Orange County Computer Lawyer Blog

Police Department Posts DUI Arrest Names and Mug Shots on Facebook

It isn’t unheard of for law enforcement agencies to use Twitter and Facebook to broadcast their activities, and in California, the Huntington Beach PD is considering naming DUI suspects on its website.  However, a New Jersey police department went one step further by using its Facebook page to post the names and mug shots of people arrested for DUI.  Fortunately, the department has now taken down this page, while it considers the legalities involved.

The Evesham Township Police Department Facebook page has been around for about six months now, but the department only recently began posting DUI arrest information.  According to the folks at the PD, this was done to put a face and a name to these arrests, and provide the public important information.  It wasn’t just Los Angeles criminal defense lawyers who found this completely inappropriate and highly objectionable.  Several legal experts have also spoken about such postings being bad policy, and not entirely appropriate for a Police Department.

The ETPD has now taken down the page, while it weighs in on whether this is legal at all.  It seems to DUI lawyers in Los Angeles that the authorities here should have considered the legalities of this before posting the mug shots online.

There are definitely privacy concerns here.  Facebook allows pictures to be tagged by your friends, and the potential for humiliation, embarrassment and long-term damage from having people tagging these photographs, is immense.  There is also one tiny point that the ETPD seems to have forgotten.  Persons whose photographs are posted on the Facebook page, have only been arrested for DUI, and have not been convicted.

Unfortunately, social media has made it possible for law enforcement agencies to rush to judgment and announce punishments, even before a person has been convicted for an offense.  Just a few months back, a prosecutor in Texas who began a practice of posting the names of persons arrested for DUI on his Twitter feed.  These are dangerous trends, and while criminal defense attorneys in Los Angeles will have no problem with law enforcement agencies using social media sites to enhance their activities, they must object when these activities interfere with citizens’ rights to due process.

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Did Lou Gehrig have a Brain Injury – Not Lou Gehrig’s Disease?

A new study indicates that the death of athletes diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease may actually have been triggered by concussions and brain injuries.  What Los Angeles brain injury lawyers will find even more surprising, is that researchers believe even Gehrig himself might not have had the disease famously named after him.

The research was conducted by doctors at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Massachusetts and the Boston University School of Medicine.  According to them, markings on the spinal cords of two baseball players and one boxer diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, indicate that they did not have the disease at all.  They, in fact, had a different disease triggered by mild brain injuries like concussions that ate away at the central nervous system in a manner similar to that experienced by persons suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease.  It’s the reason why the researchers believe it is likely that Lou Gehrig did not suffer from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis at all.

Gehrig suffered consistent concussions over the years, and insisted on playing even through these, a factor that could have contributed to impact on the central nervous system, because of brain trauma.  According to the doctors, these findings establish a connection between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and the kind of injuries that result from rough contact sports.  Proving this relationship further is going to be tough.  Persons who die from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis don’t typically have an autopsy performed on them, which makes it hard to probe this link.

According to the ALS Association, approximately 30,000 people in the country currently suffer from ALS, a disease that results in the quick and consistent atrophy of all voluntary muscle control.  Besides Gehrig who was the disease’s most famous face, there are other famous patients, like Stephen Hawking whose brain remains active years after his muscles have wasted.

The study is one more reason why the NFL and high schools and colleges across the country must take concussions very seriously.

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Alabama Man Charged with Lawnmower DUI

Here’s something that Alabama DUI criminal defense lawyers don’t come across every day.  Alabama state troopers this weekend arrested a man in Slocomb for riding a lawnmower under the influence.

41-year-old James Calhoun was riding his Yard Man lawnmower, and it stopped on State Highway 52.  A state trooper on the highway noticed that other motorists seem to be swerving to avoid something ahead.  The trooper drove closer to get a better look, and found Calhoun driving a lawnmower on the highway.

The trooper suspected that Calhoun was intoxicated, and he was taken into custody.  A blood-alcohol test showed a account of .17, more than twice the .08 allowed under Alabama law.  He has been charged with driving under the influence and driving with a revoked license as well as an open container violation.

Alabama troopers are not exactly unfamiliar with persons driving unusual vehicles under the influence.  They have in the past found persons driving golf carts while drunk, besides the usual cars, trucks and motorcycles.  This one is bound to generate a few chuckles at the Slocomb Police Department for a few months come.

Across the country, law enforcement officers have come across even stranger models of intoxicated transportation.  Perhaps the weirdest DUI offender of them all was pulled over in Minnesota in 2008 after he was found riding his motorized La-Z-Boy recliner.  62-year-old Dennis Anderson drank about nine beers at the bar and left the bar on his motorized recliner.  His blood alcohol level was .29 when he crashed his recliner into a parked vehicle.

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Facebook and Twitter Could Ruin Your California Employee Discrimination Claim

More and more employees are finding out that pouring their heart out on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or any other social networking medium, could prove very costly when they file sexual harassment, gender discrimination or any other employment-related lawsuits.

Corporate employment and labor lawyers are getting extremely Net savvy.  They know there is a wealth of information to be found on Facebook and Twitter, and to some extent, MySpace.  When these lawyers receive an employee complaint about sexual harassment, wrongful termination, gender discrimination or any other employment complaint, one of the first things that these lawyers will do is look up the employee’s Facebook page.  Not every post on your Facebook wall will provide a juicy nugget that the company’s attorney can then use against you.  However, the chances are high that if you’ve been facing a tough time at work, you are likely to vent online on Facebook or tweet a caustic message about your employer to all your followers.

California employment lawyers would warn employees who are preparing to file a claim against their employer, to tread cautiously.   Corporate and labor lawyers have very successfully used Facebook wall posts and Twitter status updates against employees.  Any posts that you make against your employer, talking of revenge of retaliation, or any other outpourings of an emotional mind, will be lapped up by the company’s attorneys.  These messages will be printed and presented when it’s time to hear your claim.  You can expect your employer’s attorneys to try to make friends with your friends, in order to gain access to any messages or posts by you.

Just about anything you post online, including Facebook wall posts, Twitter status updates, messages, forum posts, replies, retweets of Twitter tweets, and images that you post could turn up in an employment lawsuit.  It’s not just your presence on social networking sites that will come under the microscope.  If you blog, or have ever commented on someone else’s blog, you can expect these to also show on the opposing attorney’s computer screen.  Expect any tidbits of information, including any groups and forums that you have joined, videos that you upload, and even supposedly private direct messages that you’ve shared with other Facebook users, to become fair game in a lawsuit.  The other attorneys, with some effort, can gain access to all of these, spelling possible trouble for your claim.

Posted in Electronic Discovery, Employment Law, New Technology | No Comments »

Safety Device Could Make Table Saws Safer

A device that could allow the blade of a table saw to detect a human finger in its path could help prevent possibly hundreds of table saw-accident-related amputations every year.  However, the power tool industry hasn’t been overly enthusiastic about including this device in their tools.

The device has been developed by an entrepreneur Steve Gass, and is known as SawStop.  The device works through minute electrical currents on the blade and a computer-chip in the saw.  These electrical impulses can sense that there’s a human hand in its path.  Once a human hand detected, a safety brake is fired, and the blade comes to a stop in less than 3/1000th of a second.  The maximum damage that a person might experience with a saw equipped with SawStop is a scratch or a nick.  Without the safety device, the blade can easily slice through the person’s finger or hand, and probably through other fingers before the person even has time to realize what is happening.

The question is not about whether SawStop can prevent hundreds of table saw-related accidents every year.  The question is whether power tool manufacturers are willing to include this device, in order to protect their consumers.  Unfortunately, the industry has not been very willing to adapt this technology.  Gass has presented the device to most of the major tool manufacturers, and from most of them, the response been the same-they are not interested, because they’re not too sure how it will sell.

Table saw-related accidents injure thousands of people, including wood workers, carpenters and do-it-yourselfer’s every year.  There is a device out there that can eliminate hundreds of such accidents, but manufacturers won’t take steps to include these because of cost factors.  It is estimated that adding the feature to one table saw will increase the cost of the saw by up to $100.  To California product liability lawyers, it’s a small price to pay when you consider that thousands of people suffer varying degrees of amputations every year from these accidents.

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Yet Another Celebrity DUI Arrest

Last month, Motley Crue rocker Vince Neil joined a long list of celebrities who have been arrested for driving under the influence, after he was arrested for intoxicated driving in Las Vegas.  This DUI arrest seems to acquire special significance because of the fact that Neil had earlier been involved in a fatal drunk driving accident back in 1984. Neil allegedly caused an accident that killed a musician who was riding with him and injured two people.  In that accident, Neil had been headed to a bar with his friends, after an entire day of drinking, to buy more drinks.  With this, Neil joins other luminaries like Lindsay Lohan, Mel Gibson and Paris Hilton, who have been arrested on DUI charges.

It’s not as if Las Vegas drunk driving accident lawyers expect celebrities to set moral examples for the rest of the population it comes to safe driving practices.  However, the increasing number of celebrities who seem to be getting caught driving under the influence, is definitely a matter of concern.  Often, these celebs seem to get away with lighter sentences and cushy prison time.  The image of Paris Hilton, waltzing out of jail after her jail time for a DUI offense, can’t be easily forgotten.  But celebs seem to take drunk driving and all the consequences of such behavior, very lightly.  It’s easy for the general population, especially the young and teenagers who look up to these celebs, to believe that DUI is no big deal when they see their idols seemingly blasé about the whole deal.

The problem is even more acute in Las Vegas, which continues have a major problem with drunk driving accidents.  Images of Hilton breezing through her prison time and lack of seriousness with which people like Lohan take their DUI convictions, send out the wrong message to impressionable minds.

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Lindsay Lohan Sentenced to 90 Days in Jail for Probation Violations

It was high drama and more at a Los Angeles courtroom this week, as actress Lindsay Lohan was sentenced to 90 days in prison for a series of probation violations. The actress was handed down three separate sentences of 30 days each, and was ordered to spend 90 days in a drug rehabilitation facility. The case is related to two separate drunk driving arrests involving Lohan back in 2007.  The Beverly Hills judge was unforgiving, as she sentenced the star to 90 days, giving her a number of reasons why the actress deserved a sentence like this.

And there were plenty of reasons. Lohan had been in the news several times as she violated the judge’s orders, including a failure to attend alcohol education classes every week. Lohan failed to follow the terms of the probation, which is not what an Alabama DUI criminal defense attorney would advise at all. Earlier this year, she was photographed partying at the Cannes Film Festival when she was actually supposed to be making a court appearance in Beverly Hills. That incident did not go down well with the judge, and Lohan didn’t make it better by insisting that she couldn’t make it back to Los Angeles in time because someone had stolen her passport.

The judge also seemed angry at the fact that Lindsay has always denied that she was driving under the influence on both the occasions. She’s always maintained other people had been driving the vehicles in both cases, and not her. It also didn’t help that she was found with white powder on her pants some time after the arrests, and insisted that the trousers did not belong to her. A cocaine test soon after, had tested positive.

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Minimal Risk of Brain Injury from Gravitational Forces During Roller Coaster Rides

Some medical professionals have always held that high exposure to gravitational forces when a person is riding roller coasters or other high-speed amusement park rides, could increase the risk of a Traumatic Brain Injury. A new study dispels these misconceptions proving that there is a very low risk of suffering a Traumatic Brain Injury just from riding a roller coaster.

The results of the new study have been published in a study titled While Riding Roller Coasters: Implications for Brain Injury published in the American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology. According to the study, earlier research has wrongly used gravitational force or G-force measurements in order to signify the risk of a Traumatic Brain Injury from riding roller coasters. However, the kind of exposure to G-forces you have from riding an amusement park ride is not that much different from the kind of exposure you have from performing normal everyday activities.

The researchers studied the potential of suffering a Traumatic Brain Injury while performing routine activities, and while riding a roller coaster. They measured 3-D head motions while a person was riding a roller coaster, was engaged in a pillow fight, and when he was involved in a car crash. They then compared this data with published data. They found that a car crash at speeds of 8.05 miles per second contributed to the highest head injury measure of 28.1, and head impact power of 3.41. In contrast, the head injury criterion measure for roller coaster rides was 4.1, and for pillow fights was 0.36.  The team is concluding that there is little risk of suffering a brain injury from simply riding a roller coaster.

Of course, California brain injury lawyers will have to warn you that this study does not consider the kind of injuries that could result during an amusement park accident, such as when a person is stuck by ride equipment, when a person falls off from the ride, or any other such accidents. Victims of such accidents are highly at risk for suffering a Traumatic Brain Injury, besides a host of other injuries. However, it’s nice for California brain injury attorneys to know that just the act of riding a roller coaster may not significantly up your chances of suffering a brain injury.

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Is San Francisco Overreacting to Injury Risks of Cell Phone Use?

Last week, the city of San Francisco went ahead and took a step that many cell phone makers and at least a few safety groups believe, is unnecessary. The city voted to require that all cell phone retailers have warning signs displaying the amount of radiation emitted by each device.

The law will require retailers to post a notice in at least 11-point type next to cell phones listing their absorption rate. This rate is the amount of radio waves that are absorbed into the user’s body tissue from the use of the cell phone. These are known as Specific Absorption Rates, and can vary from phone to phone. However, the Federal Communications Commission requires that all phones sold in the United States have Specific Absorption Rates that are below 1.66 W per kilogram.

San Francisco is the first city in the country to adopt an ordinance like this. The law is hardly a few days old at all, and not surprisingly to any class action attorney, has already seen plenty of criticism, most vociferously from the cell phone maker lobby. Not surprisingly, the cell phone industry views an ordinance like this as something that could affect its business. San Francisco city authorities disagree. They say that they only want people to have the information they need while making a shopping decision. They insist they are not encouraging people to stop using cell phones. However, they believe that shoppers must have all the information they need before they make a purchase.

San Francisco is very different from many major American cities in that an ordinance like this has even passed the city’s lawmaking process. More expansive bills have been defeated in other cities in California and in the state of Maine. The National Cancer Institute and the Federal Communications Commission agree that there is little scientific evidence proving the dangerous health effects of cell phones on human beings. However, these are not their final conclusions, and, both agencies continue to monitor studies into the effects of cellular devices on human health.

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Ford’s New Inflatable Seat Belts Work Best for Seniors, Children

Inflatable Seatbelt

Ford Motor Company is all set to roll out its new inflatable seatbelts – a Ford auto safety innovation – on the 2011 Explorers.

According to reviewers who managed to test the seatbelts, the undeployed seatbelt is padded and much softer than regular seatbelts. This should make it more appealing to those who refuse to wear seatbelts, like children. The inflatable seatbelts are available for back seat passengers. Typically, these passengers tend to consist of children and senior adults.

During impact, the seatbelts inflate from side to side, as they are fed with cold compressed gas from a cylinder underneath the seat. This allows the impact to be spread across five times the area that a seatbelt normally would. This reduces the strain that is likely with a normal seatbelt during impact. The seatbelts are configured to deploy at a low impact, and much more slowly than front seat airbags which are typically deployed suddenly, with great force and only at high-impact. This will help protect the softer bones of both senior adults and children, preventing injuries and fractures.

These features are currently optional on the 2011 Explorers, and are available for between $200 and $300 extra. Ford is likely to introduce the inflatable seatbelts on other models too, most likely the Taurus.

It’s always exciting when auto companies create technological innovations to keep occupants safe during a crash. It’s far too soon to tell how much inflatable seatbelts will help protect back seat occupants during a crash, but any feature that aims to improve on the safety of airbags and seatbelts is always welcome. The fact that these undeployed seatbelts are more comfortable than normal seatbelts will make them more attractive to back seat passengers, who typically have some of the lowest rates of seatbelt use. Getting occupants of the backseat to buckle up has been a major concern for auto safety advocates and Las Vegas personal injury lawyers, and this feature could be a push in the right direction.

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