Latest / Ask the Lawyer / 10/17/2024 Ask the Lawyer with Tom Peyton

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10/17/2024 Ask the Lawyer with Tom Peyton · Ask the Lawyer

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Speaker 4: Count out and the very place. A good morning to
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Speaker 4: you you're listening to.
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Speaker 5: Or you can put the power of patent on your
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Speaker 5: side in studio with me this morning is Tom Paton
0:49
Speaker 5: from the Paton Law Firm. More information online Patent Lawfirm
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Speaker 5: dot com. That's with an Epathon Lawfirm dot com. Tom,
0:53
Speaker 5: Good morning, how you doing this?
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Speaker 6: I'm doing great now I finally made it here.
0:57
Speaker 7: We might have some extra listeners this morning because they're
0:59
Speaker 7: going to be from the Huntington area heading east on
1:02
Speaker 7: I sixty four.
1:02
Speaker 6: They're going to be stuck in their car listening.
1:05
Speaker 7: To hopefully our show. But no, it's just one of
1:07
Speaker 7: those mornings. I think they're trying to kind of put
1:09
Speaker 7: the finishing touches on the expansion of Interstate sixty four.
1:14
Speaker 7: Of course, I drive it every day in that area
1:16
Speaker 7: between Nitro and Hurricane, and their looks like they're putting
1:19
Speaker 7: finishing touches. They're trying to clean up some of the
1:22
Speaker 7: pavement on the side, but also putting in, you know,
1:24
Speaker 7: finishing the drainage the signs. Gotta have cranes and equipment
1:28
Speaker 7: in there doing some I think boring to get it
1:30
Speaker 7: down to the rock, but it's causing them to close
1:34
Speaker 7: one I didn't ended up not going that way because
1:37
Speaker 7: I knew it was a parking lot on I sixty
1:39
Speaker 7: four East this morning. But they've got maybe two of
1:42
Speaker 7: the three lanes closed. So if you're planning to head
1:45
Speaker 7: to Charleston, give yourself some extra time. I actually went
1:48
Speaker 7: from Hurrican over Coal Mountain through Saint Albans and then
1:52
Speaker 7: cross the Saint Almost Nitro Bridge back on the Institute
1:55
Speaker 7: and got actually had an earlier appointment that I was
1:58
Speaker 7: late for this morning. But anyway, that's my livetime weather report.
2:02
Speaker 7: But other than that, doing great today. Glad to be here.
2:05
Speaker 7: Dad covered it last week and things are pretty active
2:09
Speaker 7: around the law firm. There's not a whole lot going
2:12
Speaker 7: on from kind of waiting for some Western Supreme Court
2:15
Speaker 7: cases to come out, but.
2:18
Speaker 6: It's been a little slow.
2:19
Speaker 7: Usually this time of year they start coming in because
2:21
Speaker 7: there's you know, two terms in the Supreme Court here
2:24
Speaker 7: and they begin in uh late August, September and in December.
2:28
Speaker 7: So you see some of the cases that have been
2:30
Speaker 7: argued earlier in the month of September and some decisions
2:34
Speaker 7: coming out, but not a whole lot yet the uh really,
2:39
Speaker 7: I guess the kind of events we've been following a
2:44
Speaker 7: bet that that have come out in the last couple
2:45
Speaker 7: of days in the news that have a little legal
2:47
Speaker 7: aspect to them. As the you know, we talked about
2:50
Speaker 7: the Greenbrier at least a portion of it being noticed
2:53
Speaker 7: for foreclosure sale and then lossuit was filed and then
2:56
Speaker 7: there were some terms reached whereby the Greenbrier had to
3:02
Speaker 7: pay I think, pay off a debt in full by
3:06
Speaker 7: October twenty fourth or twenty fifth, I believe, and that
3:10
Speaker 7: was that was a deal reached, as I understand it,
3:12
Speaker 7: back in August. Then curiously, and I know this station
3:18
Speaker 7: reported it. Then there was a new notice of foreclosure,
3:20
Speaker 7: but it was the same creditor that that was already there,
3:23
Speaker 7: noticing that the foreclosure self were a day after the
3:27
Speaker 7: payment was due, which gave me some concern. I'm not
3:34
Speaker 7: a big Greenbrier officionado, but I certainly don't want to
3:37
Speaker 7: see it be down because I think it is a
3:40
Speaker 7: gym of the state. But then this week what's happened
3:43
Speaker 7: is apparently that debt. I'm not sure the amount has
3:48
Speaker 7: been cleared in some of the reports because we may
3:51
Speaker 7: not know, but it's I thought it was around twenty
3:54
Speaker 7: two million dollars. There's definitely millions of dollars. But apparently
3:58
Speaker 7: the creditor that was moving forward with the foreclosure because
4:03
Speaker 7: part of the Greenbrier Hotel was collateral for that loan,
4:06
Speaker 7: has now been paid in full. I haven't seen that
4:09
Speaker 7: that DTA trust is released or not. That's ADEDA trust
4:13
Speaker 7: is just another name basically for a mortgage in West Virginia,
4:16
Speaker 7: so it's the lean. It's recorded publicly at the courthouse.
4:21
Speaker 7: Governor Justices kind of alluded to his family did some
4:23
Speaker 7: things to get worked out. He referenced some confidentiality when
4:28
Speaker 7: it was somebody asked, I think this week during a
4:31
Speaker 7: presser how the payoff was funded, and we didn't really
4:37
Speaker 7: get a clear answer. There was some reference to a
4:40
Speaker 7: Fortress Equity Group or something to that effect, which is
4:44
Speaker 7: a legitimate some sort of investment firm, international investment firm.
4:52
Speaker 7: That it was some implication in his press or that
4:55
Speaker 7: maybe they had been part of the funding, but nothing concrete.
4:59
Speaker 7: I did read in and I haven't had a chance
5:01
Speaker 7: to look it up myself, but w W Metro News
5:03
Speaker 7: did report that I believe a new company has now
5:06
Speaker 7: recorded a deed of trust, so presumably they also have
5:10
Speaker 7: I haven't read what is collateral for that deed of trust.
5:13
Speaker 7: So there's appears down in Greenberg County there's been a
5:16
Speaker 7: new deed of trust recorded for presumably the new creditor
5:20
Speaker 7: that assisted in funding the payoff of the old creditor,
5:24
Speaker 7: and so there's it's still collateralized. But hopefully there are
5:28
Speaker 7: terms that can be met to where we don't get
5:31
Speaker 7: to the point that there's threats of you know, well,
5:34
Speaker 7: there's actually notices of foreclosure sale because it was I
5:36
Speaker 7: mean we were a week away I think in the
5:38
Speaker 7: summertime from the foreclosures, So happening again just because the
5:41
Speaker 7: sale would actually occur. It doesn't mean it could still
5:43
Speaker 7: be halted after that, but it you know, it's much
5:46
Speaker 7: harder after the sale goes through. So we'll see how
5:49
Speaker 7: it happens, Governor or how it works out. Governor Justice
5:52
Speaker 7: did reference, so it'll still be bumps in the road,
5:53
Speaker 7: you know, his kind of country talk. It's not real technical,
5:56
Speaker 7: but in any business, and they you know, obviously it's
5:59
Speaker 7: not I think it's rather obviously at this point that
6:03
Speaker 7: it's not doing well from a from a cash standpoint,
6:07
Speaker 7: because there there are various tax lanes still in existence,
6:11
Speaker 7: some of which involve sales tax that was collected but
6:15
Speaker 7: not remitted. But maybe they're catching up on those, I'm
6:19
Speaker 7: not sure, and they could they could be paying them
6:20
Speaker 7: off with funding from the new lender. And they just
6:22
Speaker 7: haven't had releases recorded debt or hasn't been reported. But uh,
6:27
Speaker 7: that was good.
6:27
Speaker 6: Good. The green buyer was, uh, save for now.
6:31
Speaker 4: Is this in trying to equate this? This is all
6:33
Speaker 4: high level you know, corporate.
6:34
Speaker 5: Financing and things like that, trying to understand it from
6:37
Speaker 5: skills that I understand is this sort of like a
6:39
Speaker 5: corporate REFI like like a refile out of foreclosure type thing.
6:43
Speaker 6: That's way I'm reading it.
6:44
Speaker 7: So you know, it's it's much more complex than your
6:46
Speaker 7: your basic mortgage. But you can get in the I mean,
6:49
Speaker 7: you get in, you in your home and you have
6:53
Speaker 7: a disability, or you're in a car wreck and hurt
6:56
Speaker 7: and you can't work and and that kind of thing.
6:58
Speaker 7: Then you know, you get behind on your payment. And
7:01
Speaker 7: you know, generally, what I found is almost every lender
7:05
Speaker 7: doesn't really want to be in the real estate business,
7:07
Speaker 7: so they'll generally work with you. It's not like your
7:11
Speaker 7: house is just instantaneously put on the OX and block
7:14
Speaker 7: on foreclosure when you miss one payment. First of all,
7:17
Speaker 7: it's your home you live in. There's some notices and
7:21
Speaker 7: some opportunities to cure the default. You're entitled to you
7:24
Speaker 7: under West Virginia law. And my experience has been that
7:28
Speaker 7: if you do get chronically behind, it's months and months
7:32
Speaker 7: before you actually have a foreclosure type sale, even on
7:36
Speaker 7: a private home. Now, of course, anytime I believe in
7:41
Speaker 7: West Virginia, anytime up to the foreclosure sale if you
7:44
Speaker 7: can get the payoff complete payoff to that lender, then
7:50
Speaker 7: they can't legally foreclose on the home.
7:54
Speaker 6: I'm pretty sure that's right. So you know, if I.
7:57
Speaker 7: Had gotten behind, you know, I got in a car accident,
7:59
Speaker 7: I wasn't able to work, I hadn't paid my mortgage.
8:03
Speaker 7: My house has noticed for foreclosure sale for next week.
8:07
Speaker 7: If I could find any lender that would essentially loan
8:10
Speaker 7: me the payoff amount, then I can pay off that note.
8:13
Speaker 7: And essentially that's a refinance, which is what you were referencing.
8:17
Speaker 7: And refinance is just essentially a payoff of the existing
8:21
Speaker 7: debt using new debt. And and you know, you just
8:25
Speaker 7: got to find a lender that's willing to do that.
8:27
Speaker 7: And so that you know, the initial lender on the
8:29
Speaker 7: Greenbrier that had is signed its note was JP Morgan
8:34
Speaker 7: Chase Bank, And so that's a Now we've got another
8:37
Speaker 7: lender that's certainly not as conventional or well known. I
8:41
Speaker 7: mean I just googled them a little bit. I mean
8:43
Speaker 7: large asset holding firm and billions and billions of dollars
8:47
Speaker 7: as I read.
8:48
Speaker 6: So, but you see those.
8:49
Speaker 7: Alternative financing lenders in these rather large transactions that they
8:55
Speaker 7: would never well, I can't imagine they would deal with
8:57
Speaker 7: a conventional mortgage for a home or something like that.
9:00
Speaker 7: But in essence, yes, now we don't know. I haven't
9:02
Speaker 7: read the Data Trust. Sometimes the deeds of trust will
9:06
Speaker 7: have the terms, so they'll have who the maybe there's
9:11
Speaker 7: a different beneficiary than even the primary lender. They'll have
9:15
Speaker 7: an interest rate, they'll have a principal due, even a
9:19
Speaker 7: term meaning the number of years by which it's got
9:22
Speaker 7: to be paid off. I haven't seen the Data Trust
9:24
Speaker 7: to determine whether we have those details on that one
9:27
Speaker 7: or not. But I presume they have a good grasp
9:32
Speaker 7: of the finances of the Greenbrier.
9:35
Speaker 6: Hotel, et cetera.
9:36
Speaker 7: And so hopefully they've got some kind of payment plan
9:38
Speaker 7: that can be met, because there's certainly some cash flow
9:40
Speaker 7: issues down there.
9:41
Speaker 5: But they're probably aggressive with enforcing certain benchmarks and stuff too.
9:44
Speaker 5: Would imagine like make sure payment's like less leniency to
9:47
Speaker 5: some degree, perhaps.
9:48
Speaker 7: Yeah, And there's actually most mortgages are backed by the
9:53
Speaker 7: FEDS ensured, and so there are you know, there's only
9:55
Speaker 7: so much of a mortgage lender can do if you
9:58
Speaker 7: get in default status. Because they do have some legal
10:01
Speaker 7: obligations to enforce the note and foreclosed. I don't know
10:05
Speaker 7: how that applies when you get into something like this
10:09
Speaker 7: with the Greenbrier where it's not a consumer transaction. I
10:13
Speaker 7: don't know if it's back this type of loan that
10:15
Speaker 7: they've gotten is back by the FED, but admitioning to
10:18
Speaker 7: see how it plays out, because obviously it was a
10:21
Speaker 7: kind of an alternative funding source to get the Greenbrier
10:25
Speaker 7: off the brink of foreclosure. And so then you have
10:27
Speaker 7: Governor Justice who's running for US Senate. You know what
10:31
Speaker 7: is required to be disclosed because he's a candidate for
10:36
Speaker 7: US Senate.
10:36
Speaker 6: I don't.
10:37
Speaker 7: I have not had a case where I had to
10:38
Speaker 7: get involved in the technicalities of that. So if he,
10:41
Speaker 7: for example, what we've seen so far is that he
10:44
Speaker 7: basically signs personal guarantees. I think most of his core
10:47
Speaker 7: family members do as well for these notes, which is
10:50
Speaker 7: not uncommon in a large commercial deal. There's nothing unusual
10:52
Speaker 7: about that. But if you've got a large lender that
10:57
Speaker 7: has international ties, to me, it seems like you know
11:02
Speaker 7: who that lender is, who their principles are, how much
11:06
Speaker 7: he owes what the terms are might be. Certainly it
11:08
Speaker 7: would be relevant to me if I was trying to
11:10
Speaker 7: decide who to vote for for a US Senate. Now,
11:13
Speaker 7: whether that's required to be you know, that kind of
11:16
Speaker 7: detail disclosed on the disclosure forms, probably not. There might
11:20
Speaker 7: be an entity on there and it say you know,
11:23
Speaker 7: he Owes and it's it's it's not even exact debt
11:27
Speaker 7: as I understand it in the disclosures. It could be
11:29
Speaker 7: you know, a range or something like that. So we
11:31
Speaker 7: may see the official lender at some point. I don't
11:34
Speaker 7: know if that would even be before the election next month,
11:38
Speaker 7: but we'll see if some of that doesn't kind of
11:41
Speaker 7: come out a little bit in the in the press,
11:45
Speaker 7: because I mean, I would be interested to know, like sure,
11:47
Speaker 7: because obviously it was a kind of a last minute
11:50
Speaker 7: effort that worked apparently, but who's behind it? And you know,
11:55
Speaker 7: I would think anytime you have a no matter how
11:59
Speaker 7: wealthy you are, if you have a multimillion dollar debt
12:03
Speaker 7: that you personally signed for and you're running for US Senate,
12:06
Speaker 7: common sense would say the public needs to know who
12:09
Speaker 7: that creditor is, just to make sure.
12:12
Speaker 6: There's no.
12:15
Speaker 7: Leverage there that would compromise a position in the US Senate.
12:18
Speaker 7: But it may just show the lender, and I think
12:22
Speaker 7: it's this Fortress Equity firm, and who's behind that and
12:27
Speaker 7: the details we may never know.
12:28
Speaker 5: It's really a good question, and you don't have to
12:31
Speaker 5: be overly political or to try to turn it into
12:35
Speaker 5: some sort of conspiracy or anything along those lines. It's
12:37
Speaker 5: just the bottom line is is you're electing somebody, you know,
12:40
Speaker 5: one of the fifty more powerful politicians in the country,
12:44
Speaker 5: and or one hundred politicians in the country, I guess,
12:47
Speaker 5: And it's kind of relevant that sort of thing, and
12:53
Speaker 5: like who are you indebted to? Where did it come from?
12:54
Speaker 5: Is there any foreign interests? What are those foreign interests?
12:57
Speaker 5: Is that going to affect any votes in the Senate?
13:00
Speaker 5: I mean, those are relevant questions regardless of politics or
13:03
Speaker 5: anything else.
13:03
Speaker 7: Ye'll be good for the public to know. But I
13:06
Speaker 7: have a feeling and you know, there may be some
13:08
Speaker 7: significant confidentiality agreement that arose from that transaction. I don't know,
13:13
Speaker 7: so I think probably if I was predicting h then
13:17
Speaker 7: you know, we'll get the name of a lender entity
13:20
Speaker 7: probably at some point, and I doubt would get much
13:22
Speaker 7: more than that.
13:23
Speaker 6: Now.
13:24
Speaker 7: I don't know what you know if if there's FBI
13:27
Speaker 7: background checks and things like that when somebody actually gets
13:30
Speaker 7: elected to the US Senate. Haven't been in that obviously
13:34
Speaker 7: scenario before or had to deal with it. So I'm
13:36
Speaker 7: not sure how that that works, either as far as
13:39
Speaker 7: contacts or funding by you know, foreign countries or foreign
13:44
Speaker 7: nationals somewhere.
13:45
Speaker 6: But you know, we'll see how it plays out.
13:47
Speaker 7: It's it's uh, it's the He's off the hot or
13:50
Speaker 7: the Greenbrier's off the hot seat for now, which is
13:52
Speaker 7: which is excellent.
13:52
Speaker 4: Which is good, and it's good for the state.
13:54
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, the state needs the Greenbrier, but
13:56
Speaker 5: it likes the Greenbrier to be relevant anyway, Well.
13:58
Speaker 7: The Greenbrier's is still a unique play and it just
14:02
Speaker 7: doesn't reflect well, frankly on the state when that kind
14:05
Speaker 7: of gym is for auction and you know it, you know,
14:10
Speaker 7: people have events reserved there, you know into the next
14:13
Speaker 7: year or so. And you know, I've got a couple
14:15
Speaker 7: of things, at least one large meeting set for next
14:18
Speaker 7: springing wondering what's going to happen here are they going
14:20
Speaker 7: to try and you know, if they go bankrupt or
14:23
Speaker 7: we're going have to renegotiate our deal for our stay
14:25
Speaker 7: there and that kind of thing. So that seems to
14:27
Speaker 7: be all off the table right now. And you know,
14:29
Speaker 7: Governor Justice, as he usually is, was quite optimistic from
14:32
Speaker 7: what I read, and that's good, and was talking about
14:34
Speaker 7: maybe concentrating on putting some more resources into the Greenbrier.
14:39
Speaker 7: It's got a cash problem, it appears, and so maybe
14:41
Speaker 7: there can be some new looks at some things. I
14:44
Speaker 7: don't know what the obviously I'm not in that business,
14:47
Speaker 7: but you know, maybe some things can be revamped or
14:50
Speaker 7: or just an interview on it. I mean, I don't
14:52
Speaker 7: know how you attract more people or you need to
14:54
Speaker 7: charge more or.
14:55
Speaker 6: What there is.
14:55
Speaker 4: Truth.
14:56
Speaker 5: I know that when all this started coming about, I
14:58
Speaker 5: was just kind of doing some research alone because I
15:00
Speaker 5: the Greenbriar.
15:00
Speaker 4: I've never overnight.
15:01
Speaker 5: I've only been there a few times, relatively casually, a
15:03
Speaker 5: few times for work, and so I was just doing
15:06
Speaker 5: a little, you know, research on what have been going on.
15:08
Speaker 5: But if you go to some of the popular booking
15:10
Speaker 5: destination sites and you sort reviews by like most recent,
15:14
Speaker 5: and they were very mixed in the last couple of
15:16
Speaker 5: years as far as not so much with the location. Obviously,
15:19
Speaker 5: people are like it's a beautiful location. It's the amenities
15:22
Speaker 5: at the location and the modernization and things along those lines.
15:24
Speaker 4: So maybe that's something to do.
15:25
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean they didn't have the casino before. Now
15:28
Speaker 6: they do. I would say that.
15:29
Speaker 7: I mean, I'm like I said, I kind of go
15:31
Speaker 7: to the Greenbrier when I have to, if I have
15:32
Speaker 7: a meeting or something to go to. But I've certainly
15:34
Speaker 7: stayed there every night, and I'm not a gambler, and
15:37
Speaker 7: so that doesn't really appeal to me. But I would say,
15:41
Speaker 7: you know, in the last twenty years, probably just my reflection,
15:45
Speaker 7: and you know, the dining is kind of not quite
15:47
Speaker 7: what it used to be and that kind of thing.
15:49
Speaker 7: But you know, yeah, Falconry, you got the bunker you
15:53
Speaker 7: can still go through, and you've got off road jeep
15:58
Speaker 7: rides and there's things. It's just for somebody is here
16:02
Speaker 7: all the time. You know, once you do those things,
16:04
Speaker 7: it's not quite as attractive as it as it was
16:07
Speaker 7: the first.
16:07
Speaker 6: Time you do them. So we'll see.
16:09
Speaker 7: And then you still have great golf courses, but those
16:11
Speaker 7: have even be reworked. Of course that some of that's
16:13
Speaker 7: not you know, I don't know if that's really had
16:16
Speaker 7: any finances. They had the flood go through, and then
16:18
Speaker 7: they modified one of the golf courses and kind of
16:21
Speaker 7: combined two of them and still really great, great courses,
16:24
Speaker 7: I'm sure, but.
16:25
Speaker 5: They do have to eat things like NFL football teams
16:27
Speaker 5: will stay over there or some of their their their
16:30
Speaker 5: off season training there and things like that.
16:31
Speaker 4: That's a neat amenity.
16:33
Speaker 6: Yeah, you think about you.
16:34
Speaker 7: Know, Governor Justice gets beat up, but he I believe
16:37
Speaker 7: it was the Saints that came in initially. I mean
16:38
Speaker 7: they built an entire kind of indoor practice facility. And
16:43
Speaker 7: actually this year, I think during the regular season, a
16:45
Speaker 7: team from the West Coast played maybe Carolina or something,
16:49
Speaker 7: and then they were going to play maybe the Commanders.
16:52
Speaker 5: Watch Sportinneers or somebody I can't remember, yes, somebody else here.
16:56
Speaker 6: So they stayed on the East coast and stayed.
16:58
Speaker 7: At the Greenbrier for it for a few days and
17:00
Speaker 7: got a little r and R while they were practicing,
17:02
Speaker 7: and and you know, the Governor Justice got the PGA
17:06
Speaker 7: Tour event here, which was when it was when the
17:08
Speaker 7: Greenbrier Classic first open. I mean I went to every
17:11
Speaker 7: single one of them and it was great, great, And
17:14
Speaker 7: so he's done a lot of good things there and
17:16
Speaker 7: hopefully you didn't get their cash flow problem resolved and
17:19
Speaker 7: we won't be talking about this anymore, but we'll keep
17:22
Speaker 7: monitoring it for now.
17:22
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was nic seeing it on TV when there
17:24
Speaker 5: would be like the PJA events and stuff like that.
17:25
Speaker 5: You see the green Brown time. He was always nice
17:27
Speaker 5: seeing that because they always put together nice packaging.
17:30
Speaker 7: Year we had, I mean tiger woodskin played one maybe
17:33
Speaker 7: two years. Didn't make the cut one year, but unfortunately
17:37
Speaker 7: and then you know Phil Milks, he had the biggest
17:39
Speaker 7: of the of the best from the PGA Tour playing
17:42
Speaker 7: there in West Virginia, which was I didn't think I
17:44
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17:48
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17:50
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17:52
Speaker 5: It anymore, but he's done a lot of good things
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17:57
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18:11
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Speaker 5: four three four five fifty eight fifty eight three zero
20:58
Speaker 5: four three four five fifty eight fifty eight. There's some
21:02
Speaker 5: breaking news as far as judges and things like that
21:04
Speaker 5: in Putnam County as well.
21:05
Speaker 6: Yeah, so we had.
21:07
Speaker 7: Had really a series of really good judges in Putnam
21:10
Speaker 7: County and most recently it's been Judge to ours Phil Stowers,
21:15
Speaker 7: who just won election again this past year. And then
21:19
Speaker 7: Judge Joe Reader, who didn't have any competition actually in
21:23
Speaker 7: the in the election and he's been there. Oh, I
21:25
Speaker 7: think Judge Reader has been there since twenty sixteen.
21:27
Speaker 6: Maybe he was.
21:30
Speaker 7: Appointed in one a special election if I recall correctly.
21:33
Speaker 6: But Judge Reader got he applied for and.
21:36
Speaker 7: Was accepted to be the US magistrate judge down in
21:40
Speaker 7: Huntington Division of the Southern District Court, Federal Court. And
21:44
Speaker 7: so he left in ear least September. And then what
21:48
Speaker 7: they do when you have a temporary you have a
21:52
Speaker 7: temporary absence or opening, then they just appoint a senior
21:55
Speaker 7: status judge and it was Judge Claudges, actually Russell Clodges,
21:59
Speaker 7: who is from Morgantown, and so I actually had a
22:02
Speaker 7: hearing with him yesterday. He's been coming down either two
22:06
Speaker 7: or three times a week and holding court. And I've
22:09
Speaker 7: had one matter with him, a criminal matter, which we
22:11
Speaker 7: had yesterday, and it was actually we had had a
22:14
Speaker 7: client who was alleged to have possessed a large amount
22:16
Speaker 7: of marijuana and we reduced it down or got it
22:19
Speaker 7: reduced down to a misdemeanor, and then we did the
22:20
Speaker 7: plea deal yesterday And to Claude was very good. It's
22:24
Speaker 7: probably not his favorite thing to be driving down to
22:26
Speaker 7: Putnam County every week to handle hearings from Morgantown. But
22:30
Speaker 7: in any event, so since September when Judge Reader left
22:35
Speaker 7: to become the US Magister judge, then Folks put their
22:39
Speaker 7: application in to become the judge at least temporarily, and
22:44
Speaker 7: we had had a few candidates.
22:47
Speaker 6: But Governor Justice announced.
22:49
Speaker 7: Yesterday, i believe or the day before that Mark Sorse
22:52
Speaker 7: has been appointed by Governor Justice to be a circuit judge.
22:56
Speaker 7: And that's a really good appointment in my mind, because
22:59
Speaker 7: I like somebody that it's even keel, and I've got
23:01
Speaker 7: experience with Mark, and he's got a lot of experience.
23:03
Speaker 7: So he served as the he was a private practitioner.
23:07
Speaker 7: This was before I was practicing law, but I don't
23:11
Speaker 7: know how long, for a number of years.
23:12
Speaker 6: So I like that because he's.
23:14
Speaker 7: Been dealing with you know, everyday people. And then he
23:17
Speaker 7: was the prosecutor, the head, the elected prosecutor in Putnam
23:20
Speaker 7: County for I think over twenty years. And when you're
23:24
Speaker 7: in that position, you know, it's not just prosecuting crimes,
23:27
Speaker 7: you know, you deal, you counsel, the county commission sometimes
23:30
Speaker 7: and the share of and things like that. So uh,
23:34
Speaker 7: at Mark, and you have to run for election, but
23:36
Speaker 7: I don't recall any real close calls and elections, and
23:40
Speaker 7: probably most of them nobody. He didn't even have opposition
23:43
Speaker 7: when he ran. But then h and he's he's dabbled
23:46
Speaker 7: in politics. I think he's run for some at least
23:49
Speaker 7: one state wide office at one point, probably didn't have
23:52
Speaker 7: enough name recognition across the state to.
23:54
Speaker 6: Do very well.
23:54
Speaker 7: But then he was appointed by Governor Justice like last
23:58
Speaker 7: year or the year before as the direct tri pullman
24:00
Speaker 7: security kind of over the I think that includes the
24:04
Speaker 7: jail system, which was a real you know, it's been
24:06
Speaker 7: a problem here. But anyway, he's appointed now, so Mark Sersaia,
24:11
Speaker 7: I'm not sure when he gets sworn in, but he'll
24:13
Speaker 7: be our new circuit judge down in Putnam County, which
24:16
Speaker 7: should be I'm really anxious to practice in front of
24:21
Speaker 7: him because I've done him for a long time, experienced
24:24
Speaker 7: even kill person my manard, in my opinion, which is
24:28
Speaker 7: a good attribute for for a judge, because you unpredictability
24:34
Speaker 7: or big highs or big lows, or or sometimes difficult
24:37
Speaker 7: to deal with from the bench. And I think Mark
24:41
Speaker 7: will be doing a really good job.
24:42
Speaker 6: Now.
24:42
Speaker 7: I guess they'll have to presume that he'll have to
24:46
Speaker 7: run in a special election next May, because again it's
24:49
Speaker 7: all it's bipartisan, and so I think it'll be next May,
24:55
Speaker 7: could be next November. I think it'll be next May.
24:57
Speaker 7: They'll have to have a special election. We'll see if
24:59
Speaker 7: he has any any competition or not. But he'll have
25:01
Speaker 7: to finish out the term if he wins, which is
25:04
Speaker 7: it's an eight year term and it should be just starting,
25:07
Speaker 7: so he'll get basically a full term. In simmy he
25:10
Speaker 7: wins that election, So that's sawy news for Putnam Gown
25:14
Speaker 7: any good news. And we had some other really good
25:17
Speaker 7: candidates as I understand it, but it would be real
25:20
Speaker 7: difficult to beat Mark s Forse's qualifications.
25:23
Speaker 5: It's a really important point that you bring up. And
25:25
Speaker 5: obviously I come from a lay perspective. You're an attorney
25:28
Speaker 5: that that argues cases in front of judges. Years and
25:31
Speaker 5: years ago, I had a friend of mine, this young
25:34
Speaker 5: lady who was recovering from various substance abuse issues, and
25:40
Speaker 5: she had been cleaned for a while. She wasn't a
25:41
Speaker 5: huge believer in the AA program. She had tried it
25:44
Speaker 5: for a while, but she kind of found her own path.
25:46
Speaker 5: One of the things that she did, and this is
25:48
Speaker 5: one of the things that made her kind of unique,
25:50
Speaker 5: is she would go to public hearings a lot, like
25:52
Speaker 5: it was like a hobby of hers. I think she
25:55
Speaker 5: spent some time in the core system a little bit,
25:57
Speaker 5: you know, and she became fascinated little bit about the process.
25:59
Speaker 5: Every once in a while, instead of an AA meeting, she
26:01
Speaker 5: would go to the this was in Lansing mission. She
26:03
Speaker 5: would go to the courthouses around their find public hearings
26:05
Speaker 5: that she could say and it didn't matter to her
26:07
Speaker 5: what it was necessarily, and occasionally I.
26:09
Speaker 4: Would go with her.
26:09
Speaker 5: But something you mentioned here a moment ago, as far
26:12
Speaker 5: as a judge's emotions not getting too high they're almost
26:15
Speaker 5: like executives of their court, you know, I mean they
26:17
Speaker 5: control everything that's in there.
26:19
Speaker 4: And something that I noticed people are used.
26:21
Speaker 5: To, you know, maybe the law and order of things,
26:23
Speaker 5: the TV of things, maybe even like my cousin Vinny,
26:26
Speaker 5: you know where Fred Gwinn's up there, you know, being
26:29
Speaker 5: the folksy country judge and stuff like that. What I found,
26:32
Speaker 5: from my completely amateur opinion, the courtrooms with judges that
26:38
Speaker 5: were more professional, buttoned up whatever it might be, you
26:42
Speaker 5: could never really tell where they were as far as
26:46
Speaker 5: until the end, and then like the revelation was actually
26:49
Speaker 5: you could almost see the process of how fair they
26:51
Speaker 5: were in the balancing of what they had to say
26:53
Speaker 5: and things like that. I found that to be much
26:55
Speaker 5: more satisfying than somebody that got a little their dander
26:58
Speaker 5: up a little bit on the bench.
26:59
Speaker 7: Yeah, but you know, judges are human, and so you see,
27:03
Speaker 7: having done this for twenty some years, I've seen all
27:05
Speaker 7: kinds of things from the bench, but.
27:10
Speaker 6: Certainly they know there.
27:13
Speaker 7: Are a referee in essence, and and they're new, they're neutral,
27:17
Speaker 7: and so well they rule one way or the other
27:21
Speaker 7: in the end. You know, a lot of times you
27:22
Speaker 7: can't predict but yeah, it's you know, I'm not sure
27:26
Speaker 7: I would have the temperament to be to be a judge.
27:29
Speaker 7: I do some family law work, not a whole lot anymore,
27:31
Speaker 7: And those are really difficult cases, and you got they're
27:35
Speaker 7: oftentimes emotionally charged.
27:37
Speaker 6: And you also have a lot.
27:38
Speaker 7: Of folks in family courts that don't have lawyers because
27:40
Speaker 7: there's you got child sport, you got custody, you got divorces,
27:44
Speaker 7: You've got a lot of things where folks have to
27:47
Speaker 7: go through that legal process, but they don't have the
27:50
Speaker 7: funds to hire a lawyer because you don't normally get
27:52
Speaker 7: an appointed attorney for matters in family court, which you know,
27:58
Speaker 7: if you go in on your own trying to represent yourself.
28:00
Speaker 7: It's hard for me to even understand it because I've
28:02
Speaker 7: been a lawyer and around the law for so long.
28:04
Speaker 7: But how do you know what's relevant to tell the judge?
28:08
Speaker 7: I mean, you could think, all this thing that happened
28:11
Speaker 7: two years ago is really still bothers me every day,
28:14
Speaker 7: but it's really not significant to the proceeding that you're
28:18
Speaker 7: in before that judge. And so you got a lot
28:19
Speaker 7: of that kind of keeping things in control. And I've
28:23
Speaker 7: seen some frustration out of family court judges.
28:25
Speaker 6: And I don't blame him.
28:26
Speaker 7: I don't think I could actually do that job very
28:28
Speaker 7: well for very long because I would I would lose
28:31
Speaker 7: patience probably. But and I've seen some you know, and
28:36
Speaker 7: judges make errors. I mean I've seen cases where there
28:39
Speaker 7: I've had cases where a judges ruled a certain way
28:43
Speaker 7: in a criminal trial and uh, we objected, and after
28:48
Speaker 7: the trial's over, my client was convicted. Then we file
28:50
Speaker 7: a motion to reconsidering. The judge reads the law and decides, well,
28:53
Speaker 7: he was wrong, and you get a tire new trial.
28:55
Speaker 7: So you know, that's the But that's what judges do
29:00
Speaker 7: than you know, standing by their guns. If they got
29:02
Speaker 7: it wrong, they should change their change their stance. And
29:06
Speaker 7: that's what really Canawllh County as well. I mean, I
29:10
Speaker 7: think we have really good judges here as well. And
29:15
Speaker 7: you know, electing judges I think has been pretty effective.
29:18
Speaker 7: Not that I don't want, you know, like the judges
29:22
Speaker 7: we have sitting up. It's a little disconcerting. We don't
29:25
Speaker 7: have a whole lot of competition in some of our elections,
29:27
Speaker 7: which I think helps, you know, bring the best of
29:31
Speaker 7: the best to the top because you I mean, I
29:34
Speaker 7: think in May, I don't know how many Knall County
29:36
Speaker 7: seats were even contested, a whole quite a few were
29:40
Speaker 7: in contest.
29:40
Speaker 4: I remember an empty ballot.
29:42
Speaker 9: Yeah.
29:42
Speaker 7: Yeah, So but maybe we can hit on a little
29:47
Speaker 7: bit what we do around the office. So we've been
29:48
Speaker 7: talking about some other matters, so you know, if we
29:52
Speaker 7: have regular listeners, I'm sure they know. But we do
29:54
Speaker 7: a lot of deed work, a state planning reference, some
29:57
Speaker 7: family law, and interview. I don't do much family law
30:00
Speaker 7: an issue. I have done a lot of it in
30:02
Speaker 7: my career, just not my favorite type of law to practice,
30:07
Speaker 7: I guess you would say, but if you need informational
30:09
Speaker 7: family you can send us an email or give us
30:10
Speaker 7: a call and we'll help you if we can. And
30:12
Speaker 7: I do take a few cases. I just don't like
30:14
Speaker 7: to get too many of those on my on my
30:16
Speaker 7: table at one time. So we might make an exception
30:19
Speaker 7: and take the case if you have an issue. If not,
30:21
Speaker 7: we can refer you to to lawyers that you do that
30:27
Speaker 7: on the regular and are good at it. Do some
30:30
Speaker 7: criminal defense too, kind of the same thing, not a
30:32
Speaker 7: whole lot of it, fairly selective in the cases we take,
30:34
Speaker 7: but bread and butter.
30:36
Speaker 6: What we do.
30:37
Speaker 7: We try cases. We like to try cases, kind of
30:39
Speaker 7: like practicing and performing in the game, and you want
30:42
Speaker 7: to play the game. And we tend to do pretty
30:45
Speaker 7: well when Dad and I try cases. We quite tried
30:49
Speaker 7: quite a few cases together, and I'm like, we have
30:54
Speaker 7: done well.
30:54
Speaker 6: I don't win or lose.
30:56
Speaker 7: You know, you really can't keep those type tabs when
30:58
Speaker 7: you have a case. I mean, you know, if you
31:00
Speaker 7: try a lot of case civil cases for damages, if
31:02
Speaker 7: you get X amount of dollars for your client, is
31:05
Speaker 7: that winning or losing? I mean, you don't really know
31:08
Speaker 7: unless you knew what was offered before you have your trial,
31:10
Speaker 7: which of course we do.
31:12
Speaker 9: Uh.
31:12
Speaker 7: Then you know, it depends on how you view it.
31:15
Speaker 7: But I I don't think we've had a case together
31:17
Speaker 7: where we haven't had a good result when we went
31:19
Speaker 7: all the way to trial. And so we have done
31:22
Speaker 7: really good there. And nobody wins every case and and
31:26
Speaker 7: and things like that. But uh, and and most of
31:28
Speaker 7: our trials are from the civil side, on the plane
31:30
Speaker 7: of side. So if you have been in an automobile
31:32
Speaker 7: accident or you have a some kind of civil dispute, UH,
31:35
Speaker 7: done done quite a few boundary dispute cases all the
31:39
Speaker 7: way to jury trials. Or you've got an employment issue
31:43
Speaker 7: meaning you're an employee and you you feel like you've
31:46
Speaker 7: been wrongfully discharged, or you've had any adverse employment action
31:50
Speaker 7: meaning you've been demoted or your pay cut or something.
31:52
Speaker 7: And uh, you know, there is nat Will State in
31:55
Speaker 7: West Virginia. So I get a lot of calls. Well,
31:58
Speaker 7: you know, they said, I, for example, stole X, Y
32:02
Speaker 7: and Z or a pencil or something from the office.
32:05
Speaker 6: Then they fired me. Well and I didn't do that.
32:09
Speaker 7: Well, okay, if you if you don't have a contract
32:13
Speaker 7: for employment, and then they can basically discharge you for
32:17
Speaker 7: any reason as long as it's not an illegal one.
32:19
Speaker 7: And so if it turns out that you didn't steal
32:22
Speaker 7: that pencil, you probably, depending on the circumstances, still don't
32:26
Speaker 7: have a claim because even though it was wrong, it's
32:32
Speaker 7: not a cause of action. So if I, you know,
32:36
Speaker 7: I think one of my employees stole something minor and
32:38
Speaker 7: I find out later they didn't, you know, I can
32:42
Speaker 7: certainly rehire them if they're willing to come back and
32:44
Speaker 7: work for me, But there isn't a cause of action
32:47
Speaker 7: generally for something like.
32:48
Speaker 5: That and that manager or owner or whoever could have
32:51
Speaker 5: could have easily have just laid them off or fired
32:53
Speaker 5: them without a reason.
32:54
Speaker 6: Yeah.
32:56
Speaker 7: Yeah, they don't have to give any reason at all.
32:57
Speaker 7: And a lot of times you don't get a reason.
32:59
Speaker 7: They're all is a reason, but as the employee or
33:03
Speaker 7: former employee, you don't always know what that reason is. Now,
33:07
Speaker 7: if you file for unemployment and your employer writes a response,
33:11
Speaker 7: then oftentimes you'll you'll find that out. But we do
33:14
Speaker 7: do a decent number of employment cases, and you know,
33:18
Speaker 7: it's all about well a lot of them are you know,
33:22
Speaker 7: proving what the motive of the employer was, and if
33:25
Speaker 7: it was you know, based on age, race, all the
33:29
Speaker 7: protected class matters, or if you're a whistleblower for example,
33:33
Speaker 7: sometimes you have a claim then that's when you have
33:38
Speaker 7: a cause of action despite the fact you're an at
33:40
Speaker 7: will employee. And of course proving motive is uh. I've
33:44
Speaker 7: had some cases like this, but not very many where
33:47
Speaker 7: you know, it's expressed, the discriminatory, illegal conduct or motive
33:52
Speaker 7: is expressed, you know, and you see it more now
33:54
Speaker 7: because we've got texting and emailing and things like that.
33:58
Speaker 7: Otherwise it's basically by implication. A lot of times any
34:03
Speaker 7: use circumstantial evidence to prove your case. Also done a
34:05
Speaker 7: decent number of wage and hour cases which you're interesting
34:09
Speaker 7: as well, whether somebody is getting paid their overtime that
34:11
Speaker 7: they're entitled to, and some misclassification cases where which is
34:16
Speaker 7: kind of there's been some changes in the law recently
34:19
Speaker 7: in that regard. So if I you know, we've talked
34:21
Speaker 7: about this a little bit before, but if you want
34:23
Speaker 7: to make an employee as an employer, you're going to
34:25
Speaker 7: have an employee bee salary. So in essence, in a nutshell,
34:30
Speaker 7: that means they're going to get paid x amount per year,
34:35
Speaker 7: fifty thousand dollars per year. They got a meet for
34:39
Speaker 7: you to then they can work more than forty hours
34:43
Speaker 7: a week and you don't.
34:43
Speaker 6: Have to pay them time and a half.
34:45
Speaker 7: It's just they get their salary and whatever their benefits
34:48
Speaker 7: are now they're supposed to be. There's certain factors before
34:51
Speaker 7: you can categorize somebody like that, Like basically somebody running
34:54
Speaker 7: a cash register at a convenience store or a local
34:58
Speaker 7: restaurant really shouldn't be salary because it's not autonomous enough,
35:04
Speaker 7: it's not kind of a professional enough.
35:06
Speaker 6: To be categorized that way.
35:07
Speaker 7: But what's changed here this summer, and before you can
35:10
Speaker 7: categorize somebody as salary, they have to make a bottom
35:15
Speaker 7: line certain amount that went up to forty three thy
35:18
Speaker 7: five hundred this summer. Now, unless it changes as of
35:21
Speaker 7: January this coming year, it goes to fifty some thousand dollars.
35:24
Speaker 7: I don't have like maybe fifty three something like that.
35:26
Speaker 7: So anybody in that gray air or that margin there
35:31
Speaker 7: between forty three and fifty three is either going to
35:35
Speaker 7: have to start getting paid time and a half if
35:37
Speaker 7: they work overtime, or they're going to have to get
35:39
Speaker 7: a race.
35:40
Speaker 5: There was a ton of movement in this area in
35:42
Speaker 5: twenty sixteen, right before the presidential election. Around around there,
35:46
Speaker 5: there was so much of the assumption that Clinton would
35:49
Speaker 5: win the election, and Obama had put in some rules
35:53
Speaker 5: about overtime where they were lowering the threshold where you
35:56
Speaker 5: had to be paid overtime, so trying to help out
35:58
Speaker 5: workers right and ended up not going through. From the
36:01
Speaker 5: corporate level. I saw some incidental raises go through before
36:06
Speaker 5: the end of the year, getting people up to that
36:08
Speaker 5: threshold so they wouldn't have to worry about their overtime
36:10
Speaker 5: and then it ended up the company.
36:12
Speaker 6: Yes, do it.
36:13
Speaker 7: As an employee, you have two basic choices. You either
36:15
Speaker 7: start making the salary employee if they're you know, keep
36:20
Speaker 7: track of their hours and due time and a half
36:22
Speaker 7: if they work more than forty hours a week, which
36:24
Speaker 7: can be hard in certain certain professions, or you're gonna
36:27
Speaker 7: have to bump them up to the fifty some thousand
36:29
Speaker 7: dollars amount. So all your employees out there that are
36:31
Speaker 7: in that range, keep that in mind because it's coming
36:33
Speaker 7: in January, unless you know, I guess it could be
36:36
Speaker 7: modified depending on who wins the election, right.
36:38
Speaker 5: Right, don't forget to advocate for yourself though, don't forget
36:41
Speaker 5: to advocate for yourself.
36:41
Speaker 6: Yeah, just to remind your there's going to be some
36:43
Speaker 6: employers that aren't.
36:44
Speaker 7: Aware of that, probably too, and so if they have
36:47
Speaker 7: a payroll service, it should be reminding them.
36:48
Speaker 6: But there could be some that slipped through the cracks.
36:51
Speaker 4: The Payton Law Firm.
36:51
Speaker 5: Thanks for turning in Peyton Law Firm back here every
36:54
Speaker 5: Thursday morning at eight twenty either Tom or Harvey stopping
36:56
Speaker 5: buy Payton Lawfirm dot com.
36:57
Speaker 4: Tom thinks a bunch for coming in.
36:58
Speaker 6: I appreciate you enjoyed it. Wait until next time.
37:00
Speaker 4: I have a great day everyone. On five ah w
37:02
Speaker 4: c HS, the Voice of Charleston