Media Coverage of the Taylor English BP Lawsuit

On July 13, Taylor English filed a lawsuit against BP on behalf of Georgia residents who’ve been affected by the oil spill. The suit, the first seeking class-action status for Georgians who own property on the Gulf, received coverage in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Atlanta Business Chronicle, AP, Marietta Daily Journal , WSB-TV and 11-Alive.

On WSB-TV, reporter Jim Strickland interviewed Taylor English attorney Foy Devine on the suit and a Georgian who has been severely impacted by the oil spill due to lost rental income on her Gulf property.

Click here for the video

AJC BP story

Click here for the full story

Taylor English Quoted in AJC on Sunday Alcohol Sales

In an Atlanta Journal-Constitution story about a Snellville, Ga. referendum vote on allowing Sunday alcohol sales, Taylor English attorney Michele Stumpe is quoted. She says  Snellville’s Sunday alcohol ban is unusual due to the town’s close proximity to Atlanta. For the full story, click here.

Taylor English, Pope McGlamry File First Georgia Statewide Class Action Lawsuit Against BP

Atlanta – July 13, 2010 – Georgia law firms Taylor English Duma LLP and Pope, McGlamry, Kilpatrick, Morrison & Norwood LLP today filed a lawsuit against BP, Transocean and other parties on behalf of Georgia residents affected by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The suit was filed on behalf of Georgia residents who own property in the areas affected by the spill, one of the biggest environmental disasters in U.S. history. It seeks compensation for loss of income, loss of property value, and loss of enjoyment by property owners based in Georgia as well as punitive damages for alleged gross negligence and willful misconduct.

The suit is the first to be filed in a federal court in Georgia seeking certification of a class composed solely of Georgia residents.

Property owners have been deeply impacted by BP’s damaged well, which officials estimate has been gushing between 1.5 million to 2.5 million gallons each day since April 20.

Chris Schorr, one of the named plaintiffs in the lawsuit, owns land in Cape San Blas in Florida that has already been impacted. His land, which he’s trying to develop, has lost an enormous amount of value due to the oil spill.

“I was planning on using vacation property rental income to pay for my son’s college education,” said Schorr, who lives in Atlanta. “But no one wants to develop property or rent vacation homes with the threat of tar balls and oily water. Now, I’m left with a property that has virtually no value that I’m being asked to pay on.”

In anticipation of the oil reaching Gulf beaches in North and Central Florida, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has expanded the closed fishing area to include waters off Cape San Blas, which is south of Panama City.

Tourism officials recently told Congress that $500 million would be needed to combat negative public perception due to the oil’s effect on Gulf Coast beaches. In Florida, tourism was down 20 percent in June—and appears to be getting much worse, according to USA Today.

Taylor English partner Foy R. Devine, a veteran trial lawyer, said the negative effects will be felt for many years by residents who own Gulf Coast properties.

“Even if the leak were plugged today, it would take years to restore the Gulf and its beaches to the condition they were in before the spill,” Devine said. “As a result, property owners in the Gulf have suffered losses estimated in the billions of dollars.”

The lawsuit, Schorr, et al. v. BP, et al., filed in the Federal District Court of the Northern District of Georgia, seeks damages outside of BP’s $20 billion trust fund. However, any damages plaintiffs receive from the fund will be figured into the lawsuit.

Taylor English has joined forces with veteran trial lawyer Mike McGlamry of the Pope McGlamry firm in preparing the lawsuit and representing the proposed class. Pope McGlamry has a long history handling claims on behalf of large classes of plaintiffs.

For more information, go to www.georgiaspillsuit.com or call 770.434.6868.

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About Taylor English Duma LLP

Taylor English is an Atlanta-based full-service business law firm that provides high quality legal services for optimal value. Areas of practice include Employment & Labor, Technology, Business Transactions, Corporate & Taxation, Creditors’ Rights, Litigation and Dispute Resolution and Real Estate, Development & Construction. Taylor English, which is ranked by Atlanta Business Chronicle as the fastest-growing law firm in Atlanta, represents all types of clients—from Fortune 500 companies and start-ups to individuals. The firm has grown from four attorneys in 2005 to over 70 today.

About Pope, McGlamry, Kilpatrick, Morrison & Norwood LLP

Pope, McGlamry, Kilpatrick, Morrison & Norwood is a regional and nationwide civil trial law firm, with offices in both Atlanta and Columbus, Georgia, committed to excellent representation and legal counsel. The firm specializes in significant business fraud and commercial tort cases, often involving extensive damages; contract disputes; business to business litigation; cases of catastrophic injury and wrongful death involving issues related to automotive and general products liability; car, truck, and construction accidents; consumer litigation, including deceptive trade practices; insurance coverage litigation and premises liability cases.

Bilski: Landmark Supreme Court Ruling Paves the Way for Innovation in the Information Age

Atlanta – June 30, 2010 – Bernard Bilski, the inventor involved in a contentious patent dispute 13 years in the making, said he had “mixed feelings” about a June 28 U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

In the landmark Bilski v. Kappos case, the Court upheld a lower court’s decision that two inventors, Bilski and Rand Warsaw, could not patent a complex method that manages how weather impacts energy prices. However, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote that advances made in the Information Age do require that patents apply to more than just physical objects.

Bilski said while a loss for him personally, the Court’s written decision is a win for innovators nationwide.

“We are personally disappointed that the Supreme Court ruled against our claims,” said Bilski, who filed for the patent in 1997. “However, we are very pleased that the Court maintained the patentability of business methods and other new areas of development.”

Jeffrey Kuester, a patent attorney with Atlanta-based Taylor English Duma LLP who represents the inventors, said a key argument in the intellectual property community has been further solidified. In this case, he said, the Court’s written decision was a validation that patents can—and should—be applied to business methods that affect software, e-commerce and many other areas of innovation.

“We’re living in a time when computers and even our energy infrastructure are defined less by physical properties and more by data,” said Kuester, who represented the inventors during the Supreme Court litigation. “While some people might be upset the Court didn’t issue a broader ruling, this is a huge step forward for innovation. The Court rightly understands that you can’t apply centuries-old principals of physicality to a digital age.”

Kuester said if the Court had made a broad ruling against non physical inventions, there’d be far fewer incentives to make advances in science and technology.

“Software, online shopping, cloud computing and medical diagnostics—these are all areas that can include innovations that aren’t necessarily physical,” Kuester said. “Without patent protection, investment in these and other types of inventions would decrease substantially.”

Going forward, Kuester said, inventors should be fully aware of the intricacies of this ruling—especially since litigation in the short-term will likely increase until lower courts further define what is patentable and what is not.

Warsaw, the co-inventor, said this particular battle is over for him but still wages on for other inventors.

“We are happy that the Court agreed with our arguments that the machine-or-transformation test is too narrow,” said Warsaw, “but it would also have been nice to receive a patent after more than 10 years.”

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About Taylor English Duma LLP

Taylor English is a full-service business law firm that provides high quality legal services for optimal value. Areas of practice include Employment & Labor, Technology, Business Transactions, Corporate & Taxation, Creditors’ Rights, Litigation and Dispute Resolution and Real Estate, Development & Construction. Taylor English, which is ranked by Atlanta Business Chronicle as the fastest-growing law firm in Atlanta, represents all types of clients—from Fortune 500 companies and start-ups to individuals. The firm has grown from four attorneys in 2005 to over 80 today.

Taylor English Continues to Expand, Adds Five Attorneys

Atlanta – June 28, 2010 – Taylor English Duma LLP has added five attorneys to further round out its practice groups.  The new attorneys have experience in real estate, sports administration, complex litigation, employment and bankruptcy law:

• Kristi Dosh represents lenders, developers and other parties on publicly-funded community-development transactions—particularly low-income housing tax credits. She also handles commercial real-estate transactions.

  In addition, Dosh has a unique focus on sports administration law and is author of the upcoming book, “Balancing Baseball: How Collective Bargaining Has Changed the Major Leagues”, published by McFarland & Co.  Dosh is also a regular contributor to Forbes.com’s “SportsMoney” blog. She previously served as a real estate associate at Nelson, Mullins, Riley & Scarborough and Morris, Manning & Martin LLP.

• Natalie Nicole Mark is a member of the firm’s Litigation and Dispute Resolution practice group and focuses on antitrust, securities and other commercial litigation.

  Mark has represented clients in complex class action and multi-party disputes, as well as Securities and Exchange Commission investigations and global internal investigations concerning violations of Office of Foreign Asset Control regulations. Her pro bono work includes drafting proposed adoption regulations for an undeveloped country as well as other nonprofit projects. Prior to joining Taylor English, Mark served as an associate at Clifford Chance US LLP in Washington, D.C.

• Lori S. Thomas focuses her practice on the full range of legal issues facing employers—including wage and hour issues, discrimination, the Family and Medical Leave Act, and restrictive covenants. She also conducts training-compliance sessions on anti-harassment, union avoidance and other issues.

  Thomas has successfully defended employers in Equal Pay Act cases and collective actions under the Fair Labor Standards Act. She previously practiced employment law with Dow Lohnes PLLC and McGuire Woods LLP

• Amy K. Weber has years of experience representing financial institutions with distressed and defaulted loans, a component of Taylor English’s burgeoning creditors’ rights practice. Weber also has extensive experience litigating trade secret cases and related business disputes involving companies. Weber is a former partner at Moore Ingram Johnson & Steele LLP

• Lauren H. Zeldin focuses on discrimination, civil rights, wage litigation and other issues facing the workplace. Zeldin, who regularly advises employers on the Fair Labor Standards Act and harassment investigations, also conducts internal wage and hour audits. A recognized leader in employment law, Zeldin is a contributor to the 2007 fourth-edition-book, “Employment Discrimination Law.” She previously practiced employment law with Ashe, Rafuse & Hill, LLP

Taylor English partner Joe English said the addition of these attorneys builds on the firm’s diverse and still-growing offerings.

“Lauren, Amy, Lori, Natalie and Kristi give us additional expertise in the myriad issues that our clients face every day,” English said.

Over the past few years, Taylor English has grown steadily.

The firm was just named the fastest-growing law firm in metro Atlanta by Atlanta Business Chronicle. According to the newspaper, Taylor English registered a 1,049 percent increase in revenue and a 986 percent increase in the number of attorneys from 2005 to 2009. In addition, Taylor English was ranked the 16th-largest law firm in terms of number of attorneys in the city.

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About Taylor English Duma LLP

Taylor English is a full-service business law firm that provides high quality legal services for optimal value. Areas of practice include Employment & Labor, Technology, Business Transactions, Corporate & Taxation, Creditors’ Rights, Litigation and Dispute Resolution and Real Estate, Development & Construction. Taylor English, which is ranked by Atlanta Business Chronicle as the fastest-growing law firm in Atlanta, represents all types of clients—from Fortune 500 companies and start-ups to individuals. The firm has grown from four attorneys in 2005 to over 80 today.