Latest / WCHS Network Podcasts / 02/06/2025 Ask the Lawyer with Tom Peyton
Transcript
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- 1:02Speaker 4: for the power of Peyton Peyton Lawfirm dot com in Nitro,
- 1:04Speaker 4: West Virginia. Tom Peyton made it this morning. We're starting
- 1:08Speaker 4: a little bit late because we had to make some
- 1:09Speaker 4: uh uh, we had to make some considerations for some
- 1:12Speaker 4: road conditions this morning.
- 1:13Speaker 5: Yeah, rain or sleep nor snow Peyton law for m
- 1:16Speaker 5: to get to Yeah, no matter, telephone, but it's not
- 1:18Speaker 5: I like to be here. It's not the same. But yes,
- 1:22Speaker 5: if you're you know, living hurricane. So I was coming
- 1:25Speaker 5: down this morning. If you're traveling I sixty four east,
- 1:30Speaker 5: first use I saw about I think I counted sixteen
- 1:33Speaker 5: cars off the side of the road. I couldn't tell
- 1:36Speaker 5: if they all had flat tires, but certainly the majority
- 1:38Speaker 5: of them did, and most of them with the driver's
- 1:42Speaker 5: side front and the pottholes that are the problem. Really
- 1:47Speaker 5: got to start looking around the I call it the
- 1:49Speaker 5: new Dunbar Interstate Bridge. It's old.
- 1:51Speaker 6: Now.
- 1:52Speaker 5: Right about the Jefferson Road exit on the right, there's
- 1:57Speaker 5: one pretty significant pothole they haven't patched yet, and I
- 2:02Speaker 5: was stopped on Interstate for about fifteen minutes. I assen
- 2:05Speaker 5: there and they put hot patch down, which is kind
- 2:08Speaker 5: of temporary asphalt there, and what I assume is the
- 2:12Speaker 5: two big ones which were in the middle lane on
- 2:15Speaker 5: the left side, which is why I saw a bunch
- 2:16Speaker 5: of driver's side flat tires. But that you know that
- 2:20Speaker 5: that patching in this rain, it's already crumbling out of
- 2:24Speaker 5: the potholes, So just be if you take it slow,
- 2:26Speaker 5: you'll be fine. I was obviously already, you know, I
- 2:29Speaker 5: couldn't go fast because I had folks piled up in
- 2:32Speaker 5: front of me. But uh, just be careful right there.
- 2:34Speaker 5: And uh, just one of that we've had. We've had
- 2:36Speaker 5: that incident used to be a joint on the Interstate
- 2:40Speaker 5: here before we got the Virginia Street exit. That was
- 2:42Speaker 5: causing some problems for a while. But I guess maybe
- 2:45Speaker 5: so much rain, just just I don't know, caused the
- 2:49Speaker 5: previous patch or pothole to get worse. But so be aware.
- 2:52Speaker 5: If you're coming I sixty four east, expect delays and
- 2:54Speaker 5: take it slow once you get to the Dunbar Interstate Bridge,
- 2:58Speaker 5: because for that next quarter mile and a half mile
- 3:01Speaker 5: there are problems could be in any of the lanes.
- 3:04Speaker 5: As long as you take it slow, you'll be fine.
- 3:06Speaker 4: If you're out there listening and you're waiting for service
- 3:08Speaker 4: for your flat tire, I really have a lot of
- 3:09Speaker 4: empathy for you because this is the worst type of
- 3:12Speaker 4: weather to have something like that happened.
- 3:13Speaker 5: Yeah, it was the record there one and then, but
- 3:17Speaker 5: I mean it was it ran the gamut from a
- 3:19Speaker 5: semi truck to there was a big snap on tools
- 3:22Speaker 5: box truck. Oh my goodness, left tire is completely flat.
- 3:25Speaker 5: Not the worst place to have a flat tire I
- 3:28Speaker 5: did have. I went to the we talked about it.
- 3:31Speaker 5: A few weeks ago. I went to the I'm on
- 3:32Speaker 5: the board of governors for the State bar and we
- 3:34Speaker 5: had our meeting in Shepherdstown. Really nice.
- 3:37Speaker 6: But it was.
- 3:39Speaker 5: Second weekend of January, so we were leaving on a Saturday.
- 3:43Speaker 5: I sixty eight coming back. And if you've ever driven
- 3:45Speaker 5: I sixty eight, when you get near the western your
- 3:47Speaker 5: line traveling west, you're past Frostburg, you're pretty well out
- 3:52Speaker 5: in nowhere. Sure, I think the there's a Friendsville exit,
- 3:55Speaker 5: but there's about ten to fifteen miles where it's high
- 3:58Speaker 5: elevation Interstate. This was the Saturday when it was up there.
- 4:02Speaker 5: At least it was like eighteen degrees wind and snow
- 4:05Speaker 5: and we got a flat.
- 4:08Speaker 4: Not a great time.
- 4:09Speaker 5: It wasn't a great time. It took me two hours
- 4:10Speaker 5: and I was in a runner, my wife's fore runner,
- 4:13Speaker 5: which I had not changed a tire on before, and
- 4:15Speaker 5: so you don't know where the jack is, you don't
- 4:16Speaker 5: know how to get the spare out and oh wow,
- 4:20Speaker 5: you know, in a pile of snow on the side
- 4:23Speaker 5: of the interstate with you know, semi is speeding by
- 4:26Speaker 5: and moving moving the vehicle.
- 4:27Speaker 7: But I got it done.
- 4:28Speaker 5: It's one of those where you just when you.
- 4:29Speaker 7: Get it done, you just you're glad you have it done,
- 4:32Speaker 7: and you're glad to have it done, glad to be alive,
- 4:34Speaker 7: because you know, you think, you don't think about it
- 4:37Speaker 7: if you're not working along the interstate very much.
- 4:39Speaker 5: Either a construction worker or maybe a law enforcement officer
- 4:42Speaker 5: has to make those stops. But it's, uh, you're at
- 4:46Speaker 5: the mercy of the drivers because you can't you can't
- 4:49Speaker 5: change a tire or do much anything else on the
- 4:51Speaker 5: side of the interstate and stop every time a Semi
- 4:54Speaker 5: comes around the curve, and so you know, you just
- 4:56Speaker 5: kind of do it and get it done.
- 4:58Speaker 2: It was, it was.
- 5:01Speaker 5: It was a nightmare of a tire change, but I
- 5:03Speaker 5: was pretty proud I finally got it done.
- 5:04Speaker 4: I was in Central Texas about three o'clock in the
- 5:06Speaker 4: morning one time and had a flat tire and it
- 5:08Speaker 4: was in an older car and I went to change
- 5:11Speaker 4: with tire. It was it was a car that i'd
- 5:13Speaker 4: had for a while, but it was my secondary car,
- 5:14Speaker 4: and I sold everything I owned, and so this was
- 5:16Speaker 4: my last car left. I hadn't driven around a whole lot.
- 5:19Speaker 4: I got into the trunk to change my tire, and
- 5:21Speaker 4: I didn't have a I didn't have a tire iron,
- 5:23Speaker 4: so I didn't have a lug wrench where I could
- 5:25Speaker 4: get the lugs off. I was stranded in central Texas
- 5:28Speaker 4: at like three o'clock in the morning. This was pre
- 5:29Speaker 4: internet day, so it was all I had was an Atlas.
- 5:32Speaker 4: I didn't have a cell phone or anything like that. That
- 5:33Speaker 4: didn't exist. And a family stopped in in a beat
- 5:37Speaker 4: up pickup truck. It was a man and a woman
- 5:39Speaker 4: and two children and gave me a ride into the
- 5:42Speaker 4: nearest town. I don't even remember what the town was.
- 5:44Speaker 4: It was a tiny little town where I would wait.
- 5:46Speaker 4: I got a place to sleep overnight and got help
- 5:48Speaker 4: in the morning.
- 5:48Speaker 5: That's where I thought we were going. We had to
- 5:50Speaker 5: get a ride and just had to wait till the
- 5:51Speaker 5: next day because we did try, you know, and kind
- 5:55Speaker 5: of going back. Most folks, automobile insurance, if you have comprehensive,
- 6:01Speaker 5: does have roadside assistance with it, and so I called
- 6:04Speaker 5: my automobile ensurre and they some in Arizona answered adjusting
- 6:07Speaker 5: the claim and it's it's actually using insure that I
- 6:11Speaker 5: have a love hate relationship with because one they have
- 6:14Speaker 5: a lower premium, so I use them for my automobile insurance.
- 6:17Speaker 5: Two they're really bad at handling certain claims, which causes delays.
- 6:22Speaker 5: But they're so bad that oftentimes I get really good
- 6:24Speaker 5: results from my clients because by the time we get
- 6:25Speaker 5: to the end, they've behaved so badly, they've they've dug
- 6:28Speaker 5: themselves into a hole. But that day there was nobody available.
- 6:34Speaker 5: The guys that do the record service and things like
- 6:37Speaker 5: that were all out either plowing snow or had other calls,
- 6:39Speaker 5: so we were we were stuck. But although I did
- 6:42Speaker 5: get that was a Saturday, and Monday morning, I did
- 6:46Speaker 5: get a text back from it's probably AI or something
- 6:49Speaker 5: from my automobile ensure, probably the largest automobile ensure in
- 6:52Speaker 5: the country. In fact, I can pretty well bank on it,
- 6:54Speaker 5: so figure out who it is. But they texted me
- 6:57Speaker 5: that hey, because I was getting calls myself and from
- 7:00Speaker 5: a number I at no not answering because I'm at
- 7:02Speaker 5: work and it was my automobile and sure who had
- 7:07Speaker 5: contacted somebody to come help us, And so that guy
- 7:10Speaker 5: was calling me to make contact before he drove to
- 7:12Speaker 5: where we supposedly were on the interstate, and then my
- 7:15Speaker 5: insurer was texting me automated text saying it's ready. And
- 7:18Speaker 5: then finally I called the guy back and said, well,
- 7:21Speaker 5: this was this happened Saturday and we're not still sitting
- 7:24Speaker 5: out there. I just told me about it. I was like, well, sorry,
- 7:28Speaker 5: but we're fine. But it is just for those out there,
- 7:33Speaker 5: you aren't with completely without recourse. If you have a
- 7:36Speaker 5: vehicle damaged or you have to buy a new tire
- 7:39Speaker 5: as a result of potholes, the state has with immunity
- 7:43Speaker 5: from suit. So when you have either an injury bodily
- 7:49Speaker 5: injury or property damage as a result of road conditions,
- 7:52Speaker 5: for example, he generally you can't sue the state for that.
- 7:57Speaker 5: It depends on the facts of the situation. But if
- 8:00Speaker 5: there's active construction, like workers out there working and there's
- 8:04Speaker 5: a problem, or you get some damage or injury, then
- 8:09Speaker 5: you potentially can file a claim because there is some
- 8:11Speaker 5: insurance that covers the state when there's active construction going on.
- 8:14Speaker 5: At least that's the way it's been traditionally over the years.
- 8:17Speaker 5: If there's insurance available to cover it, then there's no
- 8:20Speaker 5: real immunity to prevent you from filing a conventional lawsuit.
- 8:23Speaker 5: But for potholes like we had to debt, it used
- 8:28Speaker 5: to be called the Court of Claims. Now it's the
- 8:29Speaker 5: Legislative Claims Commission, maybe the last eight nine years, and
- 8:33Speaker 5: so you can file what is in essence and administrative
- 8:36Speaker 5: type complaint. I've never filed one myself or represented anybody
- 8:40Speaker 5: on a simple property damage claim in that process, but
- 8:45Speaker 5: I think they have some kind of parameters where they
- 8:48Speaker 5: will honor those requests. If you can verifiable documentation of
- 8:54Speaker 5: the pothole and receipts for any cost, they'll pay you
- 8:57Speaker 5: back your out of pocket costs. But you do have
- 9:00Speaker 5: to go through the process and it's not instant. The
- 9:03Speaker 5: Legislative Claims Commission is the is the court. I think
- 9:07Speaker 5: it's a three judge panel, so you don't have a
- 9:09Speaker 5: jury trial or anything, but you can actually try your
- 9:11Speaker 5: case there before that panel, and if you win an award,
- 9:17Speaker 5: then it's sent over to the legislature for approval, which
- 9:22Speaker 5: was no requirement they approve it. I think they traditionally
- 9:24Speaker 5: pay these type claims. So if you can probably go
- 9:29Speaker 5: on the Legislative Claims Commission website. It may even be
- 9:32Speaker 5: through the Attorney General's office, and there should be some
- 9:35Speaker 5: direction there about how to submit a claim for damage
- 9:40Speaker 5: resulting from a pothole. And certainly, I mean if you
- 9:44Speaker 5: think about it while you're out the interstate trying to
- 9:46Speaker 5: change your tire, I mean today's event, as long as
- 9:50Speaker 5: you have some evidence you actually had a some damage today,
- 9:54Speaker 5: there shouldn't be any real question about whether it was
- 9:57Speaker 5: the pothole or not, as long as you're in that
- 9:58Speaker 5: area of Interstate sixty four, because there's so many people
- 10:01Speaker 5: that have had a problem. Normally, though, you need to
- 10:04Speaker 5: go back and verify the pothole, like get and you
- 10:07Speaker 5: got to be careful because you don't want to take
- 10:09Speaker 5: pictures just like yeah, there's real close up pictures. Well,
- 10:11Speaker 5: you got to get some pictures in context, so you
- 10:14Speaker 5: can do a close one to show how bad it is,
- 10:16Speaker 5: but back up where you can see some monuments on
- 10:18Speaker 5: the side, maybe a power pole with a number on
- 10:21Speaker 5: it or something like that or something, yes, something, so
- 10:23Speaker 5: you can show where it was and then get your
- 10:26Speaker 5: receipts and then you can make those claims and eventually
- 10:29Speaker 5: you probably will be reimbursed once you go through the process.
- 10:34Speaker 5: And I think it's it's those generally. I don't think
- 10:37Speaker 5: you have to come and have a trial on it,
- 10:38Speaker 5: because if you can provide sufficient documentation, they just kind
- 10:42Speaker 5: of pass them through. I haven't handled that because you know,
- 10:46Speaker 5: it doesn't make you don't get your lawyers. He's back
- 10:48Speaker 5: in addition to that, so it doesn't make a lot
- 10:49Speaker 5: of sense for the client or for us to get
- 10:51Speaker 5: involved in us. Now, if you hit a pothole and
- 10:53Speaker 5: have an injury, you know, you you'er off the road
- 10:55Speaker 5: and somebody gets hurt, then that's the type of claim
- 10:57Speaker 5: that we might handle through the Legislative Claims Commissi, because
- 11:00Speaker 5: it's not just property damage. You can have body injury
- 11:03Speaker 5: type claims be processed through that through that UH Claims
- 11:08Speaker 5: Commission as well.
- 11:09Speaker 4: I can imagine. It seems like that's one of those
- 11:11Speaker 4: things the barrier almost it's not a huge barrier, but
- 11:16Speaker 4: the barrier of the process has to almost be in place,
- 11:18Speaker 4: because if you just have tire damage, I mean, it
- 11:21Speaker 4: could be that that could be reimbursed for you and
- 11:23Speaker 4: it might be a couple hundred dollars fixed or something
- 11:25Speaker 4: like that for it to get done. But there's also
- 11:26Speaker 4: people out there that this could happen to. Not only
- 11:28Speaker 4: is there a tire problem, but maybe you got something
- 11:30Speaker 4: that goes on with you with like an axle or
- 11:32Speaker 4: with like a barying or something along those lines, and
- 11:33Speaker 4: it's a more and it's a more expensive fix. Those
- 11:35Speaker 4: people are probably a little bit more inclined to go
- 11:37Speaker 4: through the process.
- 11:38Speaker 2: Right if you have a bill.
- 11:39Speaker 5: Now, at the same time, keep in mind that if
- 11:42Speaker 5: you're you know, automobile and sure pays pretty much every
- 11:45Speaker 5: automobile ensure has a language in their policy something called subrogation,
- 11:51Speaker 5: which is a weird word, but what it means is,
- 11:53Speaker 5: in essence, they can either prosecute your claim for you
- 11:57Speaker 5: and try and get their money back. So let's say
- 12:00Speaker 5: you have ACME Auto Insurance and they paid four thousand
- 12:04Speaker 5: dollars for your car repair and your policy you give
- 12:07Speaker 5: them the right to go after, for example, the state,
- 12:10Speaker 5: to try and get reimbursement for themselves. Now, if you
- 12:13Speaker 5: have a deductible, they should get that back for you
- 12:15Speaker 5: and then you get that in your pocket. But you
- 12:17Speaker 5: can also prosecute those yourself. Now, generally, when if you
- 12:21Speaker 5: recover for the same thing that you're auto Insure already
- 12:24Speaker 5: paid you, then you got to pay back your automobile.
- 12:26Speaker 5: And sure, so you got to watch that. You don't
- 12:28Speaker 5: want to do a lot of work necessarily end up
- 12:30Speaker 5: having to to pay most of the money back to
- 12:31Speaker 5: your automobile. And sure, they'll probably works something out where
- 12:35Speaker 5: they just wave it if you do all the work
- 12:37Speaker 5: to collect the money and don't have to reimburse them,
- 12:39Speaker 5: but you do have to watch for that.
- 12:41Speaker 4: Yeah, it's all great information. And when stuff like this
- 12:44Speaker 4: comes up, I mean it's just like two days ago,
- 12:47Speaker 4: I was having this conversation about the West Virginia's process
- 12:50Speaker 4: for fouling for road damage vehicles and potholes and things
- 12:54Speaker 4: like that, and just two days later, for literally forty
- 12:56Speaker 4: eight hours later, we're talking about it as being a
- 12:58Speaker 4: pretty major story here with it things happening here in
- 13:00Speaker 4: the Kenall Valley and uh, the uh the pot, I
- 13:04Speaker 4: guess it's a pothole or the pot whole seam or the.
- 13:07Speaker 5: Yeah, it was that a scene. They weren't really big,
- 13:10Speaker 5: I mean they were what I saw was a couple
- 13:13Speaker 5: of feet by foot or something. But they must have
- 13:15Speaker 5: been quite deep and just pinched the tires or something.
- 13:18Speaker 5: But but yeah, now if you get you know, if
- 13:21Speaker 5: you hit a pothole and have it causes you to wreck,
- 13:24Speaker 5: for example, somebody gets injured, then that's a potential claim
- 13:28Speaker 5: that we can handle through the Legislative Claims Commission, And
- 13:32Speaker 5: and so you can give us a call if you've
- 13:34Speaker 5: got an issue like that and maybe we can help
- 13:36Speaker 5: you out. If it's property damage as far as just
- 13:40Speaker 5: a few thousand dollars or less, then you can just
- 13:42Speaker 5: try and file the administrative claim yourself and you'll probably
- 13:45Speaker 5: get reimbursed somewhere down the line. I don't used to
- 13:48Speaker 5: be it's it's defined those claims. When you win an award,
- 13:53Speaker 5: it's it's defined as a moral obligation of the state.
- 13:56Speaker 5: So you don't actually get a judgment where you can
- 13:59Speaker 5: prosecute against the state and try and collect it like
- 14:01Speaker 5: you would if you had a case in regular court
- 14:05Speaker 5: maybe between private entities or citizens, where you win and
- 14:08Speaker 5: you can do things like garner's wages attached back accounts,
- 14:10Speaker 5: things like that. If you win an award for the
- 14:13Speaker 5: Legislative Claims Commission, it's literally defined as a moral obligation
- 14:16Speaker 5: of the state. But and so the legislature has to
- 14:19Speaker 5: appropriate money to pay those. I think traditionally they do
- 14:21Speaker 5: pretty much fund payments on all of those, certainly the
- 14:26Speaker 5: type of claims we've been talking about this morning, so
- 14:28Speaker 5: you'll if you can document it, you'll probably get reimbursed.
- 14:32Speaker 4: Great information is always from Tom Payton from the Payton
- 14:34Speaker 4: Law Froom and right off of the headlines this morning
- 14:36Speaker 4: for everything that's going on in the Kanall Valley with
- 14:38Speaker 4: the big podole that we had one I sixty four
- 14:40Speaker 4: eastbound and the multiple vehicles up towards between fifteen and
- 14:43Speaker 4: twenty vehicles that had damage or flats on the side
- 14:46Speaker 4: of the road. I'll tell you what we're going to
- 14:48Speaker 4: twitch topics up just a little bit. Tom has some
- 14:49Speaker 4: other things he's going to talk about. We're already about
- 14:51Speaker 4: the twenty minute point of the program, so let's go
- 14:54Speaker 4: in and take our break.
- 14:54Speaker 2: Now.
- 14:54Speaker 4: We'll come back with a fresh pair of ears and eyes,
- 14:57Speaker 4: and we can take your phone calls if you want
- 14:58Speaker 4: to wait in and control the conversation. Three zero four
- 15:01Speaker 4: three four two eight one three to one three zero
- 15:02Speaker 4: four three four two eight one three one. You can
- 15:04Speaker 4: find out more about the Peyton Law Firm online. It's
- 15:06Speaker 4: Peyton Lawfroom dot com, Peyton Lawfirm dot com, pe y
- 15:09Speaker 4: t and Peyton Lawfirm dot com located in Nitro, West Ridge.
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- 17:03Speaker 4: talked about the mess on sixty four coming into charleson
- 17:06Speaker 4: this morning with a potholes process going through to try
- 17:08Speaker 4: to get back some of damage on that. But there's
- 17:11Speaker 4: other things to talk about as well, and yeah.
- 17:12Speaker 5: Money going on in the news national and local level,
- 17:15Speaker 5: of course, take a minute, just in case we got
- 17:18Speaker 5: new listeners here. What we do with the Paytent Law firm.
- 17:20Speaker 5: Although we talk a little light politics here in current events,
- 17:23Speaker 5: but primarily we do civil litigation, so we represent some
- 17:27Speaker 5: small businesses, but for the most part, you represent folks
- 17:30Speaker 5: that have been harmed in consumer transactions accidents of some sort,
- 17:35Speaker 5: either physically harmed what they call bodily injury, or financially
- 17:40Speaker 5: harmed in some way by an insurance company or something
- 17:43Speaker 5: to that effect. That's kind of the bread and butter
- 17:44Speaker 5: of what we do. At the same time, we like
- 17:47Speaker 5: to help people if we can, so we do some
- 17:51Speaker 5: basic of state planning, some deed work, decent amount of
- 17:55Speaker 5: SoC security disability claims. We used to do a pretty
- 17:58Speaker 5: good job on those. Because we don't get dozens of
- 18:01Speaker 5: them going at any one time. We kind of try
- 18:04Speaker 5: and keep them a dozen or less not that way
- 18:05Speaker 5: we can keep really good track of them and know
- 18:07Speaker 5: what's going on with the claim. Because those are you
- 18:09Speaker 5: don't think about it. Those are administrative claims, but they're
- 18:12Speaker 5: really really important to people because you get generally one
- 18:16Speaker 5: shot at a hearing, and it sometimes takes you two
- 18:18Speaker 5: years or longer to get to the point of a
- 18:20Speaker 5: hearing from the time you first fire your applications. So
- 18:23Speaker 5: you need to have a lawyer that's in a law
- 18:26Speaker 5: firm that's gotten the correct information of so security and
- 18:28Speaker 5: prepares you properly and has some strategy. When you go
- 18:31Speaker 5: in the hearing, you shouldn't really be meeting your lawyer
- 18:35Speaker 5: or some lawyer from the firm you hired for the
- 18:37Speaker 5: first time, you know, when you shut up at the hearing,
- 18:39Speaker 5: which I've heard some stories of that, but we do
- 18:43Speaker 5: a good job on those. But yeah, kind of from
- 18:47Speaker 5: the news level, I was just thinking today, it's hard
- 18:51Speaker 5: to imagine imagine a state where you've got people that
- 18:58Speaker 5: live in towns out really you know, build a house
- 19:02Speaker 5: out of private drive somewhere miles and miles of miles
- 19:04Speaker 5: where you've got to rely on your yourself or infrastructure.
- 19:08Speaker 5: People live in towns and don't have putable water. They
- 19:11Speaker 5: have to go pick up water somewhere and that's just
- 19:13Speaker 5: what's expected of them. Or we have or the state
- 19:17Speaker 5: that has jails where it's just the wild West and
- 19:19Speaker 5: the jails the guards can do whatever they want to
- 19:21Speaker 5: do because and they do because they know.
- 19:23Speaker 2: Where to take inmates that.
- 19:27Speaker 5: They want to be mean to, putting it nicely out
- 19:29Speaker 5: of camera's view, and that kind of thing where people
- 19:32Speaker 5: are sleeping on floors and what has amultitude in the
- 19:36Speaker 5: past to cruel unusual punishment, or or a state where
- 19:40Speaker 5: we have a child welfare welfare system where we ship
- 19:44Speaker 5: kids out of state to private entities who then abuse
- 19:48Speaker 5: them more or maybe have folks putting kids in a
- 19:53Speaker 5: shed and locking them in and our child welfare system
- 19:56Speaker 5: can't even seem to follow up, so where neighbors have
- 20:01Speaker 5: to call over and over again before the police finally
- 20:03Speaker 5: do something and results in the conviction of the parents
- 20:07Speaker 5: by over like thirty counts. Keep in mind CPS was
- 20:09Speaker 5: in there and then didn't find anything and never followed
- 20:13Speaker 5: up like they should have. And I think by the
- 20:15Speaker 5: time that CPS worker testified, she was wearing orange in jail.
- 20:20Speaker 5: So imagine all of that. But the newly elected governors.
- 20:28Speaker 5: What I've seen biggest in the in the in the
- 20:32Speaker 5: headlines is he's trying to get rid of the quote
- 20:35Speaker 5: woke virus, and that mostly involves potentially, let's say there's
- 20:42Speaker 5: very small percentage of juveniles still in high school or
- 20:47Speaker 5: maybe middle school that have either confusion or biological issues
- 20:53Speaker 5: or mental health issues that caused them to not identify
- 20:58Speaker 5: as the gender they were born with. Very small percentage
- 21:03Speaker 5: in West Virginia. Even smaller is there might be in
- 21:08Speaker 5: our entire state two or three of those individuals that
- 21:11Speaker 5: were born with a certain biological sex but identifies another
- 21:16Speaker 5: and plays extracricul activities. So that's even a smaller portion.
- 21:22Speaker 5: I mean, it's got to be zero point two percent
- 21:25Speaker 5: or something or less of our population. Yet with all
- 21:29Speaker 5: those other problems we got, that's West Virginia. So then
- 21:34Speaker 5: we have Governor Morrisey going on and preaching about the
- 21:37Speaker 5: woke virus and bragging about how we've rounded up I
- 21:41Speaker 5: guess sixty or seventy people maybe here locally, I don't
- 21:44Speaker 5: know if it was throughout the entire state. That maybe
- 21:49Speaker 5: in the United States illegally, and that's that's supposed to
- 21:52Speaker 5: be a big deal and help us out. I just
- 21:54Speaker 5: feels like I'm in the twilight zone sometimes because when
- 21:56Speaker 5: I think of important things, not that those things aren't
- 21:59Speaker 5: in important, and certainly they are to the to the
- 22:01Speaker 5: folks that feel marginalized because they're in a minority for
- 22:04Speaker 5: some reason. But major, major problems aren't getting solved. All
- 22:10Speaker 5: the while we're having press conferences on the quote woke virus,
- 22:14Speaker 5: and it's just to me, I think it's sad, and
- 22:17Speaker 5: it's it's it's unfortunate, and and the child welfare system
- 22:21Speaker 5: is starting to come to fruition. We've had a lot
- 22:23Speaker 5: of political rhetoric about how we're doing something about it,
- 22:29Speaker 5: but it doesn't appear that we're doing very much about it.
- 22:32Speaker 5: And and I saw I think it's on the a
- 22:37Speaker 5: few Metro news website, but they there's a judge, Judge Sweeney,
- 22:41Speaker 5: Timothy Sweeney, who's in the third Judicial Circuit, which covers
- 22:46Speaker 5: I believe Doddridge, Lewis, Pleasants, Richie and Upshur County, or
- 22:50Speaker 5: at least that's the region of the Department of Human
- 22:53Speaker 5: Services that Child Protective Services covers Region one, I think
- 22:57Speaker 5: is what it's called. So interestingly, he has a case
- 23:02Speaker 5: that's styled I'm not sure a lawsuit was filed or
- 23:05Speaker 5: if he just created this case kind of sui sponte.
- 23:10Speaker 5: That's the legal term for when judge does something on
- 23:13Speaker 5: their own without being asked to do it regard the
- 23:17Speaker 5: cases stalled, regarding critical understaffing of the Department of Human Services. Now,
- 23:21Speaker 5: keep in mind, circuit judges are the ones that handle
- 23:23Speaker 5: juvenile delinquency cases. If a kid isn't getting to school,
- 23:27Speaker 5: for example, or has spraysed, graffiti or regular significant crimes
- 23:33Speaker 5: if you were an adult, they handle those as well.
- 23:35Speaker 5: But they also handle all the abuse in neglect cases.
- 23:37Speaker 5: They have to oversee these cases, which our Supreme Court
- 23:41Speaker 5: has emphasized over and over again that those abuse and
- 23:44Speaker 5: neglect cases get basically the highest priority of any case.
- 23:48Speaker 5: I mean, I've had them, I've appealed them, and they
- 23:52Speaker 5: get fast tracked by the rules and by the Supreme
- 23:55Speaker 5: Court because they're so important. Now, this judge sees that
- 24:00Speaker 5: every day he's dealing with where do we place these children?
- 24:02Speaker 5: They can't go back into deplorable conditions in the home.
- 24:07Speaker 5: The parents maybe have mental health issues or drug problems,
- 24:11Speaker 5: which has led to a lot of this, and we've
- 24:14Speaker 5: heard stories about CPS workers having to house kids in
- 24:16Speaker 5: an office, motel rooms, and of course shipped out of
- 24:21Speaker 5: state to private entities. I know our state has contracted
- 24:25Speaker 5: out some of these some of this foster care to
- 24:31Speaker 5: corporations or entities. And I know I saw a story
- 24:35Speaker 5: two or three weeks ago somewhere in the north or
- 24:37Speaker 5: central part of the state where outright criminals have been
- 24:41Speaker 5: hired to watch these children and it was so bad
- 24:43Speaker 5: that they were then committing crimes around the town. And
- 24:48Speaker 5: I can't find that article again. So if somebody is
- 24:50Speaker 5: aware of that, maybe they could email it to me,
- 24:51Speaker 5: because I'm curious why I can't find it on Google
- 24:54Speaker 5: now unless I dream that I read it. And it's
- 24:57Speaker 5: well documented these out of state facilities we've been sending
- 24:59Speaker 5: kids to, they've then been re abused again because they're
- 25:02Speaker 5: in such a terrible uh.
- 25:04Speaker 4: And there's investigations that come from multiple state, multiple agencies,
- 25:06Speaker 4: multiple journalistic places. I mean, this is pretty objective as
- 25:11Speaker 4: far as it goes that these places are terrible places
- 25:13Speaker 4: to put children.
- 25:14Speaker 5: Right, Sure, But you know why would that get significance
- 25:18Speaker 5: when we got to worry about the woke virus.
- 25:20Speaker 4: Well, we might we might be forty nine and fiftieth
- 25:22Speaker 4: in human capital services and human services and things like that,
- 25:26Speaker 4: but we might be number one in vaccinating against the
- 25:28Speaker 4: woke mind virus. Right, So there's there's something to it.
- 25:32Speaker 5: And a kid on some of it. But you know
- 25:36Speaker 5: somebody who's been in the abuse neglect system as a
- 25:38Speaker 5: lawyer trying to help kids, both as a guardian for
- 25:40Speaker 5: them and and in other ways. It's it's really sad,
- 25:44Speaker 5: it's frustrating, so you don't know what to really do
- 25:47Speaker 5: about it. But Judge Sweeney knows one thing to do
- 25:50Speaker 5: about it. So he has entered an order a couple
- 25:54Speaker 5: of days ago. But he found that it's come to
- 25:58Speaker 5: the attention of the court that the Department of Human
- 26:00Speaker 5: Resources is severely understaffed. So you might I've heard of
- 26:07Speaker 5: cases where you show up and there's no caseworker there,
- 26:11Speaker 5: just don't have anybody there at all, and you got
- 26:13Speaker 5: this kid there that's not being custody yet. But it's
- 26:17Speaker 5: just problematic. Obviously, Judge Sweeney's seeing something personally.
- 26:20Speaker 8: UH.
- 26:21Speaker 5: He notes the understaffing is an immediate and critical threat
- 26:23Speaker 5: to at risk children, the most vulnerable residents of this
- 26:27Speaker 5: circuit and state UH and juveniles are supposed to be
- 26:30Speaker 5: the highest priority for the judiciary in the state. So
- 26:34Speaker 5: Sue Sponte on his own, he appoints various Department of
- 26:41Speaker 5: Human Services higher ups that would be let's see Laura Ellis,
- 26:46Speaker 5: Deputy commission of Field Operations, Kim Rickett's special consultant to
- 26:50Speaker 5: the Secretary, Alex mayor Or Meyer, who I think is
- 26:53Speaker 5: the recently appointed Secretary of the Department of Human Resources,
- 26:57Speaker 5: Channing Kravannak General Counsel, and Lorie Bragg, Deputy Commissioner of
- 27:01Speaker 5: Policy and Programs, And he is essentially said, those folks
- 27:06Speaker 5: are going to work as caseworkers so they can come
- 27:10Speaker 5: down to let's see Harrisville. Harrisville, Yeah, county seat of
- 27:17Speaker 5: I think Richie County, and help stop this immediate critical
- 27:22Speaker 5: staff shortage in the applicable counties. And they will be
- 27:26Speaker 5: under the immediate supervision and direction of Johndrea Nicholson's Social
- 27:31Speaker 5: services manager. Maybe she's a local person, but we'll see
- 27:36Speaker 5: what happens there. Then the folks I just recited are
- 27:40Speaker 5: then ordered to appear personally under the penalty of contempt
- 27:44Speaker 5: on February twentieth at nine am at the Richie County Courthouse.
- 27:48Speaker 5: And so, you know, we'll see what happens there. Might
- 27:51Speaker 5: be exceeding his authority there, I don't know. We'll see
- 27:54Speaker 5: if any of those folks try and file a you know,
- 27:57Speaker 5: some kind of petition or for a prohibition or something
- 28:01Speaker 5: to stop this order.
- 28:02Speaker 2: But you know, no.
- 28:04Speaker 5: Judge is going to do this lightly. But I think
- 28:09Speaker 5: he's been there for a while. Yeah, probably just had
- 28:11Speaker 5: enough of it.
- 28:13Speaker 4: The thing that really bothers me my opinion on this,
- 28:15Speaker 4: this seems like a judge that's really at the end
- 28:17Speaker 4: of his conscious he feels like he needs to do something.
- 28:19Speaker 4: I don't want to put I don't want to imply
- 28:22Speaker 4: uh reasoning here. But the thing that really bothers is
- 28:25Speaker 4: it seems like people that know about these circumstances are
- 28:28Speaker 4: setting out the warning flags as well as they can.
- 28:30Speaker 4: We need help. There needs to be help. There's problems, sure,
- 28:33Speaker 4: but the things that we're dealing with are things went
- 28:35Speaker 4: in like a national level that don't even really apply
- 28:37Speaker 4: to West Virginia a lot of times. And that's the
- 28:39Speaker 4: thing that kind of bothers me. There's real type of
- 28:41Speaker 4: things here that we can address this.
- 28:43Speaker 5: There are ways to solve this problem. Yeah, and it
- 28:45Speaker 5: involves money and resources and a commitment of time, which
- 28:51Speaker 5: time is one of those things that's limited for everybody.
- 28:54Speaker 5: So if you worry about all these things that get
- 28:57Speaker 5: headlines that are not unimportant but affect a much smaller
- 29:03Speaker 5: portion of the population. But you want to whatever try
- 29:07Speaker 5: and conform to some national theme, which is basically the
- 29:14Speaker 5: same gamut, then you don't get things resolved that are
- 29:18Speaker 5: affecting a lot of people and affecting the welfare of
- 29:22Speaker 5: not just children but everybody in the state. It's just
- 29:24Speaker 5: a complete black eye that a judge would even circuit
- 29:27Speaker 5: duge would even have to do this. So we'll see
- 29:30Speaker 5: if the legislature will just spend about a week and
- 29:33Speaker 5: get you know, get people that know I mean, I
- 29:37Speaker 5: guess if you want to keep cutting government, which is
- 29:40Speaker 5: what I'm hearing too from governor more soon, you're not
- 29:42Speaker 5: going to get anything done because you're not going to
- 29:44Speaker 5: be able to privatize this and do it properly. In
- 29:48Speaker 5: my opinion, so we've got to spend some of our resources.
- 29:51Speaker 5: As taxpayers in the state. Since we've been last three
- 29:56Speaker 5: or four years, have been being told how great we
- 29:58Speaker 5: are off financially, sure plus so great that we can
- 30:01Speaker 5: cut our income tax and help the richest people because
- 30:03Speaker 5: it only you know that cutting the income tax in
- 30:06Speaker 5: Westvinia at such a low rate, the folks that need
- 30:09Speaker 5: those cuts the most are saving very little each year.
- 30:12Speaker 5: But the folks that are reaping in millions or you know,
- 30:16Speaker 5: apply that same percentage, they're saving quite a bit. But
- 30:20Speaker 5: we'll see what the legislature does with it and what
- 30:22Speaker 5: Governor mores She does with it. He's new obviously as
- 30:25Speaker 5: as the governor, so uh, he needs a chance. But
- 30:30Speaker 5: these headlines he's getting about, you know, folks in the
- 30:33Speaker 5: country illegally or he's putting out there, and about the
- 30:35Speaker 5: woke virus, it just doesn't resonate with me when I'm
- 30:38Speaker 5: seeing other severe, significant problems that I mean, that's what
- 30:43Speaker 5: you should be talking about almost every presser instead of
- 30:47Speaker 5: this other stuff he's putting out there. So it's we'll
- 30:51Speaker 5: see what comes of this order those So February twentieth,
- 30:54Speaker 5: we'll have another show between now and then and we'll
- 30:57Speaker 5: kind of follow up on this and see if he
- 30:58Speaker 5: needs Yeah, these high ups will just figure that's what
- 31:02Speaker 5: I worry about with the national administration and the state.
- 31:04Speaker 5: And I've seen some commentary about, well, who cares what
- 31:06Speaker 5: that judge says. You know, when you start behaving like that,
- 31:10Speaker 5: then it becomes dangerous because the country starts to become
- 31:14Speaker 5: full of lawlessness. And me you just that's when society
- 31:17Speaker 5: just collapses. So they're gonna and these folks are professionals.
- 31:21Speaker 5: I mean, I know Kravanyak's a lawyer, and so I
- 31:24Speaker 5: would assume that person's not going to just ignore a
- 31:27Speaker 5: court order. They're going to address it. But if they
- 31:29Speaker 5: don't show up there and they don't take action to
- 31:31Speaker 5: stop it, and the order stays in place and they're
- 31:33Speaker 5: in contempt, I mean, the judge can send law enforcement
- 31:37Speaker 5: to go pick them up and bring them to the courthouse.
- 31:39Speaker 5: And and I don't know that the feeling I get
- 31:42Speaker 5: is that he doesn't necessarily want them to do case
- 31:44Speaker 5: worker work.
- 31:44Speaker 6: But if you're.
- 31:48Speaker 5: In an ivory tower, it's not going to hurt you
- 31:50Speaker 5: to go down at ground level and see how this
- 31:52Speaker 5: is really operating and see what these children are going
- 31:55Speaker 5: through and what the local workers are going through they're
- 31:57Speaker 5: trying to deal with the problem. To me, that all
- 32:00Speaker 5: helps make policy on the high end. And that's how
- 32:03Speaker 5: I've kind of always operated. You got to get your
- 32:07Speaker 5: hands dirty a little bit to see what goes on
- 32:09Speaker 5: down there, and then that helps you solve the problems
- 32:11Speaker 5: from a policy level. And so we'll see all this
- 32:13Speaker 5: one comes out February twentieth. There'll be something fouled before then,
- 32:16Speaker 5: probably so they don't have to go show up in
- 32:17Speaker 5: Ritchie County, or maybe they will. I mean one other
- 32:20Speaker 5: two of them could just say, well, I know there's
- 32:23Speaker 5: a problem, so I'm gonna go down to Ritchie and
- 32:24Speaker 5: take a long on this day and see what the
- 32:26Speaker 5: judge has to say, and I'll help the best I can.
- 32:28Speaker 5: It's another way to look at it rather and just
- 32:30Speaker 5: fight it and then allege some kind of judicial overreach,
- 32:33Speaker 5: which is probably what we're going to see, some kind
- 32:35Speaker 5: of adversarial response. But it's an unusual order. I haven't
- 32:40Speaker 5: seen one like this before, and I'm really curious to
- 32:43Speaker 5: watch and see how it plays out.
- 32:44Speaker 4: Yeah, that's really fascinating stuff. I'm glad you brought it
- 32:47Speaker 4: to our attention. It's an interesting story to follow if
- 32:50Speaker 4: nothing else. Of course, if you need to put the
- 32:51Speaker 4: law on your side, as just a regular resident and
- 32:54Speaker 4: you have any number of things that we talked about
- 32:56Speaker 4: this morning, or that we talk about during the course
- 32:57Speaker 4: of the decades, when the air for the Payton Law,
- 33:00Speaker 4: you can give the Payton Law Firm a call. Of course,
- 33:02Speaker 4: Peyton Law Firm in Nitro Westfrgingia. The The website is
- 33:05Speaker 4: Peyton Lawfirm dot com, Peyton Lawfirm dot com, p E
- 33:08Speaker 4: y T you and Peyton Lawfirm dot com. Located at
- 33:10Speaker 4: twenty eighth one First Avenue and Nitro. The phone number
- 33:13Speaker 4: three zero four seven five five fifty five fifty six
- 33:15Speaker 4: three zero four seven five five fifty five fifty six.
- 33:18Speaker 4: Back here every Thursday at eight twenty one five ADW
- 33:21Speaker 4: chs rast lawyer Tom.
- 33:22Speaker 5: Thank you so much for your Tom as always glad
- 33:23Speaker 5: to be here. Glad I made it. Yeah, you may
- 33:25Speaker 5: be safe out there. It's yeah. It's also water on
- 33:27Speaker 5: the interstate too. On the inside lane, Sery. Just take
- 33:30Speaker 5: it slow and you'll be fined.
- 33:31Speaker 4: Yep. Just keep a slow and steady, keep it between
- 33:33Speaker 4: the lines. Have a great day everyone. Coming up next
- 33:36Speaker 4: is Dave All and follow bout talk one. I'll be
- 33:37Speaker 4: back this afternoon on Hotline with Dave weekly. Have a
- 33:39Speaker 4: great day on five ADW c HS the voice for.
- 33:41Speaker 9: Charleston five aby w c HS A M ninety six
- 33:48Speaker 9: point five. That's then Charleston one oh four point five
- 33:50Speaker 9: Cross Lanes's l u VRC Media station.
- 33:54Speaker 2: We're proud to live here.
- 33:55Speaker 3: Too