News & Events

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Press Room

State News Headlines

January 24, 2007

The following headlines are compiled as an internal service for state Attorney General offices only. This list is not exhaustive and is a snapshot of news from around the country compiled through the use of various search engines.

Texas: Penalty in Case of False Gas-Mileage Booster

Attorney General Greg Abbott filed an agreed judgment against a Dallas company that was marketing a mothball-like product as a gas-mileage booster. The company, BioPerformance, sold its product with a claim that putting a couple of the pills into an automobile fuel tank could increase gas mileage 30 percent. The state’s investigation revealed that the product had no such power and that its main ingredient was naphthalene, used in making mothballs. The state also found that the company developed a pyramid scheme that drew in about 50,000 people nationwide and ran up some $28 million in sales. The judgment provides $7.3 million in restitution to affected consumers. Full Article

No court consensus on voter ID laws

Voter identification laws, adopted by states in recent years amid concerns about fraud, are getting mixed reviews as courts weigh whether they unconstitutionally keep some people from the polls.

State courts in Georgia and Missouri last fall invalidated laws that required voters to show photo ID each time they cast ballots. Georgia and Missouri are among 11 states that have passed such laws since 2003, inspired partly by allegations of voter fraud raised in Florida and elsewhere during the 2000 elections.

The Georgia law, blocked by federal and state judges, required people to show one of six government-issued forms of photo identification, such as a driver's license or passport. In the most recent challenge to the law, brought by voters who said they couldn't cast ballots because they did not have photo IDs, a judge ruled in September that Georgia's requirement put an unconstitutional condition on voting. Previously, state polling places had long accepted utility bills, bank statements and other types of non-photo ID as proof of residency. Full Article

Schools Act to Short-Circuit Spread of 'Cyberbullying'

Kylie Kenney heard a crescendo of whispers and jeers as she moved through an otherwise unremarkable eighth-grade school day. The reason: Word had spread of a Web site posted by some of her peers, titled "Kill Kylie Incorporated."…Now, school officials, states and even Web sites are taking action. Educators and state legislatures in Florida, South Carolina, Utah, Oregon and elsewhere are creating new policies that deal with cyberbullying, either incorporating electronic harassment into existing bullying policies, or spelling it out as an entirely new threat. In doing so, they are often crafting language that allows educators to intervene even in off-campus incidents if the activity affects the school environment.

MySpace.com, the popular networking site, last fall released a guide for school administrators, advising them to contact the site about false or offensive user profiles or to report threats or cyberbullying. It also created a hotline and email address for the exclusive use of school officials to contact MySpace. Full Article

Bayer to Pay $8 Million to Va., Other States

Virginia and 29 other states have reached an $8 million settlement with Bayer Corp. over allegations that the drugmaker did not adequately warn consumers about risks associated with the cholesterol-reducing drug Baycol.

The Pennsylvania attorney general's office says that after introducing Baycol in the United States in 1998, the company learned that the drug posed much greater health risks than similar drugs, particularly when taken in higher doses or in combination with another cholesterol-lowering drug. Bayer informed the Food and Drug Administration about the higher risks, but it allegedly failed to warn doctors and consumers about potential problems, such as a severe muscle reaction that could cause kidney failure.

Bayer voluntarily withdrew Baycol from the market in 2001. Full Article

Study: Teen drivers still distracted

More teenagers are heeding warnings about drinking and driving, but they routinely face behind-the-wheel distractions from mobile phones to passengers that contribute to thousands of fatal crashes every year, according to a study released Thursday. Full Article

Building a safer MySpace

Weeks into his tenure as safety czar of social network MySpace, Hemanshu Nigam already had his hands full. MySpace had been slapped with a $30 million lawsuit concerning a 14-year-old Texas girl who said she was assaulted by a predator she met on MySpace. Lawmakers were lobbying to have social networks banned from schools and libraries. Full Article

Bill Would Identify Sex Offenders at Nursing Homes

The Virginia State Crime Commission is calling for closer scrutiny of convicted sex offenders who live in nursing homes after finding more than a dozen housed in facilities across the state.

The commission has endorsed legislation that would require nursing homes and assisted-living facilities to check residents' names against the state sex offender registry within three days of admittance. Nursing homes also would be required to direct new patients and their families to the state's online registry to find information about offenders at a given facility. Full Article

Critics Urge Lawmakers to Curb Credit Card Abuses

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Consumer advocates urged Congress on Thursday to limit the rates and fees that credit card companies can impose, saying the industry's heavy-handed tactics are piling on debt for many Americans.

``No industry in America is more deserving of oversight by Congress,'' Travis Plunkett, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of America, said in prepared testimony for a Senate Banking Committee hearing.

The panel, led by Democratic presidential hopeful Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, is looking at the billing, marketing and disclosure practices in the U.S. industry. Full Article

Leslie R. Kershaw
Communications Assistant
Office: (202) 326-6027
Fax: (202) 408-8061
Email: lnelson@naag.org

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