Watch full size video:

Macrida Patterson, a 52-year-old Los Angeles traffic officer, told NBC's "Today" show that she suffered cuts to her cornea from the small gun of metal that had been used to secure a rhinestone heart onto the blue thong.

"I was putting on my underwear from Victoria's Secret and the metal popped in my eye. It happened really quickly. I was in excruciating pain. I screamed. That's what happened," Patterson told NBC.

Patterson's lawyer Jason Buccat, who in addition appeared upon the "Today" representation, aforesaid the metal staple causes "exact damage" to her cornea that required a topical steroid.

The outcome liability lawsuit, which was filed without interruption June 9 in Los Angeles Superior Court and first reported in succession the Smoking Gun Web site, seeks unspecified damages.

A spokeswoman for Victoria's Secret, which is operated by Limited Brands Inc, could not immediately be reached for comment.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb)

Watch full bigness video:

Sonics attorneys in court on Friday unveiled e-mails and a “poisoned well” plan that they rehearse link the incorporated town, its attorneys and potential limited buyers of the team in a “Machiavellian” conspiracy to force the Oklahoma City-based owners to sell.

Previously sealed documents were introduced during the trial, what one. will fix whether the team will have existence forced to honor the eventual two years of its KeyArena lease. The documents mention an effort to “augment pain” for Clay Bennett and the other Sonics owners.

After a week in which Seattle attorneys sought to demonize Bennett for acting in bad faith, Sonics attorneys on Friday turned the tables.

They revealed a plan by a group that included former U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton, former Sonics President Wally Walker, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Seattle real-estate developer Matt Griffin and former Safeco president Mike McGavick.

Sonics attorney Brad Keller said Gorton, an attorney with the firm K

During a 90-minute junction with Walker, Ballmer and McGavick at Walker’s hearthstone attached Oct. 7, 2007, Gorton distributed a document titled “The Sonics Challenge: Why a Poisoned Well Affords a Unique Opportunity.”

The writing states: “The critical path is to separate the NBA from the Oklahomans while increasing the exposure for each.”

It also states: “The City has taken the first of separate steps … they hired Slade Gorton and used the false step of an out-of-state umpirage filing to file suit, increasing the prospect of locking them into losses in Seattle.”

“Gorton, et al., become greater pain of staying, monetary and reputation,” the document reads.

During testimony Friday, Griffin said Gorton was the only person he knew capable of orchestrating the schemes detailed in the document, such while the mention of forcing “a pincer movement [to enlarge] the Oklahomans’ costs in some unacceptable environment while increasing the alliance’s believing [that] an alternative solution gains [it] a good new owner and keeps it in a desirable market.”

Seattle attorney Paul Lawrence objected to the admission of the “poisoned well” PowerPoint presentation and argued the incorporated town did not call into existence it. Walker testified that McGavick, working being of the kind which a concerned basketball fan, authored the document. U.S. District Court Judge Marsha Pechman, however, overruled.

Citing one “unclean hands” defense, Keller argued the city brought its lawsuit to bleed Bennett’s ownership group, the Professional Basketball Club. The Sonics, who want to sport in Oklahoma City next season, statement the city’s lawsuit originated in bad fidelity.

Lawrence was forced to explain Gorton’s firm’s relationship with a potential local ownership group that tried pressuring Bennett to sell the team while at the same time the law firm represented the city in its lawsuit against Bennett.

The potential buyers were Ballmer, Griffin, Costco CEO Jim Sinegal and wireless magnate John Stanton.

Lawrence argued the Gates firm did not do the duties of improperly, but Sonics attorneys revealed a string of e-mails that they said refute the claim.

In a July 19, 2007, e-mail, McGavick wrote: “Very Machiavellian stuff that [Walker] thinks might work, or at minutest be fun.”

In a July 24, 2007, e-mail to Stanton, Walker wrote: “I met through the city today and felt better about my message of fighting Clay’s attempt to license. Make it too expensive and too litigious for him. I get the imprinting that they were in total agreement and that they [incorporated town administration] understand the value of buying more time.”

In an Oct. 17, 2007, e-mail, Walker wrote: “Learn what Oklahoma boys are up to and if there is an opening continue to drive wedge.”

In a Dec. 2, 2007, e-mail to Ballmer, Griffin wrote: “[Walker’s] ‘deep throat’ at the league is [NBA President] Joel Litvin. … I’ll grow [Deputy Mayor Tim] Ceis to heal originate more good advice.”

In a Dec. 18, 2007, e-mail Gorton wrote: “Bennett will only sell at a reasonable price single suppose that he’s pressured by means of the NBA or he faces an expensive and unpleasant legal coming.”

In a March 4, 2008, e-mail, Walker wrote: “The Governor wants to call Bennett to handicap whether he’ll take a bribe for the team, before she is willing to take any political risk. It is the same old finger in the air, lack of predominance, that has gotten us to this dilemma. Think of for what cause ugly the trial will be, in what way ugly the Sonics departure will be. … And then we’ll rely on an NBA mandate/approval that one more team will move here after that scorched earth, incriminating process?”

During his affidavit, Griffin related he met Gorton to deliberate forcing Bennett to sell the team. A month later, Griffin amended his deposition and said he had no memory of the meeting.

Walker was hired as a K

He admitted he maintained constant contact with Litvin and said he discussed a Bellevue ring plan with Ballmer on a golf outing Sept. 9, 2007, but said Ballmer was not interested.

Seattle City Councilmember Nick Licata concluded the week of testimony and he’ll return to the witness stand which time the trial resumes Thursday. Lawrence said he plans to call Ceis taken in the character of a rebuttal witness, and one as well as the other sides will conclude with closing arguments.

Retailers have been slow to address the need on the side of plus-sized children’s clothes. Until now

Watch full size video:

Guerra and her daughter: RealKidz made its debut in May Donna Terek

by Aili McConnon

Merrill Guerra of Ypsilanti, Mich., used to desperation when buying clothes for her overweight daughter Gabi, now 11. Older children’s sizes that fit Gabi’s trunk would be too long in the pant legs and shirtsleeves, and the styles were often too sexy for a young girl. “When I talked to other girlfriends, I realized I was not lonely in my frustrations,” Guerra says. So she decided to form RealKidz, a plus-sized garments company for girls ages 5 to 12. She started selling capris, leggings, and T-shirts online in May and plans to roll out a back-to-school line this August.

Guerra is tapping into one of the hottest areas of retail: fashion for overweight kids. The $6.2 billion market in plus-sized children’s vesture is proving to be as lucrative since the clothing market for overweight adults. Together, sales are expected to grow 41% by 2012, according to market research firm Packaged Facts. With overall clothing sales in a funk, established brands similar as Lands’ End, J.C. Penney (JCP), and Old Navy are competing with a growing number of specialty retailers to expand their offerings for “plus” and “husky” junior customers.

Over the past year, Lands’ End has introduced wider shoes for chubby little feet and plus sizes for the whole of of its kids’ pants. “Parents kept telling us that verdict children’s larger sizes was rigid, and the choices were limited,” says spokeswoman Michele Casper.

While one-third of American children now are classified as overweight, retailers have been slow to adapt their designs to the more rectangular carcass shape and other indispensably of such consumers. For years the offerings were limited to a handful of items in larger sizes or features like as expandable waistbands. Then brands such as French Toast began offering a sever line of plus-sized styles in 2006. It has since expanded the sizing of its best-selling formal lines, and others be favored with done the same. The goal, says Laura Batey, vice-president of J.C. Penney Girls, is to let every girl “paroxysm into exactly what the girl next to her is wearing.”

Even as added companies try to cater to overweight children, notwithstanding that, many remain reluctant to trumpet their efforts. Old Navy offers the more than half of its plus-sized options online. Retailers argue that store floors are crammed already. But analysts think some dress in’t want to be perceived as profiting from a trend chiefly the million view as a puzzle. More important, perhaps, retailers may worry that vestments for chubby children aren’t seen as cold-blooded. Lenda Jo Connell, a professor of consumer affairs at Alabama’s Auburn University, notes that retailers think “there is more status associated through normal-sized clothing.”

But clothing chains increasingly perform that larger sizes can translate to larger profits. Most mothers of heavier children express they be possible to’t find clothes that spasm their offspring, according to a 2007 study by retail consultant NPD Group. One result, says Connell, is that such parents are less price-sensitive than many shoppers.

They may also be open to other approaches to the point to be solved. Guerra intends to launch a social network for parents of overweight kids alongside the descant of her RealKidz garments row of words. One height of one’s ambition is to swap strategies for healthy eating. Guerra’s next venture: a line for skinny kids who don’t sudden standard sizes, either.

Even in a digital world, the printer finds there is money in old media. The question is: For how extensive?

by J. Duncan Moore Jr.

Watch well stocked size video:

If the future of print media is dim, the outlook for the companies that actually press ink onto paper must be on a level darker. Newspapers are collapsing, magazines are losing advertisers, show defensive covering has morphed into spam, and even books may be threatened by handy electronic readers. Short-term trends—namely the economy’s skid—only add to the sense of doom.

Quebecor World, which had been the world’s biggest engaged in traffic printer as recently as 2003, lies in insolvency today.

Yet there is light at the top of the heap, where RR Donnelley & Sons (RRD) resides. Not that Donnelley has been printing circulating medium; the Chicago crew lost $48.9 million last year, largely because of writedowns and higher acquisition-related interest costs, and its stock value has fallen by means of one-third since be unexhausted summer. But industry analysts say Donnelley’s geographic breadth, cause operations, and strong balance sheet should enable the company to ride out a recession and snap up even more of its less fortunate rivals. As evidence, it gained market share in the first quarter—industry shipments declined 5%, yet Donnelley’s slipped without more 1%. The company, says Piyush Sharma, an analyst at Longbow Research in Cleveland, is "the principal beneficiary of labor distress."

Donnelley’s biggest operational advantage comes from adding services upstream and downstream from the presses—becoming "sticky" to the customer, in the wrangling of Matthew Troy, an analyst at Citigroup (C) Global Markets in New York. For instance, Donnelley not only prints magazines (including BusinessWeek) but sorts them by zip code and organizes them on pallets, sparing the U.S. Postal Service the tasks. In return, the Postal Service gives Donnelley a cost break, which the company passes on to its customers. "This is what sets them apart from guiltless ink-on-paper commodity printers," Troy says.

There’s probably no one in the U.S.—and, increasingly, everywhere else—who hasn’t held a Donnelley product. The circle, with 65,000 employees and 650 locations in 33 countries, handles roughly half of wholly the mail moved in the U.S. and a quarter of totally the mail in the nature. The top-secret typography and first-day transmission of Harry Potter books were Donnelley’s workmanship. Cash register receipts, tags at office-supply stores, labels on overnight packages, financial prospectuses, bills from telephone companies, banks, and mutual funds—they’re all affability of Donnelley.

For all that, the company is practically invisible. You seldom see Donnelley’s name on anything or in the business press. And that’s the way government likes it. "We wide-awake on behalf of our customers," says Donnelley Chief Executive Thomas Quinlan III in his downtown Chicago office. "The communications middling should not exist out in front of our customers." Donnelley has no public relations staff, and Quinlan doesn’t like to give interviews. "There’s no reason for me to be above the horizon," the 45-year-old boss states simply.

Donnelley does loom large in the same arena, notwithstanding—mergers and acquisitions. The company has put together greater amount of than a dozen deals in the past few years, including a $2.8 billion takeover of Canada’s Moore Wallace in 2004. That purchase allowed Donnelley to tame the No. 1 ranking in commercial printing from Quebecor. It also brought in new management: Moore Wallace CEO Mark Angelson became Donnelley’s chief. He was succeeded in April, 2007, through Quinlan, another anterior Moore Wallace executive who had become Donnelley’s vital financial official in the interim.

Donnelley kept spending in 2007, profitable $2.1 billion altogether for Banta of Menasha, Wis., and three other printers. The additions helped push Donnelley’s revenue up 24%, to a record $11.59 billion, in 2007. "They are the most disciplined, financially savvy acquirers I’ve get to across," says Troy.