Most people hate the feeling that they are getting ripped off - and that doesn’t just stop at your average everyday person.  Celebrities don’t like it either, but they have a much larger pay scale to worry about.

Former wrestler Hulk Hogan, also known as Terry Bollea, filed a lawsuit in Pinellas County, Fla. against his lawyers, according to Tampa Bay Online.

The lawsuit states that the lawyers overcharged him $1 million for his son Nick’s car crash back in 2007. Nick had crashed his vehicle into a palm tree after his car jumped over a median.  He and his passenger, John Graziano, were severely injured and taken to the hospital.

In the lawsuit, Hogan is claiming he paid more than $1 million to his lawyers to defend his son for a civil case filed by Graziano from the accident.

According to the Tampa Bay papers, Hogan states that his insurance company, Progressive Select Insurance Co., could and should have supplied him an attorney at no cost to him under his insurance policy.

At the time of the accident, the vehicle Nick was driving, a Toyota Supra, was insured by Progressive. The policy covered bodily injury limits of $250,000 per person and has a total limit of $500,000 per accident. Progressive would defend the policy holder if any civil suit arose from the accident.

Hogan states that no one at the insurance company had contacted him with this information until much later after he decided to hire out different attorneys, Tampa Bay Online reported.

About two weeks after the accident Hogan decided to consult with Morris Weinberg Jr. and Lee Fugate from the Zuckerman Spaeder law firm. He hired them to defend his son Nick against criminal charges and to protect him against civil lawsuits.

Hogan later found out the insurance company had sent letters to everyone except for him - including his business managers and his financial managers stating the company had appointed him an attorney.  Word of this, according to Hogan, also reached his newly hired attorneys, but they never told him they received the letter.

He also alleges that the attorneys told Progressive Hogan wanted only this law firm to represent him and they came to an agreement with the insurance company that they would only charge Hogan $145/per hour.

According to Tampa Bay news reports, Hogan claims the law firm charged him much higher rates from $475 and up. Hogan could no longer retain the law firm for the case.

Progressive had already paid the firm $350,000 from the $444,000 they were seeking in reimbursement.  The insurance company then decided they were no longer going to represent Hogan due to his bills being “grossly inflated and unnecessary.”

The firm states that Hogan’s claims are “baseless” and they will fight in court.

In America, a fashion crime won’t get anyone forty lashes, but unfortunately it can in Sudan.

Northern Sudan is predominantly Islamic, and the Islamic law has restrictions on public indecency, mainly for women, according to CNN.com.

Lubna Al-Hussein was threatened with forty lashes for wearing pants that were allegedly “too tight” with a sheer blouse. According to Al-Hussein, she was wearing pants, a blouse and a hijab (a head scarf worn by Muslim women).

Lashing – a common punishment in Sudan for both men and women - can be held in public.  The public lashings are reserved mainly for men, and for women the lashings are handled in private and occur shortly after the trial.

At the time of her arrest, Al-Hussein was attending a restaurant party in Khartoum when Sudan police barged in and began inspecting woman at the party to make sure their clothes were decent for public appearance.

Al-Hussein was not the only one arrested at the party - 18 other women were arrested with her. Her lawyer, Nabil Adib, does not think she was targeted specifically. According to Adib, it’s a common occurrence for police to enter public and private parties to hold these inspections.

Courts found her guilty of the crimes, but decided not to give her the lashes. They instead ordered that she pay a fine of 500 Sudanese pounds, which is equal to 209 American dollars. If she did not pay the fee, then she would be thrown in prison for one month. Her trial lasted a day and she was not allowed any witnesses or to present a defense case, according to her Adib.

Al-Hussein chose jail time and refused to pay the fine based on principal. Now, she’s looking to appeal the court’s decision in hopes to make the effort to declare the Muslims’ decency law unconstitutional.

Al-Hussein worked as a journalist for the media department of the United Nations and resigned from her position to waive her immunity as an international worker and face trial.

This action brought attention across the world and many protestors showed up at the court hearing to protest this offense. Police had to throw tear gas into the crowds to break up the protesting.

According to CNN they detained 47 supporters, apparently injuring some of these women. From Amnesty International to United Nations, this is one trial that has everyone around the world was watching, and waiting to see the results.

According to a Boston Globe article, current legislation governing criminals in Massachusetts makes it difficult for former prisoners to find work.

As a result, these former offenders are more likely to become repeat offenders. Currently there is a bill in the Massachusetts legislature that will completely change the state’s criminal record system.

Summer interns at Boston’s TenPoint Coalition organized a three-mile march from Roxbury to the State House to show support for the legislation currently under review.

For the full story about these criminal rights and the Massachusetts legislation, visit the Boston Globe.

Harrowing stories of neglect are becoming commonplace–last year, a 7-year-old Ohio girl was repeatedly raped on her special needs bus, and the news has recently been full of stories about the criminal charges associated with the death of Danieal Kelly, a 14-year-old girl with cerebral palsy whose  mother left her to starve and dehydrate to death in her bed.  But even with stories like these popping up in the news on a regular basis, it’s almost impossible to believe the story of Ed Rivera and Linda Hockaday.

Rivera is a 22-year-old mentally and physically disabled man who attends a special  needs program in New York City.  Hockaday is the 51-year-old matron charged with transporting Rivera and others like him.

While most of us were celebrating the new year on Wednesday night and early Thursday morning, Rivera–who has cerebral palsy–was sitting strapped into a seat in a locked bus.  Rivera sat in that seat for 19 hours in bitter cold.

Lest you think that perhaps Hockaday simply made a terrible mistake, think again:  Rivera is 6′2″ tall and was strapped into the seat directly behind the driver’s seat.  And, Hockaday has reportedly admitted that she knew Rivera was there.  Her explanation, according to CBS news, was that she didn’t want to be late for church.

Hockaday is now facing criminal charges and Rivera is in the hospital.  It appears that Hockaday isn’t alone in her responsibility for this near-tragic event, either.  News reports suggest that when police first went to the Outstanding Transport facility to search for Rivera, employees there didn’t bother to tell officers that there was a second bus lot.  It was in that second lot that Rivera was finally located, when police returned to the facility hours later with Rivera’s entire family to continue the search.

We’ve long known that people convicted of drug and alcohol related crimes and blue collar economic crimes such as theft were more likely to commit new crimes if they didn’t have access to things like a place to live, clean clothing, a telephone number to use on job applications, and all of the basics that make running a productive everyday life possible.

We have to believe, though, that legislators sincerely thought they were reducing the risk that sex offenders would repeat their crimes when an increasining number of jurisdictions enacted laws regulating where a convicted sex offender might live.  For instance, there are restrictions on how near to a school a sex offender may live-and in some states, those restrictions extend to parks, bus stops, and a number of other locales presumed to be frequented by potential victims.

While that makes a lot  of sense in theory, California officials are reporting that it’s not working out exactly as planned.  The restrictions are making it difficult–sometimes impossible–for convicted sex offenders to find housing.  And it turns out that just like other classes of criminal, sex offenders are more likely to commit new crimes when they lack a stable environment and a known location.  The California Sex Offender Management Board says that forcing sex offenders into a transient lifestyle actually increases the threat.

Michigan this week became the thirteenth state to legalize medical marijuana, though the law won’t be fully effective until April.  Until that time, medical marijuana users find themselves in an odd gray zone, in which they haven’t yet been issued the cards that will allow them to use the drug legally, but may raise medical use as a defense should they be charged.

But the more controversial development came earlier this week, from the U.S.  Supreme Court.  Three years ago, an Orange County Superior Court ordered law enforcement officials to return seized marijuana to Felix Kha after a doctor confirmed that he was using marijuana on medical advice and charges against him were dropped.  But prosecutors balked.  The Court of Appeals sided with Kha and the Superior Court, citing a federally protected property right.  Prosecutors appealed to the California Supreme Court, arguing that no such federally protected right could exist, since federal law makes marijuana possession illegal.

The California Supreme Court declined to hear the case, leaving prosecutors with only two options–honor the lower court ruling or take the matter one step further.  They chose to continue the fight, and asked the United States Supreme Court to decide the issue.

When the U.S. Supreme Court declined to address the issue, the 3+ year battle came to an end.  However, because the ruling is only binding in one appellate district in California, the question remains open in other jurisdictions and the issue is likely to arise again, eventually forcing state supreme courts and/or the U.S. Supreme Court to decide the issue as jurisdictions split and the law varies from place to place.

President-elect Barack Obama’s advisers are creating a proposal to ship dozens (maybe hundreds) of Guantanamo-Bay prisoners to the United States to face criminal trials.

Obama has opposed the imprisonment of the terrorist suspects in Guantanamo Bay, calling it a “sad chapter in American history”. He made a campaign promise to close the prison and said that the United States is generally equipped to handle the legal proceedings; however, he has offered few details on what he planned to do.

Under the proposed plans, some detainees would be released and many others would be prosecuted through the U.S. criminal court system.

The detainees who have cases that are entangled in classified information may see their cases before a new court designed to handle sensitive cases involving national security.

These plans were disclosed to the Associated Press in anonymity because the plans aren’t final. Stay tuned to Total Lawyers for information as it develops.

Related Article: The Election and the Supreme Court

Yesterday, disbarred Florida lawyer Graham Kligerman was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for his role in a fake mortgage foreclosure rescue scheme.

The 34-year-old lawyer is accused of being the closing agent on 57 fraudulent real estate transactions. Banks were deceived into making millions in loans. Worse, homeowners facing foreclosure, who turned to Kligerman to save their homes, actually lost their homes.

Kligerman, who pleaded guilty to wire fraud and conspiracy to commit bank, wire and mail fraud, was also ordered to pay $6.5 million in restitution payments to all the loan processors, homeowners, banks and homebuyers who were cheated by his con.

His defense lawyers argued that his deceptive behavior stemmed from mental illness and the desperation of a failing law practice—not greed. The said that Kligerman only kept $150,000 of the diverted equity and gave the rest to his law clients.

“This court is seeing too many of these types of cases,” the presiding judge said. “There are victims out here who have lost their homes. You should be down on your knees begging for these people to forgive you and do something tangible to make up for what has happened to them. They’re hurting and you’re living comfortably—What’s wrong with that picture?”

Kligerman was disbarred in 2005 after he fabricated court documents, faked a judge’s signature and diverted money to a client from one of his personal trust accounts while pretending it was a payment from defendants.

“I live with regret every day,” Kligerman told a reporter. “To anybody who was hurt, and I know there were many of them, I apologize.”

Mortgage foreclosures are at an all-time high. If you are nearing or facing mortgage foreclosure, be careful who you turn to for help. Like Kligerman, there are many predatory people out there looking to cheat homeowners who are desperate to save their homes.

Consider talking with a bankruptcy lawyer. A Chapter 13 bankruptcy repayment plan has helped thousands of Americans save their homes from foreclosure and get set up on a realistic repayment plan to better manage their debt.

With the economy in such turmoil, times are tough for everybody—even lawyers. Layoffs at law offices are rare but becoming somewhat of a trend as income dwindles.

A Chicago law firm laid off 24 defense lawyers out of its 680 staff and another firm let go of 21 defense attorneys out of their stock of 650, according to a Chicago Tribune story.

But don’t worry—if you’re looking for a lawyer, we have an extensive network and nobody’s going anywhere!

Total Lawyers can help you if you’re looking for a:

• Bankruptcy Lawyer
• Criminal Defense Lawyer
• Personal Injury Lawyer
• DUI Lawyer
• Divorce Lawyer
• Family Law Lawyer
• Estate Layer
• Lemon Law Lawyer

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) just busted a world-wide spam network responsible for burdening mailboxes with billions of illegal messages encouraging people to purchase unsafe male-enhancement and weight-loss pills.

The FTC froze the assets of two men, one from New Zealand and the other from Texas. Those assets may may go back to consumers who were sold the bogus weight-loss and male-enhancement drugs. [OK, time to insert bad, obvious joke: “I guess everything isn’t always bigger in Texas.”]

The FTC said it received more than 3 million complaints about the related spam. Preliminary estimates are that the spammers made millions of dollars off the bunk drugs.

The spam network used servers in China to host its Web sites and also used a “botnet” (a network of computers that are hijacked to send spam). In addition, it worked in Cyprus and Georgia to process the credit card information. Through this global system, more than 10 billion spam messages were sent each day.

The FTC is working with the FBI on possible criminal charges against the men.

Check out the related Total Lawyer’s article, Virginia Supreme Court Votes in Favor of Spam.