True Story of Erin Brockovich
Anderson v. PG&E
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Michael Kelly
Business Law
Professor Chowdry Erin Brockovich is the story of a woman who helped 650 people in Hinkley California get justice for the actions of Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E.) The case was titled Anderson v. PG&E and was actually settled outside of court. It was settled in the Superior Court for the County of San Bernardino, Barstow Division. The parties agreed on a settlement of $333 million to be distributed to the named plaintiffs. It is difficult to find the exact facts, statements, and decision reasoning of the case because the information is not public record. The information has remained private. It all started in
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By having knowledge of the chromium in the water supply, PG&E should have been required to let the people know that were affected by it. By not telling the citizens, they were withholding information that affected these people’s lives. Because a risk was created, consequences came, and nothing was done to prevent such injuries that did occur, PG&E should have been considered negligent. Certain criteria should be considered when looking at a negligence case. Questions to be asked are; did the defendant owe a duty of care to the plaintiff? Did the defendant breach that duty? Did the plaintiff suffer a recognizable injury? Did the defendant’s breach cause the plaintiff’s injury (p.114, Miller)? The answer to all of these questions is yes when looking at this particular case. The defendant had a duty to report the chromium leaks to the people it could have affected. A breach of that duty occurred when the plaintiffs were not informed of the chemical in their water supply. The plaintiffs then suffered multiple injuries of various degrees because they were not informed of the chemical in their water. Because PG&E did not inform the people in the area, these injuries did occur. PG&E had a duty of care that they did not uphold. A duty of care is the duty of all persons as established by tort law to exercise a reasonable amount of care in their dealings with others. Failure to do so constitutes the tort of negligence (p.114, Miller). The basic idea is that people are
Sparkle Company is a Nigerian diamond mining company. Sparkle is a joint venture, 50 percent owned by Shine and 50 percent owned by Brighten. Both Shine and Brighten are U.S.-based companies with their functional currency being the American dollar. Sparkle Companies functional currency is that of Nigeria, being the Naira. During 2009, Sparkle had several transactions with its joint venture owners and outside parties. The details of Sparkle’s transactions are three loans, three expenditures, and one revenue stream. The loans the company took out were $1 million from Brighten, $1 million from Shine, and 300 million Naira from a local Nigerian bank. The expenditures
Brandon Barnak is a 16 year old white male who is currently before the court for charges of petit larceny, grand larceny and two counts of unlawfully entering a vehicle. On May 4, 2016, Brandon appeared before the Honorable Judge Alotha C. Willis in the Portsmouth Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court with his guardian and Attorney Washington. Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Kara Cooper prosecuted the case.
The main issue of this case is to determine if Tricontinental may recover from PwC for negligence. In order to show negligence there must be four requirements that the plaintiff must show. The four requirements are: the defendant owed a duty of care, defendant breached that duty, breach of duty to care caused the plaintiff’s injury, and fourth that damages resulted.
Shakespeare Inc., a private publishing company issued its F/S on March 20, 2012. There were several accruals and events that the management of Shakespeare is considering to determine if they should be recognized or disclosed in Dec 31, 2011 F/S. In my opinion, the important things to focus on subsequent events are the period they effect and if their influence is material or not, so that in conclusion, the F/S are fairly presented.
The Pat Parker case is about a lawyer who started his own firm concentrating on writing reports and conducting political opposition research for political candidates. This particular case is about how Parker devised a research report for one particular political candidate then two years later, some trial lawyers wanted to buy the research on the Republican Attorney General. Parker was unsure on how to proceed knowing that this could potentially jeapordise the political party's candidate or even worse, he could be arrested for soliciting the information. Would Parker be violating contract law? Would he be infringing the copyright law? Would he be violating campaign statutes and other codes of ethics?
1. The objective of the strategic analysis was to identify which products were world-class in terms of “competitive position and potential,” products which could become world-class, and products which have no hope of becoming world-class.
The Civil Liabilities Act 2002 defines negligence as a failure on the part of the defendant which results in the harm of the plaintiff which could have been prevented by taking reasonable care. The breach of duty must be foreseeable, Sullivan v Moody. The risk must be not insignificant, and a reasonable person under similar circumstances would have taken precaution against the harm. In this case
In the film Erin Brockovich, several different social theories can be related to the storyline of the film. Although different, theories from Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim, and Max Weber can all adequately describe what happens in the film. The film is about a small law firm that takes on an extremely powerful organization, PG & E (Pacific Gas & Electric), on the account that they were knowingly polluting Hinkley, California’s water supply and harming the citizens. From Karl Marx, the film can be explained through his base-superstructure model of society, with PG & E serving as the powerful base, and the rest of society in Hinkley, CA serving as the superstructure. From Emile Durkheim, this movie can be portrayed through his
The issue in this case as it relates to the Kentucky tort of negligence is governed by rules or principles established by the courts. The elements of negligence are a duty the defendant owes to the plaintiff, a breach of that duty by the defendant, a causal connection between the breach and the plaintiff's injury, and actual injury. In the absence of any one of these elements, no cause of action for negligence will lie.
The breakthrough came in the form of a former employee who tells Erin that he while he was working at the plant he was ordered to destroy many of the old documents, however he kept some of them and turned them over. The documents included memos from the PG&E corporate office to the Hinkley plant, establishing that corporate officers has knowledge of the illegal dumping of contaminated water into those unlined pools (tcm web site).
The attempt to link the harm to the behavior of the defendant produced its share of successes and failures for the Schlichtmann team. Not only did the plaintiffs have to prove that the corporations contaminated the water, but they also had to show that the contamination caused the leukemia and the other health problems. To do this they enlisted the help and expertise of numerous doctors and specialists. Naturally the defending side recruited their own set of experts. As in any case, each side is going to have an expert who will refute the testimony of the other side’s expert. This is a normal part of arguing a case, but can cause confusion and complication on the part of the jurors.
The EPA is also being negligent by how long they are taking to clean up after the spill.
Who knew that Flints water could be deadly? Everyone should be allowed to have the same clean water to bathe in, drink, cook with, and to have fun in. Unfortunately, residents in Flint could not do this for quite some time. These residents were bathing and drinking from this water before the founding of high lead levels in it. Not only was it because of the high lead levels, but the pipes were very old as well. Due to actions made by the city council this caused a lot of problems for the residents in the city of Flint. This effected children, pregnant women, and the elderly the most. Many lawsuits were filed against the city of Flint. It was so serious to the point that Governor Snyder had to declare a state of emergency. This took place January 5th of 2016. High levels of lead in the water and old pipes lead to lawsuits, the sickness of Flint residents, and the city of Flint not doing their job.
As mentioned in the introduction of the mini case, Hobby Horse Company, Inc. (HH) experienced a tough year in 2011. HH opened up a number of new stores but experienced a poor Christmas season. Christmas season is the biggest sale period for retail stores. As a result, bad Christmas sales performance played a big part of HH’s loss for year 2011. As we computed the financial ratios for HH, we can see the effects from new stores openings and poor sales performance.
Erin Brockovich is a single mother of 3 who is struggling for work after a car accident left her unemployed. She turns to a law firm in hopes of suing the individual who had wrecked into her. She had hopes of just getting enough money to pay off her medical bills. However, Brockovich ended up losing the case and was left with nothing. That's when she demanded Ed Masry, the owner of the law firm, to help her find a job since