This case involved a maritime collision between the vessel Helena, owned by Sincere Navigation Corp., and the U.S. Coast Guard vessel White Alder, leading to personal injury and property damage claims. After appeals and a Supreme Court ruling changing the damages allocation from equal division to proportional fault, the court found the Helena 35% at fault and the White Alder 65% at fault, with final judgment entered in 1977. The court held that the United States was not liable for any pre-judgment interest on the amounts owed, because the Public Vessels Act bars interest prior to the rendition of judgment unless provided by contract. It determined that interest runs only from the date of the final judgment that conclusively establishes the parties' liabilities, not from earlier interlocutory or amended decrees. Trial and appeal costs were apportioned 35% to Sincere and 65% to the United States based on the fault ratio.
This case was a Section 1983 action in which a jury found that police officers arrested the plaintiff, a Continental Airlines ticket agent, without probable cause on charges including disturbing the peace and resisting an officer, awarding $10,000 in general damages and $10,000 in punitive damages against the officers and their insurer. The insurer moved to amend the judgment to name it as a defendant and specify the damages breakdown, which the court granted, and also sought judgment notwithstanding the verdict or a new trial on grounds that the policy did not cover punitive damages and that such coverage violated public policy. The court denied the coverage motions, holding that the policy's broad insuring language covering damages "because of, but not limited to, negligent acts, errors, or omissions" and defining personal injury to include deliberate torts like false arrest and assault and battery unambiguously included punitive damages. The court further reasoned that Louisiana law and public policy did not prohibit liability insurance for punitive damages when a police department purchases it to protect employees in performing their duties.
The case involved a plaintiff who, after winning a personal injury lawsuit against a former employer, was fired by a new employer and subsequently denied work by other oil industry companies due to his litigation history, which was tracked in a shared industry database. He brought a class action under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(2), the federal conspiracy to obstruct justice statute, claiming a private conspiracy to impede justice and injure him for enforcing his legal rights. The court granted summary judgment to the defendants, holding that the statute's relevant clauses require a conspiracy motivated by intent to deny equal protection of the laws through class-based animus, which was not shown here. Instead, the employers' actions were driven by economic self-interest in avoiding potentially unreliable or injured workers, without the requisite discriminatory purpose tied to equal protection.
This case is a Truth in Lending Act class action brought by Wendell Jones against Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company on behalf of consumers who entered into retail installment sale agreements using a standard disclosure form at one of its New Orleans stores. The dispute centered on whether Goodyear failed to adequately disclose the vendor’s privilege security interest created by Louisiana law on purchased movable property and on identifying which transactions qualified as consumer credit subject to the Act’s requirements. The court granted partial summary judgment establishing the disclosure violation for the class representative’s transaction and for other qualifying consumer purchases where the privilege applied, set up a process for the parties to determine consumer status for remaining class members with a magistrate hearing on disputes, and awarded statutory damages of double the finance charge per prevailing plaintiff subject to a $500,000 aggregate cap after weighing the number of affected persons and the persistence of noncompliance. The reasoning relied on the Act and Regulation Z’s mandate to clearly describe the type of security interest retained, the absence of any contrary evidence from Goodyear on the representative’s transaction, and statutory factors for determining damages.
In United States v. Beasley, the defendant, convicted after a second trial of conspiracy to defraud the United States and filing false claims in connection with a Title IV-A Social Security Act program, filed a second motion for a new trial under Rule 33 based on testimony given by two witnesses in a later civil proceeding. The court denied the motion, holding that the testimony did not qualify as newly discovered evidence because the witnesses were known and available at the time of trial, the defense made a deliberate strategic choice not to call them, and the prosecution had no obligation under Brady v. Maryland to disclose its interview notes or the prosecutors' impressions of how the witnesses might testify. The court further found that the evidence would not have created reasonable doubt even if presented.
The case was a suit by Southern Insurance Company to recover unpaid premiums collected by its Louisiana sales agent under an agency agreement. Corporate liability was conceded, but individual defendant W.C. Moore contested personal liability for the debt. The court held Moore personally liable for $120,695.39. It reasoned that the contract, governed by Texas law, was executed by Moore individually and listed the corporation only as a trade name under which he did business (d/b/a), making him the owner responsible for the obligations without qualification or limitation on his signature.
