Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

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“Lines Are Drawn for Big Suit Over Sodas”

The New York Times finally weighs in on the impending case against Big Soda (see Dec. 5). Maybe it took them longer than expected to get the spin in favor of the suit just right. Prof. Daynard’s role gets somewhat downplayed this time around, the Center for Science in the Public Interest looms larger, and the most priceless bit comes at the end:

One detail yet to be decided is whether the group will seek financial damages. Under Massachusetts’s consumer protection law, successful plaintiffs are entitled to $25 per violation, which could mean $25 for every time a student has purchased a soda in a public high school in Massachusetts over the past four years.

Mr. Gardner said he and the other lawyers realize that damages could run into the billions. “We haven’t decided about this yet,” he said. “We don’t want this to come off looking like a greedy-lawyer lawsuit.”

(Melanie Warner, New York Times, Dec. 7). Comments: Volokh.

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Roger Scruton interview

An excerpt from the interview (pt. II) with the British philosopher at Right Reason:

My advice to President Bush would be to look at the ways in which the power of the state might be needed in order to support the autonomous associations and ‘little platoons’ of American civil society. There are two evils in particular which need to be addressed: the litigation explosion, which has vastly increased the risk of small businesses, and also sown discord among neighbours; and the disaster of the inner cities, which have suffered from the worst effects of American zoning laws and laissez-faire aesthetics, with the result that the middle class has fled from the city centres, causing social decay at the heart, and an unsustainable growth in transportation and suburban infrastructure all around. I believe that federal policies could be initiated that would address both these evils, without increasing the role of the state in the conduct of litigation or in the planning of city streets.

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Lawyers preparing soft-drink suit

“Richard Daynard, a Massachusetts law professor who made his name working as a consultant on class actions against tobacco companies, is part of a broad effort by both private attorneys and nonprofit groups to sue Atlanta-based Coca-Cola and other soft drink companies for selling high-calorie drinks in schools.” (Caroline Wilbert, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Nov. 29; Caroline E. Mayer, “Lawyer coalition targets soft drink manufacturers”, Washington Post/Detroit News, Dec. 4; Todd Zywicki and vast comment section; Colossus of Rhodey). In the Boston Globe magazine, contributor Michael Blanding writes supportively of “a national legal movement to make soft drinks the next tobacco” (Oct. 30).

For more on the search for ways to blame business for our collective struggle with the waistline, see many entries in our Eat, Drink and Be Merry section. More on caffeine “addiction” theories: Aug. 18-20, 2000, Jun. 1, 2004. More on vending machine suits: Jul. 3, 2003. And as regular readers know, we’ve been covering Prof. Daynard’s activities for a long time; see Apr. 21-23, 2000 and many others.

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Boston mayor vows to seize t-shirts from stores

…because he doesn’t like the message printed on them, as Reason “Hit and Run” reports:

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino has ordered the city to seize T-shirts that say “Stop Snitchin.” “‘It’s wrong,’ Menino said. ‘We are going into every retail store that sells the shirts and remove them.'”

(Boston Herald; Boston Globe; KipEsquire; Eugene Volokh; ACLU of Mass. press release, PDF). More: Gunner at No Quarters Blog has an update.

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Onion on RIAA lawsuits

It’s satire now, but that’s what we thought when the Onion published a joke five years ago about lawyers suing Big Chocolate over obesity, and turned out to be merely prescient: “The Recording Industry Association of America announced Tuesday that it will be taking legal action against anyone discovered telling friends, acquaintances, or associates about new songs, artists, or albums.” (“RIAA Bans Telling Friends About Songs”, Nov. 30). More on and from the Onion: Nov. 3; May 26; Apr. 15; Nov. 6, 2003. More on the RIAA: Feb. 7.

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L.A.: “Lawyer held in car crash fraud ring”

It’s not as if these fraud rings were anything new (more), but a few of the details this time are particularly piquant:

A lawyer recruited 29 people, including some from a Bible study class, to stage more than 60 automobile crashes on Los Angeles freeways and collected millions of dollars in bogus insurance claims, authorities said Wednesday.

Typically members of the ring would head out in two cars onto a freeway and box in an unsuspecting SUV or commercial truck, then slam on the brakes so as to cause an accident for which passengers in the lead car could file a legal claim.

Although no one was seriously injured in the accidents, one victim was forced to close his business after his truck was totaled, officials said….

Among those involved were members of a Bible study group from the Inland Empire, said Marty Gonzales, chief investigator for the California Department of Insurance….

Many of the suspects were illegal immigrants who were promised they would earn hundreds if not thousands of dollars, Gonzales said.

In reality, some were paid nothing….

According to the insurance commissioner’s office, [22-year-old Humberto] Carlon set up the accidents and Laufer [personal injury lawyer Bernard Laufer, 52, of Huntington Park] paid him a fee to represent the phony victims in claims against insurance companies….

Such crash rings are not new to Southern California.

A family of three burned to death on the Long Beach Freeway in 1996 in an accident linked to a crash ring.

(Amanda Covarrubias, Los Angeles Times, Nov. 24).