [...]

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You know they want to know, and you know they won’t hesitate to speculate. That’s right, we’re talking about whether a party has insurance coverage and what difference it will make to a jury’s verdict. But Big Stone Gap U.S. District Judge Jim Jones didn’t have to speculate in XCoal Energy & Resources LP v. [...]

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Even after reading a “secret” revenue-boosting idea offered by a consultant to Rockingham Memorial Hospital, a federal judge said he cannot determine if the idea is so obvious or well-known in the trade as to make it worthless. U.S. District Judge Glen Conrad said the matter is a subjective issue that “may require input from [...]

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The Advisory Committee on Rules of Court has backed off from its original proposal to have jurors in criminal court identified only by number as a matter of course. The original draft had drawn criticism from newspapers, the Virginia Coalition for Open Government and even from Del. Bob Marshall, R-Prince William, who sponsored the legislation [...]

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The Supreme Court of Virginia probably thinks it has written enough on slip and fall cases that Garlick v. Safeway, Record No. 082469, doesn’t merit more than an unpublished order reinstating a case that had been dismissed on a motion to strike. The order is here for whatever guidance practitioners may find from it. The [...]

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A lawyer for the company with salvage rights to the Titanic confirms a possible expedition to the wreck site is planned for next year. Robert McFarland of Norfolk (pictured) tells the Associated Press that details of the dive should come out in hearings this week before U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith. McFarland’s client, RMS [...]

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The Boyd-Graves Conference voted this afternoon to recommend that the General Assembly extend the Virginia Tort Claims Act to local governments.   The committee assigned to study the issue split 5-5, which suggested that a consensus among the full membership of the conference would be unlikely.   The conference is composed of lawyers who represent [...]

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Virginia Lawyers Weekly honored its ”Leaders in the Law” Class of 2009 last night at a reception at the Bolling-Haxall House in downtown Richmond. The 28 members of the class were asked to vote one member of their class as the “2009 Leader of the Year.” In a very close vote, this year’s Leaders selected Henry [...]

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Democrat Steve Shannon (left) and Republican Ken Cuccinelli (right) stuck to familiar themes this afternoon at the Richmond Bench-Bar Conference in the last of their four joint appearances before next month’s attorney general election. Shannon, a Delegate from Fairfax since 2003, emphasized his work as a prosecutor and referred to himself as “a centrist, law-and-order, [...]

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William A. White should remain in jail pending trial, according to a panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The Roanoke publisher of a neo-Nazi Web site is accused of threatening people by e-mail and Web posts.  The Roanoke Times reports the appeals panel reversed U.S. District Judge James Turk, who approved bond [...]

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