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09.05.2018

60 Minutes investigates transvaginal mesh used in thousands of women

By Jessica Surber, Partner English, Lucas, Priest & Owsley, LLP Women seeking relief from a variety of issues, including incontinence and other problems after child birth, sometimes receive a mesh implant made by a variety of companies including Boston Scientific. The mesh often ends up causing more problems than… Read More

08.22.2018

Kentucky’s tax law changes in 2018: New Sales and Use Taxes

By Nathan Vinson, Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley LLP Tax law changes in 2018 were huge at both the state and national level. For this blog post, we’re parsing through the changes to the law that require sales tax to be collected on some services and “luxuries,” which… Read More

07.26.2018

Your next legal step after your divorce: change your will

By Elizabeth McKinney, Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley, LLP After you’ve completed your divorce, chances are, you want nothing to do with any more legal documents, courts or attorneys. It’s understandable. It’s a big process that can take a lot of time, and many find it to be exhausting. But you do have one more step to do as soon as your divorce is complete: change your will. I cannot stress enough how crucial this is – and how much it needs to be attended to right away. Most people create a will around the time their first child is born as a way of ensuring that their child’s welfare and their assets are protected. Typically, each spouse will leave everything to the other spouse. If you die, and your will is still in place from a time before you divorced, it will still be in force. Your ex will receive all of your assets. When a divorce becomes final, Kentucky law does automatically revoke the provisions of a will which provide for a distribution to a spouse, or appointment of the spouse as executor, trustee, or other fiduciary appointments.  Nevertheless, it is important to update your will after a divorce to designate who receives your assets, who serves as executor, etc. in place of the former spouse. Read More

07.12.2018

ELPO successfully represents 32 defendants in tainted injections cases

By Bob Young, Managing Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley LLP In 2012, there was a national outbreak of fungal meningitis caused by poor manufacturing conditions at New England Compounding Company (NECC). Out of the 753 cases reported to the Centers for Disease Control, 234 individuals contacted fungal meningitis, while more than 300 individuals suffered from fungal infections. Sixty-four patients in nine states died. We represented 32 patients from Kentucky and Tennessee, tracking the cases through the courts for more than five years. Even as NECC filed bankruptcy and the clinic that administered the injections in Tennessee closed down, we still gained settlements for our clients. It was an incredibly complicated case, but for our team, it was all in a day’s (or a few year’s) work. Read More

07.03.2018

Construction firms can avoid lead paint problems with sound legal advice

By Sarah Jarboe, Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley LLP Last month, news outlets reported that HGTV stars Chip and Joanna Gaines’ company would pay a $40,000 fine for violating the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Lead Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule (“RRP Rule”) on work sites. The fines are a result of an Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) review of the HGTV show, Fixer Upper, which showed workers on their renovation sites violating EPA regulations. Magnolia Homes, the Gaines’ company, took immediate steps to rectify problems when first contacted by the EPA in 2015, the EPA said in a statement. Beyond the $40,000 fine, Magnolia Homes will spend $160,000 to abate lead paint in homes in Waco, Texas, where the couple and Magnolia Homes are based. This large expenditure could have been avoided with good legal advice and sound work practices. Read More

06.23.2018

Consider Your Estate Plan Before Your Summer Vacation

By Heather Coleman, Attorney English, Lucas, Priest & Owsley, LLP Sweet summertime.  The sun shines bright, schools are out, and with no better time for a vacation, the roads and airports are jam-packed with travelers.  Whether scheduling a beach trip, a lake outing, or a mountain getaway,… Read More

06.06.2018

All about probate, part 2

Editor’s note: This is the second of two blog posts exploring probate: what it is, how it works and what Kentucky law has to say about this process. You can read the first in the series here. By Leah Morrison, Attorney English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley, LLP Leah Morrison, attorney Probate is one of those things that people universally dismiss as an unduly burdensome process. In fact, many clients tell me they need a will or estate plan so that they can avoid probate. Outside of the small estate scenario that we explored in the first blog post, Kentucky law provides additional mechanisms for avoiding probate. Not everyone has a Will. Perhaps most often people do not want to write one because they don’t want to think about dying, or they plan to write one and simply put it off. Some purposefully choose intestacy. Even without any planning not all assets owned by the decedent are subject to the probate process. Probate assets include everything the decedent owned in his or her individual name. These can include: bank accounts; brokerage accounts; real estate held in the decedent’s individual name or in a tenancy in common; vehicles; furniture; jewelry; and an interest in a partnership, corporation, or limited liability company. Read More

05.29.2018

Accidents can ruin summer fun at amusement parks

By Kurt Maier, Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley LLP Who hasn’t enjoyed a great ride at an amusement park in the summer months? It’s a staple of summer fun and entertainment for children, teens and adults. Your trip to an amusement park should be free of worry about accidents and injuries, but it’s becoming all too common to see serious injuries inflicted because of careless operation of amusement park rides. There certainly are well-maintained amusement parks, and there are also those that are not. You probably won’t be able to tell which one you’ve chosen by looking at them. Kentucky amusement parks have certainly had cases of serious injuries. The one that almost everyone remembers is the 2007 incident at Six Flags in Louisville (which has since closed). A 16-year-old girl was riding the Superman Tower of Power ride when a cable wrapped around her feet and severed them. The girl’s family sued the park. At the Louisville Zoo, a small train designed for parents and their children crashed. One man had his leg pinned under the train and had a series of eight surgeries to repair the damage. He had missed 18 months of work at the time of the lawsuit. A small child had disfiguring face injuries, and many others were injured in other ways. The claims were eventually settled. Read More

05.22.2018

Six Rules of Summer Co-Parenting

By Rebecca Simpson, Partner English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley, LLP Rebecca Simpson Another school year has nearly come to a close, and kids are eager for the fun and freedom of summer. For parents, however, balancing work, camps, childcare and vacation can prove complicated and stressful. These complications and stresses weigh particularly heavy upon parents who are separated or divorced. Coordinating schedules can create tension and conflict, making summer planning an enormous challenge. While every family situation is unique, and no simple solutions exist to resolve all of the complications that can accompany raising children in separate homes, these “Six Rules of Summer” offer guidance regarding issues that commonly arise during summer co-parenting. Read More

04.19.2018

All about probate in Kentucky: Part 1

By Leah Morrison, Attorney English, Lucas, Priest and Owsley, LLP Leah Morrison, attorney One of the most frequent reasons clients tell me they want to create a will, trust, or other estate documents is to avoid probate. People have come to see probate as an unduly burdensome process that can cost a lot of money and time, but in Kentucky, it’s not as bad as you might fear. Before we delve into it, let’s take a moment to review what probate is. Probate is the legal process by which the financial affairs of a deceased person are concluded. It is a court supervised process in which assets are accumulated and distributed in accordance with the decedent’s will or pursuant to the statutory plan of descent, and debts are gathered for payment. Although, in Kentucky, the supervision provided by the court is often times very minimal. While Kentucky’s probate laws are sufficient to ensure the deceased person’s assets are properly managed and distributed to the appropriate person, the requirements of the probate process are minimal enough that most people navigate it smoothly without incident. The one thing, though, to know is that probate does make your will public. Your will becomes a public document that is recorded in the court system, and is available to anyone who wishes to view it. Read More