NewsLinks

  • Commentary | The Crucial Role of Minor's Counsel in Family Law

    The Recorder
    November 5, 2024

    (Subscription required) Minor's counsel holds a unique position within the legal system. Unlike attorneys who represent parents or other parties, we are appointed by the court to champion the best interests of the child. This role is pivotal in ensuring that the child's voice is not lost in the cacophony of legal disputes and their needs are given the utmost priority.

  • C.A. Defines What Counts as ‘Incapacity’ to Undo Judgment

    Metropolitan News-Enterprise
    November 7, 2024

    Div. Seven of this district’s Court of Appeal has held that a party petitioning to set aside a judgment entered in a divorce proceeding, under a Family Code section allowing such relief in the event of “mental incapacity,” must show a mental deficit that significantly impairs the ability to understand the nature or consequences of his or her actions or of the family law proceedings.

  • Oakland warns California Supreme Court of ‘rogue’ development based on antiquated maps

    Courthouse News Service
    November 5, 2024

    A First Appellate District panel overturned a judge's finding in favor of the city in 2023 and agreed with the owner that Lot 18 of the parcel is a lawfully separate piece of land under the state's 1974 Subdivision Map Act. The panel ordered the city to issue a so-called certificate of compliance for the lot that would allow the owner to develop it separately from the part of the property on which the house sits.

  • ‘It’s time to get the project going’: Preferred courthouse site approved by Advisory Committee

    The Union
    November 6, 2024

    The Judicial Council’s Court Facilities Advisory Committee (JCC) approved the USDA National Forest Service Office location at 631 Coyote Street in Nevada City as the preferred site for a new courthouse. The design-build phase for a new courthouse — including construction — is estimated to begin in July 2027 and be completed in June 2031, according to the JCC officials.

    Related: YubaNet.com, KNCO, California Courts Newsroom

  • Attorney says appellate ruling risks 'rogue development'

    Daily Journal
    November 7, 2024

    (Subscription required) Hundreds of thousands of legal land parcels could be created throughout California if the state Supreme Court does not reverse an appellate ruling in favor of a trust that wants to subdivide its property for development, an attorney for the city of Oakland warned justices this week.

  • Lawyer Can’t Be Sanctioned for Client’s Nonappearance for Trial, C.A. Holds

    Metropolitan News-Enterprise
    November 7, 2024

    Div. Three of the Fourth District Court of Appeal has reversed a $1,500 sanction imposed on a lawyer based on his client’s representative declining to travel from New York to California while trial of the company’s fraud/contract action was trailing, insisting he would not come until the trial date was certain.

  • [U.S.] Supreme Court Hearing on Facebook's Alleged Nondisclosure Yields 'Freakish' Hypotheticals

    National Law Journal
    November 6, 2024

    (Subscription required) The nation's top tribunal was instead discussing those "freakish" scenarios in an effort to determine the viability of a securities fraud lawsuit against Facebook over another presidential election eight years earlier. In particular, the lawsuit focuses on the precipitous $100 billion stock drop which followed news reports that a political consulting firm had used Facebook data to support Trump in the 2016 presidential election.

  • Family-Law Judge Had No Authority to Order Relinquishment of Firearm, C.A. Holds

    Metropolitan News-Enterprise
    November 6, 2024

    Div. Three of the Fourth District Court of Appeal has reversed an order to a lawyer/business executive to relinquish a firearm—a command the justices said a family law judge had no authority to issue—but spurned the party’s request to invalidate a directive not to communicate with the children’s coaches or therapists.