Apr 09, 2021 · A federal appeals court refused in December 2018 to grant MacDonald a new trial, ruling new evidence did not warrant one. A federal judge on Friday refused to release an ex-Army captain imprisoned for decades for the murders of his wife and two young daughters, deciding he lacked authority to consider Jeffrey MacDonald’s request.
Apr 09, 2021 · FILE - In this March 1, 1995 file photo Jeffrey MacDonald gestures at the federal correctional institution in Sheridan, Ore. A federal judge …
Aug 24, 2020 · New evidence has emerged of additional relationships, which Easterbrook had obscured from previous investigations. By Pasha Law PC Founded in 2008, Pasha Law PC provides general counsel services to businesses in California, New York, Texas, and Illinois.
Jul 14, 2015 · RALEIGH – United States Attorney Thomas G. Walker announced Senior United States District Judge James C. Fox has denied Jeffrey MacDonald’s latest motions for a new trial. United States Attorney Thomas G. Walker stated, “Today our thoughts turn toward Colette, Kimberly and Kristen MacDonald whose lives were taken tragically by the defendant in this case.
However, McDonald's presentably weak argument from attorney Tracey Jenks stated that any food no matter what, if served over 54 °C, would cause a severe burn and that “restaurants had more pressing dangers to worry about and that the number of coffee spills is only 1 in 24 million cups of coffee making the settlements ...Aug 5, 2020
In 1992, 79-year-old Stella Liebeck bought a cup of takeout coffee at a McDonald's drive-thru in Albuquerque and spilled it on her lap. She sued McDonald's and a jury awarded her nearly $3 million in punitive damages for the burns she suffered.
The jury awarded Liebeck $200,000 in compensatory damages -- reduced to $160,000 because the jury found her 20 percent at fault -- and $2.7 million in punitive damages for McDonald's callous conduct.
In the McDonald's hot coffee case, Ms. Liebeck was found to be partially to blame for her injuries due to the way she removed the lid from her coffee cup. Her award was reduced by the percentage that the jury found her to blame for her injuries.
Though there was a warning on the coffee cup, the jury decided that the warning was neither large enough nor sufficient. They awarded Liebeck $200,000 in compensatory damages, which was reduced by 20 percent to $160,000. In addition, they awarded her $2.7 million in punitive damages.
When the temperature of a hot liquid is increased to 140° F it takes only five seconds or less for a serious burn to occur. Coffee, tea, hot chocolate and other hot beverages are usually served at 160° to 180° F, resulting in almost instantaneous burns that may require surgery.
Caesar Barber, 56, a maintenance worker who weighs about 270 pounds and stands 5-foot-10, claims McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's and KFC jeopardized his health with their greasy, salty fare.Jan 7, 2006
”Tort Reform” is the movement to limit the amount of money the injured can receive in a lawsuit. It is based on a perception that litigation is out of control. The “McDonald's Coffee Case” is the most cited example of how out of control things supposedly are.Mar 24, 2012
Liebeck's attorney filed a lawsuit based on a theory of negligence and of products liability. Her attorney argued that the restaurant was negligent because it heated the coffee much higher than necessary and enough to where it could cause serious injuries.Feb 9, 2018
During the trial, it was revealed that McDonald's kept its coffee temperature between 180 and 190 degrees Fahrenheit, even though any drink served at temperatures over 140 degrees Fahrenheit could cause serious burns. The company claimed to do that because it “made the coffee taste better.”May 18, 2018
In essence, the jury said that Mrs. Liebeck did carry some blame for her injuries because she held the coffee improperly. At the end of the day, if McDonald's served its coffee at a reasonable temperature, it would have been unlikely that Mrs. Liebeck's injuries would've been so severe.Sep 10, 2020
On average, McDonalds makes $75 million revenue in a day! With a turn over of $27 billion annually, it is the 90th largest economy in the world!
MacDonald was convicted in 1979 for the 1970 slayings of his pregnant wife, Colette; 5-year-old daughter Kimberley; and 2-year-old daughter Kristen at their family home at North Carolina’s Fort Bragg. MacDonald has declared his innocence and spent years on appeals in the “Fatal Vision” case, named for a book about the investigation.
The Associated Press. FILE - In this March 1, 1995 file photo Jeffrey MacDonald gestures at the federal correctional institution in Sheridan, Ore. A federal judge refused on Friday, April 9, 2021 to release an ex-Army captain imprisoned for decades for the murders of his wife and two young daughters, deciding he lacked authority to consider Jeffrey ...
Now age 77 and serving his sentences at a Maryland prison, MacDonald has chronic kidney disease, skin cancer and high blood pressure.
A federal judge has refused to release an ex-Army captain imprisoned for decades for the murders of his wife and two young daughters, deciding he lacked authority to consider Jeffrey MacDonald’s request
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned his convictions in 1980, but the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated them in 1982. ——— Associated Press writer Jonathan Drew in Durham contributed to this report. This story has been corrected to show that the Manson murders were committed in 1969, not 1970.
MacDonald’s second wife, Kathryn, lives in Maryland and would take care of him should he be released, according to his attorneys.
Prosecutors at the 1979 trial said MacDonald, a physician, used a knife and an ice pick to kill his wife and children at their house before stabbing himself with a scalpel. MacDonald maintains he was wrongly convicted, pointing to “drug-crazed hippies” as the killers.
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The tragedy of the MacDonald case — three human beings slaughtered and the bereaved survivor suffering half his life in prison for crimes that the full panoply of evidence shows he did not commit — is a tale of what can happen when defense counsel is not allowed reasonable, fair access to evidence secured in the prosecution file. The Brady rule, in theory, should have been transformative of state and federal criminal trial practice. The percentage of wrongful convictions should have been radically reduced by promulgation of this salutary rule by the Supreme Court. But the difficulties enforcing Brady ’s command, combined with the limitations imposed on the writ of habeas corpus by both Supreme Court opinion and legislation, have transformed a promised remedy for injustice into a sometimes cruel illusion.
When they entered the apartment, they found McDonald, a Green Beret trauma surgeon, lying unconscious across his wife Colette’s dead, mutilated body. Their two young daughters were found stabbed and bludgeoned to death in their bedrooms. MacDonald told investigators that he had fallen asleep on the couch and a woken in the middle of the night to find four intruders standing over him — three men, including one in an army jacket, and a woman with long blonde hair, dark clothing and a floppy hat, holding a candle — and that the men proceeded to attack him with a club and stab him in the chest. MacDonald claimed that, after a struggle, he lost consciousness, and awoke some time later to the gruesome sight of his murdered family. He was then treated for his injuries, including a stab wound to the chest that partially collapsed one of his lungs.
MacDonald’s first habeas petition was denied by a panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in 1985, and the Supreme Court denied certiorari in 1986. Two years later, MacDonald and an investigator named Ellen Dannelly began to sift through the thousands of pages of FOIA materials that the government had handed over in advance of MacDonald’s first habeas petition. MacDonald then retained FOIA expert Anthony Bisceglie, who filed additional FOIA requests with the Army, FBI, and DOJ. My colleagues and I came on board after Bisceglie began his FOIA work.
The Murphy FOIA materials supplied a wealth of exculpatory evidence. Some of it was forensic, some not. Foremost among the nonforensic pieces of evidence that made an impression on me was an innocuous-seeming memorandum that we called the “Puretz Memo,” named after a law student clerk who was working at the time in the U.S. Attorney’s Office and was helping the trial team, particularly DOJ lawyer Brian Murtagh, prepare for trial. The Puretz memo delineated the state of federal law regarding a prosecutor’s obligation to disclose to the defense any exculpatory evidence known to the prosecutor in accordance with the Brady7 case law promulgated by the Supreme Court, as well as the Fourth Circuit.
According to the government, they were able to reconstruct what happened due to the fact that each member of the MacDonald family had a different blood type.
To get off the gurney in its low position, 8" from the floor, MacDonald would have had to put his lower body into one of the doorways leading off the 3' wide hallway, such as the door where the bloody footprint was found just 10" inside the room.
A brown hair found in Colette’s left hand did belong to MacDonald or anyone else in the home. A month after the murders, CID Agents secretly removed hairs from one of MacDonald’s sweaters and labeled the samples as the "known hair of MacDonald.". They were disappointed when the lab identified it as horse hair.
No examination was made to determine how much Colette’s pajama top shifted with the ice pick thrusts into her chest, there had to be some shifting of her pajama top because there were 3 holes in the back, yet she had no ice pick wounds to her back. This would also bring about some shifting of MacDonald’s pajama top.
A bloody adult palm print found on the foot board of Jeffrey and Colettes bed on the morning of the murders. The print did not match Jeffrey, Colette, Kimberly or Kristen. It also did not match any of the people known to be at the murder site that morning.
CID conducted a study of directionality in 1971 and drew certain conclusions concerning 11 holes. An independent study a short time later by the FBI resulted in the same conclusion. The FBI stabbing through the pajama top experiment ignored these findings.
The ice pick blade was measured by the government as .120" wide. According to government’s measurements, the ice pick blade would have penetrated an additional 1 -1/2" to cause a maximum width hole as found in the pajama fabric.
This is the real challenge in a foreclosure trial….getting the court to believe that a homeowner in foreclosure is entitled to the same due process protections as an accused child molester or murder.
Q And have you had the opportunity to review all#N#12 of the relevant documents and business records associated#N#13 with this specific loan and the present foreclosure#N#14 action?#N#15 A Yes.#N#16 Q And what are the sum of the records that you#N#17 reviewed?#N#18 A I reviewed the copy of the note, the mortgage,#N#19 the payment history, the final judgment, the breach#N#20 letter and the J-fix (ph.).#N#21 Q And all of the records that you just mentioned#N#22 are made at or near the time of the event they are#N#23 created.
6 MR. WEIDNER: Your Honor, I’m going to point to#N#7 — we’ll get straight to it. I’m going to point to#N#8 the specific objection, it’s that document that is#N#9 sitting before the witness right there, and be real#N#10 clear about what my objection is. May I voir dire#N#11 for two sentences?#N#12 THE COURT: Okay.
11 MR. WEIDNER: You have got an original note 12 there, your Honor. The case law could not be more#N#13 explicit — most recently, a little over a month#N#14 ago. The only party that is entitled to enforce#N#15 that document that you are holding in your hand is#N#16 Residential Credit, period.
24 MS. ARENAS: Could I just have a minute to#N#25 confer with my client, your Honor?