40 STATE WORKERS ACCUSED OF FRAUD FOLLOWING HURRICANE IRENE TO BE REINSTATED
Posted: June 14, 2012 Filed under: Crime, Law, Public Policy, Uncategorized | Tags: AFSCME, Arbitrator, d-snap, fired state employees, food stamp fraud, fraud, groton, hurricane irene, luciano, Malloy, mystic, new london, old mystic, reinstated, southeastern Connecticut, stonington, susan meredith Leave a commentAccording to an Associated Press report issued yesterday, Susan Meredith a state arbitrator has reinstated 40 of the 103 state employees who lost their jobs in the wake of alleged disaster relief fraud following Tropical Storm Irene. D-SNAP — the Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — provided food stamp and other relief to qualifying Connecticut residents. Qualification for the D-SNAP assistance depended on the income and assets of the applicants and on the amount and type of damage suffered.
The story was picked up by news services across the state but also caught considerable national attention.
According to the report which cited a statement by Sal Luciano, executive director of the Union local representing some 35 of the former employees, the arbitrator determined that the errors committed by these 40 employees warranted discipline but not dismissal. Accordingly they will be required to pay restitution and serve suspensions of varying lengths –so far between 15 to 60 working days. This leaves open the issue of back pay for periods of unemployment following the August 2011 storm that exceeded the newly imposed suspensions. More than 60 additional cases are still pending–among them cases characterized as the most egregious
According to a post by the Hartford Courant blogger, Christopher Keating, the level of mutual tension between members of the Malloy administration on the one hand and lawyer for 60 former workers, Rich Rochlin, have remained high.
With controversy raging in Michigan and elsewhere over the role of labor unions in the public sector, we are curious to know how our clients and neighbors in Connecticut and especially here in Mystic, Stonington, Groton, New London, and the rest of Southeastern Connecticut view the issues.
Does the fact that the fraud impacted publicly administered relief funds, mean that public employees found to have abused the program should be accountable –not just in criminal court — but to their employer as well? Would this create an unfair disparity between workers in the public and private sectors? Should the state seek review of the decisions in Superior Court? Please tell us what you think.
DID YOU REALLY THINK FACEBOOK WAS PRIVATE?
Posted: January 4, 2012 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: connecticut lawyer, divorce, facebook, facebook privacy, groton lawyer, new london lawyer, old mystic, passwords, stonington lawyer Leave a commentIf you ever find yourself in a lawsuit, your Facebook privacy settings may no longer matter.
Discovery is a process through which parties to a lawsuit collect evidence and information to prepare their cases for settlement negotiations or trial.
Often, parties squabble over whether certain documents or areas of questioning are ‘discoverable’. Usually the dispute over whether a discovery request must be honored is based on a claim that the document or information is either too burdensome to produce or is protected by laws concerning personal privacy.
Lately, more and more of those squabbles concern whether an individual’s Facebook password and posts are discoverable. For anyone who hoped that their Facebook privacy settings were enough to keep their online discourse private from enemies or adversaries, that hope is fading fast.
Most often, Courts deal with demands for Facebook access in the context of personal injury litigation where the defendant wants to use Facebook photos or posts to show that the plaintiff’s injuries are not as serious as he or she claims. Let’s face it – photos of your golf swing or dance moves will shoot serious holes in your disability claim.
Courts increasingly agree that Facebook content is fair game in the discovery process.
Laws that prevent Facebook, itself, and other social media sites from disclosing member’s private information are of no help if you are the one being asked to allow access. For example, a Pennsylvania court recently found that the federal Stored Communications Act, which would have prevented Facebook from honoring a subpoena of documents, did not apply to the Defendant, himself.
Personal injury litigation is not the only area of law affected by this trend. In a recent pretrial ruling, a Connecticut court paved the way for a divorcing couple in a child custody case to examine each other’s past and current Facebook posts following an attempt by the wife to change her password and delete posts.
Conventional wisdom has always dictated that we shouldn’t post anything on Facebook that we wouldn’t want a potential employer to see. What this growing body of caselaw shows us is that, when you share too much information with your Facebook friends, you risk losing more than just a job.