Legal

A 19-year-old college student from Queens says he was handcuffed and locked in a jail cell after buying a $350 designer belt at Barneys on New York's Madison Avenue because he is "a young black man." Trayon Christian told NBC 4 New York on Wednesday that he saved up from a part-time job for weeks to buy a Salvatore Ferragamo belt at Barneys. When he went to the store to buy it in April, he says the checkout clerk asked to see his identification. After the sale went through and he left the store, he was approached by police.

Federal regulators are probing eBay's Bill Me Later for potential consumer abuses associated with its money-lending practices, the company disclosed in a regulatory filing. Bill Me Later, which eBay absorbed in 2008 through a PayPal acquisition, has previously come under fire for charging deferred interest and is fighting a lawsuit in Utah, where its current and former issuing banks are chartered.

Thirty-two states and U.S. territories, and the federal government, will share in a $2.55 million agreement reached with Kmart, which was accused of obtaining full government reimbursements for partially filled prescriptions at the retailer's pharmacies, Georgia's attorney general's office announced Wednesday. Kmart didn't admit to any wrongdoing but agreed to pay civil damages and penalties to compensate Medicaid, Medicare and other federal healthcare programs, Attorney General Sam Olens’ office said. In a statement to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Kmart said it settled to avoid a lengthy legal battle.

J.C. Penney and Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia on Monday announced a revised agreement that eliminates Stewart's products in home goods categories to which rival Macy's claims exclusive rights. The amended deal calls for the domestic doyenne's company to design Martha Stewart-branded products for J.C. Penney in window treatment, holiday and other categories not claimed by Macy's. Penney also gave up its 17 percent stake in Martha Stewart's company. Macy's sued J.C. Penney and Martha Stewart Living after the two announced a partnership in December 2011. 

A Pennsylvania man is suing digital retail giant Amazon.com because he says the company is putting its employees through rigorous security searches without pay. The class-action suit was filed on Sept. 27 by attorneys for Winebrake & Santillo LLC on behalf of Neal Heimbach of Allentown, Pa. Heimbach has served as a warehouse worker at Amazon's logistics facility in Breinigsville, Pa. — just 10 miles from Allentown — since 2010. He's seeking damages in excess of $50,000 because he claims the company required its more than 100 employees at the facility to undergo lengthy security searches.

For retailers, a government shutdown couldn't have come at a better time — after the key back-to-school shopping period but before the crucial year-end holiday season gets under way in earnest.

The Container Store filed paperwork to go public Monday, seeking to raise about $200 million. The Dallas-based company operates 61 stores nationwide focused on storage and organization merchandise. It also designs and sells shelving systems. It said in a regulatory filing that it plans to use proceeds from the initial public offering to pay dividends to preferred shareholders and to repay debt. The filing did not indicate the number of shares to be sold or the estimated price range.

Federal authorities want to know where all that cheap wood at Lumber Liquidators comes from. On Thursday, the discount hardwood flooring retailer's headquarters in Toano, Va., and another location in Richmond, Va., were raided by special agents from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations unit, together with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Justice Department. The agents were looking for evidence the company had imported wood products from forests in far eastern Russian that are home to the endangered Siberian tiger.

Wal-Mart won dismissal of class-action claims in a regional gender discrimination lawsuit filed by women who were formerly part of a nationwide lawsuit against the world's largest retailer. U.S. District Judge Robert N. Scola in Miami yesterday said governing law in the appellate circuit in which his court is located prohibits the filing of a second class action if the time to do so expired while the prior case was pending. The lawsuit was filed last year on

Advocates and opponents of letting states require out-of-state retailers to collect sales taxes praised a set of principles from House Republicans. Representative Bob Goodlatte, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, yesterday released seven principles that will guide his approach to the issue. He wants legislation to be simple so that an exemption for small businesses is unnecessary and wants a measure to include a way for retailers to protest tax rules set by states where they don't have operations.