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Paralegal accused of stealing from law firm
Headline Topics |
2011/07/20 09:24
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Authorities say a South Florida paralegal stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from her Fort Lauderdale law firm.
Miami-Dade officials on Tuesday charged 53-year-old Brenda Wilcott-Kelly with more than 80 felonies, including grand theft and forging documents. Records show she's also took money from a lawyer who was on his deathbed.
Employees of Hermelee amp; Geffin were in court Tuesday as Judge Dennis Murphy set Wilcott-Kelly's bond at $116,000.
Defense attorney Morgan Cronin said his client is innocent.
According to the arrest affidavit, Wilcott-Kelly took $82,472 from the firm to pay off her husband's credit cards. She is also accused of stealing $31,050 from lawyer Steven A. Schultz, while he was in the hospital. Schultz leased space from the firm. |
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Challenge to visa lottery dismissed by judge
Headline Topics |
2011/07/15 22:20
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In a blow to thousands of hopeful would-be immigrants who had been told they'd won a chance to apply for a green card, a federal judge ruled that the State Department can toss out the results of its May visa lottery, which were deemed invalid because of a computer error.
The State Department said the results of a fresh drawing would be available Friday.
Members of the group had been seeking class action status in their bid to stop the government from nullifying their selection in the visa lottery.
In early May, about 22,000 people were notified they had won a chance to apply for a visa as part of the Diversity Visa Lottery Program, which is aimed at increasing the number of immigrants from the developing world and countries with historically low rates of emigration to the U.S.
One of them, 42-year-old French native Armande Gil, who lives in Florida, called Thursday's decision by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson another disappointment. |
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Soldiers seek foreclosures class action
Headline Topics |
2011/07/14 22:21
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Lawyers said they hope to get class action certification in New York for an increasing number of active-duty U.S. soldiers fighting mortgage foreclosures.
A federal lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court in New York alleges CitiMortgage should have done a quick Internet check before foreclosing on the home of Army Sgt. Jorge Rodriguez of Del Valle, Texas, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported Thursday.
In 2003, Rodriguez purchased a home with a mortgage eventually sold to CitiMortgage. He was deployed in 2006, and while he was in training at Fort Hood, Texas, the mortgage company sold his home in a foreclosure sale, the newspaper said.
Rodriguez was sent to Iraq and was on active duty until August 2007.
The federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act prohibits the foreclosure sale of an active-duty soldier's home without a highly detailed court order. Lenders can access a certain Web site to learn whether a soldier is on active duty, the newspaper said.
It's just an issue that we have seen percolating throughout the country, said Gary Lynch of Sewickley, Pa., an attorney for the plaintiffs. Major lenders operated on perhaps what might be a fundamental misunderstanding of the requirements of the statute.
The complaint indicates CitiMortgage may have initiated thousands of foreclosure proceedings ... without adequate safeguards to ensure that service members on active duty were not targeted. |
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Strauss-Kahn's French accuser heard by police
Headline Topics |
2011/07/12 04:24
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A French writer who contends that former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn tried to rape her gave a statement to French police investigators on Monday, a judicial official said.
Tristane Banon brought a criminal complaint last week, and the Paris prosecutor's office has opened a preliminary investigation into her allegations that Strauss-Kahn attacked her in an empty apartment during a 2003 interview.
A judicial official speaking on condition of anonymity in accordance with French judicial regulations said police heard from Banon on Monday.
Banon made no official report of being victimized after the alleged attack eight years ago. Her lawyer, however, said he has evidence, including text messages related to the incident, and Banon has explained that her mother — a Socialist Party politician — dissuaded her from making a complaint immediately after the alleged incident.
A prominent Socialist, Strauss-Kahn had been seen as a leading potential contender and challenger to conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy for next year's elections — until the New York hotel incident embarrassed Strauss-Kahn's party and left him in the political wilderness.
Banon has told L'Express magazine that during an interview for a book project, Strauss-Kahn grabbed her hand and arm before the two fell to the floor of his apartment and fought for several minutes, with the politician trying to open her jeans and bra and putting his fingers in her mouth and underwear. |
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