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Even insurers aren’t immune from the effects of the downturn. A report by WFTV and the AP indicates that State Farm Florida has filed plans to “discontinue its Florida property insurance product lines,” which would include “insurance coverage for homeowners, renters, condominium unit owners, personal liability, boats, personal articles, and business property and liability policies.” The reason? In mid-2008 State Farm’s requested 47-percent Florida homeowners insurance rate increase was rejected by Florida’s Office of Insurance Regulation, and State Farm Florida has been struggling since, even in the absence of any major storms in the hurricane-prone state....

It looks like Steve Harvey has won a round in his nasty divorce battle. Mary Lee Harvey recently accused Steve Harvey of leaving her homeless, cheating on her with Marjorie Bridges, who is now his wife, stealing her money and conspiring to turn their son against her, TMZ reports. A few of her YouTube videos went viral and were all over the web. The court found that Mary Lee Harvey’s claims were not true....

Lawsuit filed over Taco Bell’s definition of beef (KGO-TV/DT) FDA: Don’t Eat Your Alfalfa Sprouts (FindLaw’s Injured) CDC Report Shows Food Safety Concerns Continue (FindLaw’s Injured) Hey, Where’s the Beef? Wendy’s once asked the question in a famous television commercial. The ads made the claim that while their burgers featured a generous helping of real ground beef, their competitors tried to hide their beef with big buns. For years, it has been a running gag to question what really goes into a “ground beef” Taco Bell taco....

Every new year brings new changes to the hundreds of pages of the Internal Revenue Code, the law that spells out what you can and cannot do in filing your federal income tax return in time for the April 15 deadline. Tax law changes are important for all filers to keep in mind, but can especially come in handy for parents, homeowners, students, and others looking to save money – by taking advantage of new and updated tax deductions and tax credits....

Police say that after Gerald Melton, a homeless man trying to sleep on a Nashville sidewalk, asked Katie Quackenbush to move her Porsche SUV, the two engaged in heated argument, Melton walked back to where he was sleeping, and Quackenbush followed him with a gun, shooting him twice in the abdomen and leaving him for dead. Quackenbush’s dad claims Melton threatened his daughter’s life, and she was merely firing two “warning shots,” “closed her eyes when she shot,” thought she pointed the gun away from him, and “didn’t know that she hit him....

Pawn shops provide a quick way for consumers to borrow money, but there are legal aspects that you should consider before handing over your goods as collateral. So here are five legal tips to consider when getting a pawn shop loan. How pawn shop loans work. In general, a pawn is deposit of personal property with a pawnbroker as security for receiving a loan. Until the loan is repaid within a specific time period, the pawnbroker keeps your property....

The University of Texas at Austin can continue its affirmative action program, after a federal appeals court upheld its use on Tuesday. In a 2-1 vote, a panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cleared the use of race in undergraduate admissions, Reuters reports. This decision comes more than one year after the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the case to be returned to the 5th Circuit and be examined under more exacting scrutiny....

All civil lawsuits have statutes of limitation – time limits after which you can longer sue. These statutes can vary depending on the type of offense and the state, but all are designed to have parties litigate an issue while evidence and memories are still fresh. This can be tough when dealing with certain offenses like sexual assault, especially when the victim is a child at the time. Children can be too fearful to report sexual assault until they are older, and by then, the statute of limitations on their ability to sue their attacker may have tolled....

While the phrase ‘wrongful arrest’ gets used frequently to describe when law enforcement arrests the wrong person, that isn’t exactly how the legal remedy of wrongful arrest or false arrest works. If you think you’ve been wrongfully arrested, you may need to file a government tort claim or some other form within 60 days with your state, city, or county in order to be able to file a lawsuit under state law....

“There are certain things only a government can do. And one of those things is ensuring that the foods we eat are safe and do not cause us harm.” - President Obama The current FDA recalls on such a common foodstuff as eggs has got many of us thinking about food safety. Today, the latest news on the recalls says the numbers of potentially contaminated eggs under recall may continue to increase....

You might think you’re just pulling power out of that public charging kiosk in the mall or airport. But it turns out hackers could be pulling data from your phone at the same time. “Just by plugging your phone into a [compromised] power strip or charger, your device is now infected, and that compromises all your data,” Drew Paik of security firm Authentic8 told CNN. So you might want to think twice before just plugging your smartphone in to a public port to charge....

Bill Cosby has decided to drop a lawsuit he filed against Andrea Constand, who accused the actor and comedian of drugging and sexually assaulted her in 2004. Cosby had claimed that Constand breached a 2006 confidential settlement agreement by cooperating with law enforcement in Pennsylvania who were investigating Cosby last year. Cosby was ultimately charged by the Montgomery County district attorney’s office with sexual assault last December and his attorney said Cosby is dismissing the suit to “focus his efforts on defending himself against the claims that have been lodged against him....

In this hurly-burly, topsy-turvy, crazy messed up world we live in, there’s something that we can all agree on. Dogs are good. They catch abusive babysitters. They win Supreme Court cases. Even when they’re bad, shockingly bad, they’re good. That’s why we like to have them around, so much so that they can be registered as service and comfort animals. And considering the stress of having to go to court, when would you need your best friend more?...

A number of microwave popcorn manufacturers are making efforts to remove the chemical food additive diacetyl from their products. Diacetyl, which is found in butter flavoring mixtures used in microwave popcorn, may cause bronchiolitis obliterans, a lung disease. The New York Times reports that “the three companies that sell Orville Redenbacher, Act II, Pop Secret and Jolly Time microwave popcorn said they planned to change the recipes for their butter-flavored microwave popcorn to remove diacetyl....

CVS Caremark, operator of the largest pharmacy chain in the U.S., will pay $2.25M to settle claims that it failed to protect the sensitive medical and financial information of its pharmacy customers and store employees. As part of the settlement, the company has agreed to adopt new practices intended to prevent future privacy violations. According to a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) News Release issued Wednesday, some of CVS Caremark’s more than 6,000 pharmacies disposed of sensitive patient information in open dumpsters – including empty prescription pill bottles and medication instruction sheets that contained patients’ detailed personal and medical information....

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has released its annual report on the latest crime trends in the United States. The statistics show that both violent crime and property crime were down nationwide in 2007, when compared with data from 2006. According to the report released Monday (Crime in the United States 2007), in 2007 there were about 1.41 million instances of violent crime in the U.S. (down 0.7 percent from 2006), and approximately 9....

The emergency contraceptive Plan B “morning after” pill will soon be made available over-the-counter to 17-year-olds, federal health officials announced yesterday. The announcement from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) came one month after a federal court slammed the agency’s handling of the approval process for the Plan B “morning after” pill (levonorgestrel), and basically ordered that the drug be made available to 17-year-olds over-the-counter (as it is currently available to women 18 and older)....

The Fort Hood shooter, U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan, sought a change of venue to move his murder trial out of Fort Hood, Texas. Hasan is accused of killing 13 people during a mass shooting in 2009. Along with requesting a change of venue, Hasan is also asking that the military judge change the makeup of officers on the jury and that the judge reconsider the procedure for sentencing should he be convicted, reports Reuters....

In a shocking case out of Cleveland, Texas, an alleged group sexual assault of a girl was recorded on cell phones and circulated throughout students in her school district. The incident involved nearly 20 people, with at least 13 adults being arrested thus far, along with five juveniles. The girl was reportedly 11 years old. The girl told a forensic interviewer that three suspects picked her up and took her to the residence of a suspect....

Halle Berry was in court Thursday to petition a judge to let her move to Paris, and she enlisted pal Salma Hayek to help her make the case. Berry wants to move to Paris, France with her 4-year-old daughter Nahla. But she can’t without a judge’s permission. The reason for the move is allegedly safety. Berry claims that paparazzi are endangering her daughter with their aggressive stalking. Her ex-husband and Nahla’s father, Gabriel Aubry, doesn’t want them to move....