texts: Splitting a claim into several small claims

texts:
UK, small claims court question.
Is it permissible to split a large claim into several small claims, against multiple defendants, arguing a different cause of action in each?
Consider this hypothetical and entirely fictional case:
Adam inherits a valuable piece of art (e.g. a painting).  Adam has no interest in art, and decides to sell.
Bill contracts to handle the sale. He promises to sell the painting for a minimum of £120,000, and to charge a commission of £10,000.
Charlie is a professional art restorer. Bill hands the painting to Charlie for cleaning. But Charlie makes a mistake, and damages the painting, reducing the value. It subsequently sells for £90,000.
Bill deducts £20,000 from the sale price, double the agreed commission, and sends Adam the balance of £70,000.
Adam is outraged. He had been expecting a payment of £110,000 but has ended up £40,000 down.
Adam consults Dave the lawyer. Dave advises that he might have to spend £50-60,000 to recover the loss, might not win, might not recover costs, etc.
So Adam considers a claim in the small claims court. The UK small claims limit is £10,000, but Adam has a plan. He will make three separate claims, asking for maximum damages in each.
First, he will sue Charlie for damaging the painting.
Second, he will sue Bill for damaging the painting. (vicarious liability)
Third, he will sue Bill for overcharging on the fees.
Is Adam's plan legally permissible? Basically, is it allowed to

sue two different people  for the same negligence, and
sue one person twice for two different things.

Can a big claim be split up into smaller claims like this?
Note - for clarity,  I'm not interested in Adam's dispute. I don't need to know about overcharging and the law of contracts, or liability for damage in tort law. Just the point about splitting up the case. And the case I described is just an example. Make the answer as general as possible, not restricted to this particular case.
And, as a final reminder, the jurisdiction is England and Wales.
Not asking for legal advice, you are not my lawyer, etc.


texts: Can a city enforce antitrust laws in the US?

texts: I know this would probably depend on the state and city, but do cities have any recourse for monopolistic behavior? For example, say a parking provider buys up all of the parking in the city and begins to charge monopolistic prices for parking. Does the city have any recourse to break up the parking provider, or force them to sell off some amount of parking?


texts: Are companies allowed to trade securities based on internal user data?

texts:
Take a company like Google, that has access to real time information on what billions of people want at any given moment, their plans for the future - not to mention the entire email archives of hundreds of millions of people.

It's not hard to imagine how this data can be harvested to build a pretty vivid picture of where market forces might be headed. As a simple example, Google could make pretty reasonable predictions about how many people are looking to buy homes in a certain area and the price they'd be willing to pay for it. As another example, Google could probably make good approximations on how many people are seriously interested in purchasing a Tesla vehicle.

So my question is, is there any legal problem with Google (and loads of others with large amounts of user data) actively investing/trading based on this data? For instance, should Google Engineers notice a spike in searches on "Tesla customizations" and "Tesla dealerships near me", can they purchase shares in $TSLA ?

This obviously isn't classic insider trading, because the "inside" data they have isn't from Tesla itself, but from their own company. That's why I'm wondering if it's allowed.


texts: Is asking your potential rapist to use a condom considered giving consent in the US?

texts:
Is asking somebody who is forcing themselves on you to use a condom enough to give him / her consent? If you consider yourself being the victim of rape, but you ask for the person to use a condom is that giving consent?
I have heard it said that consent cannot be implied or inferred; it is either given or it is not.  Also in some cases people can be unable to give consent out of a legal point of view even if expressed in an otherwise normal way. Like a 16 years being before the age of legal consent. So basically the logic is boolean.
This makes me think asking for a condom is not the same as consent.


texts:
Does right to Data Access request /GDPR supersede restrictions in Employment contract of previous employer ?

Is above fundamental right's affected by
Clauses in temporary employment contract like 'you can not contact client (not to be confused as person but medium sized enterprise-business)'

If one needs to contact client of employer/agency.


texts:
I am involved in a situation where a former housemate has left my sharehouse in the Netherlands and owes me €3000. This person now lives in the US.

The facts:

I have evidence they owe me this money, including an itemised list they agreed to and messages from them to me insisting they will pay me the agreed amount.
They are an American citizen with EU citizenship (not from the Netherlands but another western European country)
They have a bank account in the Netherlands although I don't think it has more than €1000.
We have a previous relationship in Australia, where they have another bank account containing more than €3000.
They have far more than €3000 in bank accounts in the US.
It has been four months since they left the Netherlands.
It has been one month since their last message telling me they would send me the money (no contact from then since then)

Is it possible for me to take this person to a small claims court? If so where would I do this? It's unlikely they will return to the Netherlands so I'm not sure if it would be worth doing it in that particular jurisdiction.

If not, do I have any recourse anywhere or anyhow?


texts: In Michigan, are cough drops a taxable item?

texts: In Michigan, are cough drops taxable? I was told they are seen as candy, and therefore not taxed. I just purchased some and was charged tax. Also, I was told bagged ice is a taxable item. Is this true?


texts: Does bitcoin count as income in the U.K.?

texts: If I mine bitcoin, would it count as income in the UK? If so, would I have to declare the value of my bitcoin on any forms which ask for how much money/income I have?


texts: Is news aggregation for headlines only legal?

texts:
Is it legal to display recent news that are collected from multiple news sites on my page?
The goal is to show daily news (100 articles), side by side, that are collected from an api.
Single instance of an article would hold only the headline, date published and a link to the original article (their page).
No paywalls, no advertisements. Maybe an option to donate, if someone wants to, but no benefits from that.
The readers would have the ability to lookup older articles also.
Read some stuff online on this subject, but didn't find a definitive answer.


texts: Is reading an illegally copied book illegal on its own?

texts: Let's say there is a copyrighted book which is published illegally by someone. Is it also illegal for the people who have received the book to read it?


texts: When the Vice-President is serving as Acting President on account of a temporary disability of the President, do they retain their Vice-Presidential powers, including the power to preside over the Senate and cast a tie-breaking vote?


texts: In Australia if you are working from home and your employer is based in another state which public holiday do you get?

texts: In Australia the states have their public holidays on different days. If an organisation has offices in many states the staff get the day off for the state they are based in. However if the organisation is based in one state and the person working from home is based in another state which public holiday should be taken?


texts: Does copyright law extend to ideas expressed in movies?

texts: My main question is in regards to ideas expressed in movies, but which are not fully explored. For example, if a science fiction movie presents a race which has a particular habit or nuance which is not known to exist elsewhere, can an author make use of that habit or nuance to create a fictional race which also portrays that habit or nuance? This could apply to many art forms including, written stories and poetry among others.


texts: Do users who are given another user's email address have obligations under GDPR?

texts:
I have an app/website which connects people into groups and then the group performs work in the real world. That work in the real world will occasionally require that group members talk to each other. My app/website does not have a messaging feature yet and so I'm considering my options. While I could embed a chat screen into my app/website, that is a chunk of work I'd like to avoid for the moment. Instead, I'm considering other well supported messaging options such as email or SMS. Specifically, launching the default email or SMS app on the user's device. Since the point of the messaging is for members of the group to message each other, this would require that I hand over one group member's personal data (i.e. email address or phone number) to another group member. I understand that under GDPR I need to get specific consent for this use case when I first collect their personal data. If I get this consent, have I fully complied with the GDPR rules in the scenario I've described?
Does the user who my app/website gives the personal data to have any obligations under GDPR?
Does launching the native email app (or SMS app) with a fellow group member's personal data have legal issues beyond GDPR?


texts: What are the laws on using a company's logo in journalistic coverage?

texts:
We have a non-commercial (academic) blog, and are writing a post about a commercial company.

The post is not especially flattering, for context.

Can we use the company's logo to illustrate the blog post, or can the company legally complain about this?


texts: Do I have to pay taxes on external savings?

texts: I am thinking about moving to Canada to work, save for retirement, and move back to Portugal for retirement because of the lower cost of living. I will contribute to the Canada Pension Plan and also save for my retirement. I have to calculate how much I want to save to get a fixed retirement salary but I don't know if I'll have to pay taxes over the money I saved on a normal Canadian bank account (taxed in Canada) and then withdrew in Portugal and how many taxes I'll pay over the Canadian Pension Plan. Thank you in advance for your help.


texts: How legally enforceable are documents giving up paternity?

texts:
I have recently been witness to an argument between two acquaintances and since neither of them were lawyers, I offered to post to Law.SE to try and resolve it.

For context: since same-sex marriage became legal in USA, many newly married lesbian couples who cannot afford sperm bank/fertility services, use sperm donors, usually found either through interpersonal networks or various personals sites. From what I've been told, there's a significant amount of people who pursue this approach. Obviously, since you get what you pay for, unlike "official" fertility services, these come with certain medical as well as legal risks.

There is apparently a typical protocol involved in this to mitigate the legal risks, one part of which is that both parties sign some sort of "legal" release forms - in case of the donor, the document being signed states that they will not seek paternal rights in the future.

The argument I was witness to revolved around whether this sort of a document is legally enforceable, or is just a feel-good paper with notary seal on it.

My main contribution to the argument was that (1) neither one of them was a lawyer so the should really seek professional advice if this was a practical concern, and (2) I'm pretty sure state laws differ on the topic so the answer might be "it depends".

So, the exact question is:

A male sperm donor, who is not donating via a fertility clinic/sperm bank, signs a document stating that they relinquish future paternal/parental rights to the child conceived from their sperm. Later on, the donor changes their mind and seeks legal paternal/parental rights, such as visitation with the child. How legally enforceable is the document the donor signed in the eyes of the legal system?

You can assume that the document was written as well as it can be from the viewpoint of a lawyer familiar with that state's family law, and was notarized.

If the answer depends on jurisdiction, an example of a state where the answer is "yes" and one where the answer is "no" would suffice, although an explanation of how to tell the answer for any other arbitrary state would be desirable as well.


texts: Is there a difference between "illegal activity" and "criminal activity"?

texts: What is the difference in meaning and use of the phrases "illegal activity" and "criminal activity"? Is one broader than the other?


texts: Can a landlord in Massachusetts charge a “landlord fee”? What might this fall under?

texts:
I’m looking at some places to rent in Massachusetts and I came across one that asks for first month’s rent ($750), a security deposit ($725), and a reputably low “landlord fee” ($365). I thought I saw somewhere that such fees were illegal, at least in Boston, but now I’m struggling to find anything with the same terminology. Is it legal? Could they be using an unusual name for a different fee?
I’m not very knowledgeable about anything of this sort, so any help is appreciated.


texts: Laws regarding behavior while in a polling place waiting line - what is soliciting?

texts:
Consider the Georgia Senate Bill SB202 recently passed SB 202 . It includes (Section 33 at pdf page 21, line 1872)

No person shall solicit votes in any manner or by any means or method...

(This prohibition is pertinent to proximity to the place of polling and the proximity of other voters waiting to vote)
While in a line waiting to vote, my wife and I have a discussion wherein I explain why I'm going to vote for Joe as dog catcher. I don't ask her to vote for Joe, my conversation is confined to why I'm voting for Joe. I am not displaying or distributing campaign material.
Would I be in violation of the statute ?
Without raising my voice, another voter might overhear my conversation, does that changed anything?
Extra credit: Does this prohibition by the government violate my free speech rights? (providing that I am not causing a disturbance)
ETA:  Also just realized that this act makes it illegal for me to offer to give my wife a drink from my water bottle, or share a slice of pizza while waiting in line to vote!


texts: UK: What constitutes reasonable consent for not allowing tenants to keep a pet?

texts:
I'm currently renting a house in the UK and have been for 6 months now. The tenancy agreement states, you may: 'Not keep any cats or dogs on the property. Not keep any other pet, animal, bird, reptile, fish, insects or the like on the Property, without the Landlord’s consent, which will not be unreasonably withheld.'

From my brief bit of research I understand this is technically an invalid clause anyway as cats and dogs shouldn't be excluded from the request for permission?

Anyway I politely requested permission, via the estate agents, to own a green-cheeked conure parrot, with the obvious caveat that I pay for any (unlikely) damage repairs and/or cleaning at the end of the tenancy. They responded simply saying the landlord said 'no'.

I of course replied asking for a reason why and the estate agent responded with 'The tenancy state no pets and they want to adhere to this.'. This was blatantly false and so I again pressed for a reason, this time quoting the clause in the contract itself, but they've conveniently not responded to that request.

What are my rights in this situation? What would be the consequences to purchasing the parrot anyway?


texts: Why are Metric Compatible fonts not copyright infringement?

texts:
Metric compatible fonts (typically open-source) copy certain metrics from a (typically copyrighted) "source font". "Advance width" at least, and maybe other metrics (I have seen discussions of copying kerning data). Why is this not copyright infringement? Presumably the designer of a metric compatible font is not printing the source font and measuring it. They are using the exact metrics to achieve exactly the same horizontal spacing.

Why does the creation of a metric compatible font not constitute copyright infringement?


texts: Pretty much the above, can a minor with say, considerable earned assets of his own have a will made, and if not is there any alternative to a will that's possible for a minor?


texts: Can a US firm legally hire someone as intern after they have graduated from school/university and aren't enrolled in any school/university?

texts:
Can a firm US based in the United States legally hire someone as intern after they have graduated from school/university and aren't enrolled in any school/university anymore?

If state-dependent, I am interested in California.


texts: Invention assignment in case of live/work arrangement in California

texts:
Section 2870 of the California Labor Code protects an employee's ownership in personal inventions so long as these inventions are ... developed entirely on his or her own time without using the employer’s equipment, supplies, facilities, or trade secret information ....

How is this provision affected in a work/live arrangement where the employee spends his after-hours (personal time) and nights at the office and wants to continue working on personal projects during that time? Would this constitute "use of employer's facilities and equipment" (rooms and internet connection) and thus invalidate the provision (i.e. any inventions made during that time will become company property) or is such use an understood subletting agreement in which these facilities effectively become the employer's personal space?

If such a living situation would compromise 2870, is there an example for a solid legal addendum that the company and employee can sign to protect the employee's ownership of personal intellectual property?


texts:
I am a screenwriter who has been approached by an actor with an idea for a script. The story is based on literary criticism articles which posit that Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne had a "Brokeback Mountain" moment during a weekend retreat in upstate New York.

My concerns, of course, the obvious - using a widely-acclaimed American author's name in a script featuring LGBT sexuality could be litigious, if not career-ending.

I have suggested changing the character's names and adding a disclaimer, but the actor is adamant that the names not be changed.

Can anyone tell me if there any other options?

Thank you!


texts: Am I obligated to provide information which is publicly available?

texts:
If I am involved in a civil case and I am served with a discovery motion to provide certain information, but this information is publicly available (such as employment history, residential address, etc), am I obligated to provide this information to the other party?

My thinking here is that there's nothing preventing you from accessing this information other than you spending some effort on getting it - so why should I be compelled to make your job easier for you?
It's also possible that I might inadvertently provide some information which is not really public and in doing so might hurt my case somehow.

On the other hand, not providing this information might be seen as simply being obstructive and using delaying tactics when presumably the end result would be the same (assuming that the information I provide matches that which is publicly available).


texts:
If I approach a person and offer to pay them to assault a third party and the assault took place, I assume that I would be guilty of some crime myself.

If, however, I approach a person and offer to pay their legal fees if they assault a third party, but not pay for the assault itself, would I also be guilty of a crime ??


texts: Does pleading guilty circumvent the 'corpus delicti' rule?

texts:
The corpus delicti rule states, if I understand it correctly, that there must be evidence that a crime occured (other than a confession) before anyone can be convicted of that crime. I have found claims online that the corpus delicti rule is applied at least in parts of the United States. (1, 2)

However, the United States has a plea system that allows for a person to be convicted without a trial ever starting if the defendant pleads guilty (At least, that's how I understand it, I'm not from a common law country). This seems to be a contradiction to the corpus delicti rule because no evidence of the crime was presented to the court before the conviction.

So my question is: Does corpus delicti really apply in the U.S. or is it possible to circumvent this test completely by means of a guilty plea?


texts: Are there legal implications to lying about your sponsors?

texts:
Let's say I release a video where I say "sponsored by Company C" even though they never sponsored me.

Are there legal implications to lying about that, or is this action protected by the First Amendment?

At first, I thought that mentioning Company C is like doing free advertising for them, so why would they care. However, if Company C doesn't want to be associated with me, and the alleged association damages their reputation, then maybe this counts as slander:

  oral defamation, in which someone tells one or more persons an untruth about another, which untruth will harm the reputation of the person defamed.

Since in this case, I wouldn't be blatantly saying a bad thing about the company (e.g. "their CEO is a murderer"), I imagine they would need to do a bit more work to prove to a court that their reputation was damaged.

(this is also assuming that slander applies to companies)


texts: Can a repair business sell goods that haven't been picked up for over a year?

texts:
A friend has an upholstery shop in Buffalo, NY. A customer brought her a set of seats to re-do more than a year ago. The project was completed and several attempts have been made to contact the customer to pick them up and pay for work done, to no avail.

Can she sell the seats at this point to recoup her investment without running into a problem, should the customer resurface down the road?


texts: Is it against Riot Games Worlds Pick'em contest rules to collaborate with others in predicting the result?

texts:
The contest in question is the League of Legends Worlds Pick'ems. Entrants are to rank teams in order of winning probability for both virtual and physical prizes.
As there are a limited number of permutations of team rankings, a strategy I thought of was to gather many valid entrants and systematically choose each permutation so that one person is guaranteed to win the prize.
However, I am unsure if this voids my entry. The closest clause in the Contest rules that disqualifies such strategies is:

Any use of robotic, repetitive, automatic, programmed or similar methods will void all Entries by that Entrant.

However, without any background in law I am unsure if that clause or any other clause applies to my situation.
Will using such strategies void my entry?


texts: Can a group continue with app development without the member who originated the idea?

texts:
Following situation:

5 friends started an app together: The idea guy, a designer, backend, android and iOS engineer. The friends worked on the app for roughly a year however the idea guy started getting more and more angry about the project taking too long to finish. Eventually he started threatening us to shut down the project if we don't work faster and tried to replace members.

We refused and he eventually 'stopped' the project by removing access to all servers and cancelled paid accounts to Github and Co (most of them were held by shared accounts where he wasn't even the one paying them)

Now, the 4 of us are not happy about this at all since we worked for 1 year almost every day on this thing and in our opinion this 1 guy does have no right to decide whether the project is dead or not so we want to finish it without him: Put together some money, re-purchase servers and so on.

The idea guy incorporated a real company on paper but none of us signed anything, nor did he pay any of us. There are also no patents or anything like that. (When we asked him a few times to finally get the paperwork done he always avoided the question which seemed to be like he never really intended of sharing anything with us from the beginning.) The idea guy also mentioned very strongly that this idea is his property and he will pursue legal actions if we do anything without him.

Certain assets like sounds, a few graphics and the project name were created by him which is obviously his IP. If we were to remove this, could the 4 of us legally continue with the project under a different name?


texts: Am I allowed as a minor to copyright materials and trademark names in Utah?


texts: Intestate succession in Utah: Parent and Siblings

texts:
Joe owned a home. He died without a will. His survivors are a mother and six siblings.

Do I understand correctly that the mother inherits everything and the siblings nothing? Here is a link to the UT code that led me to this conclusion:

Utah - Section 103 Share of heirs other than surviving spouse


texts: Can the chairman of a NASDAQ-listed company also be the chairman of another company?

texts: I am looking to find out if a chairman of a NASDAQ-listed company can serve another company as the chairman. Please cite all sources used, so that I may reference and personally check. I looked through the NASDAQ policies and rules but was unable to find anything.


texts: When is a Web-Site Owner Obligated to Report a Crime?

texts: I own and operate a web-based forum. Users can post information for other users to view. While I am not a mandated reporter as defined by the state I live in, the site users come from different parts of the United States and some from other countries. Would I be obligated to report a crime or suspected abuse which is posted by a user to law-enforcement agencies? If so, what criteria should be used to determine which agency or agencies I report to?


texts: If a second builder completes a house at higher cost, why would this affect your claim for damages against the first builder?

texts:
Here are the facts of a problem question, created by my law teacher.

B1 (Builder 1) had agreed to build four backyard micro-cabins for P (Plaintiff), a developer, at a cost of
£5 each. It was agreed that each house would be paid for when it was completed and that Al, an architect, must certify all completions. B1 completed two houses but P refused to pay because, P claimed, the windows were not up to specification. Al died just before the second house was
completed and had not issued the certificates of completion. The two houses were each worth £7 on the open market.

Because of P’s refusal to pay, B1 was unable to pay his suppliers what he owed
them. In turn, they refused to allow B1 to have more building materials on
account. B1 stopped building.

Consequently, P entered the site and used B1’s materials, valued at £1 and completed the third house. P then engaged B2 (Builder 2) to build the fourth house, with B2's own materials, at an agreed contract price of £6. P paid B2 after B2 completed this fourth house.

Advise P. All prices should be multiplied by 1000, but I didn’t write out the 0’s to simplify the facts.

My teacher claims that

About the final house completed by B2, you must consider whether the increased cost of completion would affect P’s claim for damages against B1
by reference to case law relating to the expectation interest.

Can someone explain this? What does my teacher mean?
I know that Expectation Interest equates to the net value of what the innocent party would have received, had the contract been performed. The expectation measure aims to put the claimant in the position that he would
have been in had the contract been performed in accordance with its terms (Robinson
v Harman (1848)). This measure falls short of achieving this aim in a
number of ways: for example, contract law does not compensate for all types of loss,
it requires the type of loss to be reasonably foreseeable, it lays down certain causation
requirements, and the claimant may be unable to recover if they have not taken sufficient
steps to minimise the loss they suffer.


texts: Email commitment possibly broken by big company

texts:
So here is the story:

I email company A asking for a specific service they provide. They tell me to describe my idea and I ask explicitly for confidentiality (but not NDA just expressed) which was explicitly accepted.

Company A is in USA, California.

They have an internal discussion and they decide that they do not want to provide me with the service because they are not sure if their investors/partners would be happy with it (very vague explanation).

After 3 months, company B launches an effective replica of the core of my idea. Company B is owned by people that are investors in company A. Company B's product now uses the service that was denied to me by company A.
Company B is sold for a 9 figure amount one year after to a much bigger company.

Proving that someone from company A talked to company B (although they have common shareholders) is the difficult part.

Do I have a case?


texts:
One (badly written) article from 2009 seems to suggest that prescribed burns are illegal in Russia. Is that (still) the case? And if, to the contrary, they are legal, who can authorize them?

What I could find out from a more recent (and somewhat better written) 2015 article in the same venue:

  Starting with
  the first East-West international conference “Fire in Ecosystems of Boreal Eurasia” (Goldammer
  & Furyaev 1996) and the Fire Research Campaign Asia-North (FIRESCAN) (FIRESCAN Science
  Team 1996, 2013) a dialogue with the forestry authorities of Russia (and the predecessor
  administration in the former Soviet Union, the State Forest Committee) has been initiated to
  replace the fire exclusion policy in the protected zone of the Russian Federation, Mongolia and
  Kazakhstan by an integrated fire management approach, which would include the use of natural
  fire and prescribed burning (Goldammer 2013a). Between 2008 and 2013 three major scientifictechnical events have taken place in Mongolia and Russia. The First International Central Asian
  Wildland Fire Conference “Wildland Fires in Natural Ecosystems of the Central Asian Region:
  Ecology and Management Implications” was held in Mongolia in 2008 and had significant impact
  on the review of past approaches in forest and fire management and on the ongoing process to
  formulate fire management policies in the region (Byambasuren & Goldammer 2013). In 2012 and
  2013 two “International Fire Management Weeks” were organized in Krasnoyarsk Region, Russia,
  and resulted in the formulation of recommendations for adapting the fire management policy of
  the country with reference to the use of prescribed fire, allowing natural wildfires to burn within
  prescription and to take advantage of natural regeneration processes.1
   The aspect of changing
  fire regimes as a consequence of climate change and land-use change has been addressed in a
  dedicated conference in 2013 and resulted in a strong warning to the governments of the region
  that the changes ahead may result in a threat by dangerous fires in future.

That seems to suggest that at least until 2013 prescribed burn was either not legal or not practiced in Russia. So has anything changed in that regard?


texts: Is it legal to prevent a single parcel of land from being split?

texts:
I've spoken with a landowner in the rural area of Saratoga, California, who owns a single parcel with more land than he knows what to do with, and I asked him why doesn't he build an MDU or some such, to which he replied that the city will never allow to re-zone and/or split the parcel of the land he owns, and that neighbours and such will generally be against any such arrangements, because it'll increase crime and drive the property values down.

However, upon what principle could an application to have the parcel of land split be denied?  Wouldn't such restrictions unduly violate the property rights of the owner with such a large piece of land?


texts: What's the rationale for "joint controller" instead of keeping every entity doing stricly separate?

texts:
After reading Case C-40/17 and Case C-210/16 I still cannot figure out why GDPR would require "joint controller" decision.
Wouldn't it be much simpler to decide that e.g. in "Fashion ID" case, the Facebook cannot set cookies if Facebook hasn't acquired consent from the end user? That would allow embedding Like buttons on any page at will and Facebook could only track the users that have already given consent for Facebook. Technically facebook would have been able to run their own JavaScript code on the host page so they could have implemented the consent query on any page if they really wanted to set cookies only after getting consent.
This would also immediately solve questions such as Who's liable for GDPR compliance when embedding/hosting a self-contained 3rd-party website/service? and Who needs to implement Cookie Consent for embedded content? because in both cases the host that wants to set non-necessary cookies would need to independantly verify they already have been given consent for those cookies. As GDPR doesn't define how such content must be acquired, there could be an UI on the host domain document and then the acquired consent must be explicitly transferred to 3rd party. In practice, the transfer cannot be just "it's okay" but "user has given consent for trackingdomain.com via domain example.com at yyyy-mm-dd with log id abc123ef" because GDPR requires that the user must be able to retract the consent later and entity doing the processing must be able to specify the origin for the consent.
Is the current ruling just caused by the interpretation that embedding any content via URL is considered implicit consent for the whole domain?
In practice, this would practically prevent 3rd party cookies for any services the user hasn't expicitly visited previously.


texts:
Under Ohio law, a person's income must change by 30% or more either up or down to trigger the CSEA to reevaluate the support order amount. If the income changes by a lesser amount there is no administrative review.

However, a judicial review is still possible1: this involves the parties (parents) visiting a magistrate and request a recalculation of the support order amount.

What specific part of the Ohio Revised Code both authorizes this reevaluation and provides the specific process to follow to request a judicial review? What specific citation in the O.R.C. would one quote when filing a motion with the court?

1 This claim was made by a state employee who was not able to provide any further instructions other than "talk to a lawyer." Given that this appears to be a simple process not involving arguing the law in front of a judge, it would be much cheaper to do this without paying a retainer.


texts: Marital property in NJ: spouse have right to use car?

texts:
The question is simple, but the situation is anything but. The bare bones info: my friend's son is a new driver who just had a minor, but scary, brush with the law. There is an extra car in this family, as my friend's husband kept his existing car when he purchased a newer one.

Hoping to get her son's attention, my friend would like to store his somewhat sporty car at another location, while her son would drive her own 15 year-old car, and she would use her husband's older car. This way the stored car would be an incentive toward some improvement and responsible behavior on her son's part, before it would be his to use again.

My friend's husband is refusing to "allow" her to use the car, as his way of forcing his own idea that the sporty car should be sold as a punishment. Does my friend have a right to the car as marital property, even though it's in the husband's name only?

They've been married 25yrs, so everything mentioned here has been acquired during the marriage, and, if it matters, she is the primary earner, but did not pay for the car.

I'm not intending this as a discussion of parenting, and no one is talking divorce or any other legal action, I would simply like to know whether the car is jointly owned (and hers to use) under NJ law, even though his name is the only one on the title.

I hope this is an ok question for this site.
Thanks much!


texts: What do you sue for in a breach of warranty case when no other repair is available?

texts:
We purchased a spa from a local dealer and had it delivered approximately one year ago.  We immediately reported that over 50% of the jets were not working or working poorly, and were also not adjustable.  Since then we've gone back and forth with the seller, with them insisting that they will only replace the jets if we pay several hundred dollars for a warranty trip fee, plus the cost of the jets and labor if they deem the problem not their fault.

I'm unwilling to agree to the above because I don't believe the warranty trip fee is valid, as they have breached the initial contract by not delivering the spa in working order.  So this is a contracts issue before a warranty issue (even if I accepted that a "warranty trip fee" is anything other than criminally unethical).  Further, I'm unwilling to put the determination of whether they are at fault or not solely in their hands, as that gives them complete freedom to avoid responsibility.  In any case, both they and the manufacturer are no longer responding to me.

Normally in a case like this I'd look for the next closest authorized servicer, pay them to come out and do the repair, then sue the seller for the cost of said repairs.  However, the next closest servicer is 82 miles away and won't go outside their area.  And even if we could get the seller to respond, they will not come out unless we agree to the conditions noted above, which I won't agree to as I believe that would constitute a settlement and negate my right to sue for the charges back.  So we're now in the position of owning a $6k spa that doesn't work right, and that cannot be serviced (because the seller will no longer respond).

In this case I'm unsure how to quantify the damages, as no amount of money will allow us to get a spa in working order as agreed upon in the original contract.  Do we sue under breach of contract and demand the return of 100% of our money and for them to come take the spa?  Is there some legal value placed upon a warranty that we can sue for?  Do we hire a non-authorized servicer and sue for their cost plus the cost of any future issues caused by them being non-authorized?  Do we sue under some theory of 'emotional suffering'?

What is the appropriate way to quantify this case for submission to small claims, given that the courts cannot technically compel the seller to service our spa?


texts: Have Supreme Court cases with multiple subsequent reaffirming decisions been overturned?

texts: Suppose Supreme Court decision A is subsequently reaffirmed in decisions B and C. Have there ever been situations where the court later overturns A, despite B and C?


texts: Does the right to use a road affect liability in accidents?

texts: The German traffic law is very restrictive for children on bicycles. In particular Strassenverkehrsordnung §2, section 5 states that children up to 8 years of age are not allowed to bike on roads and need to use the pedestrian sidewalk exclusively. Now suppose a child does ride on a road and is involved in a traffic accident with a car. Suppose the child adhered to all traffic rules (apart from being on the road) and the car driver is at fault, for example bike goes straight, car turns right, collision. Does the fact that the child was not allowed to be on the road have any influence on how liability is established?


texts: Research basis for left-lane passing laws

texts:
-- Question --

Does anyone have links to research indicating that:

impeding the flow of traffic in the left-most lane

causes more accidents than

speeding.

--  Context --

I want to drive at or under the maximum posted speed limit, even when passing. If, for instance, I'm driving 70 on an interstate trying to pass a semi-truck which is varying between 68 and 73 (due to hills, let's say), but averaging ~69, then I'll eventually pass him, but it might take a few minutes.

If someone rushes up on my tail at 100 and hangs out on my tailgate, I'm not sure if I should (1) speed to complete the pass, moving over to the right lane, (2) brake and move over to let the dangerous vehicle by, or (3) proceed at the posted maximum speed limit to pass the vehicle (even if it takes a few minutes) and move over ASAP.

(3) is the option I'd rather take almost all the time, though I've done (2) in practice and considered (1) several times because I don't want to incite road-rage by braking in front of an already dangerous driver.

I've heard, though, quite a few people mention un-cited research which supposedly indicates that impeding the flow of traffic is far more dangerous than speeding. I find this very hard to believe.

NHTSA publishes facts like: ~30% of traffic fatalities in the US involve someone speeding for many years. (https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/812687) but they similarly recommend giving right-of-way to speeders whenever possible just to avoid getting in a wreck (a sensible, but frustrating, recommendation).

-- My search --

I've looked for a few hours already in an attempt to find such research but have only found a few dead links to papers that are no longer found on websites which previously hosted them.

I thought that maybe this kind of research might be used as supporting evidence for passing many of the (I believe) new-ish laws regarding left-lane passing in all the states. I'm not sure how I'd find such research (possibly from the proceedings of the chambers of one of the legislatures during discussions on these laws???) so I'm really hoping that someone might have it to hand quickly here to save me a few hours or days of research.

--Conclusion--

These left lane passing laws seem to cause a lot of confusion and encourage people to break the law by speeding. The supposedly extant research might further encourage people to choose to speed rather than possibly endanger others by following the posted limits.

I wonder, personally, if it might be better for states to focus on enforcing the posted speed limits and making the left-lane laws a rule of thumb to encourage people to drive safely (like all the other defensive driving things one can do to avoid collisions, accidents, loss of control, etc), while not encouraging people to do (1) or (2) above or copping out completely and just always speeding (and relying on the defense of "I followed the flow of traffic so that I wouldn't be endangered by others' speed." vs a possible traffic violation ticket).

I feel like the effects of the passed laws might have simply been that people are now choosing to always speed (endangering themselves and others while simultaneously breaking the law) rather than possibly deal with a ticket for impeding the flow -- which would mean that these laws are actually making public safety worse.

Thus, I'm really interested to see if this research exists somewhere so I can better inform myself.


texts: Is it legal to OWN a machete in New Jersey? (Decor purposes only)

texts: I bought a machete online about 2 hours ago because I thought it looked cool and I figured it would be nice to display it on my wall. I have no intentions to carry it, use it for illegal purposes, or even use it at all. I’m 16 incase that’s relevant.


texts: Blinds in my rental apartment fell on my head

texts: While I tried to push the string to open the blind a little the whole 20 pound piece fell off the wall and hit me in the head from 7 feet above. I haven't gotten a severe concussion yet (it happened tonight) but there are symptoms of mild concussion. Also the accident caused an open wound on my scalp. Is there a way to bring guilty people to responsibility?


texts: What to do when an Ambulance can't pass you?

texts:
So here's the deal: Earlier I was driving on the highway to work, which currently is under construction work. Because of that, one of the two lanes is closed and the second one is slightly narrowed. There is no emergency lane either. Then their was this ambulance driving right behind me, with sirens on and blue light flashing, so it surely was an emergency. In situations like that, as a driver, you obviously drive to the side and let the ambulance pass. However, because of the construction work this simply was not possible.

What is the right thing to do in such a situation? Is there anything written down in law (maybe the Straßenverkehrsordnung).

I tried to speed up a little  to at least make it through constructions quicker. But the drivers in front of me didn't, so that was pretty much useless.


texts: Universal 2 factor authentication (U2F) and pleading the fifth amendment

texts:
Back in 2013, WIRED stated that using fingerprint authentication on a phone may not prevent authorities (in the US at least) to gain access to one's phone without their agreement, whereas a memorized password requires approval by the accused party.

Supposing the party protected sensible information with a U2F device (not just a phone based On Time Password (e.g. Google Authenticator)), would authorities be legally allowed to simply use that device without the accused party's consent?


texts: The trouble of White Oaks in the neighbor's yard

texts:
Charles inherited and owns an estate of land in upstate New York, Westchester County, Eastchester township. It's not incorporated in either Bronxville or Tuckahoe. On the west side of his land, he has a group of at least 100-year-old white oaks, Quercus alba. They are about 120 feet tall (~36 meters) tall and Charles can only see them when getting onto the top of his roof, because of the extent of his estate.
Now, these white oaks line the whole side of a small plot that is inhabited by his neighbor Max. Max got into the possession of this plot by virtue of Max winning this one plot in a farmer's fair lottery sponsored by Charles 20 years ago. In the afternoon, the trees cast their shadow into the Max' yard. A recent land survey made clear, that the trees are on Charles' land. But Max wants afternoon sun. Too bad that the trees rob him of this chance, and that Charles' is unwilling to either remove the trees or sell the land with the trees on.
Let's assume Max doesn't want the error of chopping down the trees and making himself liable for having to pay for replacing these trees. What could Max reasonably sue Charles for, to force Charles to remove at least some of the trees?
(Names and location are chosen because of C. Xavier and M. Eisenhardt)


texts: Marijuana use by an employee, if it is completely legal in the particular country/state

texts:
First of all, I am not a lawyer, I do plan to become one however, and therefore I am very eager do some "thought experiments" in regards to law. Also I am from Latvia and I am familiar with how the law hierarchy works here. I have some very basic knowledge from my high school law lessons, about how my question works in Latvia(As mentioned on my bio, I am about to start my studies), however I am interested in hearing from both European Union setting as well as The United States.
So as for my question - I stumbled upon this discussion on reddit and started thinking, what if country X just passed a law that grants marijuana the same legal status as for example tobacco. A code of conduct in a workplace A objects any use of marijuana and punishes their employee for a failing a single test by a small margin by relieving him from the duty. As far as I know, in the hierarchy of law, a company's code of conduct, must comply or in other words "is under"  the actual laws of employment, etc (That is at least how it works in Latvia). So unless the employee was under such an influence that would hinder his ability to work and this has been a regular occurrence; was it a lawful sacking?
This is my first question here, so I hope that this is an appropriate way of asking.


texts: Is sending log data + customer name + location compatible with data privacy and GDPR?

texts:
I've written an updater program. Our customer downloads it to update our software with database. It would be helpful if we would know who has already updated our software. For this purpose I've added a function which uploads the log file to our ftp server, which is only visible to us. The log does only contain information about the update process, no personal data. But in order to know from which customer this log came he can fill out in the GUI his company name and location. Otherwise we wouldn't know to whom the log belongs to.

My question is: Do I need to add a checkbox that the customer agrees sending the log + customer name + location or not? Better would be if not because then not everyone will send the log. But only if it's compatible with GDPR and data privay laws. And if it's needed, is a checkbox where the customer agrees enough?


texts: Is it more important to trademark your brand name or your logo?

texts: I am looking at getting a trademark through Legalzoom for a new product my startup is about to launch.  If the logo for the product includes the name of the brand and the product, do I really need to also trademark the names on their own?


texts: Does a police officer have to get permission to break the law?

texts:
Does a police officer require permission before breaking the law?

Justice Brandeis states:

  Decency, security, and liberty alike demand that government officials shall be subjected to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen. In a government of laws, existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy. To declare that in the administration of the criminal law the end justifies the means — to declare that the government may commit crimes in order to secure the conviction of a private criminal — would bring terrible retribution. Against that pernicious doctrine this court should resolutely set its face.

  Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 485, 48 S.Ct. 564, 575, 72 L.Ed. 944 (1928) (Brandeis, J., dissenting):


texts: Why does Uber have no Google Maps copyright attribution?

texts:
On Uber's Google Map, there is no line with attribution to Google's data providers.

But the Google guidelines say very clearly:

  All uses of Google Maps ... must provide attribution to both Google and our data providers. We do not approve of any use of content without proper attribution, in any circumstance. ... Requests for exceptions will not be answered or granted. ... Only including “Google” or the Google logo is not proper attribution when there are third-party data providers cited with the imagery. (https://www.google.com/permissions/geoguidelines/attr-guide.html)

Why does Uber not attribute the copyright properly? Is this even legal?


texts: What is the difference between an adjudication and a proceeding? Are they simply synonymous?


texts: Under what principles can one be sued for not obeying a clickwrap contract they never signed?

texts:
Many software packages come with a EULA which uses claims such as "by opening this package you hereby agree to ... (some laws going far beyond classical copyright)".

Now, what happens if your friend opens the package and installs it on his computer, and I would use the software not in a way permitted by the EULA.

For example, I decompile someone's code which they prohibit by EULA.

Under what grounds can I be sued? I never agreed to the EULA so it's not contract violation.


texts:
Just lately I realized that anti-discrimination/equal opportunity legislation only applies to proscribed categories of discrimination grounds, e.g. race, ethnicity, gender, orientation, age, etc.
Up to then I'd assumed that custom & practice processes like:

Giving all applicants a fair opportunity

Advertising positions internally, locally, nationally and internationally in that order

had an obligatory legal basis.
So in the western hemisphere is it quite legal for employers in non-union workplaces (assumed not special jobs where discrimination is allowed) to do things like:

Exclude close family/marital relations of existing employees ?

Summarily hire members of the business owner's family ?

Exclude internal applicants from consideration for jobs for which they have relevant qualifications ?

Hire non-local (here defined as those who can commute to work from their existing home) candidates in preference to local ones similarly qualified

Hire foreigners where they have suitable work permits ?


texts: What do I need to do about police unlawfully break in my house

texts: The copsArrested me on false charges use my car keys to use my house key to get into my home I found them on my camera cause neighbors said my house was raided while I was arrested and so it prompted me to watch my camera to see and just so happened the female cop called to transport me to jail suddenly got to busy so they transported me in back of k9 car with k9 and the woman was the first person to show in at my home that was the emergency she had to invade my home with out search warrant thereWe’re10 police officers at my home that night from 5pm /11pm searching my filing cabinets and chilling in my house the neighbor heard them call ga power to try And cut my camera system off didn’t work so they tried to manually do it and failed miserably I went to my local police station to ask was there any search warrants for my address that day and there was not so what is my rights


texts: What types of recourse do I have against people who pursue me on social media with the intent of making my professional life difficult?

texts:
I have already posted one thread here about my interactions with people on Facebook. Briefly, I made a factual statement about a mathematical concept that some people thought was incorrect and decided that they would contact my employer to report me for being ignorant of mathematics. My employer responded with that boilerplate about employee confidentiality: basically that they would not be responding to requests about my status as an employee.

Most of these people belong to a single Facebook group that is dedicated to promoting a point of view about mathematics. The postings of this group are public and I read one of the threads that they had made about me. One poster intimated that I had a LinkedIn profile and that they could continue to pursue me through that, since they seem to have obtained no satisfaction from contacting my employer.

I was wondering if people continue to pursue me on other forms of social media and say things that are intended to cause you harm if there is any form of legal recourse. I fully understand that there may not be, but I don't think it hurts to ask. I don't see a real possibility of actual harm coming to me, but I would like whatever is happening to stop, since I believe that what is happening is in some sense wrong.

As I understand it, the jurisdiction for torts committed over the internet is the jurisdiction in which the wronged party resides. For me, that is Washington state.


texts: Tenant lost the job because of covid-19 and unable to pay the rent. Now what?

texts:
I own a condo apartment in Schaumburg Illinois. The tenant has lost her job because of COVID-2019 and is unable to pay the rent. I however have to pay the monthly installments as mortgage for this house.

What are the options for me? Can i terminate the lease which currently ends on October 2020? Is there a law where i can evict the tenant?


texts: Can my employer prevent me, as a remote employee, from moving to another state?

texts:
I am currently a remote employee in CO (employer is in AZ). I want to switch states to OR (my employer already has remote W2 employees in OR). My employer already pays state tax there, insurance etc. though they have no building there just as they have no building in CO. Theoretically, there should be zero difference to them, I have confirmed this with payroll. I have confirmed with my manager, and that individual could not care less where I live. I have also discovered, their per-employee cost basis (for remote) is lower in OR than in CO.

It does require a lot of approvals however in our system to change my W2, both with payroll, my manager, my manager's manager and the HR Director + a few others. Some of these individuals are a little personally put off that I'm moving to OR instead of AZ where headquarters is at. If at any point along the way I am denied (I can't think of a valid reason), do I have any legal recourse to force the issue - would it be worth the attempt? Can a company let me go for no other reason than - I moved to a location that hurt their feelings? For example, can my employer say: "We never offered a job to you in OR"? etc.


texts: In essence, contracts are supposed to abide with statutes. But is there a way for a contract to overpower the laws passed by a legislative body? (e.g. Regulation of minimum wage)


texts: What freedoms does a US citizen give up and/or retain under martial law, and who has the power to declare it and why?

texts: I guess I'm asking more or less of the legal definition of martial law and any details surrounding that term?


texts: Can Congress provide a binding interpretation of the USA Constitution by statute?

texts:
The Eight Amendment of the USA Constitution forbids the imposition of "cruel and unusual punishment".
Can Congress enact a statute which says "The death penalty is cruel and unusual"?
Would that statute be a binding interpretation of the federal constitution, which is the supreme law of the land?
Would that statute make States statutes and States Constitutions that allows the death penalty null and void as infringing on the Federal Constitution, as interpreted by this new Congress's statute?


texts: IP address as privacy-data in European Union (EU) for specific social identities

texts:
In the European Union (EU) there is a clash between direct and indirect personal data.

Internet Service Providers (ISP) can use the IP address to identify personal data.
The provider of the webservice cannot use the IP address to identify personal data.

This does mean the provider of the webservice can identify the personal data only indirectly via the ISP.
So in Germany, there usually is the term in General Terms & Conditions:

"Eine Nutzung der Internetseiten der (...) ist grundsätzlich ohne jede Angabe personenbezogener Daten möglich."
(Translation: The usage of the internet sites of (...) is basically possible without any expose of person-bound information.)

Following a text of the EU there is a line:

"(a) 'personal data' shall mean any information relating to an
identified or identifiable natural person ('data subject'); an
identifiable person is one who can be identified, directly or
indirectly, in particular by reference to an identification number or
to one or more factors specific to his physical,     physiological,
mental, economic, cultural or social identity;"

Says that IP addresses for

Physical
Physiological
Mental
Economic
Cultural
Social

identities are personal data, no matter if directly or indirectly.
Question
Assuming we have a website in a social identity, so an IP address is a personal data. Can we still say:

The usage of the internetsites of (...) is  basically possible without
any expose of person-bound informations.

?


texts:
The  18 U.S. Code § 1111 punished first degree murder by death

Whoever is guilty of murder in the first degree shall be punished by death or by imprisonment for life;
Whoever is guilty of murder in the second degree, shall be imprisoned for any term of years or for life.

The US code is a federal law, isn't it?
Now Article VI, Clause 2 of the US Constitution, the "Supremacy Clause", says that

[...] the Laws of the United States [...] shall be the supreme Law of the Land [...] and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

This should imply that every state of the land should punish murder by death, no? How there can be States without death penalty?


texts: invoice for services with specific monthly payment vs salaried employee

texts:
I got a remote work offer for a company based in UK , they asked me if i would be able to confirm if it would be acceptable for me  to invoice them monthly for my services or whether i would need to be a salaried employee .

and in case i decided to get paid for invoice , they proposed  an initial starting payment level per month.

So what is the difference between each option ?


texts: Am I allowed to point a web camera at a nearby business that continues to make noise to get evidence?

texts:
There is a bar across the alley from my home. Even when everything was closed for COVID-19 people would sit on the back deck and make a lot of noise until 4am. I've also noticed lots of trucks coming and going late at night and suspect there is some sort of side business or illegal suite. This is question is more specific than my other related Ongoing noise issues from business beside home

Am I allowed to point a web camera at them to record their activity as evidence? I would like to have it running all the time and set to record on motion. I can see them through my window. I've already reported the problem to the city but the problem continues.


texts: Intellectual Property Rights for Digital Artwork and an Artist in the United States

texts:
My fiancee is an artist, and regularly creates digital art work, mainly digital drawings and the occasional print of that artwork.  There is a certain level of implicit 'copyright' of the artwork, as I understand it, as her intellectual property.

However, individuals occasionally commission her, which goes a little outside my understanding of these implicit IP rights in the circumstances.  I also occasionally commission artists to create artwork, of which the subject matter, situation depicted, and in most cases the characters depicted are my intellectual property (or, at times, the joint intellectual property of me and my fiancee).

This is essentially the question at hand:  Under United States law, where we reside, what are the legal rights and protections granted to an artist for their artwork which they create, and are those rights and legal protections lessened when they are commissioned by another individual, depicting characters, individuals, or situations which are the intellectual property of the one who made the commission?


texts: Is the owner of a company responsible for people getting injured on their premises?

texts:
To frame my question: Someone I know, who is retired and over 70 years old, went to a new health center (baths, jacuzzis, etc.).
The floor was very slippery, and had no warning signs or handles.
They slipped and severely injured their arm (shattered humerus). The treatment and care are intensive, and traumatic for the patient, who needs to cancel all their plans for the next three months and get in-house help for a long time, as well as psychologic trauma help.
The owner of the health center admits that people fall all the time, although no one has ever fallen and injured themselves so severely, and also claims that everything has been certified as safe by an organization.

Could the manager of the health center be liable for this injury (and its consequences for the victim)?

On what legal grounds?

Is the safety of your customers / clients part of the civil code in this particular situation?

This happens in France, under French legislation, and I would need the right Code Pénal and Code du Travail's references.


texts: What are the regulations regarding position statements?

texts:
"By 4pm on 7 August 2018 both parties must send a written statement to each other"

Everyone knows what is expected and what to do.

Other Court orders are not so specific, they only mention a deadline without the specific information

  "The parties are to file position statements by 2nd February 2018"

  "The parties shall file and serve position statements by 4PM on 26th April 2018."

  "The parties shall file and serve statements by 4.00pm on 30th November 2018"

  "The parties to respond to the report and set out their positions by serving the position statements by 4pm on 13 February 2019"

(careful observer will notice four different date formats - no hour, 4PM, 4.00pm and 4pm)

Sometimes there are more details, such as number of pages (2, 4, undefined) as well as spacing (1.5, 2, undefined), there are no mentions of the font size, margin or paper size.

As a result, the first time I have a chance to read the position statement of the respondent is in the courtroom.

Even when we assume following the protocol when preparing the bundle, it is only the index (not content) that is communicated. See also related question about bundles: What is a reasonable timeframe to agree on the contents of the bundle?

Just wondering where to find a relevant regulation regarding the position statements and what is the exact protocol of filing them.

EDIT / UPDATE:

Just confirming that to file and serve means to file and serve to the court?

(throughout 5 court hearings the other party did not send me their, with the exception when it was explicitly "to each other")

https://courttribunalfinder.service.gov.uk/courts/croydon-county-court-and-family-court

Enquiries: enquiries.croydon.countycourt@justice.gov.uk
Listing: hearings.croydon.countycourt@justice.gov.uk
Filing and records: e-filing.croydon.countycourt@justice.gov.uk
Bailiffs: bailiffs.croydon.countycourt@justice.gov.uk
Family queries: family.croydon.countycourt@justice.gov.uk

And the best thing is - even if I find a piece of regulation, read it a few times to ensure I have a proper understanding - then I'm the only who knows it and others are breaking it and I have no way of enforcing it.


texts: Effect of Multiple Names on Bank Account

texts:
Background: I learned recently that multiple account holders on a bank account keep that account out of probate if one person dies. Or, in other words, if one person dies then the other account holders (such as children) keep the account funds–creditors have no claim.

Note: I saw a news story today where a state was going after a couple's assets (home, accounts, etc.) to cover a fine. A huge fine for a relatively benign offense I add as an aside.

Theoretical question: If I put my children's names on my accounts (savings, checking, etc.), then later authorities fine me for something, and I did not pay the fine, could the account funds be seized by authorities? Or are they treated in the same way as an estate (such as held by the children)?

(I emphasize: theoretical Q, but I'm estate planning, and this is of interest to me.)


texts:
When I was in Rome, I got two warnings from the locals:

Beware pick pockets and keep your valuables safe and covered in the streets.
Don't buy water bottles from the guys on the street: they might be used bottles.

Pick-pocketing is obviously illegal no matter where you are, but what about the second one: Is it legal to sell water in used water bottles in Rome? Is it legal in the U.S.?


texts: Law case title convention: Why sometimes not "Plaintiff v. Defendant"?

texts:
Quoted from this page:

  Plaintiff v Defendant - the "v" is pronounced "and" in civil cases and "against" in criminal cases

However, I've seen a few cases not following this rule. For example, Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, where the party of Twombly is the plaintiff. Why is that?


texts: I received a parking ticket.  I contested the ticket in writing to the Hearing Examiner who decided against me. Under the "Officer Comments" the address that was noted was a different address than on the actual parking ticket.  Is this conflict of addresses a ground for dismissal, if I appeal his decision?


texts: Are "If you breach this disclosure agreement we may sue you" clauses *legally* necessary?

texts:
This recent question asks the meaning of the following clause in a Mutual Non-Disclose Agreement (MNDA):

  The Parties agree that the disclosing Party will suffer irreparable injury if its Confidential Information is made public, released to a third party, or otherwise disclosed in breach of this Agreement and that the disclosing Party shall be entitled to obtain injunctive relief against a threatened breach or continuation of any such breach and, in the event of such breach, an award of actual and exemplary damages from any court of competent jurisdiction.

Now, my doubt is what would happen to the MNDA if that clause (and any other else to the same effect) were not in the agreement. It seems to me that "if you breach the contract we may sue you" is pretty much a given for any contract1.

Does this clause have any actual legal effect?

Here I use the "legal" term in a narrow meaning (if the matter goes to court, will it make it a difference the presence of absence of the clause?); I guess that there could be some practical reasons for the clause, like:

if the opposing party is not legally savvy, it serves to remind it that breaching the contract can have penalties.
if the customer notices the absence (for example comparing the agreement with some other agreement), s/he may think that his/her lawyer "forgot" to include it.
it does no harm, so there is no actual reason to make an effort to remove it.
(feel free to tell me of other non-legal motives for the clause).

If jurisdiction is relevant, let's go with that of the original question (Ohio), although it would be nice to know if I could expect a similar situation elsewhere or if it is dependant on the jurisdiction.

1I know that there may be arbitration clauses forcing the parts to submit to a different conflict resolution mechanism; let's just assume the contract does not not have any.


texts: Can I sue Apple if battery replacement was refused because the program is not available in my country?

texts:
I bought an iPhone 6s in Moldova. I have sometimes unexpected shutdowns. Recently I discovered that Apple has iPhone 6s Program for Unexpected Shutdown Issues. I checked the serial number and my iPhone qualifies for a free battery replacement under that program.

On the Apple Find location site the official repair service is DAAC SYSTEM INTEGRATOR and there is no alternative.

I called that service and asked if I can bring the device to them but they answered that in Moldova this program is unavailable.

Is Apple legally obligated to make the program available in Moldova?


texts: Does a Company Handbook effectively constitute an extension to the Employment Contract

texts:
In my employment contract it is stated (in so many words1) that I must adhere to the rules set out in the company handbook.

Does this make the handbook an extension of the contract? Out of which follows:

Would breaking a rule in the handbook constitute breach of contract?
Does my employer's updating the handbook constitute a unilateral change of contract?

Locale is UK but (I assume) contract law is pretty universal so answers specific to any region are welcome.

1I do not have the contract in front of me and going from memory.


texts: What would be involved in breaking or renegotiating NAFTA?

texts:
A couple weeks ago, a Republican candidate for president suggested that if elected, he'd renegotiate NAFTA or break it. What would be involved in either of those processes? Or specifically:

Repeal/Withdrawal

Would simply floating a "repeal NAFTA" bill through the legislature and getting it signed by the President be sufficient to withdraw from NAFTA? (Can't imagine otherwise, national sovereignty and all that.)

Violation

What are the penalties for members to the treaty if they violate its provisions?

Renegotiation

Are there any provisions in the treaty for amendments, or would "renegotiation" basically be like passing another treaty?


texts: Does federal law require people criminally prosecuted to be in federal jail?

texts:
A few months ago, Attorney General Jeff Sessions implemented a "zero tolerance policy", requiring the Department of Justice to criminally prosecute every single person caught crossing the border illegally.  This has resulted in large numbers of children being separated from their parents.  So today President Trump passed an executive order intended to end the family separation issue.  Here is what it says:

The Secretary of Homeland Security (Secretary), shall, to the extent permitted by law and subject to the availability of appropriations, maintain custody of alien families during the pendency of any criminal improper entry or immigration proceedings involving their members.

Now some have argued that this executive order will be overturned because extended detention of children violates the Flores settlement, and the courts may not be willing to modify the Flores settlement.  But I'm interested in a different issue.
Under the executive order, parents being criminally prosecuted for crossing the border illegally would be held in detention centers by the Department of Homeland Security as they await trial.  My question is, is this permitted under federal law?  Or does federal law require that those being criminally prosecuted at the federal level (at least for illegal entry) be held in the custody of U.S. Marshals in federal jail as they await trial?
Here is what this article says:

To be clear, there is no official Trump policy stating that every family entering the US without papers has to be separated. What there is is a policy that all adults caught crossing into the US illegally are supposed to be criminally prosecuted — and when that happens to a parent, separation is inevitable.
Typically, people apprehended crossing into the US are held in immigration detention and sent before an immigration judge to see if they will be deported as unauthorized immigrants.
But migrants who’ve been referred for criminal prosecution get sent to a federal jail and brought before a federal judge a few weeks later to see if they’ll get prison time. That’s where the separation happens — because you can’t be kept with your children in federal jail.

But when the article talks about those referred for criminal prosecution being sent to federal jail, is it just talking about standard practice, or is it talking about what federal law requires?


texts: Can an airline pilot be prosecuted for killing an unruly passenger who could not be physically restrained?

texts:
The 'Arming Pilots Against Terrorism Act' (H.R.4635) '...shields flight deck officers from liability for acts or omissions in defending the flight deck of an aircraft against acts of criminal violence or air piracy...'.

In a scenario in which an unruly/violent passenger cannot be physically restrained by either the flight attendants or the flight deck officers, and one of flight deck officers then shoots the unruly passenger and that person ends up dying from the gunshot wound, can this flight deck officer be prosecuted for murder?


texts: If a used car buyer backs out of buying a car do I have to return the deposit even if i didn't explicitly say it is "nonrefundable"?

texts:
I have a person who said they were going to buy a car from me on craigslist. Then 3 days later he backed out. He is now threatening to sue me since I won't give him his $500 deposit back. His only argument is that I never explicitly said it was nonrefundable. Does he have any legal ground? Any recommendations?

EDIT

Just to clarify why I am not returning it. I normally would out of kindness but the car is a bus that I rent out on Airbnb. I had to cancel all the reservations and lost out on a couple of hundred dollars with just that. Plus the only reason I asked for it was that I had a hard offer from someone later that day. I was just trying to be nice but In retrospect, I should have sold it out from under him.


texts:
I'm self-representing for a case that is centred on whether an amount of money was raised or not. I have reason to believe the defendant is likely to alter any documents he presents related to bank transactions to demonstrate that such an amount was raised. Is it possible to subpoena the bank records of that account directly from the bank for a small-claims case in NSW?

Thanks.


texts: What does "by conditioning our tax return preparation services" mean?

texts:
Referencing Internal Revenue Bulletin 2013-3 (January 14, 2013) 5(1)(a) specifically, there's some pretty confusing language here that I can't figure out what it means.

  If we obtain your signature on this form by conditioning our tax
  return preparation services on your consent, your consent will not be
  valid.

I encountered this while doing my free H&R tax return, and didn't want to agree to it without understanding what it's asking. From the context I assume it means that they're asking for consent to disclose information about my tax return, but that's really not clear.


texts: Chicago landlord opening security deposit account under tenant's name

texts:
I recently moved into an apartment in Chicago and sent my security deposit check to the landlord about 2 weeks before moving in. Now, 1 week after moving in (about 3 weeks after initially sending the check) my landlord has emailed me regarding setting up an account in my name for the security deposit.

In his email he has asked for the following:

Date of birth
Address
Phone number
SSN
Occupation
Government issued ID
Completed W9

This seems odd to me for several reasons:

Is there risk involved in him opening an account under my name? For instance he has some sort of access to it I assume, what if he misuses it in some way and my name is on the account?
Email does not seem like the correct place to request all of this sensitive information.
Why would he be starting this process just now, 3 weeks later?

The above are just my concerns, my real question is: Is this normal practice/should I provide information as is? If not then what would be the correct course of action?

I apologize if this is in the wrong network, if it belongs somewhere else (i.e. personal finance) let me know and I will move it.


texts: If we anonymize Google Analytics IPs do we still need to ask for Cookie consent?

texts:
Trying to figure out the most light weight way to have Google Analytics on a site without having to ask for cookie consent.  If we turn on IP Anonymization do we still need to ask for consent?

If so is there any way to use Google Analytics without having to ask for consent?


texts: What distinguishes hate speech from harassment in the US?

texts:
In the United States, hate speech is protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution no matter how morally repugnant it is. But harassment is a crime and is therefore not protected.

Here are some examples of hate speech which US courts have declared are protected.

KKK rallies in Jewish neighborhoods.
Westboro Baptish Church pickets funerals with signs that say "God Hates Fags".
Burning Koran, Bible, national flags, and the Constitution itself.

Harassment on the other hand is generally defined as any of the following when there is no valid reason for it.

Stalking
Insulting or tormenting somebody
Repeatedly annoying somebody (or somebodies) after being told not to
Scaring somebody
Requesting dates or sexual intimacy after being told "no"
Unwanted words or actions intended to cause fear, anxiety, or suffering
Catcalling or verbal bullying
Threats to do any of the above
Threats of violence

What distinguishes these two things?


texts: Am I allowed to take money for cigarettes?

texts:
If someone comes over to me asking to spare a cigarette and offers to pay for it, am I allowed to take the money?

Is it considered selling tobacco without having the proper license?


texts: Is it legal to publish others' private health data?

texts:
Suppose someone finds private health data about themselves online, identifying them by name and by specific family information.  The person does not recall signing anything that gives anyone permission to share or publish this data.  My questions are:

a) Is it legal for the website to publish this data?

b) If not, would the hosting site or publisher be in any way liable?

c) Is it common for people to accidentally sign sharing agreements about this sort of data without realizing it?  If so, do these agreements stop the signer from being able to do anything about it later?

Edit in response to comments:  This is in the US, California if it matters, but the person isn't necessarily a US citizen.  Let's say the website is a legitimate hosting/sharing website focusing on presentation/slideshow content, and the data is in a particular slideshow that a user uploaded and shared on the site.  We'll assume the slideshow is indexed and discoverable via search engines, etc, and is in the first page of results on a Google search for the person's name.


texts: Changing a tenancy agreement for a new tenant taking over from an old one

texts:
I currently live in a house of 4 tenants. We have each signed a joint tenancy agreement that specifies our monthly rent payable. This tenancy agreement is due for renewal in 4 months from now.

One of the current tenants is to leave and be replaced by a person of our choosing. The landlord has requested that the new tenant pay a slightly increased level of rent and thus has proposed that the figure on the current tenancy agreement be amended to reflect this. He then intends to increase the rent further in 4 months when the tenancy agreement is renewed.

I expressed my reservations about this and indicated that either a new tenancy agreement should be issued to replace the current one - subject to our agreement (which would mean the tenancy agreement renewal period would reset?) or postpone all rent rises until the contract is renewed in 4 months.

What can we do in this situation? Is the landlord simply allowed to to modify the contract for an incoming tenant?


texts: Did Alabama legalize gay marriage, or outlaw it?

texts:
On 4 March 2016, the Supreme Court of Alabama dismissed a petition by conservative activist group Alabama Policy Institute and a probate judge to halt gay marriages in the state.

This was reported by mainstream NBC News (which may have a liberal lean?) as the end of legal challenges to gay marriage in the state.

On the other hand, conservative family activism and religious liberty group AFA reported on the same decision as a stand against judicial tyranny and a refusal to acknowledge the constitutionality and nationwide binding precedence of Obergefell v. Hodges.

I was confused by the apparent contradiction between the two accounts, so I checked the ruling on the court's website. Chief Justice Roy Moore spends 100 pages explaining why gay marriage is evil and unnatural, why Obergefell was an unconstitutional opinion, why unconstitutional opinions do not creating binding precedent, what our oaths of loyalty to the constitution mean, what the difference between a ruling and an opinion is, why he needn't recuse himself, and why Obergefell only applies to the parties to the case, and not to the probate judges of the state of Alabama.

Then he concludes by saying on page 100:

  As stated at the beginning of this special concurrence, the
  certificate of judgment in this case does not disturb the March 2015
  orders of this Court that uphold the constitutionality of the Sanctity
  of Marriage Amendment and the Alabama Marriage Protection Act. For
  that reason, as explained above, I concur.

I'm confused. His discussion make it seem like AFA has reported correctly that the Alabama judiciary is taking a principled stand against the SCOTUS's decision in Obergefell. But then he concurs to dismiss the petition to halt gay marriage, which seems to have the effect of enforcing Obergefell. If he thinks the probate judges are bound to deny marriage certificates to same sex couples, why is he concurring to dismiss, instead of dissenting? Justice Bolin also writes a concurrence, where he states that despite disagreeing with Obergefell, he recognizes the authority the SCOTUS has over Alabama. That makes sense. But what is Chief Justice Moore doing here?


texts: What constitutes gross misconduct for teachers in the UK?

texts:
I recently heard of a story where an employee at a primary school in England was put on paid suspension. The reason given for this suspension was that she attended a peaceful demonstration against hate.

In the letter which the employee received, she was told that attending this demonstration could qualify as gross misconduct. An investigation has now been launched with regards to whether this was indeed gross misconduct.

This suspension also means that she cannot collect her own children from the school premises as she has been told to stay clear of the premises and to not make contact with staff.

Is attending a peaceful protest outside of work hours considered gross misconduct in the UK?


texts: Is it legal for a company to require an extra software license for a backup?

texts:
I work for a company that has purchased a software license for software that is needed to make our company run smoothly. We'd like to create a backup of the server in case of hardware failure, however the company we bought it from says that creating a copy of the software on the server is illegal and is instead asking for an insane amount of money for an additional license to create a backup on our own hardware.(Backing up the database for the program isn't an issue with them, just the software itself)

I understand that under U.S.C Title 17 § 117 that if we owned the software we'd be able to create a backup, however because we're just licensing it this might not apply.

In case of a hardware failure they would reinstall the software on another server and restore the database backup however this would be only doable during business hours and would take longer than us doing it ourselves.

Is it legal for them to deny us the ability to create our own backup and instead have to rely on them?


texts: Does Congress have the authority to enact laws that govern small businesses?

texts: Suppose Mike's Bikes, a store that attracts primarily customers from the local area, is in violation of some provision of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Mike's lawyer challenges the constitutionality of the provision on the grounds that "Mike's Bikes" does not operate outside Mike's home state, nor does it sell to more than a few residents of other states.


texts:
Does GDPR have any clauses that hint at piercing of the corporate veil?

Can GDPR violations lead to piercing of the corporate veil?


texts: Is it legal to sell cracked gaming accounts?

texts:
A coworker recently said they have a small side business in which they were selling cracked gaming accounts.

Is this legal?

It sounds very illegal, but I haven’t found anything definitive on Reddit or forums. It clearly goes against the terms of service....


texts: If a signal person in California tells me to kill someone, do I have to do so?

texts:
According to California sample written driving test (problem 6):

You see a signal person at a road construction site ahead. You should obey his or her instructions:

A. Only if you see orange cones on the road ahead.
B. Unless they conflict with existing signs, signals, or laws.
C. At all times.

C is the correct answer and B is marked as incorrect. So could a signal person tell me to kill someone? If they did and I did so, would I still get in trouble? I am following their instructions, and the test explicitly states that I should follow their instructions even if they conflict with existing laws.


texts: Generalized anxiety disorder and child custody

texts: In New Jersey, can a parent be denied child custody (or can custody rights be modified, e.g., require a neutral party present during visitations) when one parent has been diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder? If not, which type of mental illness could have such results?


texts: Does adding text "I am not a lawyer" or equivalent, on the internet in general, do anything in legal terms?

texts:
There's this question here about US specifically, but I'm interested to know if, in general, on any site on the internet, whichever jurisdiction its content may be hosted in, does adding "I am not a lawyer" to your advice protect you from any potential liability?

I know people use it mostly to prevent possible misunderstanding and interpreting as professional advice. Some claim though that they "heard somewhere" that they could get in trouble should things involve actual lawyers. Does such a statement as "I am not a lawyer" on StackExchange, Reddit, Quora, Yahoo answers or another site/community with a multinational audience and users from all sorts of jurisdictions have any legal meaning?


texts: Can I obtain discount codes using disposable email addresses?

texts:
A lot of online shops offer discount codes to new customers that sign up for their newsletter. While you can use an email address only once to obtain such a code I found out that using disposable email address services allows me to create such a code for every order. Is that legal?
Obviously these discount codes are an incentive for new customers so I am not sure if this is considered a fraudulent behavior.


texts: What is an appropriate CC license, if any, for work I may wish to re-use commercially in the future?

texts:
I am writing a set of cycling route guides, with photographs, which I intend to publish on a website, free of charge. I would like to license the text and images with a permissive Creative Commons license if possible, but retain the ability to re-use the content myself in a future commercial work (e.g. a book), should I choose to create one.
I have little knowledge of CC or licensing in general so I would like to know if this is a common  tenet of CC and/or if there is a specific CC license I should select that would leave open this possibility for myself in the future, while allowing others non-commercial use now.


texts:
Trump recently received a subpoena that would have forced him to testify at a trial. He appealed it saying he couldn't be compelled to testify as the sitting president. The appeal is now dismissed as moot since he is no longer president:

While president, Trump had tried to quash a subpoena that would force him to testify at the civil trial in the Bronx and sit for a videotaped deposition beforehand. In 2019, his lawyers appealed a judge’s order denying his request.
On Tuesday, the state’s Appellate Division dismissed Trump’s appeal as moot.
“This appeal concerning the proper standard for determining whether a sitting President may be compelled to give videotaped trial testimony about unofficial acts in a civil action against him or her is moot given that the rights of parties will not be directly affected by our determination,” the court said in its ruling, “and that there will not be an immediate consequence of the judgment.”

Source
Why would the court do this instead of rule on it anyway? This sounds like it just postpones the ruling until some time in the future when it happens again. True, it might not happen again, but it also might. It feels like running away from a problem on the grounds that it doesn't need to be solved today, and therefore shirking responsibility.


texts: Removing personal information from Google when being cyberstalked

texts: I would like to make a request to the search engines to remove personal information based on the ground of being stalked and that putting personal information can lead to more stalking. Is there any court cases regarding this issue?


texts: I've worked for many years on a cruise ship performing my own songs, and I'd like to know how to claim the royalties. I'm a GEMA member and of course, I have reported to them. they said that sent the claim to SIAE in Italy as the ship's flag is Italian. It has been already 6 years and GEMA seems to know be able to solve it and they told me that they aren't sure how it works with the cruise ship industry. Someone here with the same experience? Thank you


texts: Would DC Statehood Require a Constitutional Amendment or State Approval?

texts:
DC Statehood has been in the news recently, and I'm wondering about the logistics of it. First, take this excerpt from Article IV Section 3 of the Constitution:

New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union; but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress.

Although I would imagine DC is not considered to be under the jurisdiction of Maryland or Virginia, it seems to be at the junction of the two states, right? Also, how would we define "part?" Is DC a "part" of Maryland? So would DC statehood technically require approval from the Maryland and Virginia state legislatures?
Now, here's an excerpt from Article I Section 8

The Congress shall have Power To… exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States…

Giving Congress the power to "exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatshoever, over such District" seems pretty mutually exclusive with statehood. Would the Constitution need to be amended for DC statehood?


texts: Can a university make rules about students' lives outside campus?

texts:
I recently noticed that my university has a Covid-related policy stating that students are not permitted to attend public gatherings off-campus. Today, they officially stated that students breaking this rule can be expelled. The institution is private but receives federal funding.
While I understand the rationale behind this rule (and agree that going to parties etc. in these times of pandemic is not a responsible behavior), it raises the following question in my mind:
Can a university make rules about what students can and cannot do during their free time? I assume that they have a right to control and regulate events that involve their name and reputation (e.g. events organized by an official student association) but where is the limit? What about events that have nothing to do with the university? For instance, can they prevent their students from attending political events? Can they make rules about anything, e.g. "you cannnot eat burgers on Tuesdays" or something absurd like this?
Is the answer the same for employers and employees?


texts: In the US, can a state court issue a subpoena against, arrest, try, convict, or jail the US president?

texts:
The US president has the authority to grant a pardon to a person other than himself in respect of a federal crime, even before the person has been indicted. There has also been some discussion over whether he can issue a federal self-pardon. But he does not have the right to issue a pardon for a state crime.
My question is this: what authority do state criminal courts have over the US president? In particular, could they issue an enforceable subpoena against him, order his arrest, try, convict, or jail him?


texts: If you parody a song and put it in a movie or in a successful YouTube/Netflix series, do you still need to contact copyright holders?

texts:
I am parodying several songs for the soundtrack of what will hopefully be a full feature movie, and would like to know if by doing so I have to contact the copyright holders to obtain a license.
--I spoke to a friend about it recently, and he said that even though the lyrics are changed, the melody or tune itself will still be protected under copyright. I also looked into the question elsewhere and was told to copyright look into collective societies, but from the looks of it, this is more what you'd do if you are producing music, which I'm not, but am instead writing parodies of copyrighted music.
Although this is a different question, I'm also not sure if there is some word limit where if you change a certain number of words per verse it counts as a parody, but if not, then it doesn't. The reason this seems like it might be an issue to me is that in lexicography (the art and craft of dictionary making) dictionary makers have often copied definitions of words, where certain laws now exist to show whether a definition has actually been copied or is just similarly worded--as subtle a difference as that can sometimes be.
Since verses are similar to dictionary entries, similar issues have surely come up in music in the past, for which laws (must?) now exist.
If this is not the right place for the question, I'm not sure that "movies" or "comedy" would be any more pertinent, so please do suggest a better place to ask if this isn't it.
Thank you


texts: Are the standards of proof different for a U.S. versus a foreign national in an alleged "sham marriage?"

texts:
It is not illegal for a U.S. citizen (or anyone else) to marry for money in the U.S. But from what I understand, it is a felony for a U.S. citizen to receive money from a foreign national to enter a sham marriage to facilitate the foreigner's immigration.

A felony charge has to be proved "beyond a reasonable doubt." Does this standard also apply to the foreign national who will have to face deportation?

And suppose there are complicating circumstances. For instance, the U.S. partner really wanted to be married to the other person even if money was a factor, while the foreigner did not. Or vice-versa. Would sanctions then be applied to only the guilty party and not the other?