The BUSKLAW Newsletter

As reported by MLive  and  ABC 12 News , famous interior designer Carleton Varney has sued the new owners of  Mackinac Island's famous Grand Hotel . ( Mackinac Island is also famous for its fudge , a guilty pleasure.) You would expect the lawsuit to be for breach of contract, i.e., the Grand Hotel's owners failed to pay Mr. Varney for his interior design services rendered. His relationship with the Hotel goes back about 43 years, and the Hotel was recently sold by its long-time family owners, the Mussers, to an international investment firm, KSL Capital Partners.    But there will be no pondering of any design contract's terms, no assessment of facts that may or may not constitute breach of contract, no rumination over contractual issues. Because Varney's lawsuit is for damages arising from first, age discrimination , and second, conversion of his personal property.  Although Varney's Complaint isn't available online (and a trip to the Washtenaw County Ci...

Organizers of the Embedded GR IT group invited me to attend their next meeting to discuss the legal aspects of folks working as independent contractors on IT engagements. Although my experience in this field has been on the "other side of the table" (i.e., representing businesses hiring these contractors), I do have some thoughts on what contractors should - from a legal view - NOT agree to.  Embedded GR is a group of engineers, hobbyists, students, and managers in the Grand Rapids, MI area. They discuss the development, tooling, and processes associated with the creation of embedded systems. I appreciate the opportunity to share my legal expertise with this group. Much of what I say will apply to all contractors working on projects for employers, regardless of whether their work relates to embedded systems. So if you are a contractor (doing work of any sort), you may want to attend to get my take on what you should avoid (or at least push back on) when signi...