This past Thursday three sexual abuse lawsuits were filed against the Diocese of Portland in Maine. These are the first lawsuits filed that are a direct result of Democratic Gov. Janet Mills signed a law last year that allowed victims to bring civil lawsuits about…
On June 14, a motion was filed to coordinate Exactech knee, ankle, and hip recall lawsuits into a federal multidistrict litigation in the Eastern District of New York. Multidistrict litigation is a special procedure in which federal civil (noncriminal) cases from around the country are…
Last month, the 86-member executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention released a 288-page independent report by Guidepost Solutions that found that church leaders had covered up sex-abuse claims for over two decades. The report revealed that the church had long maintained a secret databas
Professor Kevin Lewis O’Neil is the Director of the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies and Professor in the Department for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto. A cultural anthropologist, his work focuses on the moral dimensions of contemporary political practice in…
On Saturday, March 19, 2022, Pope Francis released his new Apostolic Constitution Praedicate Evangelium (To Preach the Gospel) which replaces the founding constitution “Pastor Bonus” that was penned by Pope John Paul II in 1988. As in all documents from the Vatican, it is important…
Both the House and Senate in the state of Kentucky have proposed legislation that would significantly revise the current laws governing the civil prosecution of childhood sexual abuse. Kentucky had been a state with restrictive statutes of limitations (SOL) prior to the proposed legislation. Curren
Less than one day remains for victims to file lawsuits for old sex abuse cases in New Jersey. Under the 2019 Child Victim’s Act, survivors of child sexual abuse in New Jersey were given the opportunity to file a civil claim against the individual who…
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration and state and local health agencies have been investigating the origin of a rare, multistate tuberculosis outbreak. More than 100 patients may have been infected with the bacteria that causes tuberculosis during spinal surg
Millions of Americans currently suffer from heart failure, and ventricular assist devices are a popular tool to assist people with advanced heart failure to return to normalcy. The HeartWare Ventricular Assist Device (HVAD) has been implanted into more than 19,000 patients. HeartWare, later acquired
Last week, the former prince of the Catholic Church, Theodore McCarrick appeared in a Dedham MA criminal court room to answer charges that he had sexually molested a minor boy 50 years ago. As expected, he pled not guilty. The presiding judge ordered $5,000 bail,…
A request for the creation of a multidistrict litigation docket, has been filed by plaintiffs with claims pending against Johnson & Johnson relating to the benzene content in the company’s Neutrogena aerosol sunscreen products. This comes several months after an analysis by the independent lab…
This week, criminal charges were filed against disgraced and defrocked Theodore McCarrick for incidents that began in 1974 in Massachusetts. The sexual abuse of the then 16-year-old began at a wedding reception in Massachusetts where the survivor lived with his family. McCarrick faces 3 counts…
