Signal International, LLC is a Mobile, Alabama based marine construction firm specializing in the construction of large oceangoing structures such as offshore drilling rigs, production platforms and barges. [1] The company also has operations in Pascagoula, Mississippi, and Orange, Texas. The company filed for bankruptcy on July 12, 2015, following settlements on lawsuits alleging human trafficking and violating H2B visa conditions for migrant workers. [2]
The company was formed after the acquisition of Friede Goldman Halter in 2002. In 2010 the company acquired Bender Shipbuilding and Repair in Mobile, Alabama. The purchase came after Bender filed for bankruptcy. The cost was $31.2 million. [3] Dick Marler is the President and CEO. [4] In 2005 the company hired over 300 workers for a single project to create a floating hotel to serve offshore workers. [5] In 2014 Signal was awarded a $4.5 million government contract to repair and refurbish a navy product tanker. The firm employed an additional 150 workers for that contract. [6]
In 2008 the company was sued in United States federal court on allegations related to human trafficking and infringement of visa policies for migrant workers. Allegations centered on 12 guest workers (among 500) who claimed that Signal forced them to live in squalid living conditions. Approximately 500 skilled Indian nationals were promised a decent living in worker's quarters only to later find they were being housed in an overcrowded setup where up to 24 men shared a space the size of a double-wide trailer. [7] The workers were hired to rebuild infrastructure damaged after Hurricane Katrina. The "camps", in Orange, Texas, were guarded at all times and workers were subject to inspection upon entry and exit. [8] Signal International also deducted $1050 per month from employee paychecks to pay for "rent". In their testimony, affected migrant employees detailed further infringements such as regular searches in the camps, no alcohol or visitor policies, and guards addressing workers by numbers. Signal saved an estimated $8 million in labor costs as a result of this scheme. [8]
In May 2013 suits were filed by 83 other workers with similar claims. In August 2013 the Southern Poverty Law Center filed additional suits representing 500 more workers. [1] In February 2015, a federal court jury awarded $14.1 million in damages to 5 workers arising from the original suit. [9] Following the lawsuits, Signal international filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on July 12, 2015. [2] At the time of claiming bankruptcy, Signal had 11 similar lawsuits involving 227 other migrant workers from India under similar circumstances. [2] Another $20 million was settled by the company to trafficked workers in early July 2015 just before filing bankruptcy. [8]
The Church of Scientology has been involved in court disputes in several countries. In some cases, when the Church has initiated the dispute, questions have been raised as to its motives. The Church of Scientology says that its use of the legal system is necessary to protect its intellectual property and its right to freedom of religion. Critics say that most of the organization's legal claims are designed to harass those who criticize it and its manipulative business practices.
Beginning in 2003, The SCO Group was involved in a dispute with various Linux vendors and users. SCO initiated a series of lawsuits, the most known of which were SCO v. IBM and SCO v. Novell, that had implications upon the futures of both Linux and Unix. SCO claimed that Linux violated some of SCO's intellectual properties. Many industry observers were skeptical of SCO's claims, and they were strongly contested by SCO's opponents in the lawsuits, some of which launched counter-claims. By 2011, the lawsuits fully related to Linux had been lost by SCO or rendered moot and SCO had gone into bankruptcy. However the SCO v. IBM suit continued for another decade, as it included contractual disputes related to both companies' involvement in Project Monterey in addition Linux-related claims. Finally in 2021 a settlement was reached in which IBM paid the bankruptcy trustee representing what remained of SCO the sum of $14.25 million.
Silicon Knights was a Canadian video game developer. Founded in 1992 by Denis Dyack, the company was headquartered in St. Catharines, Ontario. They started developing for computers such as the Atari ST and IBM PC compatibles. After 1996, they moved to console titles.
A migrant worker is a person who migrates within a home country or outside it to pursue work. Migrant workers usually do not have the intention to stay permanently in the country or region in which they work.
Forever 21 is a multinational fast fashion retailer headquartered in Los Angeles, California, United States. Originally founded as the store Fashion 21 in Highland Park, Los Angeles in 1984, it is currently operated by Authentic Brands Group and Simon Property Group, with about 540 outlets.
Richard F. "Dickie" Scruggs is an American former naval aviator and disbarred trial lawyer. He is the brother-in-law of former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. Scruggs first came to the public eye after successfully suing the asbestos industry on behalf of ill shipyard workers. He later represented the state of Mississippi in the tobacco litigation of the 1990s. He also represented hundreds of homeowners in lawsuits against insurance companies following Hurricane Katrina, and a national class action of patients against HMOs in the early 2000s.
Peter J. Nygård is a Finnish-Canadian former fashion executive. In 1967, he founded Nygård International, a Winnipeg-based company that made women's apparel. In 2020, Nygård was accused of long-term sex trafficking, rape, and racketeering after the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided his company's offices in New York City. Later that year, he was formally charged and was arrested on sex trafficking and racketeering charges, including allegations of sex trafficking involving minors. In October 2021, Nygård was charged by Toronto police with multiple counts of sexual assault and forcible confinement in incidents that occurred between the mid-1980s and mid-2000s; accusations of sexual misconduct by Nygård date as far back as 1968. As of September 2022, Nygård's criminal trials are ongoing and he has not been convicted of any crimes.
Stan Lee Media (SLM) was an Internet-based creation, production and marketing company that was founded in 1998, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2000, and ultimately dismissed from bankruptcy in November 2006. In its early years, the company created Stan Lee branded super hero franchises for applications in all media. Its 165-man animation production studio was based in Los Angeles from 1998 to 2001. It won the 2000 Web Award for the best Entertainment Portal on the World Wide Web, but the company failed in the same year and the corporate shell has been involved in numerous lawsuits in the years since. The company has been characterized as "a sleazy Internet start-up that could function as the poster child for the excesses of the turn-of-the-century era." Stan Lee himself cut ties with the company long before his death.
Sparrow's Point is an unincorporated community in Baltimore County, Maryland, United States, adjacent to Dundalk. Named after Thomas Sparrow, landowner, it was the site of a very large industrial complex owned by Bethlehem Steel, known for steelmaking and shipbuilding. In its heyday in the mid-20th century, it was the largest steel mill in the world. The site of the former Bethlehem Sparrows Point Shipyard and steel mill is now renamed Tradepoint Atlantic in a revitalization program to clean up the environment and make it one of the largest ports on the East Coast of the United States. Today Sparrows Point is home to many distribution centers, fulfillment centers, training lots, storage lots, and the like, including those operated by Under Armour, Amazon, Home Depot, Volkswagen, and McCormick & Company.
Garlock Sealing Technologies is a subsidiary of Enpro Company that produces sealing products. Garlock has a global presence, with 1,887 employees, at 14 facilities, in twelve countries.
SeeqPod was a search and recommendation engine specifically for indexing and finding playable search results including audio, video, podcasts and Wikipedia articles that were publicly accessible on the World Wide Web. The site claimed to have indexed more than 13 million individual tracks and files. On April 1, 2009, SeeqPod filed for bankruptcy protection under chapter 11. The service is currently unavailable. In August 2010, Intertrust Technologies announced that it had acquired all software and patents developed by SeeqPod, Inc. via the Chapter 7 Bankruptcy proceeding. Intertrust did not acquire the domain names used by the company.
Jordan is a source, destination, and transit country for adults and children subjected to forced labor and, to a lesser extent, sex trafficking. Women from Southeast Asia and East Africa voluntarily migrate to Jordan for employment among the estimated 50,000 foreign domestic workers in the country; some domestic workers are subjected to forced labor. Many of these workers are unable to return to their home countries due to pending criminal charges against them or due to their inability to pay overstay penalties or plane fare home. Some migrant workers from Egypt—the largest source of foreign labor in Jordan—experience forced labor in the construction, service, and agricultural sectors. Syrians may face forced labor in the agricultural sector, while some refugee children are subjected to the worst forms of child labor. Men and women from throughout Asia migrate to work in factories in Jordan's garment industry where some workers experience forced labor. Jordan's sponsorship system places a significant amount of power in the hands of employers and recruitment agencies, preventing workers from switching employers or receiving adequate access to legal recourse in response to abuse. Some Sri Lankan women engaged in prostitution in the country may be trafficking victims.
Malaysia is a destination and a source and transit country for women and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced prostitution and for men, women, and children who are in conditions of forced labour.
Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Philippines, known as HHIC Phil, was established in February 2006 by Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction of South Korea. In the same month, the first ship building contract was signed for 4 container ships. In May 2006, the construction of a shipyard began on Redondo Peninsula - on the western edge of Subic Bay.
The smartphone wars or smartphone patents licensing and litigation refers to commercial struggles among smartphone manufacturers including Sony Mobile, Google, Apple Inc., Samsung, Microsoft, Nokia, Motorola, Huawei, LG Electronics, ZTE and HTC, by patent litigation and other means. The conflict is part of the wider "patent wars" between technology and software corporations.
Google has been involved in multiple lawsuits over issues such as privacy, advertising, intellectual property and various Google services such as Google Books and YouTube. The company's legal department expanded from one to nearly 100 lawyers in the first five years of business, and by 2014 had grown to around 400 lawyers. Google's Chief Legal Officer is Senior Vice President of Corporate Development David Drummond.
Todd Pacific Shipyards, Los Angeles Division was a shipyard in San Pedro, Los Angeles, California. Before applying its last corporate name, the shipyard had been called Los Angeles Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company and Todd Shipyards, Los Angeles Division. Under those three names, the San Pedro yard built at least 130 ships from 1917 to 1989.
Labor trafficking in the United States is a form of human trafficking where victims are made to perform a task through force, fraud or coercion as it occurs in the United States. Labor trafficking is typically distinguished from sex trafficking, where the task is sexual in nature. People may be victims of both labor and sex trafficking.
Bollea v. Gawker was a lawsuit filed in 2013 in the Circuit Court of the Sixth Judicial Circuit in and for Pinellas County, Florida, delivering a verdict on March 18, 2016. In the suit, Terry Gene Bollea, known professionally as Hulk Hogan, sued Gawker Media, publisher of the Gawker website, and several Gawker employees and Gawker-affiliated entities, for posting portions of a sex tape of Bollea with Heather Clem, at that time the wife of radio personality Bubba the Love Sponge. Bollea's claims included invasion of privacy, infringement of personality rights, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Prior to trial, Bollea's lawyers said the privacy of many Americans was at stake while Gawker's lawyers said that the case could hurt freedom of the press in the United States.
Typhoon! was a Tigard, Oregon-based Thai restaurant with seven locations in the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington, including Beaverton, Bend, Gresham, and Redmond. The restaurant closed in 2012.