The VLW Blog

A federal jury has decided former Virginia Beach lawyer Brian Gay stole about $400,000 from the estate of a deceased client. After Monday’s guilty verdict on nine counts, Norfolk U.S. District Judge Raymond A. Jackson revoked Gay’s bond. The Virginian-Pilot reports Gay was led away in handcuffs. Gay had attempted to justify his use of [...]

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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 [...]

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A self-described “spiritual counselor” has lost her federal-court bid to avoid regulation as a business by Chesterfield County. Patricia Moore-King uses the trade name “Psychic Sophie,” and offers Tarot card readings and psychic and clairvoyant readings, in person, live online, over the telephone and via email. She leases office space in a business complex that [...]

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“What part of no don’t you understand,” runs the refrain of a country-western song. That chorus may have echoed in Scott Street’s mind as he tried for the fourth time to explain to bar applicant Jonathan Bolls that he failed the Virginia bar examination in 2008. Bolls was in federal court earlier this month with [...]

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The Bank of America is asking a federal judge to block Donald Trump’s claimed right-of-first-refusal to buy the embattled Albemarle House mansion near Charlottesville. Trump owns the front yard and other nearby properties formerly controlled by heiress Patricia Kluge, who has given up millions in assets after declaring bankruptcy in June. Trump says his claimed [...]

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Prince William County Commonwealth’s Attorney Paul Ebert denies he violated the law or the Rules of Professional Conduct in the capital murder prosecution of Justin Wolfe. Wolfe was convicted of arranging the murder of a drug dealer, but his case now is subject to habeas corpus review based on a July opinion from U.S. District [...]

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A former punk rock musician from Charlottesville who threw the kitchen sink into his defamation lawsuit against an international society writer has his case washed down the drain by a federal judge. Jason Jackson used 91 pages to lay out his 66 counts against Taki Theodoracopoulos and five other defendants in his lawsuit, filed without [...]

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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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A Norfolk federal court has awarded reimbursement for experts’ travel time to depositions, but at a rate that is half the hourly charge for time actually spent in deposition. Senior U.S. District Judge Norman K. Moon, who sits in Charlottesville, was called to Norfolk to hear the federal government’s condemnation case involving 1.604 acres in [...]

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David P. Baugh, the capital defender for the central region of the state, has filed a formal complaint with the Virginia State Bar against Prince William County Commonwealth’s Attorney Paul Ebert and Richard Conway, one of Ebert’s deputies. The complaint is based on an opinion earlier this month by U.S. District Judge Raymond Jackson, who [...]

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