For most children, a significant portion of every day is spent at school under the care of educators. These are the people parents trust with their children’s safety and well-being. While these student-teacher relationships should be constructive and nurturing, some teachers use their position of influence to take advantage of and abuse innocent children. A physical education teacher in Salem … Continue reading
On June 6, 2017, Jay Hoffmeister, a former client of Kafoury & McDougal, stood before lawmakers in Salem in support of House Bill 2712 (HB 2712), which would require domestic violence prevention policies to be adopted by all police departments in Oregon. Memories of the tragic 2010 case in which Sgt. Jeffery Grahn turned a gun on his wife, Charlotte, and … Continue reading
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has launched an extensive study, spearheaded by a core group of reporters and staff, into the increasingly pervasive problem facing our health care system: sex abuse committed by medical professionals on the patients who trust them. Taking into account a multitude of public records spanning the past 16 years, the AJC has published a series of articles, … Continue reading
President Barak Obama recently proposed a $263 million federal spending package, $75 million of which would be used to fund putting body cameras on 50,000 police officers around the country. The remaining funds would be used to expand police training and reform programs in the wake of a grand jury’s decision not to indict a Ferguson, Missouri police officer who … Continue reading
The time has come for the Portland City Council to approve the use of body video cameras on all Portland Police officers. The ineffectiveness of Portland Police review boards and internal affairs investigations have created a system where Portland Police officers can ignore their responsibilities as peacekeepers and civil servants. This allows officers to abuse citizens with no repercussions. Body … Continue reading
On July 25, 2013, the Oregon Supreme Court denied review of the Court of Appeals decision in Royshekka Herring v. American Medical Response Northwest, Inc., a case handled at the trial and appellate level by our firm, Kafoury & McDougal. On December 8, 2007, Royshekka Herring was transported by an AMR Northwest ambulance. She awakened to find EMT Lannie Haszard’s … Continue reading
A quarter of a century ago, I had a case in which an elderly woman suffered a stroke after she had been awakened in the middle of the night by police bashing in her front door, ransacking her home. The City of Portland was the named defendant, but the target was the Portland Police Narcotics Unit, which received a warrant … Continue reading
Our firm represents many citizens abused at the hands of police. These cases are difficult to win, because normally it is a victim’s word against a police officer’s. In one of our recent cases, Hammick v. City of Portland, we were awarded $175,000 against the City of Portland (the largest jury verdict ever against the City of Portland for police … Continue reading
The Portland Police Bureau has been in the news recently because of a series of incidents in which officers used excessive or deadly force, most notably the incidents involving James Chasse, Jr., Aaron Campbell, and the beanbag shooting of a 12-year old girl on a TriMet platform. James Chasse, Jr. died in September 2006 after being beaten, tasered and having … Continue reading
On January 21, 2010 a divided U.S. Supreme Court decided Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. This case dramatically changes the rules of campaign finance and unleashes corporations to spend unlimited money on elections. At issue in the case was whether a group could advertise a film critical of then-Senator Hillary Clinton during a presidential primary. The U.S. Supreme Court … Continue reading
