Milt Toby, JD

Horse owners whose animals were affected by a contagious equine metritis (CEM) outbreak during the 2009 breeding season might have the option of filing a lawsuit for damages against the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). Agencies of the federal government generally are immune to lawsuits under the principle of sovereign immunity, but there are a few limited exceptions.

For the vast majority of consumers and business owners, an infusion of outside capital is necessary to buy any big-ticket item–a home, a farm, livestock, equipment.

“Steal a little and they throw you in jail,” Bob Dylan wrote a few years ago, “steal a lot and they make you king.” In today’s economy that means you receive a huge government bailout if you accumulate billions in debt and are “too big to fail,” but for everyone else, you’re on your own. Bankruptcy might be the only viable alternative for many individuals and businesses, horse owners among them.

Citing a “failure to recognize” bad acts and a “lack of remorse,” Judge George J. Pulver Jr. on May 18 handed down the maximum possible sentence to prominent Thoroughbred owner and breeder Ernest Paragallo. Convicted on 33 counts of animal neglect, a Class A misdemeanor, Paragallo was sentenced to two years in jail and ordered to pay fines totaling $33,000 ($1,000 for eac