About Steph Weber
Steph Weber is an award-winning journalist specializing in healthcare, business, and law. She has written for Physicians Practice, Medscape, and Rheumatology Network and created content for several other industry publications, companies, and colleges. As a frequent Super Lawyers contributor, she enjoys drilling down complex legal topics into bite-sized, actionable advice for readers and interviewing the nation’s leading attorney voices, highlighting their most memorable achievements and lessons learned. She lives in Northern Indiana.
Articles written by Steph Weber
What To Do if You're Targeted by Discrimination at Work
If you're targeted for workplace discrimination, make an internal complaint, file an EEOC charge, and get a right-to-sue letter for a hostile work environment claim. Employers cannot take adverse employment action against protected classes under Title VII, and workers should report to HR any employment discrimination. Employees facing workplace harassment or employer retaliation should preserve records and document evidence of wrongful termination. An employment attorney can file a constructive …
Denied!?
Exploring common reasons for life insurance nonpayment and avenues for recoveryLife insurance offers a financial safety net, one that covers final expenses and eases the burden on a surviving spouse or children. So when a life insurance claim is unexpectedly denied, it only adds to the distress of losing your loved one. “The application process for life insurance is fairly rigorous,” says Joshua L. Mallin, an attorney at Weg & Myers who specializes in insurance coverage litigation. “An innocent misrepresentation—if it’s what the courts call …
Navigating the Tax Labyrinth
When to consult a tax attorney instead of an accountantTax issues should be remedied sooner than later. But by the time one woman came to see tax attorney Yvonne R. Cort, her hasty solution had backfired. “[The woman and her husband] hadn’t filed yet, and she kept pestering her husband to find out what his income was,” says Cort, who focuses on tax controversy matters at Capell Barnett Matalon & Schoenfeld in Jericho. “She didn’t get an answer and filed a joint return [without] the husband’s income, hoping to claim innocent spouse …
Why Do Life Insurance Policy Benefits Get Denied?
Life insurance policy benefits get denied because of material misrepresentations, policy lapse for premium nonpayment, medical nondisclosure, or fraudulent applications. Insurance covers accidental death, with excluded activity for death certificates tied to illegal acts or with suicide clauses. Claims during the contestability period are subject to policy rescission for missing documentation, age misstatements, or incomplete investigations. Life insurance may delay payouts because of a …
Alternatives to Bankruptcy
Attorneys suggest solutions for navigating financial troublesBy the time the company contacted attorney Scott A. Wolfson, its cash-flow issues had reached critical mass. “The CEO walked me around his facility, then described the company’s unsuccessful negotiations with its lenders over the past three years,” says Wolfson, who works with distressed companies and corporate debtors at his Troy-based firm Wolfson Bolton. “Things had progressed in an irreversible manner. He was [going to lose] control to his lenders.” While clients initially assume …
California Business Contracts: Clauses To Include for Safety
When a local bakery owner asked Daniel Blomgren to review a new commercial lease, a seemingly innocuous word caught his attention. “There was a section about a step up in rent, and it said ‘and’ instead of ‘or,’” says Blomgren, who represents entrepreneurs and small business owners at Coepio Legal in San Francisco. “I calculated the difference in cost over the course of the lease due to that one single word, and it was tens of thousands of dollars,” he says. “A bad …
From Southwestern Indiana to West Point
C. Erik Chickedantz spent the '60s in service to his countryWhen C. Erik Chickedantz arrived at the United States Military Academy at West Point in the summer of 1959—a long way from his small southwestern Indiana hometown of Washington—he began his “plebe year” with a grueling eight-week basic training session known as “Beast Barracks.” “It was very regimented. Reveille every morning at 0530, except on Sundays. A lot of military training,” recalls Chickedantz. “We’d march to classes and to the mess hall for three square meals. You …
How To Reduce Your Company's Attack Surface
California is the winner of an unwelcome title: the state with the most data-breach incidents and exposures of consumers’ personal records. The state’s size and concentration of tech and internet companies no doubt have much to do with these metrics, but the problem is worrisome for all business owners who increasingly rely on data as the currency of commerce. “You’re looking at a situation where people — and businesses equally — don’t even recognize how much exposure they …
All the Angles
From the minutia to the big picture, Deborah J. Caruso has it coveredOn Sept. 6, 2016, the Carmel-based ITT Educational Services, Inc., one of the nation’s largest for-profit post-secondary educators, abruptly closed, shuttering nearly 140 ITT Technical Institute campuses in more than three dozen states. The closure resulted in 8,000 employee layoffs and left 40,000 students in limbo. Ten days later, ITT filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Deborah J. Caruso of Rubin & Levin in Indianapolis was appointed the bankruptcy trustee by the U.S. Trustee’s office. …
Decoding Stephen Reynolds
Stephen Reynolds was a coder before becoming a prominent IP litigator and data security mavenAt 10, Stephen Reynolds was one of several classmates selected to participate in a weekly computer skills pull-out program conducted at Florida State University’s Supercomputer Computational Research Institute. “[The] lab had a supercomputer and little terminals and the students would learn how to use the internet, including telnet, HTTP, FTP and the first internet search engine I can remember, WebCrawler,” says Reynolds. By the time middle school approached, Reynolds was tinkering with …
Find top lawyers with confidence
The Super Lawyers patented selection process is peer influenced and research driven, selecting the top 5% of attorneys to the Super Lawyers lists each year. We know lawyers and make it easy to connect with them.
Find a lawyer near you