C|M|LAW Library Blog

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine recently called for the State Medical Board of Ohio to conduct a thorough review of all cases of sexual assault allegations against physicians over the last 25 years.  DeWine’s request came at a news conference where he discussed the Report of The Governor’s Working Group on Reviewing of the Medical Board’s Handling of the Investigation Involving Richard Strauss.  The Working Group was created by DeWine’s Executive Order 2019-16D.  The Working Group Report found:

Medical Board staff opened case 96-1534A into Strauss in July 1996….  [T]he investigation fell into what one former employee called a “black hole.”  The Medical Board’s investigation sat open but inactive from early 1997 until after Strauss left the University, left the State of Ohio, and allowed his Ohio medical license to lapse in September 1998.  The Medical Board’s investigation sat inactive while Strauss moved to California where he held a medical license.  The Board’s investigation, while open, continued without action until it was administratively closed in January 2002, with no official action ever pursued or taken against Strauss.

Dr. Richard Strauss has been accused of sexually abusing over 170 students at Ohio State University, where he worked 1978-1998.  Strauss died by suicide in 2005.

Law Library Legal Research Seminars cover Westlaw, Lexis Advance and Bloomberg Law, as well as many topical legal research areas such as administrative law.  Several Seminars emphasize cost-effective research or include a social justice research issue.  Law Library Legal Research Seminars are for C|M|LAW students, including our MLS and LLM students, and are continuously available online via the Westlaw TWEN platform.  You earn points for completing an online Seminar by correctly answering 3/4 of the questions on that Seminar’s quiz.  Your Seminar points are good for the entire time you are here at C|M|LAW.  When you earn 100 points, you are awarded a Law Library Legal Research Letter of Recognition and a Digital Badge, which you can post to your LinkedIn page.  You can earn multiple Letters and Digital Badges.  Here are the currently available online Law Library Legal Research Seminars:

• The Bluebook: Citing to Basic Sources
• Starting Research with Secondary Sources**
• Terms & Connectors Searching**
• Cost-Effective Searching on Lexis Advance & Westlaw**
• Lexis Overview
• Shepard’s
• Westlaw Overview
• KeyCite
• Practical Law from Westlaw
• Bloomberg Law Overview
• Administrative Law
• Cost-Effective Federal Legislative History: Congress.gov and Govinfo.gov**
• Researching Foreign Law
• Tax Law Research
• Health Law & Bioethics Resources & Scholarly Writing
• HeinOnline
• Scholar Catalog

** Social Justice track Seminar.  For more information on the Law Library Legal Research Seminars, contact Laura Ray, Outreach & Instructional Services Librarian.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has encouraged and promoted resources for food producers to use in flooded areas affected by Tropical Storm Barry. The FDA issued a reminder to “harvesters that generally, if the edible portion of a crop is exposed to contaminated flood waters, it is considered ‘adulterated’ under the Federal, Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act and should not enter the human food supply.”  The FDA’s Guidance for Industry: Evaluating the Safety of Flood-affected Food Crops for Human Consumption provides the information that producers can use as they assess potential damage to their food crops. This guidance is an important resource for the growers who produce and market these crops, as they are responsible for assuring the safety of flood-affected food crops for human consumption.

The U.S. Supreme Court has granted cert for three consolidated cases on the question of whether Congress must fulfill a statutory promise to pay insurers who lost money by participating in the Affordable Care Act’s insurance marketplaces.  The court accepted and consolidated three cases brought by insurers who say Congress must honor the statutory commitment to offset their losses.  The corporations claim they were paid 12 billion dollars less than owed by the US government.

The cases are Maine Community Health Options v. United States, Moda Health Plan v. United States and Land of Lincoln Mutual Health Insurance Co. v. United States.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently held a public hearing on cannabis-derived compounds, including cannabinoids, such as cannabidiol (CBD).  The hearing was prompted by industry confusion since the passage of the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 (AIA; Pub. L. No. 115-334).  The AIA excluded hemp from the statutory definition of marijuana (a controlled substance), and expanded the definition of hemp to “Cannabis sativa L. and any part of that plant, including the seeds thereof and all derivatives, extracts, cannabinoids, isomers, acids, salts, and salts of isomers, whether growing or not, with a delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol concentration of not more than 0.3 percent on a dry weight basis.” [See The 2018 Farm Bill (P.L. 115-334): Summary and Side-by-Side Comparison, Congressional Research Service R45525, updated 2/22/19.]  The FDA continues to classify cannabis-derived compounds as “unsafe,” but the FDA has taken little action to remove such products from the marketplace.  The recent FDA public hearing provided a forum for “stakeholders to share their experiences and challenges with products containing cannabis and cannabis-derived compounds, including information and views related to the safety of such products, as well as to solicit input relevant to the agency’s regulatory strategy related to existing products.”  The FDA has also opened a public docket on regulations.gov, and the docket will be open until 7/16/19.  For additional information see the FDA Regulation of Cannabis and Cannabis-Derived Products page.