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1. According to the News & Observer piece, NC-OSHA reforms that were implemented after the tragic fire at the chicken plant in Hamlet have begun to slip. The article cites a sharp drop in both inspections and citations: ‘N.C. OSHA inspections and citations have dropped sharply. Total citations sank to […]

In Capps v. Southeastern Cable, the employee was hired by Southeastern to install cable TV an internet service for Time Warner cable customers. Southeastern told its installers that they were being hired as independent contractors rather than employees. Installers were required to provide a certificate of insurance showing that they […]

The highly publicized case of Jamie Leigh Jones, the woman who alleged she was assaulted while working for defense contractor KBR, demonstrates that juries should be trusted. Ms. Jones claimed that during her employment for KBR in Iraq, she was drugged and raped by a company employee. When she asserted […]

The most conservative United States Supreme Court in nearly a century recently continued its assault on the constitutional rights of ordinary citizens harmed by corporate wrongdoing. In the case of AT&T v. Concepcion, the Supreme Court told corporations that they could write into the fine print of most any contract, […]

The United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of generic drug manufacturers in PLIVA, Inc. v. Mensing, holding that federal drug regulations applicable to generic drug manufacturers bar the plaintiffs’ state-law failure to warn claims. The Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, held that manufacturers of generic drugs cannot be […]

The United States Supreme Court ruled against a class of current and former female employees of Wal-Mart who had sued the nation’s largest private employer for employment discrimination. In ruling in favor of Wal-Mart, the court continued a disturbing trend of siding with big business and against individuals. In reversing […]

Safety experts and researchers say wrong site surgeries may be on the rise based on data compiled by the Joint Commission, an organization that accredits hospitals and other health care institutions, The Washington Post reports. Wrong site surgeries include operating on the wrong limb, the wrong organ or the wrong […]

N.C.G.S. 97-22 requires an injured employee to provide the employer ‘written notice of the accident’ within 30 days (emphasis added). In Gregory v. W.A. Brown & Sons (Gregory II), the Court of Appeals has concluded that an employer who had actual notice of an accident was not prejudiced by the […]

“Government, taxpayers, nursing home residents as well as their families and caregivers should be outraged and seek solutions,” says Daniel R. Levinson, Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services, in announcing the result of a DHHS audit which found that nearly one in seven elderly nursing home […]

A bill was recently introduced in the Senate which would prohibit corporations from including arbitration clauses in their standard contracts with consumers and non-union employees. Though the Federal Arbitration Act, passed in 1925, was originally intended to cover only certain types of disputes, such as those between merchants and where […]