It _is_ interesting to see how far one person can get filing frivolous lawsuits. A great subject of study would be to calculate the costs of these – how far do they get, on average? How much court time is spent? etc.

On a practical note, though, money could easily be saved up front by just getting the guy proper psychiatric care. I saw one suit that he moved to dismiss because he realized that the voices were in his head, not in real life.

This could be a case of the costs of not providing rigorous health care.

i really should be more annoyed about how he is using the legal system, but i really can’t get too worked up about it. the lawsuits are just too funny…it’s as if he’s using the courts as an as-yet-untested form of performance art, and i want to see how far he can take it.

he missed his calling…he should never have gone into identity theft. he’d have made a ton of money legally as an absurdist humourist.

In divorce and family law cases, the “winner pays” rule is common in many states, at the expense of both innocent spouses and their employers, who are ordered to pay the fees of divorce lawyers they end up successfully fighting.

In California and Massachusetts, the spouse who had more assets before the divorce is commonly ordered to pay the attorneys fees of the other spouse even when the “richer” spouse prevails on the relevant motions and legal issues, and the divorce leaves the nominally “richer” spouse under crushing support payments.

That’s true even when the divorce so ruins the once wealthier spouse (through support payments and equitable distribution) that the spouse whose attorney receives the fees really is more prosperous afterwards.

(In Massachusetts, child support equals 25 percent of gross income — and more than a third of net income — for just one child, leaving the supposedly “richer” non-custodial parent actually poorer than the custodial parent after the divorce, as a result of having to pay most of the “richer” parent’s net income in child support and spousal support).

Non-parties (such as a spouse’s employer) dragged into document disputes with a divorcing wife may be ordered to pay her attorneys fees even when they prevail in quashing her subpoena for documents aimed at them. (The California Third District Court of Appeal ordered just that).

Thankfully, in other states, like Virginia, a spouse who brings an unsuccessful appeal in a divorce case typically does not receive attorneys fees from the spouse who won, even if the losing spouse is poorer.

“Winner pays” thus does not apply to everything.

Note, however, that even in Virginia spouses commonly end up paying lawyers for the other side, even absent a showing of fault.

That’s because the supposedly wealthier husband against whom a no-fault divorce is typically granted (over his objection) is commonly ordered to pay attorneys fees even in states like Virginia, even though soon after the divorce, the ex-husband’s living standard typically falls because of support obligations.

See my December 4, 2007 post “The Economics of Divorce” at openmarket.org.

yojoe