Wrong direction; State lowers bar on MCAS science standards.
COLUMN: IN OUR OPINION The state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education this week took a step back from educational excellence by approving "emergency rules" that will permit high school students to appeal for relief from the MCAS science requirement after just one failure. The...

Dr. failed to follow-up 'knowing feeding tube in lung'.
CASE ON POINT: Lee v. Martindale, 2008-AR-0626.021 (06/25/2008) S.W.3d--AR CASE FACTS: In January 2000, Indianna Barnes was admitted to Saline Memorial Hospital with respiratory problems. Doctors placed her on a nasogastric feeding tube so that she could receive nutrition. Dr. Mark Martindale, her attending physician, saw her...

KY: can 'highlighted' records go to jury room? Court barred records from going to jury room.
CASE FACTS: Mary Herr was treated by Dr. Stephen Burton, who became her family doctor, while he was working for Olash Medical Associates, PSC. In addition to her other symptoms, she was treated for mitral and tricuspid valve prolapse. Dr. Burton referred Mary to Dr. Michael Imburgia, who continued...

Failure to diagnose pulmonary embolism-death results.
CASE ON POINT: 2008-MN-0904, 070 Hawkins v. Fontaine, (09/02/2008) N.W.2d--MN ISSUE: Should a Dr. who fails to diagnose pulmonary embolism in-spite of classic symptoms-be liable for a patient's death? CASE FACTS: On May 3, 2004, Bonnie Moore was seen in the Urgent Care Department of...

Settlement to repay adoptive families.
Byline: Karen McCowan The Register-Guard The state of Oregon has agreed to pay a combined $1.7 million to thousands of families who adopted Oregon foster children and then saw their promised state assistance abruptly reduced during a 2003 state budget shortfall. The payments to the...

State appeals board backs Springfield street closure.
Byline: Jack Moran The Register-Guard SPRINGFIELD - The City Council did nothing wrong in approving the permanent closure of a downtown street to make room for a police parking lot, a state appeals panel has ruled. The Land Use Board of Appeals concluded this week...

Washington Commandments display can stay, federal appeals court rules.
A Ten Commandments monument on public property in Everett, Wash., does not violate the Constitution and may stay where it is, a federal appeals court ruled March 26. Americans United brought the case on behalf of local resident Jesse Card. In court, AU argued that the six-foot-tall...

McDonnell Appeals Decision On Virginia Partial-Birth Infanticide Act.
Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell is asking the full Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the decision of a three-member panel of that court which struck down Virginia's Partial-Birth Infanticide law. On May 20 a split panel overturned the law, concluding that it imposed an "undue burden"...

A Texas appeals court ruled that the state's child-protective-services agency failed to show that the children of schismatic Mormon polygamists seized in a massive April raid were in "immediate" or "urgent" danger to "physical health or safety.".
A Texas appeals court ruled that the state's child-protective-services agency failed to show that the children of schismatic Mormon polygamists seized in a massive April raid were in "immediate" or "urgent" danger to "physical health or safety." The 16-year-old girl whose hotline call triggered the raid-she said she already...

State, environmentalists both lose appeals of power plant decision.
In an extremely long and complex opinion, the Sixth District Court of Appeal has upheld water discharge permits for Duke Energy's Moss Landing power plant. Environmentalists have been on the offensive ever since Duke applied for permits to rebuild and expand the natural gas-fired power plant in...