The Department of Justice regards online tutoring services as “public accommodations” subject to the Americans with Disabilities Act, and in September entered into a consent decree with Sylvan Learning Centers, which agreed to provide aids such as written materials and “videotext displays” (as well as free sign-language interpreters) for the assistance of deaf persons who might wish to use its services. As TechLaw Journal notes (Sept. 26-30), and as we have often noted before in our ongoing coverage, there is reason to expect the legal pressure for web accessibility to extend to online businesses more generally.
Author Archive
Lawyer liable to both client and opponent
As one of our reader/informants sums up this litigation against a Kentucky surgeon filed by (and backfiring against) a Tennessee attorney: “Plaintiff lawyer (who is a JD/MD) gets sued by both his plaintiff client and the defendant doctor and he loses to both.” (Andrew Wolfson, “Attorney is loser in malpractice lawsuit”, Louisville Courier-Journal, Nov. 28; Childs, Dec. 27). More on countersuits by doctors: Point of Law, Dec. 20.
White House race roundup
- Marie Gryphon rounds up what’s known about the Republican candidates and their views on litigation reform [Point of Law]
- Obama’s signature achievement as an Illinois legislator was a law requiring that police videotape interrogations and confessions, the better to protect both suspects from beatings and cops from false charges of abuse; some “death penalty abolitionists … worried that Obama’s bill, by preventing the execution of innocents, would deprive them of their best argument” (!). [Peters/WaPo]
- Giuliani-bashers had a fine old time hammering the former mayor on supposed scandal over girlfriend’s driver. So was there anything there? [NYTimes, Newsday “Spin Cycle”, Frum; standard disclaimer]
- Edwards has resolved to run as a plaintiff’s lawyer in full jury-stirring mode; we know a fair bit about his trial-winning style, less about how he settles cases [Beldar]
- Quite a few adherents of the scary Christian Reconstructionist movement seem to like Gov. Huckabee a lot, one hopes he doesn’t like them back [Lindsey, Cato-at-Liberty; Box Turtle Bulletin]
“The wonderful blog, Overlawyered”
Thank you, Patent Troll Tracker (Jan. 4).
“Inmate Sues Jail, Blames It For His Escapes”
Colorado: “An inmate who twice escaped from the Pueblo County jail filed a federal lawsuit Thursday, alleging that guards abused him and didn’t do enough to stop him from breaking out.” Scott Anthony Gomez, Jr.’s lawsuit “claims authorities ‘did next to nothing to ensure that the jail was secure and that the Plaintiff could not escape.'” (TheDenverChannel.com, Jan. 4).
Tiger victims in ambulance: “Don’t tell them what we did”
The Dhaliwal brothers prefer to have attorney Mark Geragos do the talking, greatly frustrating investigators trying to reconstruct what happened in the zoo mauling. (Jaxon Van Derbeken, “In ambulance, survivors of S.F. tiger attack made pact of silence”, San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 5; “San Francisco Authorities Seek to Inspect Tiger Attack Victims’ Cell Phones”, AP/FoxNews.com, Jan. 5; Patricia Yollin, Tanya Schevitz, Kevin Fagan, “S.F. Zoo visitor saw 2 victims of tiger attack teasing lions”, San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 3; Jacob Sullum, “The Buck Keeps Moving”, syndicated/Reason, Jan. 2). Earlier: Jan. 3.
Mississippi wrong-doc-sued case
Robert Loblaw’s Decision of the Day blog, on appellate decisions, has this update (and somewhat longer write-up) on a case briefly noted by guestblogger Jason Barney in this space in October:
Ratliff v. Stewart, 06-61018 (5th Cir., Dec. 6, 2007)
The facts in this Fifth Circuit decision reflect rather poorly on the practice of law in the Southern District of Mississippi. The underlying case arises from injuries that plaintiff Sarah Ratliff allegedly suffered from the drug Stadol. Although Ratliff eventually settled her claims, her litigation took some strange turns, resulting in this appeal.
To start, Ratliff’s attorney named the wrong doctor as a defendant. The attorney knew that Ratliff had been prescribed Stadol by a Dr. Stewart with an office in McComb, Mississippi. Without investigating further, the lawyer found a defendant who fit the bill: Dr. Lawrence Stewart. But Lawrence Stewart had never prescribed Stadol to Sarah Ratliff. Although he did have a patient named Sarah Ratliff, she insisted that she had not filed a lawsuit against him.
As it turns out, the plaintiff had been treated by Lawrence Stewart’s father, Edsel Ford Stewart, who by this point had passed away. But Lawrence’s protests fell on deaf ears, as did his motion to dismiss, complete with an affidavit stating that he had never treated the plaintiff. After filing their opposition to this motion, the plaintiff’s attorneys finally bothered to check with their client and, lo and behold, she told them that they had sued the wrong guy. Just for fun, the attorneys waited another month before confessing error and letting Lawrence off the hook.
Did they learn from their mistake? Not really, as they then filed a suit against the estate of “the elder Lawrence Stewart.”
Could it get any worse? Maybe a little. Five months after being dismissed from the case and nine days after the rest of Ratliff’s case was reassigned to a different judge, Lawrence Stewart’s attorney sent a letter to follow up on an earlier request for attorney fees. But he sent it to the old judge. And, in an even bigger blunder, the old judge decided to award attorney fees for a case that was no longer on his docket.
The mess eventually got cleaned up: the old judge vacated his order and the new judge adopted it. Ratliff appealed, but the Fifth Circuit rejects his arguments and largely affirms the fee award.
U.K.: Farm stiles and gates yield to wheelchair access
In the English countryside stiles and so-called kissing gates “have been a familiar feature of the landscape for centuries, but local authorities now believe that installing them along footpaths and rights of way is a breach of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.” (“Farms kiss goodbye to stiles and gates to allow wheelchair access”, Times Online, Nov. 30). According to Wikipedia, some kissing gates are designed on a large enough scale that wheelchairs can pass through.
“That’s why I didn’t become a trial lawyer”
Democratic front-runner (if it’s okay to call him that now) Barack Obama tells a Newton, Iowa audience about his early decisions to pursue civil rights, community organizing and public office rather than more lucrative legal specialties, and is blasted in parts of the lefty blogosphere for the implied dig at John Edwards. (Shailagh Murray, Washington Post “The Trail”, Dec. 30; Kos, TPM, Kia Franklin, etc.) Per the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza, “Obama is starting to use the term ‘trial lawyer’ more often on the stump to describe Edwards, perhaps hoping to capitalize on the negative associations many voters have with that particular profession.” (“The Trail”, Dec. 31).
P.S. Some highlights of our earlier Obama coverage: Aug. 5, 2004 (“Anyone who denies there’s a crisis with medical malpractice insurance is probably a trial lawyer”); Apr. 10, 2007 (making inroads nonetheless on Edwards’ trial-lawyer donor base; per Legal Times, “Despite Obama’s silence on the issues trial lawyers care about, those who support him say they are confident he will back trial lawyers when the time comes”); Jul. 31 and Aug. 5 (auditions at AAJ/ATLA convention). P.P.S. Plus Ted at Point of Law a year back (“far from convinced” that Obama will cross the trial bar, despite his vote for the Class Action Fairness Act).
“Son seeks estate of mother he killed”
After Joshua Hoge stabbed his mother and brother to death with a butcher knife, he was found not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to Washington’s Western State Hospital. His mother’s estate then sued King County and won $800,000 “when it was determined that a public-health clinic had failed to give Hoge his medication and was partially responsible for the slayings.” Now Hoge is suing to obtain part of his mother’s estate, which would allow him to capture some of the lawsuit winnings. A Washington statute restricts killers from profiting by their crimes, but by its terms applies to “willful” killings. Besides, says Jean O’Laughlin, Hoge’s attorney, her client isn’t covered because he was found not guilty. A Seattle University associate professor of Law, John Strait, agrees: “For all intents and purposes, there is no crime. We don’t punish people for being really sick. We don’t impose criminal culpability on people who are mentally ill,” he said. “It’s nutty logic.” (Natalie Singer, Seattle Times, Jan. 3). I wrote a couple of years ago about Washington state’s unusually broad assignment of liability to public agencies for crime and other private misconduct.