In the Comcast case, subscribers seeking $875 million in damages charged that the company had swapped territory with other cable companies to gain market power and raise prices.
Mars receives only 40% of the terrestrial solar intensity, has no magnetic field to deflect damaging charged particles from the Sun, achieves an average equatorial temperature of only 240 deg K (-33 deg C), no liquid water, a 0.006 Bar atmosphere, no sources of nitrates, phosphates, etc., and insufficient solid CO2 at the poles to produce any greenhouse gas effect.
But by then Mr. Lax had filed his own suit against Mr. Zakarian seeking more than $2 million in damages, charging "breaches of fiduciary duties and misappropriation of funds".
Douglas Clifton, the editor of The Plain Dealer, said that the mayor's behavior was "disappointing" and that the newspaper was deciding whether to sue the city for punitive damages, charging violation of its civil rights.
If the controversy is not resolved, Mr. Harkins said, the developer plans to take the town to State Supreme Court, asking for damages, charging that the town is illegally delaying construction.
It now faces a wave of lawsuits, including one filed at the end of July by the Federal Housing Finance Agency seeking nearly $1 billion in damages, charging that UBS misrepresented the quality of the underlying mortgages.
But however genuine the activists' beliefs, ideals formed no defence against a criminal damage charge.
In 1999, Melchett faced criminal damage charges alongside 27 fellow activists after ripping up genetically modified crops.
Still, it is not clear that an overhaul of the fraud act would change the damage charges Mr. Keys is facing.
