Point of Law is your one-stop shop for detail on the Vioxx-litigation background of it all. (Linda A. Johnson, AP/ABCNews.com, Nov. 28).
Author Archive
Balloon victim won’t sue
She’s from Albany, not New York City, which may possibly be one reason Sarah Chamberlain and her family have no plans to file suit over the accident at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. One of the giant balloons hit a lamppost and brought debris raining down on Sarah, who needed nine stitches to her head, as well as her disabled sister Mary, who wasn’t seriously hurt:
Sarah and Mary’s father, Stephen Chamberlain, staff director for the Public Employees Federation, said the family has no intention of taking Macy’s or the city to court.
“To me, the lawsuit-lottery stuff is almost dishonest,” he said. “This was an accident. We’re just very thankful no one was seriously injured.”
(Joe Mahoney, Celeste Katz and Tracy Connor, “Her spirits are sky high”, New York Daily News, Nov. 26). “Miracle on 34th St.”, one columnist calls the family’s lack of litigiousness (Arnold Ahlert, New York Post, Nov. 28).
More: “The father’s words should be inscribed on a plaque and affixed to the base of the pole, memorializing a place in the city where a mishap occurred and nobody went to court,” writes Daily News columnist Michael Daly, who quotes a subway ad and website which dangle enticing dollar sums in front of potential litigants. “‘Between the two of them [Sarah and her sister] you could hit a million dollars,’ one noted attorney said yesterday.” (“Greed didn’t suit him”, Nov. 27). And CBS Early Show commentator Harry Smith calls Mr. Chamberlain’s attitude “heroic and refreshing” (“Accidents Happen”, Nov. 28).
Thanks to “Jacqui”
…of EnviroPundit green building blog, for kindly nominating Overlawyered for Best Law Blog in the Weblog Awards 2005 nominations.
“Borat” welcomes Kazakh suit
George Will on campaign regulation
“Under Vermont’s limits, a candidate for state representative in a single-member district can spend no more than $2,000 in a two-year cycle. Every mile driven by a candidate—or a volunteer—must be computed as a 48.5-cent campaign expenditure. Just driving—and not much of it—can exhaust permissible spending.” (“Free Speech Under Siege”, Newsweek, Dec. 5). More: Aug. 23, etc.
Online game blamed in Chinese teen’s death
“The parents of a 13 year-old boy who died falling from a building are suing World of Warcraft developer Blizzard, claiming that the massively-multiplayer online game is to blame for their son’s death. According to Chinese news agency Xinhua, the parents, who reside in the city of Tianjin, claim the boy jumped to his death whilst re-enacting a scene from the game. They are supported by Zhang Chunliang, a well-known activist whose campaign seeks to highlight the dangers of Internet addiction….There are more than 1.5 million World of Warcraft players in China — making up more than a third of the game’s worldwide subscriber base, even though the game only went on sale there in June.” (Ellie Gibson, “Parents set to sue Blizzard after World of Warcraft player dies”, GamesIndustry.biz, Nov. 21)(Joystiq.com thread). More on computer- and videogame suits: Oct. 21, Nov. 9, etc.
Update: Ed Fagan disciplinary hearings
Kate Coscarelli of the Newark Star-Ledger is covering them:
The brash-talking attorney was the focus of two days of disciplinary hearings that will ultimately decide whether he should be disbarred for mishandling client funds. The sometimes-contentious hearings were held …in a third-floor room at state Superior Court in Hackensack before retired Judge Arthur Minuskin, who is the special ethics master in the case.
The state Office of Attorney Ethics has charged Fagan with mishandling almost $400,000 in client funds, including money from two Holocaust survivors: Estelle Sapir, who got a large settlement from the Swiss banks, and Gizella Weisshaus, a Brooklyn woman who was the first survivor to sue the banks.
(“Holocaust lawyer fights his own court battle”, Nov. 17). More on attorney Edward Fagan: Aug. 27, Jun. 4 and many more.
State of legal academia: Prof. Deborah Rhode
This also brings to mind a comment I heard at a 1992 academic feminist conference at Radcliffe College. One [of] the panelists, Stanford Law School professor Deborah Rhode, pointed out that white men constitute only 8% of world’s population and added, to great mirth and delight from the audience, “That’s a very encouraging fact.” Because, of course, all those non-white men around the world are so much friendlier to women’s rights.
Cathy retells the anecdote here with trivially different wording and a 1993 National Review article by Stephanie Gutmann, “Are all men rapists?”, includes the following: “The [65-page] committee report [on the Violence Against Women Act] cites a book by Stanford law professor Deborah Rhode, who recently announced at a conference that ‘white men make up only 8 per cent of the world population. I find that such an encouraging fact.'”
Open-source software insurance
A “consulting outfit called Open Source Risk Management has partnered with Lloyds of London underwriter Kiln and broker Miller Insurance Services to offer insurance against open-source liability” — that is to say, the risk of getting sued for use or development of open-source software. OSRM chairman Daniel Egger says he was inspired to start the outfit by SCO Holdings’s suits against IBM and other defendants over Unix-derived code: “”What was striking was the amount of uncertainty and fear caused by a relatively weak claim,” Egger said. “Just because they cried wolf doesn’t mean there aren’t wolves out there.” (Marie-Anne Hogarth, “Open-Source Software: Open to Liability”, The Recorder/Law.com, Nov. 15). See Nov. 13, 2004 and Nov. 6, 2003.
In the New Yorker
The New Yorker’s talented medicine correspondent, Atul Gawande, is said to have an article in the Nov. 14 of that magazine “about who pays the price when patients sue doctors”. It isn’t online, but the magazine’s website has posted an excellent Q & A with Gawande.