Washington
Judge orders US refugee office to reconsider some children’s cases
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge said Monday that the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement must reconsider the cases of some migrant children who have been stuck in government custody since the Trump administration changed the identification requirements for would-be family sponsors.
The opinion from U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich in Washington, D.C., found that the Trump administration’s more stringent regulations caused undue delays for the children and the parents and adult siblings who were hoping to bring the kids into their homes.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“The ruling sends a clear and necessary message: the government cannot trap children in detention simply because their families lack specific documents or legal status,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, a legal advocacy firm representing some of the migrant children. “The court’s decision is not only a step toward reuniting families — it pushes back against a broader effort to erode long-standing legal protections for children.”
Under the Trump rules, migrant children have stayed in shelters for an average of 217 days before being released to family members, according to data from the Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement.
During the Biden administration, migrant children spent an average of 35 days in shelters before being released to sponsors.
The Trump administration says adult sponsors who took in migrant children were not always properly vetted, placing some of the children at risk of abuse or exploitation. The new regulations include DNA testing and income verification. They also prohibit sponsor applicants from using foreign passports and documents from other countries to prove identity.
Friedrich said there’s a compelling reason for the rule changes — an ORR report in 2023 found multiple instances of fraud, including 10 occasions where children were released to sponsors with falsified documents.
Still, the judge wrote, there wasn’t any advance notice given of the changes, and many of the children in government custody arrived in the United States with the expectation that they had family members and friends who could sponsor them. If they had been aware of the changes, they might not have entered the U.S., the judge wrote.
One child who had already been released to live with his sister for two years under the old requirements was taken back into custody after driving without a license. Now, under the new rules, he is stuck in government custody without a potential sponsor, the judge noted.
It’s likely that the Office of Refugee Resettlement “acted arbitrarily and capriciously by not providing adequate justification for its new sponsor documentation requirements,” Friedrich wrote. He said the agency wasn’t obligated to approve any particular sponsor or to release any individual child, but it cannot create a new blanket policy without explaining how it weighed the disrupted interests of the families and children against other valid concerns.
New York
Judge dismisses Justin Baldoni’s $400M lawsuit against ‘It Ends With Us’ costar Blake Lively
A judge on Monday dismissed the lawsuit that actor and director Justin Baldoni filed against his “It Ends With Us” costar Blake Lively after she sued him last year for sexual harassment and retaliation.
U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Liman’s decision is the latest development in the bitter legal battle surrounding the dark romantic film.
Baldoni and production company Wayfarer Studios countersued in January for $400 million, accusing Lively and her husband, “Deadpool” actor Ryan Reynolds, of defamation and extortion.
The New York judge ruled that Baldoni can’t sue Lively for defamation over claims she made in her legal claim, because allegations made in a lawsuit are exempt from libel claims. Liman also ruled that Baldoni’s claims that Lively stole creative control of the film didn’t count as extortion under California law.
The judge, however, said Baldoni could revise the lawsuit if he wanted to pursue different claims related to whether Lively breached or interfered with a contract. His legal team indicated it planned to do so.
“Ms. Lively and her team’s predictable declaration of victory is false,” one of Baldoni’s lawyers, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement. He said that Lively’s claims that she was sexually harassed on the film set, and then subjected to a secret smear campaign intended to taint her reputation, were “no truer today than they were yesterday.”
“It Ends With Us,” an adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s bestselling 2016 novel that begins as a romance but takes a dark turn into domestic violence, was released in August, exceeding box office expectations with a $50 million debut. But the movie’s release was shrouded by speculation over discord between Lively and Baldoni.
The judge also dismissed Baldoni’s defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, which had reported on Lively’s sexual harassment allegations.
“Today’s opinion is a total victory and a complete vindication for Blake Lively, along with those that Justin Baldoni and the Wayfarer Parties dragged into their retaliatory lawsuit, including Ryan Reynolds, (publicist) Leslie Sloane and The New York Times,” Lively’s attorneys, Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb, said in a prepared statement.
The lawyers said they “look forward to the next round” of seeking attorneys’ fees, treble damages and punitive damages.
A spokesperson for The New York Times said they were “grateful to the court for seeing the lawsuit for what it was: a meritless attempt to stifle honest reporting.”
“Our journalists went out and covered carefully and fairly a story of public importance, and the court recognized that the law is designed to protect just that sort of journalism,” Charlie Stadtlander said in an emailed statement.
Lively appeared in the 2005 film “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” and the TV series “Gossip Girl” from 2007 to 2012 before starring in films including “The Town” and “The Shallows.”
Baldoni starred in the TV comedy “Jane the Virgin,” directed the 2019 film “Five Feet Apart” and wrote “Man Enough,” a book challenging traditional notions of masculinity.
Connecticut
Judge orders managers for late Johnny Winter to pay relatives $226K in damages
A Connecticut judge has settled a bitter feud over the estate of the late legendary blues guitarist Johnny Winter, ordering his managers to pay $226,000 in damages for improper payments they received after his 2014 death and rejecting their claim to the rights to his music.
Relatives of Winter’s late wife, Susan, sued Winter’s manager, Paul Nelson, and his wife, Marion, in 2020, claiming the Nelsons swindled more than $1 million from Winter’s music business. The Nelsons denied the allegations and countersued. They accused the relatives of improperly having Paul Nelson ousted as the beneficiary of Winter’s estate, and they claimed ownership of his music rights.
After a seven-day trial before a judge in January 2024, Judge Trial Referee Charles Lee ruled Friday that the Nelsons received improper payments and made improper withdrawals from Winter’s accounts, but rejected claims they committed fraud, mismanagement and breach of contract.
“The court finds that the conduct for which it has awarded the damages set forth above was negligent or at least arguably legitimate,” Lee wrote in a 54-page decision that also rejected the claims in the Nelsons’ countersuit.
The judge said the Nelsons’ most serious impropriety was withdrawing $112,000 from Winter’s business account and depositing it into one of their own accounts in 2019, without listing Susan Winter as a signatory on their account. Susan Winter owned all of her husband’s assets — valued at about $3 million at the time of his death. The judge said punitive damages may be imposed on the Nelsons because of that transfer.
Paul Nelson, who managed Johnny Winter’s business from 2005 to 2019 and played guitar in his band, died in March 2024 from a heart attack during a music tour. Marion Nelson, who did bookkeeping for the Winters and the music business, did not immediately return an email message Monday. The Nelsons’ lawyers did not immediately return phone and email messages. It wasn’t clear if they planned to appeal.
Susan Winter died from lung cancer in October 2019. Months before her death, she removed Paul Nelson as her successor trustee to her family trust, which included all of her late husband’s assets. She named her sister and brother, Bonnie and Christopher Warford, from Charlotte, North Carolina, as her new successor trustees, and they sued the Nelsons.
The Warfords’ lawyers did not immediately return phone and email messages Monday. Phone numbers for the Warfords listed in public records were no longer in service.
The Nelsons claimed the Warfords took advantage of Susan Winter and had her sign legal documents while she was medicated near the end of her life. They also alleged the Warfords soured their relationship with Susan Winter with false embezzlement claims. The Warfords denied those allegations.
The judge ruled that the Warfords were entitled to damages because of improper payments the Nelsons received, including $68,000 in royalty payments from a 2016 auction of Winter’s assets, $69,000 in cash withdrawals, $18,000 in expense reimbursements and $15,000 in other royalty payments.
The Warfords also were awarded $56,000 that remains in one of the Nelsons’ accounts, the same account used in the $112,000 transfer criticized by the judge. In 2020, the Nelsons transferred about $151,000 out of that account to the Warfords’ lawyers.
Lee also rejected claims by the Warfords that Paul Nelson should not have received $300,000 in auction proceeds from the sale of three of Johnny Winter’s guitars, because Winter promised those guitars to Paul Nelson.
John Dawson Winter III was born and raised in Beaumont, Texas. He burst onto the world blues scene in the 1960s, dazzling crowds with his fast licks while his trademark long, white hair flew about from under his cowboy hat. He and his brother Edgar — both born with albinism — were both renowned musicians. Johnny Winter, who played at Woodstock in 1969, was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in 1988.
Rolling Stone magazine listed him as the No. 63 best guitar player of all time in 2015. He released more than two dozen albums and was nominated for several Grammy Awards, winning his first one posthumously in 2015 for Best Blues Album for “Step Back.” Nelson produced the album and also took home a Grammy for it.
Johnny Winter, who spent two decades living in Easton, Connecticut, before his death, battled heroin addiction for years and credited Nelson, whom he met in 1999, with helping him get off the opioid methadone and revive his career, according to the 2014 documentary, “Johnny Winter: Down & Dirty.”
Judge orders US refugee office to reconsider some children’s cases
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge said Monday that the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement must reconsider the cases of some migrant children who have been stuck in government custody since the Trump administration changed the identification requirements for would-be family sponsors.
The opinion from U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich in Washington, D.C., found that the Trump administration’s more stringent regulations caused undue delays for the children and the parents and adult siblings who were hoping to bring the kids into their homes.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“The ruling sends a clear and necessary message: the government cannot trap children in detention simply because their families lack specific documents or legal status,” said Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, a legal advocacy firm representing some of the migrant children. “The court’s decision is not only a step toward reuniting families — it pushes back against a broader effort to erode long-standing legal protections for children.”
Under the Trump rules, migrant children have stayed in shelters for an average of 217 days before being released to family members, according to data from the Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement.
During the Biden administration, migrant children spent an average of 35 days in shelters before being released to sponsors.
The Trump administration says adult sponsors who took in migrant children were not always properly vetted, placing some of the children at risk of abuse or exploitation. The new regulations include DNA testing and income verification. They also prohibit sponsor applicants from using foreign passports and documents from other countries to prove identity.
Friedrich said there’s a compelling reason for the rule changes — an ORR report in 2023 found multiple instances of fraud, including 10 occasions where children were released to sponsors with falsified documents.
Still, the judge wrote, there wasn’t any advance notice given of the changes, and many of the children in government custody arrived in the United States with the expectation that they had family members and friends who could sponsor them. If they had been aware of the changes, they might not have entered the U.S., the judge wrote.
One child who had already been released to live with his sister for two years under the old requirements was taken back into custody after driving without a license. Now, under the new rules, he is stuck in government custody without a potential sponsor, the judge noted.
It’s likely that the Office of Refugee Resettlement “acted arbitrarily and capriciously by not providing adequate justification for its new sponsor documentation requirements,” Friedrich wrote. He said the agency wasn’t obligated to approve any particular sponsor or to release any individual child, but it cannot create a new blanket policy without explaining how it weighed the disrupted interests of the families and children against other valid concerns.
New York
Judge dismisses Justin Baldoni’s $400M lawsuit against ‘It Ends With Us’ costar Blake Lively
A judge on Monday dismissed the lawsuit that actor and director Justin Baldoni filed against his “It Ends With Us” costar Blake Lively after she sued him last year for sexual harassment and retaliation.
U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Liman’s decision is the latest development in the bitter legal battle surrounding the dark romantic film.
Baldoni and production company Wayfarer Studios countersued in January for $400 million, accusing Lively and her husband, “Deadpool” actor Ryan Reynolds, of defamation and extortion.
The New York judge ruled that Baldoni can’t sue Lively for defamation over claims she made in her legal claim, because allegations made in a lawsuit are exempt from libel claims. Liman also ruled that Baldoni’s claims that Lively stole creative control of the film didn’t count as extortion under California law.
The judge, however, said Baldoni could revise the lawsuit if he wanted to pursue different claims related to whether Lively breached or interfered with a contract. His legal team indicated it planned to do so.
“Ms. Lively and her team’s predictable declaration of victory is false,” one of Baldoni’s lawyers, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement. He said that Lively’s claims that she was sexually harassed on the film set, and then subjected to a secret smear campaign intended to taint her reputation, were “no truer today than they were yesterday.”
“It Ends With Us,” an adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s bestselling 2016 novel that begins as a romance but takes a dark turn into domestic violence, was released in August, exceeding box office expectations with a $50 million debut. But the movie’s release was shrouded by speculation over discord between Lively and Baldoni.
The judge also dismissed Baldoni’s defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, which had reported on Lively’s sexual harassment allegations.
“Today’s opinion is a total victory and a complete vindication for Blake Lively, along with those that Justin Baldoni and the Wayfarer Parties dragged into their retaliatory lawsuit, including Ryan Reynolds, (publicist) Leslie Sloane and The New York Times,” Lively’s attorneys, Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb, said in a prepared statement.
The lawyers said they “look forward to the next round” of seeking attorneys’ fees, treble damages and punitive damages.
A spokesperson for The New York Times said they were “grateful to the court for seeing the lawsuit for what it was: a meritless attempt to stifle honest reporting.”
“Our journalists went out and covered carefully and fairly a story of public importance, and the court recognized that the law is designed to protect just that sort of journalism,” Charlie Stadtlander said in an emailed statement.
Lively appeared in the 2005 film “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” and the TV series “Gossip Girl” from 2007 to 2012 before starring in films including “The Town” and “The Shallows.”
Baldoni starred in the TV comedy “Jane the Virgin,” directed the 2019 film “Five Feet Apart” and wrote “Man Enough,” a book challenging traditional notions of masculinity.
Connecticut
Judge orders managers for late Johnny Winter to pay relatives $226K in damages
A Connecticut judge has settled a bitter feud over the estate of the late legendary blues guitarist Johnny Winter, ordering his managers to pay $226,000 in damages for improper payments they received after his 2014 death and rejecting their claim to the rights to his music.
Relatives of Winter’s late wife, Susan, sued Winter’s manager, Paul Nelson, and his wife, Marion, in 2020, claiming the Nelsons swindled more than $1 million from Winter’s music business. The Nelsons denied the allegations and countersued. They accused the relatives of improperly having Paul Nelson ousted as the beneficiary of Winter’s estate, and they claimed ownership of his music rights.
After a seven-day trial before a judge in January 2024, Judge Trial Referee Charles Lee ruled Friday that the Nelsons received improper payments and made improper withdrawals from Winter’s accounts, but rejected claims they committed fraud, mismanagement and breach of contract.
“The court finds that the conduct for which it has awarded the damages set forth above was negligent or at least arguably legitimate,” Lee wrote in a 54-page decision that also rejected the claims in the Nelsons’ countersuit.
The judge said the Nelsons’ most serious impropriety was withdrawing $112,000 from Winter’s business account and depositing it into one of their own accounts in 2019, without listing Susan Winter as a signatory on their account. Susan Winter owned all of her husband’s assets — valued at about $3 million at the time of his death. The judge said punitive damages may be imposed on the Nelsons because of that transfer.
Paul Nelson, who managed Johnny Winter’s business from 2005 to 2019 and played guitar in his band, died in March 2024 from a heart attack during a music tour. Marion Nelson, who did bookkeeping for the Winters and the music business, did not immediately return an email message Monday. The Nelsons’ lawyers did not immediately return phone and email messages. It wasn’t clear if they planned to appeal.
Susan Winter died from lung cancer in October 2019. Months before her death, she removed Paul Nelson as her successor trustee to her family trust, which included all of her late husband’s assets. She named her sister and brother, Bonnie and Christopher Warford, from Charlotte, North Carolina, as her new successor trustees, and they sued the Nelsons.
The Warfords’ lawyers did not immediately return phone and email messages Monday. Phone numbers for the Warfords listed in public records were no longer in service.
The Nelsons claimed the Warfords took advantage of Susan Winter and had her sign legal documents while she was medicated near the end of her life. They also alleged the Warfords soured their relationship with Susan Winter with false embezzlement claims. The Warfords denied those allegations.
The judge ruled that the Warfords were entitled to damages because of improper payments the Nelsons received, including $68,000 in royalty payments from a 2016 auction of Winter’s assets, $69,000 in cash withdrawals, $18,000 in expense reimbursements and $15,000 in other royalty payments.
The Warfords also were awarded $56,000 that remains in one of the Nelsons’ accounts, the same account used in the $112,000 transfer criticized by the judge. In 2020, the Nelsons transferred about $151,000 out of that account to the Warfords’ lawyers.
Lee also rejected claims by the Warfords that Paul Nelson should not have received $300,000 in auction proceeds from the sale of three of Johnny Winter’s guitars, because Winter promised those guitars to Paul Nelson.
John Dawson Winter III was born and raised in Beaumont, Texas. He burst onto the world blues scene in the 1960s, dazzling crowds with his fast licks while his trademark long, white hair flew about from under his cowboy hat. He and his brother Edgar — both born with albinism — were both renowned musicians. Johnny Winter, who played at Woodstock in 1969, was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in 1988.
Rolling Stone magazine listed him as the No. 63 best guitar player of all time in 2015. He released more than two dozen albums and was nominated for several Grammy Awards, winning his first one posthumously in 2015 for Best Blues Album for “Step Back.” Nelson produced the album and also took home a Grammy for it.
Johnny Winter, who spent two decades living in Easton, Connecticut, before his death, battled heroin addiction for years and credited Nelson, whom he met in 1999, with helping him get off the opioid methadone and revive his career, according to the 2014 documentary, “Johnny Winter: Down & Dirty.”
