A “56-year-old man pleaded guilty Thursday in Caroline County District Court to one count of ‘attempted suicide’ and was sentenced to a three-year suspended jail sentence, and two years of probation.” While the Maryland legislature has not enacted any law against attempting to end one’s own life, the state’s judicial system continues (unlike most states’) to recognize a category known as common law crimes. [Justin Fenton, Baltimore Sun]
Archive for March, 2018
ADA mass filing roundup
- U.S. House (215 Rs + 12 Ds) passes HR 620, ADA Education and Reform Act, aimed at curbing drive-by lawsuits by giving owners a chance to fix before being liable. Though a modest and targeted reform — it reaches only architectural barriers, and doesn’t try to get at web accessibility suits — it was met with wheelchair sit-ins and hysterical coverage about “gutting” the ADA, and its future in the Senate is uncertain [Minh Vu, Seyfarth Shaw]
- Another idea, from Utah Rep. Norm Thurston: “The Bad Faith Demand Letters Concerning Americans with Disabilities Act” [Matt Gephardt and Michelle Poe, KUTV] “Disabled persons advocate says piles of lawsuits show ADA working as designed” [same, on views of Aaron Kinikini, legal director at Utah’s Disability Law Center]
- “ADA litigant sues Chef Kwan’s, city of Menlo Park; She’s filed 37 suits in 30 months” [Palo Alto, Calif.; Emily Mibach, Daily Post]
- Web accessibility complaints fuel continued surge in ADA suits [Seyfarth Shaw, more]
- F’rinstance: lawyer rolls out ADA web accessibility claims against NYC grocers [Aaron Elstein, Crain’s New York] Celebrity and cosmetic brands hit [Lisa Fickenscher, New York Post] “Wet Willie’s” bar chain takes its number in line [Steven Helland, Frederikson & Byron]
- “This suit is but one of 385 ADA lawsuits that Deutsch filed in 306 days” [Jon Deutsch v. Annis Enterprises on an Omar Rosales case] But Rosales beats a disciplinary proceeding rap in Travis County court, so maybe there’s nothing that violates current law in his challenged methods [David Barer, KXAN] More: Mark Pulliam.
Did bots fraudulently submit $400,000 in claims in a class action settlement?
“U.S. District Judge Jon Tigar asked federal prosecutors to investigate nearly 6,000 potentially bogus claims submitted in a $5.3 million settlement with app makers, including Twitter, Instagram and Yelp…. None of the [5,924] identified claims used unique claim numbers provided in email notices that were sent out to potential class members. In addition, numerous claims had different physical addresses but came from identical IP addresses.” [Ross Todd, The Recorder] Some used repetitive street addresses and unlikely or repetitive names of individuals, including at least one individual who was a legitimate member of the class but whose name was used by others to file claims. [Alison Frankel, Reuters (“The class action claim bots are coming! (Actually, they’re already here)”); ABA Journal]