West Virginia
Court declines to answer whether distribution of opioids can cause public nuisance
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia’s Supreme Court on Monday declined to answer a federal court’s question in an appeal in a landmark lawsuit over whether the distribution of opioids can cause a public nuisance.
The 3-2 opinion returns the case to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia.
It’s been nearly three years since a federal judge in Charleston ruled in favor of three major U.S. drug distributors who were accused by Cabell County and the city of Huntington of causing a public health crisis by distributing 81 million pills over eight years in the county. AmerisourceBergen Drug Co., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. also were accused of ignoring the signs that Cabell County was being ravaged by addiction.
U.S. District Judge David Faber in Charleston said West Virginia’s Supreme Court had only applied public nuisance law in the context of conduct that interferes with public property or resources. He said to extend the law to cover the marketing and sale of opioids “is inconsistent with the history and traditional notions of nuisance.”
Last year the appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, sent a certified question to the state Supreme Court, which states: “Under West Virginia’s common law, can conditions caused by the distribution of a controlled substance constitute a public nuisance and, if so, what are the elements of such a public nuisance claim?”
Had the state justices ruled that opioids distribution can cause a public nuisance, the case would have returned to the 4th Circuit anyway. Had the West Virginia court found that opioids can’t cause a public nuisance, the appeal would have ended, the 4th Circuit has said.
Instead, a majority of the West Virginia justices refused to get involved.
Justice Haley Bunn delivered the opinion of the West Virginia Supreme Court. Justice Beth Walker, who is retiring next month, issued a separate opinion. Chief Justice Bill Wooton was joined in a dissenting opinion by Circuit Judge Tera Salango. Salango and Circuit Judge Andrew Dimlich heard the case on temporary assignment after two other justices disqualified themselves.
Paul Farrell Jr., an attorney representing the plaintiffs, said Monday he was disappointed that the justices declined to answer the legal question.
Farrell said the appeals court still must address a combination of factual and legal issues.
A Cardinal Health spokesperson declined to comment on Monday’s ruling. Emails seeking comment from AmerisourceBergen and McKesson weren’t immediately returned.
During arguments earlier this year before the state Supreme Court over the certified question, Steve Ruby, an attorney for the companies, called the plaintiffs’ arguments to grant the public nuisance “radical” and that, if granted, it would “create an avalanche of activist litigation.”
Thousands of state and local governments have sued over the toll of opioids. The suits relied heavily on claims that the companies created a public nuisance by failing to monitor where the powerful prescriptions were ending up. Most of the lawsuits were settled as part of a series of nationwide deals that could be worth more than $50 billion. But there wasn’t a decisive trend in the outcomes of those that have gone to trial.
The appeals court had noted that the West Virginia Mass Litigation Panel, which works to resolve complex cases in state court, has concluded in several instances that opioid distribution “can form the basis of a public nuisance claim under West Virginia common law.”
In his 2022 decision, Faber also said the plaintiffs offered no evidence that the defendants distributed controlled substances to any entity that didn’t hold a proper registration from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration or the state Board of Pharmacy. The defendants also had suspicious monitoring systems in place as required by the Controlled Substances Act, he said.
In 2021 in Cabell County, an Ohio River county of 93,000 residents, there were 1,059 emergency responses to suspected overdoses — significantly higher than each of the previous three years — with at least 162 deaths.
The plaintiffs had sought more than $2.5 billion that would have gone toward opioid use prevention, treatment and education over 15 years.
Rhode Island
Jurors deliberate fate of basketball coach who held naked fat tests
WAKEFIELD, R.I. (AP) — Jurors began deliberating Tuesday in the child molestation trial of a former Rhode Island high school basketball coach who asked hundreds of male student-athletes to take off their underwear so he could check their body fat.
Defense attorneys contend Aaron Thomas conducted the tests because he was focused on developing a successful athletics program, downplaying the credibility of students who say they were humiliated and embarrassed.
The trial for the once popular coach and teacher at North Kingstown High School lasted six weeks. Thomas, 57, is charged with second-degree child molestation and second-degree sexual assault.
For nearly 30 years, Thomas designed and administered a fitness test that involved measuring their upper inner thighs and pressing his fingers into their groin areas with no other adults present.
Defense attorneys acknowledged it was wrong and not backed by body composition expert but insisted it didn’t break the law. They said that’s because Thomas didn’t touch the boy athletes for sexual gratification or arousal, a key requirement under the charges he faces.
“I suggest to you that justice was served years ago,” John Calcagni, Thomas’ attorney, said during closing arguments on Monday. “He lost his job. He’ll never coach and teach ever again.
And in his own words, his reputation has been destroyed.”
Prosecutors, meanwhile, presented a starker picture in their closing argument on Tuesday, focusing on Thomas creating a program that allowed him to have unfettered access to young naked boys for decades.
Quoting from the student-athletes who testified throughout the trial, the prosecution argued that Thomas preyed on prepubescent boys who were smaller in size and likely intimidated by Thomas’ authority.
“He’s someone who used somewhat legitimate testing as a cover and a guise to administer his own perverted tests, under the guise of legitimacy for his own pleasure,” said Special Assistant Attorney General Meegan Thomson.
A key detail surrounding the case is the question Thomas would present to the male athletes, asking if they were “shy or not shy?” Those who said no were asked to strip naked, allowing Thomas to pinch various areas of their bodies, including near their groins and buttocks. The tests were conducted behind closed doors, first in a small closet-like room and then eventually in Thomas’ office.
During his testimony, Thomas told his attorney he likely saw more than 600 student-athletes throughout his career, with “roughly 80%” of them taking their underwear off during the test.
He acknowledged that removing the underwear was not necessary.
During his third day of testifying, Thomas acknowledged he lied to law enforcement when he was initially asked if students were naked for the tests.
Although Thomas is alleged to have performed the tests on multiple students over many years, the charges relate to just two. One was 14 at the time of the alleged crime between September 2000 and February 2002.
On Monday, the defense team attacked the credibility of the two student-athletes whose allegations led to the charges, pointing out the mental health struggles of one of the witnesses and inconsistent statements in their testimony.
Calcagni also stressed that some of the student-athletes are pursuing a civil lawsuit against North Kingstown, saying “when money is on the line, that becomes a motivating factor for people, sometimes to stretching the truth, and sometimes not to tell the truth at all.”
Thomson pushed back against those attacks, saying that one of the witnesses involved in the charges has passed the statute of limitations to file a civil lawsuit and countered that the mental health struggles directly stemmed from the years of abuse caused by Thomas.
More than a dozen student-athletes testified throughout the six-week trial, as well as law enforcement officers, body composition experts and former school officials.
Judge Melanie Wilk Thunberg told jurors that if they don’t find Thomas guilty of sexual assault, they can consider whether he’s guilty of misdemeanor battery, a lesser charge.
Missouri
Attorney general has sued a utility over an explosion of a home that killed a 5-year-old
LEXINGTON, Mo. (AP) — Missouri’s attorney general sued a natural gas company Monday over the explosion of a home in a small town that killed a 5-year-old boy, accusing the utility of violating a state safety law.
Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s lawsuit came less than a week after federal investigators said in a preliminary report that a Liberty Utilities employee failed to mark a section of a gas line before another company drilled into it while installing a fiber optic cable. The April 9 explosion destroyed a home in Lexington, a town of about 4,500 people about 55 miles (89 kilometers) east of Kansas City.
The blast killed Alistair Lamb and injured his 10-year-old sister, Cami, and their father, Jacob Cunningham. Bailey’s lawsuit, filed in Lafayette County Circuit Court, alleges that a Liberty employee “falsely” told the company installing the fiber optic cable that all gas lines had been marked. The lawsuit called the explosion a “preventable tragedy.”
Bailey said Liberty violated a state law designed to ensure that digging for underground water, sewer and telecommunications lines is safe. Bailey is seeking a $10,000 fine for each day the section of gas line wasn’t marked and wants a special monitor appointed to ensure that the company complies with the law.
The company said in a statement that as a party to the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board’s ongoing investigation, it cannot comment much about the explosion or the lawsuit.
Liberty said it will continue to help families affected by the explosion and “support broader recovery efforts.”
California
Former teacher of the year gets 30 years in prison for sexually assaulting two students
SAN DIEGO (AP) — A onetime county teacher of the year at a Southern California elementary school has been sentenced to 30 years to life in prison for grooming and sexually assaulting two young boys on campus.
Jacqueline Ma, who taught at Lincoln Acres Elementary in National City near San Diego, pleaded guilty in February to two counts of forcible lewd acts on a child, one count of a lewd act on a child, and one count of possessing child sexual abuse material.
She was arrested in March 2023 after the mother of one of the victims reported inappropriate messages she found between her son and Ma on a family tablet. Investigators learned that Ma had groomed the boy for more than a year before she sexually abused him when he was 12 years old, according to the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office.
Investigators also discovered that she had groomed and sexually assaulted an 11-year-old boy in 2020.
Ma had taught in the district since 2013 and had a bachelor’s degree in biology and a master’s in education, both from UC San Diego, according to her teacher of the year profile in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Court declines to answer whether distribution of opioids can cause public nuisance
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia’s Supreme Court on Monday declined to answer a federal court’s question in an appeal in a landmark lawsuit over whether the distribution of opioids can cause a public nuisance.
The 3-2 opinion returns the case to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia.
It’s been nearly three years since a federal judge in Charleston ruled in favor of three major U.S. drug distributors who were accused by Cabell County and the city of Huntington of causing a public health crisis by distributing 81 million pills over eight years in the county. AmerisourceBergen Drug Co., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. also were accused of ignoring the signs that Cabell County was being ravaged by addiction.
U.S. District Judge David Faber in Charleston said West Virginia’s Supreme Court had only applied public nuisance law in the context of conduct that interferes with public property or resources. He said to extend the law to cover the marketing and sale of opioids “is inconsistent with the history and traditional notions of nuisance.”
Last year the appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, sent a certified question to the state Supreme Court, which states: “Under West Virginia’s common law, can conditions caused by the distribution of a controlled substance constitute a public nuisance and, if so, what are the elements of such a public nuisance claim?”
Had the state justices ruled that opioids distribution can cause a public nuisance, the case would have returned to the 4th Circuit anyway. Had the West Virginia court found that opioids can’t cause a public nuisance, the appeal would have ended, the 4th Circuit has said.
Instead, a majority of the West Virginia justices refused to get involved.
Justice Haley Bunn delivered the opinion of the West Virginia Supreme Court. Justice Beth Walker, who is retiring next month, issued a separate opinion. Chief Justice Bill Wooton was joined in a dissenting opinion by Circuit Judge Tera Salango. Salango and Circuit Judge Andrew Dimlich heard the case on temporary assignment after two other justices disqualified themselves.
Paul Farrell Jr., an attorney representing the plaintiffs, said Monday he was disappointed that the justices declined to answer the legal question.
Farrell said the appeals court still must address a combination of factual and legal issues.
A Cardinal Health spokesperson declined to comment on Monday’s ruling. Emails seeking comment from AmerisourceBergen and McKesson weren’t immediately returned.
During arguments earlier this year before the state Supreme Court over the certified question, Steve Ruby, an attorney for the companies, called the plaintiffs’ arguments to grant the public nuisance “radical” and that, if granted, it would “create an avalanche of activist litigation.”
Thousands of state and local governments have sued over the toll of opioids. The suits relied heavily on claims that the companies created a public nuisance by failing to monitor where the powerful prescriptions were ending up. Most of the lawsuits were settled as part of a series of nationwide deals that could be worth more than $50 billion. But there wasn’t a decisive trend in the outcomes of those that have gone to trial.
The appeals court had noted that the West Virginia Mass Litigation Panel, which works to resolve complex cases in state court, has concluded in several instances that opioid distribution “can form the basis of a public nuisance claim under West Virginia common law.”
In his 2022 decision, Faber also said the plaintiffs offered no evidence that the defendants distributed controlled substances to any entity that didn’t hold a proper registration from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration or the state Board of Pharmacy. The defendants also had suspicious monitoring systems in place as required by the Controlled Substances Act, he said.
In 2021 in Cabell County, an Ohio River county of 93,000 residents, there were 1,059 emergency responses to suspected overdoses — significantly higher than each of the previous three years — with at least 162 deaths.
The plaintiffs had sought more than $2.5 billion that would have gone toward opioid use prevention, treatment and education over 15 years.
Rhode Island
Jurors deliberate fate of basketball coach who held naked fat tests
WAKEFIELD, R.I. (AP) — Jurors began deliberating Tuesday in the child molestation trial of a former Rhode Island high school basketball coach who asked hundreds of male student-athletes to take off their underwear so he could check their body fat.
Defense attorneys contend Aaron Thomas conducted the tests because he was focused on developing a successful athletics program, downplaying the credibility of students who say they were humiliated and embarrassed.
The trial for the once popular coach and teacher at North Kingstown High School lasted six weeks. Thomas, 57, is charged with second-degree child molestation and second-degree sexual assault.
For nearly 30 years, Thomas designed and administered a fitness test that involved measuring their upper inner thighs and pressing his fingers into their groin areas with no other adults present.
Defense attorneys acknowledged it was wrong and not backed by body composition expert but insisted it didn’t break the law. They said that’s because Thomas didn’t touch the boy athletes for sexual gratification or arousal, a key requirement under the charges he faces.
“I suggest to you that justice was served years ago,” John Calcagni, Thomas’ attorney, said during closing arguments on Monday. “He lost his job. He’ll never coach and teach ever again.
And in his own words, his reputation has been destroyed.”
Prosecutors, meanwhile, presented a starker picture in their closing argument on Tuesday, focusing on Thomas creating a program that allowed him to have unfettered access to young naked boys for decades.
Quoting from the student-athletes who testified throughout the trial, the prosecution argued that Thomas preyed on prepubescent boys who were smaller in size and likely intimidated by Thomas’ authority.
“He’s someone who used somewhat legitimate testing as a cover and a guise to administer his own perverted tests, under the guise of legitimacy for his own pleasure,” said Special Assistant Attorney General Meegan Thomson.
A key detail surrounding the case is the question Thomas would present to the male athletes, asking if they were “shy or not shy?” Those who said no were asked to strip naked, allowing Thomas to pinch various areas of their bodies, including near their groins and buttocks. The tests were conducted behind closed doors, first in a small closet-like room and then eventually in Thomas’ office.
During his testimony, Thomas told his attorney he likely saw more than 600 student-athletes throughout his career, with “roughly 80%” of them taking their underwear off during the test.
He acknowledged that removing the underwear was not necessary.
During his third day of testifying, Thomas acknowledged he lied to law enforcement when he was initially asked if students were naked for the tests.
Although Thomas is alleged to have performed the tests on multiple students over many years, the charges relate to just two. One was 14 at the time of the alleged crime between September 2000 and February 2002.
On Monday, the defense team attacked the credibility of the two student-athletes whose allegations led to the charges, pointing out the mental health struggles of one of the witnesses and inconsistent statements in their testimony.
Calcagni also stressed that some of the student-athletes are pursuing a civil lawsuit against North Kingstown, saying “when money is on the line, that becomes a motivating factor for people, sometimes to stretching the truth, and sometimes not to tell the truth at all.”
Thomson pushed back against those attacks, saying that one of the witnesses involved in the charges has passed the statute of limitations to file a civil lawsuit and countered that the mental health struggles directly stemmed from the years of abuse caused by Thomas.
More than a dozen student-athletes testified throughout the six-week trial, as well as law enforcement officers, body composition experts and former school officials.
Judge Melanie Wilk Thunberg told jurors that if they don’t find Thomas guilty of sexual assault, they can consider whether he’s guilty of misdemeanor battery, a lesser charge.
Missouri
Attorney general has sued a utility over an explosion of a home that killed a 5-year-old
LEXINGTON, Mo. (AP) — Missouri’s attorney general sued a natural gas company Monday over the explosion of a home in a small town that killed a 5-year-old boy, accusing the utility of violating a state safety law.
Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s lawsuit came less than a week after federal investigators said in a preliminary report that a Liberty Utilities employee failed to mark a section of a gas line before another company drilled into it while installing a fiber optic cable. The April 9 explosion destroyed a home in Lexington, a town of about 4,500 people about 55 miles (89 kilometers) east of Kansas City.
The blast killed Alistair Lamb and injured his 10-year-old sister, Cami, and their father, Jacob Cunningham. Bailey’s lawsuit, filed in Lafayette County Circuit Court, alleges that a Liberty employee “falsely” told the company installing the fiber optic cable that all gas lines had been marked. The lawsuit called the explosion a “preventable tragedy.”
Bailey said Liberty violated a state law designed to ensure that digging for underground water, sewer and telecommunications lines is safe. Bailey is seeking a $10,000 fine for each day the section of gas line wasn’t marked and wants a special monitor appointed to ensure that the company complies with the law.
The company said in a statement that as a party to the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board’s ongoing investigation, it cannot comment much about the explosion or the lawsuit.
Liberty said it will continue to help families affected by the explosion and “support broader recovery efforts.”
California
Former teacher of the year gets 30 years in prison for sexually assaulting two students
SAN DIEGO (AP) — A onetime county teacher of the year at a Southern California elementary school has been sentenced to 30 years to life in prison for grooming and sexually assaulting two young boys on campus.
Jacqueline Ma, who taught at Lincoln Acres Elementary in National City near San Diego, pleaded guilty in February to two counts of forcible lewd acts on a child, one count of a lewd act on a child, and one count of possessing child sexual abuse material.
She was arrested in March 2023 after the mother of one of the victims reported inappropriate messages she found between her son and Ma on a family tablet. Investigators learned that Ma had groomed the boy for more than a year before she sexually abused him when he was 12 years old, according to the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office.
Investigators also discovered that she had groomed and sexually assaulted an 11-year-old boy in 2020.
Ma had taught in the district since 2013 and had a bachelor’s degree in biology and a master’s in education, both from UC San Diego, according to her teacher of the year profile in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
