New Installation at the GE/MOBIL/BP/AT&T Sponsored Smithsonian Institute, formerly a museum.

Title of Installation: A Jury Box

Enter Docent:

“Children, there was a time when the very ground you are standing on was a Country. The Country had a Constitution. The Constitution granted citizens of what we used to call the United States certain things called rights and liberties. Some were even called fundamental rights. What you are looking at now is not a set of church pews in the GE/MOBIL/BP Church. No, this is something that used to be in a building called a Court House. It is called a “Jury Box” and citizens of the United States used to sit in it and decide disputes, instead of having a King decide or a Dictator, or GE/MOBIL/BP who pays something called an arbitrator to decide a dispute. As you all know, the arbitrators are paid by GE/MOBIL/BP because we do not have money, but I’m getting off track. So, I heard the reason that the United States used to have something called the “jury trials” is because this right was contained in a document called the Constitution. Everyone had a right to trial by jury, no matter who you were. Even people who were accused of crimes had a right to a jury trial and they were presumed innocent until found otherwise by a jury of their peers. Isn’t that weird? The idea was that a jury of ones peers could decide disputes and claims, especially since they were not financially interested in the outcome of a particular case. The Constitution had other rights too. People could bear arms to protect themselves. Remember that exhibit of guns we saw earlier. Those were the arms the Constitution was referring too. People also had something called “privacy rights” which is hard to explain, basically, unlike today, a person could keep their private lives private, and make their own decisions about their bodies and things like that. I know, it is radical, isn’t it? I’ll have to do a little more research on that. Anyway, before companies owned the United States, people owned their own homes, and had something called personal property. It used to be illegal for another person or a company to take someone’s property! Oh, and citizens of the United States used to do something called vote. That’s spelled V.O.T.E. Citizens would vote other citizens into office. Those people would represent them and help to enforce the Constitution. Then, one day, one of the Courts, called the “Supreme Court” became sponsored by the companies. They started taking away a lot of the rights in the Constitution. Anyone who protested the taking away of rights by the Supreme Court was called unpatriotic. They began to give the companies more and more power. For example, they decided that the corporations could donate money to citizens being elected. They began to decide elections. (Whispering---I really don’t think that was right. My grandmother told me that things were better than. She voted once! And, she sat in a jury box! She told me she used to be something called an “American”)

(VOICE HEARD OVER THE PUBLIC ADDRESS SYSTEM SPONSORED BY GE---COMRADE SMITH, MOVE ON NOW!!!!!)

Insert embarrassed look here…O.K. Children, let’s now move to the next exhibit. This is a something the Citizens used to call a park. We used to have these. The green stuff on the ground is called grass. The tall things with the round tops of them were called trees.

Today the United States Supreme Court Ruled Today That Companies Can Force Consumers to Give Up Their Right to a Jury Trial and Have Their Complaints Decided by an Arbitrator Paid by the Company. See, AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion

Disability Discrimination Verdict of $1,571,500 upheld in Los Angeles against City

In RORY CUIELLETTE v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES, B224303, the City appealed from a judgment of $1,571,500 in favor of Plaintiff, an LAPD Officer, on his claims of disability discrimination and failure to accommodate a disability under the California Fair Employment and Housing Act, Government Code section 12900, et seq. (FEHA).[1] On appeal, the City contended that substantial evidence did not support the trial court’s liability determination because the evidence showed that plaintiff was unable to perform the essential duties of a police officer with or without a reasonable accommodation. However the court held that even if defendant could not perform all of the essential functions of a police officer, he could perform the essential functions of a position into which he had been placed by the LAPD as a reasonable accommodation in accordance with its then existing practice. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals held that substantial evidence supported the trial court’s determination that the City was liable for a FEHA violation, and affirmed the judgment against the City.

Fire Damage - Fire Injury - Causation Good New Case

In Garbell v. Conejo Hardwoods, Inc. - filed April 5, 2011, California, Second District, Div. Three - See, http://www.metnews.com/sos.cgi?0411%2FB221482

The Court of Appeals found sufficient evidence of causation of negligence where the jury found a fire started in a trashcan in garage, and the defendant's employees were found to have admitted that they threw cigarette materials into the trashcan shortly before the fire started.