Lead Stories

Should the federal criminal sentencing guideline be used to add an extra eight to ten months in prison for the executive director of a charity who embezzled about $150,000 from the agency when the guideline says a two-level enhancement should be applied when the offence involves “a misrepresentation that the defendant was acting on behalf of a charitable” organization?

A federal District Court in Illinois said it should be applied.  The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals has said not so fast.

The trial court that recently ruled that the New York Attorney General did not have grounds to force a judicial dissolution of the National Rifle Association (See Nonprofit Issues^®, Vol. XXXII, No. 2) has denied counterclaims by the NRA seeking to dismiss the entire case as unconstitutionally retaliatory or selective.  The Court has ruled that the AG may continue to pursue a variety of other claims against the organization and individual defendants.

The Attorney General for the District of Columbia may proceed with a suit to dissolve a nonprofit fiscal sponsor that it claims provided more than $4 million in grants, constituting more than 99% of its total grantmaking, to a related for-profit corporation, the District’s Court of Appeals has ruled.

A federal District Court in Pennsylvania has dismissed a hostile work environment claim brought against a behavioral health facility by a black woman aide because “an objectively reasonable caretaker would not have been detrimentally affected” by her patient’s regular race-based harassment.

A trial court in New York has dismissed a complaint brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James seeking to dissolve the National Rifle Association for its failure to oversee top executives and prevent the loss of millions of dollars improperly spent by its leaders.  But the Court has allowed the AG to continue to prosecute various claims against the individual defendants for breach of fiduciary duty and other offenses.

An appellate court in Michigan has reversed a trial court decision granting summary judgment to the former president of a family foundation who was being sued by his brother, a former director of the foundation, for breach of fiduciary duty.  The trial court had said that the plaintiff brother had failed to show evidence of a breach of duty.  The Court of Appeals said he hadn’t been able to show evidence because the trial court had granted a protective order against discovery of the evidence he needed to show.