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JOHN WHITMAN SUCCESSFULLY REPRESENTS MAINE TURNPIKE AUTHORITY IN SETTLEMENT OF PAUL VIOLETTE MATTER
December 2011
In Maine news, no story was bigger in 2011 than the revelation that Paul E. Violette, former State Senate Majority Leader and for 23 years the Executive Director of the Maine Turnpike Authority, was accused of misappropriating Turnpike funds totaling about $500,000 over a period of years. Representing the Turnpike, RWLB attorney John S. Whitman filed suit against Violette last summer and has just consummated a settlement recovering all of the funds in question. His net worth extinguished, Violette now faces criminal prosecution.
CAROL EISENBERG EDITS HISTORY OF CLEAVES LAW LIBRARY
November 2011
Attorney Carol Eisenberg of RWLB, who is a member of the Cleaves Library board of directors, served as editor and copy editor for a new book published by The Nathan and Henry B. Cleaves Law Library. The book, “A Brief History of the Nathan and Henry B. Cleaves Law Library On The Occasion Of Its 200th Anniversary In The Year 2011,” was written by attorney and historian Hugh MacMahon. The book was distributed to all attendees at a bicentennial celebration luncheon that featured remarks by The Honorable John G. Roberts, Jr., Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
The Library is located in the Cumberland County Courthouse in Portland and celebrates its bicentennial in 2011. One of the nation’s oldest law libraries, Cleaves dates to a time before statehood, when Maine was still part of Massachusetts. The library traces its origins to an 1811 declaration by 21 members of the Cumberland County Bar – including the father of poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow – pledging to each pay two dollars a year to support the library, then known as the Cumberland Law Library. The next 200 years of bequests, fires, relocations, and colorful characters are an interesting slice of Maine history, and indeed many of the leaders of Maine government have also been leaders of the library.
BARRI BLOOM WINS VETERINARIAN DEFENSE
November 2011
Barri represented the her client (a veterinarian clinic) against a claim that a cat, Winston, acquired ringworm when he was clipped at the clinic for an unrelated surgical procedure. The cat was diagnosed with ringworm about six weeks later but not before it infected four other cats owned by the plaintiff. The case was tried to a judge in Knox County Small Claims Court. The judge found that although the plaintiff had an expert veterinarian who testified that the ringworm could have been caused by unsanitary clippers at the defendant's clinic, the plaintiff failed to sustain her burden of proof that it was more probable than not that this was how the cat acquired ringworm.
MAINE SUPREME COURT DECISION ON LOSS OF CONSORTIUM
July 6, 2011
On June 28, 2011 the Maine Supreme Judicial Court handed down a decision, Steele v. Botticello, 2011 ME 72, which reaffirms the principle that a husband’s settlement and release of his personal injury claim against a third party did not bar his wife from bringing a later, separate lawsuit against the same party for loss of consortium arising from the same incident.
The decision pointed out that the terms “derivative” and “independent,” as they are used to describe loss of consortium injuries and claims, are imprecise and may be misleading. Such claims are both derivative and independent. In the case at hand, the wife’s loss of consortium claim was not barred by her husband’s settlement and release of his personal injury claim, even though she was aware of the injury and his lawsuit, because she was not a party to the settlement agreement.