NorthCarolinaLaw

www.edelsteinpayne.com Speeding Ticket reduced, Failure to Appear Stricken October 2017 Not something I would normally feel the urge to publicize, but there is a need for lawyers to handle traffic matters and I do that.  I did so yesterday for a woman who had missed her court date, incurring a $250 FTA fine in addition to the penalties of a 78 in a 55 speeding ticket.  She had filed her own motion asking to strike the failure to appear and for a new court date, but the motion was denied. I negotiated a "9 over" speeding violation, and successfully requested that the court  waive or strike the FTA. The result is a good one, because the original ticket would have resulted in a license revocation because it was more than 15 mph over the speed limit that was 55 or greater. So, I handle Wake County traffic matters, ranging from DWI, Driving While License Revoked, Reckless Driving, Speeding to Elude, to simple Speeding Tickets. Give me a call if you w...

https://edelsteinpayne.com/employment-law Forsythe County Superior Court Judge Orders City of Kernersville to Produce Personnel Documents for our Client Originally Posted by Sean Cecil May 19, 2016  (0 Comments) On Monday, firm partner Travis Payne argued a mandamus petition in Forsythe County on behalf of our client, a Kernersville firefighter, who was fired and then denied access to unredacted copies of documents used to support his firing. Citing an important 2013 court case,  Wind vs. City of Gastonia  (for which he drafted an  amicus curiae  brief), Attorney Payne successfully argued that records related to our client's discipline is not subject to the disclosure exemptions for employment records. Although the final order is pending, the City has indicated an inclination to appeal the ruling. The City will also be required to provide the client with a new grievance hearing.   A writ of mandamus is a court order to a public offici...

SCOTUS Affirms Class Certification in Tyson Foods "Donning and Doffing" Overtime Case Originally Posted by Sean Cecil Mar 24, 2016  (0 Comments) The following materials were prepared by Edelstein Payne & Lucas firm partner   Vanessa Lucas   and will be presented in her upcoming Federal Law update CLE training seminar to educate other lawyers at the North Carolina Advocates for Justice annual convention:  Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo,  577 U.S. ________(2016)                                                                                                                                           ...

https://edelsteinpayne.com/employment-law 4th Circuit: GEICO Investigators Not Exempt from FLSA Overtime Requirement Originally Posted by Sean Cecil Jan 29, 2016 (0 Comments) The Fair Labor Standards Act   requires, subject to several exceptions, overtime pay of 150% an employees' regular rate for work in excess of 40 hours in a week. (It is not true that you are exempt from overtime merely by virtue of being a salaried employee.) One common set of exceptions that cause a lot of confusion is the Executive, Administrative, and Professional (EAP) exceptions, commonly referred to as the “white collar” exceptions. The EAP exceptions focus on actual job duties as opposed to job titles, and have been subject to extensive litigation over the years. As a threshold matter, no EAP exemption applies to employees who are paid less than $455/week (the Obama Administration is in the process of an administrative rulemaking that would increase this minimum threshold to $955/week). ...

https://edelsteinpayne.com/employment-law Laid-off Workers Sue Disney, Claim They Were Illegally Replaced by Foreign Workers Originally Posted by Sean Cecil Jan 26, 2016 (0 Comments) Two separate lawsuits were filed against Disney this week by laid-off workers who claim that Disney colluded with two "global consulting" companies to replace them with foreign citizens through the H-1B visa program. The plaintiffs, who were forced to train their replacements, allege that the replacements violated a legal requirement that H-1B visas not issue unless the employer certifies that issuance will not adversely affect the working conditions of American workers. The lawsuits, according to the New York Times, "represent the first time Americans have gone to federal court to sue both outsourcing companies that imported immigrants and the American company that contracted with those businesses, claiming that they collaborated intentionally to supplant Americans with H-1B work...

edelsteinpayne.com Writ of Mandamus Obtained on Behalf of Statesville Firefighter Originally Posted by Sean Cecil Jan 11, 2016 (0 Comments) Last month, Edelstein Payne & Lucas partner Travis Payne and I traveled to Statesville, NC to appear in Iredell County Superior Court to petition the court for a writ of mandamus. A mandamus action in North Carolina is a petition for a court order requiring a governmental official to perform his or her non-discretionary official duties. Our client, a longtime member of the city's fire department, had applied for a promotion and underwent promotional processes. When he was not chosen for the promotion, he sought review of the decision to not promote him, as provided  in the City's Charter. He was denied a Civil Service Board review, despite several explicit requests, and was left with no choice but to petition the court for a writ of mandamus.  There are five "elements" which must be established by a party p...

www.edelsteinpayne.com NC Workers' Compensation: Delay in Seeking Retroactive Payment for Attendant Care was Reasonable (Originally Posted by Sean Cecil Dec 01, 2015)  (0 Comments) Sometimes it's better not to appeal a ruling you don't agree with. In an opinion issued today by the North Carolina Court of Appeals, workers' comp insurer Liberty Mutual was again ordered to pay an injured worker's attorney fees, after the company unsuccessfully appealed an order to pay for attendant care for the second time. The worker, Connie Chandler, was injured over ten years ago when she fell and hit her head on stairs while performing janitorial duties. She was diagnosed with a concussion and a closed-head brain injury. Her condition deteriorated, eventually she required round-the-clock attendant care and was later ruled legally incompetent; her husband was appointed guardian.  Ms. Chandler's husband acted as his wife's attendant for years, without pa...