- Jury tells Marriott to pay $55 million after stalker takes nude video of TV personality from adjoining hotel room [Business Insider]
- R.I.P. John Sullivan, long-time advocate for lawsuit reform in California [Sacramento Bee]
- Colleges, speed cameras, and surveillance on buses in my latest Maryland policy roundup; paid leave, publicly financed conference centers and criminalizing drinking hosts in the one before that;
- AAJ, the trial lawyers lobby, “panned companies’ method of fighting class actions as unfair after member accused it of using the same strategy” [John O’Brien, Chamber-backed Legal NewsLine]
- In the 1920s, battling chain stores was part of the mission of the Ku Klux Klan [Atlas Obscura]
- Class-action lawyer Goodson, “husband of Supreme Court justice, recommended 2 firms that got state auditor contract” [Arkansas Democrat-Gazette]
- “Indian court issues summons to Hindu monkey god Hanuman” Again? [Lowering the Bar]
Posts Tagged ‘India’
One reason contingent-fee law firms outsource a lot
An element of case management like organizing medical records, if done in-house, “cannot be expensed to the file,” as this vendor of offshore (India-based) physician services reminds attorney clients.
October 28 roundup
- India monk: I’ll need eight months to respond to court summons because my religion requires me to get there on foot [BBC]
- NYC’s inhospitable treatment of cat cafes leaves you wondering if dogs get a better shake [Nicole Gelinas, New York Post]
- As VW litigation heats up, keep your eye on lawyers’ angling re: multi-district litigation, advises Ted Frank [Chamber-backed Legal NewsLine; Rob Green, Abnormal Use; yet more on multi-district litigation, John Beisner, Chamber ILR]
- A public health study “builds upon Critical Race Theory” to criticize results of Stand Your Ground doctrine in Florida, but most of the cases it uses weren’t decided on basis of that doctrine [Andrew Branco, Legal Insurrection]
- “Subway ‘Footlong’ Settlement: Lawyers Feed, Consumers Fast” [Judicial Hellholes, earlier, note also this on Subway’s affection for the term]
- Not only did the free market not cause that $750 generic pill, it might be on the way to generating a $1 alternative [Bonnie Kristian/Rare, my earlier take] Still, it’s a little more complicated than that, as Alex Tabarrok explains;
- Kathleen Kane saga: “Pennsylvania Attorney General Suspended from the Bar, Still Refuses to Quit” [Hans Bader, CEI]
Banking and finance roundup
- Stock analyst in India puts out a “sell” recommendation, is arrested and jailed [W$J, compare Argentina economists]
- Dear Mayor Bill de Blasio, Messrs. Dodd, Frank, & Co.: London thanks you! (It’s now back on top over NYC as most-desired financial center.) [Business Insider]
- Amid court setbacks, SEC says it might tinker with its use of in-house administrative judges after all [David Michaels, Bloomberg]
- “The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Arbitration Study: A Summary and Critique” [Jason Scott Johnston and Todd Zywicki, SSRN]
- “Rand Paul and Five Expats Sue the Feds Over FATCA” [Matt Welch, Reason, earlier on this exceedingly bad law]
- Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) came to Cato and spoke, that’s not a punch line setup but a real thing that happened [Tom Clougherty, more on Warren-Vitter and “too big to fail”]
- Use credit responsibly? Sucker! NYC first city to follow state trend toward banning employer use of credit history in hiring [Jennifer Mora, David Warner, and Rod Fliegel, Littler this spring]
Food roundup
- “A refuge for drunks”: the Los Angeles city council’s war against tamale wagons, popular food carts of their day, 1900-1925 [Gustavo Arellano, Reason]
- Yet another study punctures “food desert” myth, but will government listen? [L.A. Times, earlier]
- To make a point, members of Congress dine on steak, eggs, and raw milk that can’t be shipped across state lines per USDA regs [Scott Shackford, Reason]
- “New Rockstar Lawsuit: Consuming Massive Amounts of Caffeine (x4) Allegedly Leads To Heart Attack” [Abnormal Use; related, Jacob Sullum]
- Four-day Mumbai ban on sale of meat during religious festival “part of a creeping invasion into the private lives of citizens” [Tanmaya Nanda, Business Standard; Pradap Bhanu Mehta, Indian Express]
- “A brief history of the dairy lobby’s unwholesome influence on the U.S. Supreme Court” [Damon Root, Reason]
- “New Jersey Federal Baked Goods Fraud Class Actions Are Toast” [Steve McConnell, Drug and Device Law]
Advocacy infographics, international labor division
The Washington Post published, and many well-intentioned people circulated, an infographic asserting that more than 1,000 migrant workers have already lost their lives in Qatar from the building of the World Cup and that more than 4,000 are on track to perish by the time the project ends. How dodgy are those numbers, generated by the International Trade Union Confederation and amplified into an influential graphic by WonkBlog’s Christopher Ingraham? “More than 500,000 Indians live in the country. …. ITUC seems to have presumed that any Indian who dies in Qatar has lost his or her life because of the World Cup.” The problems with the numbers go on from there. “Qatar has a terrible human rights record and often treats workers like slaves. But imprecise arguments and exaggerated numbers do not help.” [Rohan Venkataramakrishnan, Scroll.in]
Indian High Court strikes down speech-throttling law
The law in India still poses a variety of civil and criminal hazards for speech, but Section 66A of the Information Technology Act — which originated as a measure to fight “cyber crimes against women” — was an unconstitutionally vague restraint on speech, according to the nation’s Supreme Court. [Indian Express, Hindustan Times, Times of India and more (police still have other legal provisions available against “offensive” speech on social media)]
Free speech roundup
- Why are PEN and Index on Censorship luminaries supporting Hacked Off press control campaign in UK? [Brendan O’Neill]
- Religious offense, hate speech and blasphemy: meet India’s self-appointed “Ban Man” [WaPo]
- “Like a free press? Thank corporate personhood.” [Dylan Matthews, Vox]
- Participant’s memoir: “spontaneous” mob violence against Danish cartoons was anything but [Lars Hvidberg, Freedom House]
- Floyd Abrams testifies at Senate hearing on proposed constitutional amendments to curtail First Amendment for purposes of limiting campaign speech [Volokh]
- Ruling: Pennsylvania high court judge can proceed with libel suit against Philadelphia newspapers [Philadelphia mag, Inquirer]
- Missouri gun activist ordered to remove material from internet about police encounter wins settlement [Volokh, earlier]
February 20 roundup
- “Woman Arrested Nine Years After Failing to Return Rented Video” [S.C.: Lowering the Bar, more]
- “Why India’s Ban Against Child Labor Increased Child Labor” [James Schneider, EconLib]
- “I’ve never seen an attorney general sanctioned.” Court hits Nevada AG Catherine Cortez Masto with sanctions after collapse of robosigning suit against mortgage servicer that state hired D.C.’s Cohen Milstein to bring [Daniel Fisher, update (case settles)]
- Another review of the new collection The American Illness: Essays on the Rule of Law (Frank Buckley, ed.) [Bainbridge, earlier]
- They would be major: “The Gains from Getting Rid of ‘Run Amok’ Occupational Licensing” [David Henderson]
- E-cigarettes could save lives [Sally Satel, Washington Post]
- How incentives to avoid tax can lead to social tragedy, in this case via ABBA stage outfits [Guardian]
September 3 roundup
- The bureaucracy in India brings Gilbert & Sullivan to life: “He has been corresponding with himself for the last 26 days as an officer wearing different hats.” [Deccan Chronicle via @tylercowen]
- “Certificate of Need” laws: “You Shouldn’t Have to Ask Your Competitors for Permission to Start a Business” [Ilya Shapiro]
- No massive shift to arbitration clauses in franchise world since SCOTUS rulings [Peter Rutledge and Christopher Drahozal via Alison Frankel; Andrew Trask]
- Evergreen headline in slightly varying forms: “Anti-abuse group’s director quits after arrest in assault” [Sacramento Bee; related here, here, etc.]
- Economic liberalization increases growth [Alex Tabarrok]
- “With Auto Amber Alerts, We’re Opted In By Default To A ‘Little Brother’ Surveillance Society” [Kashmir Hill]
- How Florida trial lawyers plan to crack the tobacco-verdict vault [Daniel Fisher]