The VLW Blog

Two Northern Virginia businessmen and their fledgling solar energy business have filed a defamation lawsuit against the town of Front Royal and three of its leaders alleging they were defamed by allegations of bribery. The lawsuit by Donald Poe and Gregory Horton seeks $30 million from the town and three members of the town council. [...]

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It’s Christmas-in-July in Loudoun County where the supervisors again are planning to grab the third-rail issue of courthouse holiday displays. Before the leaders vote on public displays at the courthouse, however, Chief Circuit Judge Thomas Horne wants to let local judges speak up on the issue. As reported by the Loudoun Times, Horne has written [...]

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A spokeswoman from the Grand Canyon National Park last night confirmed that the body retrieved on Monday has been positively identified as that of Kirby Porter, 50, of Mechanicsville. She reiterated that Sunday night the park’s communications center received a report of a man seen exiting a car at Moran Point, climbing over a retaining [...]

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“Michael Scott” is vexatious and frivolous, as fans of the TV show “The Office” know. Now there is an official court document attesting to that fact. Or at least attesting to the fact that a Norfolk Circuit Court has found one “Michael A. Scott” to be “vexatious.” In 2008, the court levied $40,000 in sanctions [...]

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A couple of new developments on the Melendez-Diaz front have appeared this week. A Norfolk Circuit Court has ruled on defense lawyer Andrew Sacks’ Melendez-Diaz challenge to Va. Code § 19.2-187.02, the Virginia statute that lets in a hospital blood alcohol screen that showed a driver’s .13 BAC after a two-fatality auto accident. Sacks is [...]

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Lawyers for Salem’s Lewis-Gale Medical Center hope to persuade the Supreme Court of Virginia they were unfairly surprised by a judge’s last-minute decision to allow emotional distress damages in a lawsuit filed by a former emergency physician. The doctor won a $900,000 verdict claiming the hospital got her fired from her medical practice group for [...]

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A light-duty job offered to a woman used to heavy lifting turned out to be a no-duty job she was entitled to quit, the Virginia Court of Appeals ruled last month. Melissa Ann Carpenter said she was “driven crazy” by having nothing to do in the clerical position involving data entry and filing. Carpenter had [...]

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UPDATE: 2010/07/14, 10:40 a.m. A message on the office phone of Kirby H. Porter says that he has died. The Richmond Times-Dispatch has details, including allegations in divorce proceedings of marital and financial difficulties. A body found yesterday 250 feet below the South Rim of the Grand Canyon may be that of former Hanover County [...]

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The Supreme Court of Virginia is taking aim at the issue of whether a robber can be convicted of use of a firearm without evidence of a real gun. In March, the Court of Appeals overruled a 1995 decision holding that an object the victim reasonably believed to be a firearm could never constitute a [...]

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Appellate lawyers familiar with the small green, yellow, and red argument timing lights used by appeals courts are confronted with a much different system when they make their cases to the Supreme Court of Virginia’s traveling writ panels. As lawyers assembled today in a small courtroom in Salem for writ hearings, many were surprised to [...]

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