Day 3: Testimony gets heated in Rolling Stone trial

  If yesterday was an emotional sob fest, Wednesday’s proceedings in UVA administrator Nicole Eramo’s defamation lawsuit against Rolling Stone were much calmer, with the leading ladies in the suit—plaintiff Eramo and defendant/reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely—both taking the stand and both sparring with opposing counsel. It was not without emotion, however. At the lunchtime recess […]

Campaign trail: Spy center backs off Trump sign ban

Mike Sienda already felt aggrieved when his boss at the National Ground Intelligence Center’s Rivanna Station told him in early September to not show up on grounds with his giant Trump-Pence signs on the side of his box truck. When he was told he couldn’t park on the federal property with a smaller Trump 2016: […]

Day 1: Jurors selected in Eramo v. Rolling Stone defamation trial

Nearly two years after Rolling Stone put UVA in the national spotlight with an article called “A Rape on Campus,” 100 potential jurors crammed into U.S. District Court October 17 for the start of a 12-day trial to determine whether the magazine, reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely and Wenner Media LLC defamed former UVA associate dean […]

Activist calls for boycott of City Council

JoAnn Robertson has had enough. She was appalled at conditions facing elderly and disabled residents at Crescent Halls who spent the summer without air conditioning. Now she’s calling for a boycott of City Council in protest of its new public comment rules that went into effect in February—and that already have drawn a lawsuit. At […]

Legal opinion: Don’t clutter the Constitution of Virginia

Virginia voters will notice two constitutional amendments on the ballot in November, and given past history, they’ll probably pass them, despite legal experts concerns that such amendments clunk up the state constitution. The first amendment on the ballot enshrines an existing right-to-work statute that prohibits employers from requiring union membership. The second allows spouses of […]

Fake cancer survivor gets 14 months

Carmelo “Carmine” Carrozza, who claimed he had cancer and collected paychecks from The Greenbrier resort in White Sulphur Springs while taking a job at the Darden School Foundation, was sentenced October 5 to 14 months in prison for wire fraud and ordered to pay more than $48,000 in restitution, according to a release from the […]

Night lights: Munitions company shines in Rockfish Valley

David Connolly used to gaze out the windows of his Afton Mountain home and see twinkling lights and the occasional headlight in the valley below. That was before Zenith Quest International “fired up the lights,” he says, of its already controversial, 84,000-square-foot firearms and ammunition distribution warehouse smack in the middle of Nelson County’s scenic […]

Toss up? Down ticket in the 5th District

In a normal election year, the incumbent Republican 5th District congressman would run for re-election and win. That’s how it works. Incumbents are always favored, and in a gerrymandered district, they’ve already picked their voters. Turns out 2016 is anything but a normal election year. At the top of the ticket are two of the […]

Interact this way: Albemarle police pocket guide raises concerns

A just-printed Albemarle County Police Department pamphlet was intended to build trust and cooperation between citizens and law enforcement during interactions that are now under a national spotlight. Its content, however, has alarmed some local attorneys, who say the guide’s instructions are incorrect or even unconstitutional. “The document is very concerning,” says Legal Aid Justice […]