The VLW Blog

A longtime veteran prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s office has been named a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The judges of the U.S. District Court appointed David J. Novak to the position, effective Feb. 1, 2012. Novak succeeds U.S. Magistrate Judge Dennis W. Dohnal, who recently retired from the bench.
Novak, [...]

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Internet-savvy lawyers are closely watching a Virginia State Bar disciplinary case set for hearing next week involving the right of an attorney to blog about his cases without posting an advertising disclaimer.
Richmond lawyer Horace F. Hunter – armed with a brief penned by First Amendment scholar Rodney Smolla – faces a VSB district committee hearing [...]

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Former restaurateur and eccentric Roanoke businessman Roland “Spanky” Macher got a stern lecture as a federal judge imposed a 30-month sentence for fraud.
Macher was charged with failing to pay taxes, making false statements in bankruptcy court and illegally obtaining food stamps, according to The Roanoke Times.
“Your behavior was just outrageous – totally beyond [...]

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Danville U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser has ordered a new trial for a Martinsville contractor’s claims of racial discrimination, based in part on post-trial evidence that undermined testimony about the company’s damages. The decision undoes a jury’s $3.17-million award against the Danville housing authority in February.
At trial, the owner of the plaintiff grading contractor testified [...]

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U.S. District Judge James Jones minced no words denying lawyer John Flannery’s claim that the judge had secret meetings with prosecutors in the Paul Thomson cocaine case.  “Mr. Flannery’s assertion is outrageously false and unfounded,” Jones wrote in an order Thursday.
Flannery – who is defending the Winchester lawyer accused of buying cocaine from a client [...]

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Lawyers for the commonwealth and the federal government took two different views of the so-called individual mandate in argument today over the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, perhaps better known as Obamacare.
Virginia Solicitor General E. Duncan Getchell Jr. contended that the requirement that an individual have insurance or pay a penalty [...]

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Richmond lawyer John A. Gibney Jr. was scheduled to cruise through the Senate Judiciary Committee at a routine meeting yesterday morning, but Chariman Pat Leahy, D-Vt., was unable to round up a quorum.
Gibney is back on the docket for a committee next Thursday. Virginia’s  two Democratic senators, Jim Webb and Mark Warner recommended him for [...]

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Updated at 10 p.m., April 28, with a link to the hearing. Gibney’s segment begins 124 minutes and 50 seconds into the hearing.
Richmond lawyer John A. Gibney spent less than 15 minutes before the Senate Judiciary Committee this afternoon in his quest for a federal judgeship in Richmond.
Gibney appeared to benefit from the greater interest [...]

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Richmond lawyer John A. Gibney, nominated by President Obama for a seat on the federal bench, has a date with the Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow.
According to the committee’s website, Gibney comes up April 28 at 2:30 p.m. A webcast of the hearing apparently will be available.
- Paul Fletcher

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Two more bar groups have announced their endorsements for two federal court vacancies.
The Virginia Trial Lawyers Association found U.S. Magistrate Judge M. Hannah Lauck highly qualified for a U.S. District Court seat in Norfolk. The VTLA found Linda S. Laibstain, a partner at Williams Mullen in Norfolk, to be qualified.
For a seat in the Western [...]

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