April 10 — Soap star: ABC wrote my character out of the show. “A former star of ABC’s daytime drama ‘All My Children’ has filed a lawsuit for nearly $32 million, claiming that the network lied to him and damaged him professionally and financially.
“Michael Nader, who played the dark, dashing and rich Hungarian Count Dimitri Marick on ‘All My Children’ for nearly 10 years, says in court papers that he ‘became ill’ in February 2001 and went on medical leave.
“Nader, 57, was in fact in drug treatment after a narcotics arrest in Manhattan’s East Village. The district attorney’s office said he pleaded guilty and was sentenced May 22, 2001, to three years of probation.
“Nader’s Dimitri character …was written out of the show in 1999. The character was resurrected in 2000 but was written out again in 2001 after Nader’s arrest and rehab. … Nader says [in court papers] he told ABC in March 2001 that he was ready to work but officials there told him to continue on medical leave. … [Later they] refused to release him from his [$1.7 million five-year] contract [signed in April 2000] so he could work elsewhere.” (“Former ‘All My Children’ Star Files Suit”, AP/Newsday, Apr. 3). (DURABLE LINK)
April 10 — “Peter’s Pence”. Baltimore plaintiff’s lawyer and political czar Peter Angelos, who had been demanding $1 billion in fees for representing the state of Maryland in its tobacco suit, has ended the dispute by agreeing to take a mere $150 million instead. The people over at the National Association of Manufacturers’ Human Resources Policy Department feel awfully sorry for the Orioles owner for having to settle for such a measly amount and have launched a “Peter’s Pence” campaign by which readers can collect the spare change off their dresser tops and send it to him to help make up some of the extra $850 million (“Workplace Watch”, NAM, April; Daniel LeDuc, “Md., Angelos Reach Tobacco Fee Deal”, Washington Post, Mar. 22). (DURABLE LINK)
April 10 — “Can Pain Treatment Survive Our Addiction to Law?”. After suffering the effects of a partially collapsed lung, writer Jonathan Rauch learns firsthand how much pain sufferers have to lose if our runaway litigation system takes away their access to the revolutionary pain relief medication OxyContin (National Journal/Reason Online, Apr. 6). See also Damien Cave, “No relief”, Salon, Apr. 4; Duane Freese, “In Rx, Who’s To Blame For Abuse?”, TechCentralStation.com, Feb. 14; and earlier reports on this site: Jan. 23-24, 2002, Aug. 7-8 and July 25, 2001. Updates: see May 30, Aug. 27. (DURABLE LINK)
April 8-9 — An eggshell psyche at U.Va. Law. Worst harassment suit of the year? At the University of Virginia, first-year law student Marta Sanchez on Feb. 26 filed “a claim of assault and battery in Albemarle Circuit Court, seeking $25,000 in compensatory damages and $10,000 in punitive damages” against Prof. Kenneth Abraham, a nationally prominent scholar in tort law. To quote Wendy McElroy’s summary of the case: “During an introductory program last August, Abraham demonstrated a legal principle known as the ‘egg-shell skull rule’ from Vosburg v. Putney, a case commonly taught in torts classes [in which one child’s minor battery on another unexpectedly causes major harm to the victim]. Abraham announced his intention to show the class of about twenty students how a slight contact could be actionable. Then Abraham briefly touched Sanchez on her fully clothed shoulder. …Former students confirm that the shoulder tapping is a standard part of Abraham’s lesson on Vosburg. Sanchez says the tap flooded her with memories of being terrorized, raped and molested when she was 11 years old and living in her native land of Panama.” “What some would characterize as mere touching to this victim was an extreme event,” said Sanchez’s lawyer, Steven Rosenfield. “What makes it different is that she was the victim at the hands of men in the past.” (DURABLE LINK)
SOURCES: Nick Denton, “University student sues law professor”, Cavalier Daily, Mar. 27; AP/Richmond Times-Dispatch, Mar. 26; Wendy McElroy, FoxNews.com, Apr. 2; Justin Park, “Student sues professor”, Virginia Law Weekly, Mar. 22 (PDF); blogs InstaPundit, Mar. 25 and Mar. 26 and DaveTepper.net, Mar. 25.
April 8-9 — Zero tolerance leaves ’em gasping. School districts across the country are decreeing that “students with asthma must keep their emergency inhalers in the school office, rather than on hand.” Better time your attacks for after school, guys (Catherine Seipp, Reason, Apr.). (DURABLE LINK)
April 8-9 — “Former clients sue attorney O’Quinn”. “Twenty former clients of lawyer John O’Quinn are suing him for alleged mishandling of the Kennedy Heights and Chevron contamination settlement, in which they received $12 million instead of the $500 million that he asserted their claims were worth.” Billed at the time as a major “environmental racism” case, the Kennedy Heights litigation asserted that toxic residues had caused cancers and other ailments among the largely African-American residents of the Houston neighborhood, a charge disputed by defendant Chevron. But were the clients really unaware that it’s standard practice for lawyers in this country to talk up a far higher valuation for injury claims than those claims are actually likely to settle for? The former clients also say O’Quinn used his involvement in the Kennedy Heights case for image-buffing purposes to help beat a 1998 disciplinary rap. “A similar [pending] lawsuit was filed in 1999 by about 80 former plaintiffs who were Kennedy Heights residents claiming O’Quinn allegedly shortchanged them on a settlement.” (Jo Ann Zuniga, Houston Chronicle, Apr. 3). In 1999, when former breast implant clients filed a complaint against O’Quinn, the combative litigator struck back with a libel suit against the women’s lawyer which resulted in a quick gag order shutting down the story (see Aug. 4, 1999). (DURABLE LINK)
April 8-9 — Traffic-cams: Volokh v. Labash. UCLA law prof Eugene Volokh, in a contrarian vein, ventures to defend the red-light cameras that some cities use to generate speeding tickets, arguing that if they are operated in a non-abusive way they hold out promise of being more objective than traffic cops (“The Cameras Are Watching — And It’s a Good Thing”, Wall Street Journal, Mar. 26, reprinted at author’s site). However, Matt Labash’s new investigation for the Weekly Standard shows that the use of cameras in practice has been anything but free from error and abuse (example: cities’ propensity to shorten the duration of yellow lights to bolster revenues). There will be little reason to trust the system’s integrity so long as cities go on letting a contractor run the program in exchange for a share of ticket revenues: as we’re always emphasizing on this site, contingency fees and trustworthy law enforcement just don’t mix (see Sept. 6, 2001) (Matt Labash, “Inside’s the District’s Red Lights”, Weekly Standard, Apr. 1; “The Yellow Menace”, Apr. 2; “The Safety Myth”, Apr. 3; “Getting Rear-Ended by the Law”, Apr. 4; “Fighting the Good Fight”, Apr. 5). (Update/correction: the original post named Lockheed Martin as the contractor in charge of the program, but a reader advises us (see letter, Apr. 19) that Lockheed sold its photo traffic-enforcement division to Affiliated Computer Services Inc. of Dallas, Texas on August 24, 2001; we have corrected the text accordingly). (DURABLE LINK)
April 5-7 — Right to yell “fire”. In Denver, Claudia Huntey is suing her landlord, which she says violated disability-rights law when it evicted her. “She was cruelly thrown out of her apartment solely because she makes involuntary vocalizations due to her Tourette’s syndrome,” said her attorney, John Holland, who said the apartment managers should have made greater efforts to accommodate Huntey’s condition after repeated complaints from other residents of the complex. “What happened to Claudia Huntey is a societal wake-up call reminding us that this continuing struggle is far from over,” said Holland. For neighbors, the wake-up calls were of a different nature: Huntey suffers from more than usually intense symptoms of Tourette’s, as a result of which “[t]he intensity of the constant, involuntary sounds cause her ribs and chest muscles to ache, and she is chronically hoarse from yelling. … For reasons she does not understand, Huntey most often says or yells, ‘Fire!'”. (Sue Lindsay, “Tourette’s sufferer sues, charging unfair eviction”, Rocky Mountain News, Apr. 4). (DURABLE LINK)
April 5-7 — From the grave, instructions to sue. Brooksville, Fla.: “A woman who hanged herself in jail while waiting to face charges in her husband’s death asked in a suicide note that her lawyer sue the jail for allowing her to die. … [Laren] Sims, 36, was awaiting extradition to California to face charges of killing her attorney husband, Larry McNabney, and burying him in a vineyard. ‘My impression is she’s got a scam going even in death,’ said San Joaquin County prosecutor Lester Fleming, who was trying to extradite Sims to California. ‘It’s just an amazingly cold-blooded note.'” (“California woman accused in husband’s murder urged suit based on suicide”, AP/Boston Globe, Apr. 4). (DURABLE LINK)
April 5-7 — Avoid having a medical emergency in Mississippi. The malpractice-suit crisis in the Magnolia State just keeps getting worse: “The Mississippi Trauma Advisory Committee has suspended re-inspection of its hospitals for a year to give health officials time to address the growing problem of surgeons leaving the system.” The state legislature, in which trial lawyer-legislators occupy strategic positions (see June 15, 2001), adjourned without heeding the doctors’ plea for legal relief. (“Mississippi in trauma crisis as surgeons leave”, AP/Memphis Commercial Appeal, Mar. 19)(& see Jun. 3-4, 2002). (DURABLE LINK)
April 5-7 — Advice the whole country could use. P. J. O’Rourke, reviewing two etiquette books: “[M]uch of their advice [the “Etiquette Grrls”] is needed by the entire nation: ”It is much, much more polite simply to tell someone ‘See you in hell’ than ‘See you in court.”’ (New York Times Book Review, Mar. 24). Also: Michael Kinsley on suing as “our national sport” (scroll to near end) (“Social Hypochondria”, Washington Post, Mar. 1). And: author Philip Howard (The Death of Common Sense) is launching a new organization called the Coalition for the Common Good that will gather participants from across the political spectrum in an effort to curb legal excess (Michael Barone, “The Common Good”, U.S. News, Mar. 25; Stuart Taylor, Jr., “How More Rights Have Made Us Less Free”, National Journal/The Atlantic, Feb. 12). (DURABLE LINK)
April 3-4 — High court nixes back pay for illegal aliens. Last week, in Hoffman Plastic Compounds v. NLRB, the Supreme Court by a 5-4 vote ruled that illegal aliens can’t collect damages for being fired from jobs it was never lawful for them to hold (Gina Holland, “Supreme Court Restricts Illegal Workers’ Rights in Employment Cases”, AP/Law.com, Mar. 28; see Oct. 28, 1999). Our editor has a new piece out in National Review Online today (Wed.) expressing relief that for the moment at least the country will be free of this absurdity. (Walter Olson, “A Wink Too Far”, Apr. 3). For a contrasting view, here are the editorialists at the San Francisco Chronicle (“Green light for abuse”, Apr. 2).
April 3-4 — “Addictive” computer game blamed for suicide. 21-year-old Shawn Woolley of Hudson, Wisc. played the popular online game EverQuest a whole lot. Then he committed suicide. Now his mother Elizabeth says she plans to sue Sony Online Entertainment, saying the game should have come with a warning label concerning its “addictive” nature, and she’s lined up attorney Jack Thompson, veteran of earlier litigation attacks on videogame companies (see, for example, July 22, 1999). A psychiatrist had diagnosed Shawn with depression and schizoid personality disorder which “fed right into the EverQuest playing,” claims Mrs. Woolley. “It was the perfect escape.” A specialist in “computer addiction” appears on cue in the article, as if summoned by the lawyer, to say that “The manufacturer of EverQuest purposely made it in such a way that it is more intriguing to the addict” and that it “could be created in a less addictive way, but (that) would be the difference between powdered cocaine and crack cocaine.” Moreover, “[h]aving low self-esteem or poor body image are also important factors, he said.” (Stanley A. Miller II, “Death of a game addict”, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Mar. 30) (and see letter to the editor from attorney Jack Thompson, Apr. 11). (DURABLE LINK)
April 3-4 — Microsoft case and AG contributions. Columnist Robert Novak rather rudely totes up the very considerable contributions that Microsoft’s rivals have been making to the campaigns of state attorneys general like Bill Lockyer in California and Carla Stovall in Kansas, both of whom are running for governor (Robert Novak, “Money driving Microsoft case?”, Chicago Sun-Times, Apr. 1) (& see Apr. 15). Blogger Ed Driscoll reminds us that AGs also have another constituency that wants them to keep the pressure on Redmond, namely trial lawyers who stand to gain a fortune from the private suits against the company (Mar. 31; see Jeff Taylor, “Symposium: Microsoft Endgame?”, National Review Online, Nov. 5, 2001).
April 3-4 — Ninth Circuit orders Agent Orange payments. The federal appeals court that does so much to provide this site with material has ordered that Vietnam veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange and later contracted prostate cancer and diabetes be given disability payments, “setting a precedent that could cover many illnesses linked to the defoliant.” (“Some Agent Orange Veterans Win Payments”, Reuters/New York Times, Apr. 2). The problem remains that health authorities are by no means agreed that the compound had anything to do with those ailments or most of the others complained of. (Howard Feinberg, “Vetting Agent Orange”, TechCentralStation.com, Mar. 11; Reason links, Feb. 28) (see Jan. 7-8).
April 1-2 — Intel Corp. versus yoga foundation. For more than a year lawyers for giant chipmaker Intel Corp. have been menacing the Yoga Inside Foundation of Venice, Calif., claiming that the nonprofit group’s name infringes on its own “Intel Inside” trademark. “Yoga Inside has nothing to do with computers. It provides free yoga classes in schools, treatment facilities, shelters, prisons and underprivileged communities.” Founder Mark Stephens says the similarity of the slogans “never even crossed my mind” until the company complained. Because of the large sums it has spent to promote its trademark, “Intel argues, the linguistic construction ‘(Blank) Inside,’ whether concerning state-of-the-art technology or a centuries-old spiritual practice, should uniquely belong to the chipmaker.” As for the bad karma to be had in picking on a little group like this, “We’re certainly sensitive about that,” said Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy. “But our hands are tied because of the way the law is structured”. (David Lazarus, “Intel forces yoga group to fight for its name”, San Francisco Chronicle, Mar. 29; Slashdot thread) (DURABLE LINK)
April 1-2 — No more ANZAC Day marches? Australia has rapidly Americanized its liability system and is now paying the price in the form of a drying up of insurance for local events such as ANZAC Day, which honors veterans. “Federal Assistant Treasurer Helen Coonan called [a Mar. 27] forum to share ideas after a series of community events had to be cancelled because of the insurance crisis. … Earlier, Senator Coonan said it was common sense to restrict the ability of those injured while drunk, drug-affected or committing a crime to sue for compensation.” (“States thrash out insurance crisis”, AAP/News.com, Mar. 27; “Quick insurance savings ruled out”, AAP, Mar. 27). With medical claims spiraling, New South Wales health minister Craig Knowles has warned that the nation’s “main medical malpractice insurer could collapse within weeks”, which could leave 60 percent of Australia’s doctors “uninsured for private practice work, and throw the health system into chaos”. (Mark Robinson, “Doctors’ insurer on brink of collapse”, Sydney Morning Herald, Mar. 22). (DURABLE LINK)
April 1-2 — Roger Parloff on 9/11 fund. “If the victims may have no viable claim in the tort system after all, because no one was really at fault for their deaths other than the terrorists, then why must a compassion-driven, taxpayer-financed fund pay what the tort system might theoretically have extracted from a totally hypothetical, deep-pocketed, unambiguously guilty defendant? … [Critiques of the Feinberg proposals as insufficiently generous] demonstrate the otherworldly sense of entitlement that the tort system now fosters.
“In setting up an alternative to the tort system, Congress made an admission that cannot be retracted. … What they said, in essence, was this: In all probability, skilled plaintiffs’ lawyers representing sympathetic victims would convince juries that the airlines were responsible for what happened. That’s because plaintiffs’ lawyers have become expert at redirecting blame from judgment-proof targets toward minimally blameworthy, solvent targets. We all know that such ‘fault’ is, to some degree, a fiction. It’s just a compassionate way to ensure that grievously injured, inadequately insured people get taken care of. The trouble is, when catastrophes get big enough, not even corporate entities are sufficiently deep-pocketed to pay without other innocent human beings suffering as a result. In blaming and bankrupting the airlines — or the private security firms, or the airports, or the municipalities that operate them, or Boeing Corporation, or any of the other usual suspects — we will obviously be scapegoating minimally blameworthy corporations for the nation’s universal unpreparedness. In so doing, we will be creating new waves of innocent victims: airline employee-shareholders who, like Enron’s, see their retirement funds vaporize; public and private employees who are thrown out of work; local residents whose public services deteriorate and whose taxes rise when their local municipal authorities in New York, New Jersey, or Boston go broke.” So now how about applying those lessons in other areas of mass tort litigation? (Roger Parloff, “Tortageddon”, The American Lawyer, Mar. 18). (DURABLE LINK)
April 1-2 — Gary & Co. shenanigans at Maris trial. Last August, after a three-month trial, a Gainesville, Fla. state court jury awarded the family of late baseball star Roger Maris $50 million against Anheuser-Busch Inc. in a dispute over the termination of a beer distributorship. The family had earlier lost an antitrust case against the beer company in federal court. They were represented at the August trial by noted Stuart, Fla. attorney Willie Gary (slavery reparations 1, 2, 3, Loewen, Disney, Coke, Gannett, Microsoft, etc.) who joined the family’s legal team two months before trial on a contingency fee basis.
Court records depict the trial, presided over by senior judge R.A. Green Jr., as a veritable carnival of lawyer misconduct. “At the beginning of this trial,” wrote Judge Green, “it became apparent to the court that counsel, primarily plaintiff’s counsel, would ‘press the limits’ of proper conduct and compliance with directives of the court.” Judge Green found two attorneys on Gary’s team, including his co-counsel and partner Madison McClellan, to be in contempt, whicle Gary himself “was ejected from the courtroom at one point and silenced by the judge on another occasion for uttering a profanity”. Moreover, “the Maris legal team sent a private investigator to conduct surveillance on the defense lawyers’ offices”, to which the defense lawyers responded with counter-surveillance. Judge Green then took the highly unusual step of appointing special master Stephen N. Bernstein to conduct a confidential investigation of lawyer misconduct at the trial. In a 35-page report, the special master concluded that the behavior of Gary and the other lawyers was “an insult to the integrity of the legal system,” and “resulted in an atmosphere that elevated tactics in pursuit of opposing counsel over the duty to pursue truth.” (Larry Keller, “Maris Trial Had Its Share of Misbehaving Lawyers”, Miami Daily Business Review, Jan. 28). Updates Jan. 5 and Jan. 7, 2004: (ethics charges against Gary thrown out by judge); Sept. 5, 2005 (case and related litigation settle for sum in excess of $120 million). (DURABLE LINK)
April 1-2 — New traffic records on Overlawyered.com. Our best month ever for number of pages served (March), best week ever (last week) and best day ever (last Wednesday). Thanks for your support!
April 19-21 — Pitcher hit by line drive sues maker of baseball bat. Hurling for the Pittsfield (Ill.) High School baseball team, Daniel Hannant put one over the plate to a batter from opponent Calhoun High School, who smacked the ball in a line drive straight at the pitcher’s mound where it hit Hannant on the head. Now Hannant is suing … guess who? The maker of the baseball bat, Hillerich & Bradsby, known for its trademark Louisville Slugger. (“Lawsuit comes out swinging”, Chicago Tribune, Apr. 18) (& see letter to the editor, Jun. 14; update, Dec. 30). (DURABLE LINK)
April 19-21 — No apologies from RFK Jr. As the uproar continues in Iowa over Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s assertion that large hog-raising operations are more of a threat to American democracy than Osama bin Laden, Kennedy’s office has sent word to the Des Moines Register not to expect an apology or retraction. (Mark Siebert, “Kennedy stands by hog-lot remark”, Apr. 18; J. R. Taylor, “To the Preening Born”, New York Press “Billboard”, Apr. 18; earlier reports on this site Apr. 15, Apr. 17). Far from being an unconsidered slip of the tongue, the comparison seems to have been a feature of Kennedy’s speeches for months, to judge from a report published back in January on another of his Midwestern swings: “This threat is greater than that in Afghanistan,” he was quoted as saying. “This is not only a threat to the environment, it is a threat to the American economy and democracy.” (Gretchen Schlosser, National Hog Farmer, Jan. 15, linked in WSJ OpinionJournal.com “Best of the Web” Jan. 21). And a staff attorney from Kennedy’s office has sent us a letter responding to our editor’s Wednesday New York Post op-ed on the affair, to which we append a fairly lengthy response — see our letters page.
MORE: The food-industry-defense group Center for Consumer Freedom has been on the warpath against Kennedy and his band of lawyers for a while. It quotes Iowa Agriculture Secretary Patty Judge as saying: “The true agenda of this group is to sue farms and take the monetary rewards back to the East Coast.” (“Trashing Pork, Cashing In”, Apr. 11). Kennedy has estimated “damages” against the industry of $13 billion: “We have lawyers with the deepest pockets, and they’ve agreed to fight the industry to the end,” he has said. “We’re going to go after all of them.” (“Kennedy’s Pork Police Hit Iowa”, Apr. 2; “Waterkeepers, Farmers Weepers”, Dec. 12, 2001) “‘We’re starting with hogs. After the hogs, then we are going after the other ones,’ referring to the poultry and beef industries.” (“Warning”, Jan. 16, 2001, citing “Concerns that pork suit may be extended to other areas,” Des Moines Register, Jan. 8, 2001). (DURABLE LINK)
April 19-21 — Traffic-cams, cont’d. In the controversy (see Apr. 8-9) over the uses and abuses of automated traffic camera systems, a reader writes in (see letters page) to say we were wrong to describe Lockheed Martin as the current contractor on the systems; it actually sold the operation last August to another company. Our apologies. And Eugene Volokh reports on his blog (Apr. 17) that he found some inaccuracies in Matt Labash’s Weekly Standard investigative series on the cameras which Labash and the Standard have been happy to correct. See also “Hawaii scraps ‘Talivan’ traffic cameras”, AP/ABC News, Apr. 11. (DURABLE LINK)
April 19-21 — Clipboard-throwing manager = $30 million clipping for grocery chain. The Ralphs supermarket chain in California had a store manager who over the course of a decade “physically and verbally abused six female Ralphs employees by calling them vulgar names, manhandling them, and throwing items like telephones, clipboards and, in one instance, a 30- to 40-pound mailbag, at them.” So a San Diego jury awarded them $5 million each in damages. (Alexei Oreskovic, “$30M Awarded in Sex Harassment Suit Against Grocery Chain”, The Recorder, Apr. 9)(& update Jul. 26-28: judge cuts total award to $8 million). (DURABLE LINK)
April 19-21 — See you … at the Big Apple Blog Bash Friday night. (DURABLE LINK)
April 18 — “Tampa Taliban” mom blames acne drug. By reader acclaim: “The family of 15-year-old Charles Bishop has filed a $70-million lawsuit against the maker of acne medication Accutane, saying nothing else explains the teenager’s suicidal flight into a downtown Tampa high-rise.” Bishop, whose father bore an Arab surname, left a suicide note praising Osama bin Laden; the county medical examiner’s office found no trace of Accutane in his bloodstream, although it says that does not rule out the possibility that he might have been on the medication, for which he had been written a prescription. Although the maker of the widely used acne drug denies that it causes psychosis or suicidal impulses, its cautious consent form “required the Bishops to agree to tell their physician ‘if anyone in the family has ever had symptoms of depression, been psychotic, attempted suicide, or had any other serious mental problems.’ Julia Bishop, however, did not reveal that in 1984, she and Charles’ estranged father failed in a bloody suicide pact during which she stabbed him with a 12-inch butcher knife.” Mrs. Bishop’s lawyer, Michael Ryan of Fort Lauderdale, calls that earlier suicide pact incident “completely irrelevant”. (Robert Farley, “Suit: Drug behind suicide flight”, St. Petersburg Times, Apr. 17; Natashia Gregoire, “Teen Pilot’s Family Sues Drug Maker”, Tampa Tribune, Apr. 17; “Accutane acne drug maker sued over suicide”, USA Today/Reuters, Apr. 16; Broward Liston and Tim Padgett, “Despair Beneath His Wings”, Time, Jan. 13; Howard Feinberg, “Is Accutane to Blame?”, TechCentralStation.com, Apr. 18; see Feb. 1). Updates: manufacturer wins first jury trial (Margaret Cronin Fisk, “Suits Probe Acne Drug, Depression”, National Law Journal, Apr. 25; Michael Fumento, “The Accutane Blame Game”, National Review Online, May 9). (DURABLE LINK)
April 18 — Judge compares class action lawyers to “squeegee boys”. A Florida judge has rejected the tentative settlement of a shareholder lawsuit filed by Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach against power company Florida Progress Corp. over a 1999 merger, saying the evidence indicated that the suit did not leave class members in a better position than if it had never been filed. Added Pinellas County Judge W. Douglas Baird: “This action appears to be the class litigation equivalent of the ‘squeegee boys’ who used to frequent major urban intersections and who would run up to a stopped car, splash soapy water on its perfectly clean windshield and expect payment for the uninvited service of wiping it off.” (Jason Hoppin, The Recorder, Apr. 17). (DURABLE LINK)
April 18 — Welcome Humorix.org readers. The Linux-humor site started linking to us way back in 1999, if we remember correctly. Also sending us visitors lately: Auckland (N.Z.) District Law Society, Mar. 14 (“For a change of pace, spend some time with this digest of news stories … Most cases reported on are from the U.S., but there are quite a few examples from Europe, Australia, and elsewhere”); WTIC-AM Hartford, “Morning Links”, Apr. 7; American Civil Rights Union “ACLU Watch”, Nintendominion “Site Unseen”, Mar. 31; Dog Brothers Martial Arts (Hermosa Beach, Calif.), Mutual Reinsurance Bureau, Anne Klockenkemper (Univ. of Florida) Media Law Resources, Smith Freed & Eberhard P.C. (attorneys at law, Portland, Ore.), Univ. of Nevada-Reno Tau Kappa Epsilon, RKKA.org (Russian Red Army-themed wargaming); Fureyous.com, Mar. (“My dream site, a site where I can find the entire downfall of civilization due to frivolous and pathetic lawsuits and legal actions”), and many more. (DURABLE LINK)
April 17 — New York Post op-ed on RFK Jr. & hogs. Our editor has a piece today on the op-ed page of the New York Post about the furor that broke out in Iowa when celebrity environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. told a rally that large-scale hog farms are more of a threat to America than Osama bin Laden and his terrorists. For links to the local Iowa coverage, see our item here from Monday, of which the Post op-ed is an expansion. (Walter Olson, “Osama, the Pigs and the Kennedy”, New York Post, Apr. 17).
April 16-17 — Pharmaceutical roundup. The total cost of the settlement over the diet compound fen-phen has ballooned to more than $13 billion, swollen by mass recruitment by law firms of claimants who defendants believe have suffered no ill effects from the compound at all aside from possible worry. “Wyeth’s general counsel, Louis L. Hoynes Jr., said he believes that in a different legal climate his company might have been able to settle all serious claims for less than $1 billion. That would amount to an average of $1 million each for 1,000 cases.” (L. Stuart Ditzen, “Mass diet-pill litigation inflates settlement costs to $13.2 billion”, Philadelphia Inquirer, Apr. 9 — whole article well worth reading). Lawyers for a group of British women have filed what is believed to be the first injury suit over the “third-generation” birth control pill, which they say raises the risk of blood clots, and similar suits are expected to follow in the United States (Mary Vallis, “U.K. suit targets perils of The Pill”, National Post, Mar. 5). In one of the more recent applications of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Daubert doctrine, courts have dismissed several lawsuits seeking to blame Pfizer’s anti-impotency drug Viagra for users’ heart attacks, ruling that the expert testimony in the cases was not based on scientific principles that had gained “general acceptance.” (Tom Perrotta, “Viagra Cases Dismissed”, New York Law Journal, Jan. 22). The Nov. 9, 2001 installment of CBS’s “48 Hours” launched a one-sided attack on psychiatric drugs used to treat attention deficit and hyperactivity and told the stories of two parents who say their use of the ADHD drug Adderall caused them to behave irrationally, resulting in the death of their children; but Hudson Institute fellow Michael Fumento finds that much was misstated or left out in the network’s account, including the exact role of the trial lawyers hovering in the background (Michael Fumento, “Prescription for Bias“, “Dawn Marie Branson: A Sad Story Only Half Told“) And although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not chosen to give a green light for the reintroduction of silicone breast implants for American women following the litigation-fueled panic that drove them from the market, they have regained popularity among women in Canada, reports the CBC (“Silicone implants back in style”, Sept. 20, 2001). (DURABLE LINK)
April 16-17 — A DMCA run-in. Tom Veal’s Stromata site, which covers topics ranging from pension regulation to science fiction, had a run-in a few days ago with its hosting service, Tripod, which abruptly closed down access to the site and then took its sweet time about reopening it. The reason? Tripod had received a nastygram from a law firm charging that Stromata was in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, not because it had posted any copyrighted material itself, but because it had linked to another site which had (it said) posted an unauthorized translation of a widely discussed piece on terrorism by Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci. Unfortunately, as Veal notes, the incentives under DMCA are for hosts to muzzle speech in haste and un-muzzle at leisure. (“Et Cetera”, Apr. 9). (DURABLE LINK)
April 16-17 — Unlikely critic of litigation. The Washington group Judicial Watch files lawsuits at a manic clip, but now its founder Larry Klayman is taking to the mails to decry our national problem of excessive litigiousness. “One may liken the overall effect of Klayman’s direct-mail sermon against frivolous lawsuits to that of a Weight Watchers commercial starring Marlon Brando or a temperance lecture given by Hunter S. Thompson.” (Tim Noah, “Larry Klayman Decries Evils of Litigation!”, Slate, Apr. 3). (DURABLE LINK)
April 15 — RFK Jr. blasted for hog farm remarks. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the highest-profile spokesman for the developing alliance between trial lawyers and some environmentalist groups (see Dec. 7, 2000), “made an ass of himself” in remarks last weekend at a Clear Lake, Ia. rally, according to veteran Des Moines Register political columnist David Yepsen. Kennedy’s “statement that large-scale hog producers were a bigger threat to America than Osama bin Laden’s terrorists has to be one of the crudest things ever said in Iowa politics. … [Kennedy] brought his Waterkeeper’s Alliance for a rally [in Clear Lake]. It’s a group that is threatening lawsuits against livestock industries. … Rural America needs positive solutions to this problem, not the corrosive rhetoric of another out-of-state political operative or lawsuits from greedy trial lawyers. … What was one of the finest hours of this legislative session was marred by this fool from the East. … Kennedy looks to be cashing in on his family’s name. … If his name were Bob Fitzgerald, he’d be dismissed as another one of the kooks on the fringe of this debate.” Other reaction was not much more favorable: “‘You have to be a complete wandering idiot to make that statement,’ said [Luke] Kollasch [of Algona, Ia.], whose family owns several hog farms and feed and construction companies in northwest Iowa.” (Donnelle Elder, “Big hog lots called greater threat than bin Laden”, Des Moines Register, Apr. 10; “Kennedy’s outrageous rhetoric” (editorial), Apr. 11; David Yepsen, “Kennedy cashes in on family name while acting like a fool”, Apr. 14) (DURABLE LINK)
April 15 — Updates. Stories that seem to have a life of their own:
* Richard Espinosa, “who is suing the city of Escondido because his dog was attacked by a cat inside a city library, now says the attack was a hate crime.” (see Dec. 4, 2001) (“Cat attack now described as hate crime”, MSNBC, Apr. 5)
* “The Florida Legislature has partially undone a landmark Florida Supreme Court ruling issued in November that gave slip-and-fall injury victims the upper hand in lawsuits against supermarkets and other premises owners.” (see Jan. 7). The ruling had required businesses to prove they were not negligent when presented with slip-fall claims. However, trial lawyers extracted a compromise in which plaintiffs will not have to prove that a slippery material was on the floor for long enough for the store owner to have known about it. (Susan R. Miller, “Florida Legislature Passes Bill on Slip-and-Fall Cases”, Miami Daily Business Review, Mar. 27).
* “A Hays County judge has thrown out a default judgment that would have awarded $5 million to a local woman whose near-topless image was used in a national television ad for a ‘Wild Party Girls’ video without her permission. … Judge Charles Ramsay set aside the default judgment, ruling that the plaintiff had listed the wrong company in the lawsuit, and that the video’s makers were not either properly named or properly served.” (see Mar. 6-7) (Carol Coughlin, “Topless suit is groundless, judge rules”, San Marcos (Tex.) Daily Record, Mar. 30).
* More on the symbiotic relationship between state attorneys general and Microsoft competitors (see Apr. 3-4): “An April 2000 e-mail message from the Utah attorney general’s office to Novell, revealed in court, asked for ‘guidance … preferably without involving too many people seeing this language.'” (Declan McCullagh, “Report: MS Foes Bribed Attorneys”, Wired News, Apr. 6). (DURABLE LINK)
April 12-14 — Hey, no fair talking about the pot. During a 20-hour trip from California to Texas pulling a U-Haul trailer, three young women work their way through a bag of marijuana. Of course the ensuing rollover accident is, like, practically totally the fault of their Firestone tires and the U-Haul company, or at least so their lawyers argue in a suit against those companies, even though the tires did not suffer the “tread separation” that has heretofore been seen as the distinctive source of accident risk with the now-recalled Firestones. Now Matagorda County, Tex. Judge Craig Estlinbaum has declared a mistrial at the request of plaintiff’s lawyer Mikal Watts who complained that defense attorney Morgan Copeland “had breached a pretrial order by introducing detailed evidence of marijuana use” during the trip. If we read the AP story correctly, Judge Estlinbaum had ruled that the defense could mention only that portion of the marijuana it could prove the driver consumed, and attorney Copeland, who may now face sanctions in the famously pro-plaintiff county, had improperly let jurors know about the whole bag. The Ford Motor Co. was also named as a defendant but has already settled out of the case (“Texas judge declares mistrial in Firestone case”, Yahoo/ Reuters, Apr. 5; Pam Easton, “Judge declares Firestone mistrial”, AP/ MySanAntonio.com, Apr. 6). Update — additional coverage of ruling: Miriam Rozen, “Mistrial declared in Firestone case”, Texas Lawyer, Apr. 15).
April 12-14 — In the line of fire. Post-Enron, many companies feel the need to seek out savvier and more experienced executives to sit on boards and audit committees, but with escalating fears of personal liability “attracting talent may become nearly impossible. ‘Recruiting directors for the audit committee is like calling them on deck for a kamikaze attack,’ quips [corporate finance officer Bob] Williamson.” (Marie Leone, “Audit Committee? Thanks, But No Thanks”, CFO Magazine, Apr. 5).
April 12-14 — L.A. police sued, and sued. The family of the late James Allen Beck, who died in a fiery shootout with L.A. sheriff’s deputies last August after barricading himself in his home, has filed a wrongful death claim against the sheriff’s department. During the standoff Beck, an ex-police officer with a history of stockpiling weapons at his home, shot and killed Deputy Hagop Kuredjian. (“Mother of gunman who died in shootout files claim”, Sacramento Bee, Apr. 10)(& see Feb. 23, 2000). And: “Heirs of the late rap star Notorious B.I.G. have filed a wrongful death and federal civil rights lawsuit against Los Angeles Police Chief Bernard Parks, two former chiefs and the city of Los Angeles, claiming they did not do enough to prevent the rapper’s death five years ago in a drive-by shooting.” (“Notorious B.I.G. heirs sue LAPD, officials, city”, CNN, Apr. 11).
April 11 — Don’t ban therapeutic cloning. Though not usually the petition-signing types, we (our editor) have signed a petition being circulated by Virginia Postrel’s just-launched Franklin Society opposing the current stampede in Congress to ban all scientific use of cloned human cells including “therapeutic” (non-reproductive) uses, and even the use of imported pharmaceuticals developed via such methods (see “Criminalizing Science” (symposium), Reason, Nov.). If you agree with us that this proposed law is a bad idea, you can sign the petition here and view the list of distinguished signers: despite efforts in some conservative quarters to hand down a party line opposing this potentially life-saving branch of biomedical research, support for it in fact cuts across the political spectrum. For information on contacting elected representatives, see InstaPundit, Apr. 10. (DURABLE LINK)
April 11 — Texas doctors’ work stoppage. Monday’s one-day work stoppage by South Texas doctors outraged at spiraling malpractice costs (see Mar. 15-17) drew national attention (“Texas docs protest malpractice claims”, AP/CNN, Apr. 8; see also Dean Reynolds, “Crushing Cost of Insurance”, ABCNews.com, Mar. 5 (Nev., Pa.)). And a Florida physician has launched an insurance policy for doctors “that aims to provide them with the legal resources they would need to countersue lawyers or expert witnesses filing frivolous lawsuits”. (Tanya Albert, “Frivolous suits feel wrath of Medical Justice”, American Medical News, Feb. 11). (DURABLE LINK)
April 11 — Batch of reader letters. Topics include the “pedal-extender” suit against Ford; OxyContin; suing food companies for waistline problems; police getting ticketed while responding to calls; laws mandating handicap accessibility in private homes; and why schools would send kids home when they have a slight sniffle. One writer upbraids blogger Natalie Solent for thinking it crazy to impose strict product liability on British blood suppliers that currently offer their services free of charge to patients; he thinks she (and by extension we) must not have stopped to consider that blood transfusions can transmit lethal diseases like AIDS and hepatitis.
Best of all, we hear from attorney Jack Thompson, the anti-videogame crusader who has just filed a lawsuit claiming that Sony’s EverQuest game is responsible for the suicide of a user, and he turns out to be every bit as suave and ingratiating as we dared hope (“go to Afghanistan where your anarchist, pro-drug views will be greatly rewarded”), though we wonder whether he caught the phrase “as if” in our original Apr. 3 posting. Mr. Thompson will probably not appreciate Eugene Volokh’s new satirical piece for TechCentralStation.com (“Worse than Internet Addiction”, Apr. 10). (DURABLE LINK)
April 29-30 — “Gunning for manufacturers through courts”. “A NYC council member is seeking to limit access to guns in NYC even more by opening the door to lawsuits against gun manufacturers who don’t follow a ‘corporate code of conduct’. David Yassky, a former law professor and aide for Chuck Schumer when he was a congressman, received money from 189 attorneys and others of his ‘social class’ in his successful campaign for Council, and filed an amicus brief in the US vs Emerson case encouraging a finding that in the 2nd Amendment, ‘bear arms’ meant for military use only.” (“Gunning for manufacturers through courts”, “Cut on the Bias” blog (Susanna Cornett), Apr. 22; “Metro Briefing: New York”, New York Times, Apr. 22).
On a happier note, the city of Boston last month dropped its extortionate lawsuit against the gun industry (David Abel, “Gun control forces say suits to go on”, Boston Globe, Mar. 29; “Mayor was right to drop gun case” (editorial), Boston Herald, Mar. 29 (“This case was frankly a publicity stunt — an expensive publicity stunt supposedly in the cause of ‘public health.’ But the roughly $500,000 it cost so far was diverted from other goals.”); “Boston Abandons Lawsuit Against Firearms Manufacturers”, National Shooting Sports Foundation press release, Mar. 28). (DURABLE LINK)
April 29-30 — “Erin Brockovich, the Brand”. “She gets confused with Heather Locklear and Suzanne Somers. … Over the course of last year, she became the most popular public-speaking client in the William Morris stable.” For newer readers, here’s our take. (Austin Bunn, New York Times Magazine, Apr. 28). (DURABLE LINK)
April 29-30 — Lawyers for chimps? “More and more legal reformers … are pressing to give chimpanzees legal standing — specifically, the ability to have suits filed in their names and to ask courts to protect their interests. … The advocates of granting legal standing to chimps have gained support from constitutional scholar Laurence Tribe, a Harvard Law School professor.” (David Bank, “A Harvard Professor Lobbies to Save U.S. Chimps From Monkey Business”, Wall Street Journal, Apr. 25 (online subscribers only); “Monkeying Around With the Constitution”, Ribstone Pippin blog, Apr. 25; InstaPundit, Apr. 25) (& see May 14-15). (DURABLE LINK)
April 29-30 — “Targeting “big food'”. The “campaign against Big Food is following the attack on Big Tobacco almost to a ‘T.’ … Any day now, I expect to hear that Big Food has secretly been adding special ingredients with known health risks — like salt — to their products for years to tempt the ignorant.” (Bruce Bartlett, “Targeting ‘big food'”, National Center for Policy Analysis opinion editorial, Apr. 3). It is already being argued that obesity, like smoking, imposes costs through health care provision on the non-obese, allegedly justifying more intensive government regulation of lifestyle choices (Pierre Lemieux, “It’s the Fat Police,” National Post (Canada), Apr. 6). And a 1998 revision by the federal government of its Body Mass Index standards more or less ensures that a large portion of the population will be considered to be suffering from a weight problem; according to the index, NCAA basketball stars Lonny Baxter of Maryland, Oklahoma’s Aaron McGhee, Kansas’s Nick Collision and Indiana’s Tom Coverdale are all considered “overweight” and in need of more exercise. (“Husky hoops stars?”, Center for Consumer Freedom, Mar. 27). (DURABLE LINK)
April 26-28 — “Positive Nicotine Test To Keep Student From Prom”. In Hartford City, Ind., Blackford High School has banned senior Rob Mahon, 18, from the senior prom after he tested positive for nicotine in a random drug test. Mahon, who is the editor of the school newspaper, “did not smoke on school property and is upset that he’s being punished for an activity that is legal for someone his age.” School officials, however, said that Mahon “knew the rules prohibiting drugs, alcohol and nicotine before he agreed to the testing that’s required for those in extracurricular activities.” The Indiana Civil Liberties Union is planning to represent him in a legal challenge. (TheIndyChannel.com, Apr. 25). Update May 10-12: school backs down. (DURABLE LINK)
April 26-28 — “Support case hinges on failed sterilization”. An attorney for plaintiff Heather Seslar is attempting to convince the Indiana Supreme Court that the doctor whose effort to sterilize Seslar fell short, with the result that she became pregnant and gave birth to a healthy baby girl, should pay for the entire cost of raising the child to adulthood. “A lower court already has sided with Seslar. Unless the Supreme Court overturns that decision, Indiana would become the fifth state to grant parents who underwent sterilization the right to sue doctors for the costs of raising an unexpected child. California, New Mexico, Oregon and Wisconsin also recognize the right.” (Vic Ryckaert, Indianapolis Star, Apr. 4). (DURABLE LINK)
April 26-28 — Columbia Law School survey on public attitude toward lawyers. A new nationwide survey commissioned by Columbia Law School asked a thousand respondents nationwide what they thought of the profession. It “contains some disheartening news for lawyers. … A full sixty percent of respondents said lawyers are overpaid, compared with a mere two percent who thought lawyers underpaid.” Thirty-nine percent considered lawyers either especially dishonest or somewhat dishonest, while 31 percent found them especially honest or somewhat honest, which left them faring better than politicians in the honesty ratings but sharply worse than police. Finally, respondents were asked: “Do you believe that lawyers do more harm than good by filing lawsuits that may raise the cost of doing business, or do they perform a beneficial role by holding big companies accountable to the law?” The wording of this question is decidedly peculiar — its first half, for example, states the case critical of trial lawyers about as ineptly as it is possible to do — and yet the side holding that lawyers “perform a beneficial role” prevailed by only a fifty to forty-one percent margin. (Michael C. Dorf, “Can the Legal Profession Improve Its Image?”, FindLaw, Apr. 17). (DURABLE LINK)
April 25 — “Disability rights attorney accused of having inaccessible office”. “The attorney who sued Clint Eastwood over disability accommodations at his hotel near Carmel was himself sued Tuesday on allegations his office bathroom was not wheelchair friendly. The federal suit was brought by George Louie, executive director of Oakland-based Americans with Disabilities Advocates. He alleges the bathroom and other amenities at attorney Paul Rein’s office in Oakland violate the Americans with Disabilities Act.” (AP/Contra Costa Times, Apr. 23)(see Oct. 2, 2000, Sept. 21, 2000 and links from there). Update: the allegations, which Rein vigorously contested, were later dropped without payment, according to court records (Joy Lanzendorfer, “Enforced Compliance”, MetroActive, Dec. 26, 2002). (DURABLE LINK)
April 25 — Mold sweepstakes: You May Already Be a Winner. “Entertainer Ed McMahon is suing his insurance company for more than $20 million, alleging that he was sickened by toxic mold that spread through his Beverly Hills house after contractors cleaning up water damage from a broken pipe botched the job.” (“Ed McMahon sues over mold, says dog died”, Los Angeles Times/ AZCentral.com, Apr. 9). Buyers of homeowners’ insurance may wind up among the losers: “State Farm, the largest insurer in California representing 22 percent of the market, decided last week that it would no longer write new homeowner policies in the state starting May 1. While that’s partly due to past losses, it’s also in large part due to the rising cost of mold-related claims. … In Texas, which has had the most claims increases [over mold] in the nation, rates have already nearly doubled for many homeowners.” (Deborah Lohse, “Mold becomes toxic issue to homeowners, insurers”, San Jose Mercury News, Apr. 23). Mold claims “could be the next asbestos. Yes, there’s a bit of difference: Asbestos fibers are known to cause disease and death. Whether household mold can do so is, to put it charitably, a matter of debate. But that hasn’t slowed the litigation over mold.” (Mary Ellen Egan, “The Fungus that Ate Sacramento,” Forbes, Jan. 21). Update May 21, 2003: McMahon’s claim said to have reaped $7 million settlement.
TEXAS MOLD LINKFEST: “Insurers estimate they paid out $670 million for mold-related property damage in Texas in 2001, more than double the total in 1999.” (Egan, Forbes, link above). See (all links 2001:) Jacob Sullum, “Fungi phobia”, TownHall.com, Aug. 21 (the wonderfully named Dripping Springs case); Bill Summers, “Mold cases could have a rotten effect”, San Antonio Express News, Oct. 18, reprinted at Texans for Lawsuit Reform; Eric Berger, “Mold Fears Overblown, Experts Say”, Houston Chronicle, July 12; CALA Houston links; Shannon Buggs, “Tackling Questions on Mold Coverage”, Houston Chronicle, Nov. 18; W. Gardner Selby, San Antonio Express News, “Coverage cut under review”, Nov. 13. (DURABLE LINK)
April 25 — Durbin’s electability. Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, a key Capitol Hill ally of the trial lawyers (he was the point man in defense of their unconscionable fees in the tobacco affair, for example), ran less well in his recent primary than incumbents usually do. Could he be headed for one-term status, like former Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun? (Steve Neal, “Durbin lacks the profile of a winner”, Chicago Sun-Times, Apr. 24)(see July 7, 2000). (DURABLE LINK)
April 23-24 — Fieger’s ivied walls. Controversial attorney Geoffrey Fieger is in the news again after losing a murder case for a client in Sarasota, Fla.: “Chief Circuit Judge Thomas Gallen said Fieger should be punished for calling two men who served on the jury ‘Nazis’ and ‘creeps.’ Fieger fired back, saying he has a First Amendment right to say bad things about jurors and that he may sue the judge for saying otherwise. Gallen said the Michigan lawyer’s ‘outrageous’ behavior violated a Florida Bar rule that says an attorney ‘shall not make a statement that the lawyer knows to be false or with reckless disregard as to its truth or falsity concerning the qualifications or integrity of’ court officials and jurors.” Fieger client Ralf Panitz, 42, “was convicted March 26 of killing his ex-wife, Nancy Campbell, on July 24, 2000, the same day he, Campbell and his new wife appeared on an episode of the ‘Jerry Springer Show.'” (Jennifer Sullivan, “Attorney, judge in war of words”, Manatee (Fla.) Herald-Tribune, Apr. 2).
Civility disputes involving Fieger are of course a staple item on this site. Last year, for example (see May 3, 2001), he faced a probe before the state attorney grievance commission following reports that he used his radio show to unleash “an obscenity-laced tirade” against three state appeals judges. For more examples of the Southfield, Mich.-based attorney’s style, see Sept. 14, 1999 and May 31, 2001. So it came as a bit of a shock to learn that the litigator’s name is now going to be adorning a prominent Michigan institution of legal education. According to Michigan State University’s law school, “Fieger has made a gift of $4 million to initiate and sustain the Geoffrey Fieger Trial Practice Institute,” billed as “the first trial practice institute at a law school designed specifically to train law students as successful trial lawyers.”
Rising to the dignity of the occasion in a press release, MSU-DCL dean and professor Terence Blackburn endorsed the school’s new benefactor in language well suited for a client recruitment brochure. “Mr. Fieger is arguably the most preeminent [sic] trial lawyer in the country, and he is an inspiration to our students,” Blackburn said. “It is Mr. Fieger’s dedication to his clients, his thorough preparation for each case and his skill in the courtroom that serve as a model for this institute.” (“Fieger’s $4 Million Gift To Law College at MSU Establishes Nation’s First Trial Practice Institute for Law Students”, MSU news release, Nov. 27; “$4 million gift to MSU-DCL funds trial practice institute”, MSU News, Dec. 6; “Fieger’s gift”, Lansing State Journal, Nov. 29 (defense of grant); letter from concerned alum, Detroit Free Press, Nov. 28). Last year the Detroit Free Press found Fieger unapologetic about charges by his opponents that he bullies and badgers witnesses on the stand. (Dawson Bell, “Fieger’s wins lose luster in appeals”, Detroit Free Press, May 29). “‘Trials are battles,’ Fieger said. Intimidating witnesses ‘is what trial attorneys do,’ he said.” Can we assume that it will therefore be a skill taught at the new institute? (DURABLE LINK)
April 23-24 — “Woman sues snack-food company for spoiling diet”. By reader acclaim: “A woman is suing a snack food company for $50 million saying its label on Pirate’s Booty corn and rice puffs foiled her diet. … Pirate’s Booty, manufactured by Robert’s American Gourmet Food, Inc., was recalled in January after the Good Housekeeping Institute found it contained 147 calories and 8.5 grams of fat, while its label said it contained only 120 calories and 2.5 grams of fat.” Now Meredith Berkman, 37, is suing claiming the mislabeling caused her to suffer “emotional distress” and “weight gain…mental anguish, outrage and indignation.” (AP/Salon, Apr. 13). Update: Feb. 9, 2006 (Berkman objects to settlement). (DURABLE LINK)
April 23-24 — Norway toy-ad crackdown. Yes, reports Bjorn Staerk on his blog (Mar. 25, Apr. 2), the Scandinavian country really does have an Ombudsman for Gender Equality whose apparent duties include monitoring sexism in toy ads, and yes, this ombudsman really is proposing to ban a particular toy ad which refers to boys as “tough”. (DURABLE LINK)
April 22 — Lawyers puree Big Apple. Figures from the City of New York’s fiscal year 2000 show that the city paid a record $459 million in judgments and settlements, a 10.5 percent increase over the previous fiscal year. $406 million of that figure was laid out on personal injury claims, up 11.5 percent from fiscal 1999. (Elaine Song, “Costs Climb for the City”, New York Law Journal, Mar. 21; “New York Sees Higher Verdicts in 2001”, New York Law Journal, Mar. 21; “Tort City, U.S.A.” (editorial), Wall Street Journal, Apr. 17 (online subscribers only). (DURABLE LINK)
April 22 — “How to Stuff a Wild Enron”. P.J. O’Rourke gives a flat tire to the pols and pundits who’ve tried to get anti-capitalist mileage out of the Enron scandal (The Atlantic, Apr.).
MORE ENRON LINKS: C. William (Bill) Thomas, “The Rise and Fall of the Enron Empire”, Texas Society of CPAs (via Political Hobbyist, who generously names us “one of the more famous blogs out there in the blogosphere“); Renee Deger, “Widening the Enron Net”, The Recorder, Apr. 9 (law firms, investment banks sued); Laura Goldberg, “Enron plaintiffs target bankers’ deep pockets”, Houston Chronicle, Apr. 5; Otis Bilodeau, “Gimme Shelter”, Legal Times, Apr. 16 (“In a worst-case scenario — where damages are so high that the firm itself goes bankrupt — partners in a general partnership could be forced to pay off the damage award over their entire careers.”); Renee Deger, “Leaning on the Lawyers”, The Recorder, Apr. 15; (prospects for Vinson & Elkins, Kirkland & Ellis); “Lerach’s Enron Sweep” (editorial), Wall Street Journal, Apr. 17 (online subscribers only); bloggers “Robert Musil” Apr. 14 and other dates, “Max Power” Apr. 10. (DURABLE LINK)
April 22 — “St- st- st- st- stop.” “A man with a stutter was turned down as a driving instructor by the British School of Motoring because he couldn’t say ‘stop’ fast enough in an emergency”. Mr. Arsenal Whittick, 39, has filed a complaint with an employment tribunal charging disability discrimination. (“Stutterer turned down as driving instructor”, Evening Standard, Apr. 11)(via andrewsullivan.com, from which our headline is also swiped). And Dave Kopel, analyzing the pending Supreme Court case of Chevron v. Echabazal (can employers exclude physically vulnerable workers from jobs that might kill them? — see Mar. 1), includes a very kind reference to this site. (National Review Online, Mar. 27). (DURABLE LINK)
April 21 — Social notes from all over: New York Blog Bash. It isn’t easy to get our editor over to Avenue B, but he brings back a glowing report of the Friday night event hosted by the formidable duo of Orchid and Asparagirl and with econ-blog-diva Megan McArdle in attendance. Not only were those present uniformly agreeable to converse with, but their weblogs — see the RSVP list at Daily Dose for a not quite complete list — collectively make for an afternoon’s browse that’s about 8,500% percent more enjoyable and stimulating than is afforded by, say, the Sunday New York Times. Update: photos courtesy Asparagirl (our editor is the one with the beard and dark clothes). (DURABLE LINK)
