Law Offices of Joseph Potashnik

In New Jersey,  if you steal between $200 to $500 worth of merchandise, you’re guilty of crime in the fourth degree. For first offense, you can be sentenced to community service or even some jail time, and pay fines. Stealing under $200 is a disorderly persons offense.  But this is not the end.  Under  N.J.S.A. 2A:62C, a shoplifter may also be subject to civil action.  The owner may sue for the value of merchandise up to $500 and there is an additional fine of $150 plus attorneys fees. The law allows the merchant an his employees to detain you if they suspect you of stealing. They can call the police and press criminal charges or they can shake you down for $150 and let you go.

If you’re stopped at the store and are accused of shoplifting, what you going to do - make a scene and face criminal charges or pay   $150 and get out of there? Sounds like an easy way for the store keeper to make money.

Basically, what it means is that the merchant

Found this:

“Rutgers Law School-Newark Professor Frank Askin and his students at the school’s Constitutional Law Clinic last week filed suit against President George W. Bush in U.S. District Court for launching the Iraq war. The filing, on which Askin’s team has been working for most of the academic year, lists New Jersey Peace Action and two members of Military Families Speak Out as plaintiffs and is seeking a declaratory judgment only, that the war is illegal. It argues Congress, vested by the Constitution with the sole authority to declare war, was not permitted to delegate its authority to the president in the months before the United States launched its March 2003 invasion.”

Whatever…..

Five people were indicted yesterday for stealing from New Jersey’s unemployment insurance trust fund.  These are different indictments, but they all have the same common feature - failing to report new income while collecting unemployment benefits.

The Washington Post reports today that the U.S. government has injected hundreds of foreigners it has deported with dangerous psychotropic drugs against their will. The article cites medical records, internal documents and interviews with people who have been drugged.  The story IDs at least 250 cases in which the government has, without medical reason, given drugs meant to treat serious psychiatric disorders to people it has shipped out of the United States since 2003. Further, according to the story, there are records that show that the government has routinely ignored its own rules, which allow deportees to be sedated only if they have a mental illness requiring the drugs, or if they are so aggressive that they imperil themselves or people around them.

A New Jersey gas station clerk from Elizabeth is indicted for lottery fraud. allegedly, he altered a ticket as if to make it look like it had the winning numbers and tried to scan it at his gas station a couple of times. It was a Tic Tac Toe scratch off game and the winning combination was worth only $7,000. He was now indicted for third-degree attempted theft by deception and fourth degree forgery. The first carries up to 5 years prison sentence and a $15,000 fine and the second has a maximum of1,5 years and a $10,000 fine. Didn’t really pay..

I recently found out that up until the 1960’s the standard jury instructions charged in criminal cases in New Jersey had this: Ladies and Gentlemen, by every acquittal of a criminal defendant, you create disdain and contempt among the very class of society that the law is made to restrain.

A New Jersey dentist has been sentenced to 3 years in state prison for billing the Medicaid program about $6K for rendering general anesthesia. As it happens, there was no general anesthesia. In fact, sometimes there was no anesthesia at all (Ouch!). The dentist, a 69(!) year old man, pleaded guilty to second- degree health care claims fraud. Besides prison time, he’ll pay about $13K in fines and restitutions. He’ll be barred from participating in Medicaid programs for 5 years. Of course, that is only relevant if he ever practices dentistry again, which is doubtful.

Problem with insurance and Medicaid fraud is that it has a tendency to come back and bite you when you don’t expect. Bite the fraudsters, that is. Last week, another New Jersey doctor took a guilty plea to a charge of third degree Medicaid fraud committed between 2003 and 2005. Dr. Patel of Elizabeth admitted submitting bills for services and procedures that were never performed for patients who were not even treated on the dates of “services”. At the time, the doctor became about $9,000 richer. I bet she just spent that money for her defense. I also bet she’ll have to cough up more in penalties. She can also do some time. After they’re done with her, she’ll lose her medical license. It will cost her dearly to restore it if and when she decides to practice medicine again. When a doctor who’s lost a license petitions for restoration, there is never a guarantee that the license will be restored, though. It really wasn’t worth it. Every doctor convicted of insurance fraud I’ve ever seen is very very sorry.