Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Search Results for ‘champerty’

“Judge rules Righthaven lacks standing to sue, threatens sanctions over misrepresentations”

Copyright troll tripped up:

A federal judge in Las Vegas today issued a potentially devastating ruling against copyright enforcer Righthaven LLC, finding it doesn’t have standing to sue over Las Vegas Review-Journal stories, that it has misled the court and threatening to impose sanctions against Righthaven. … [U.S. District Court Judge Roger] Hunt’s ruling today came in a 2010 Righthaven lawsuit against the Democratic Underground, operator of a big political website.

One of DU’s message board posters had reprinted without permission, but with link and credit, four paragraphs’ worth of an article under copyright to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, which is one of a number of newspapers with working agreements with RightHaven. And this part’s interesting:

In their counterclaim [which Judge Hunt allowed to proceed], attorneys for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a digital free speech group based in San Francisco, hit Righthaven and Stephens Media with allegations of barratry (the alleged improper incitement of litigation); and champerty (an allegedly improper relationship between one funding and one pursuing a lawsuit)….

Some fans of entrepreneurial lawyering in the academy and elsewhere have sought to portray rules against barratry and champerty as wrongheaded survivals of a much older approach to the role of the legal profession. But it looks as if EFF — no one’s idea of a Blackstone-reading antiquarian club — just put those rules to powerful use. [Las Vegas Sun]

P.S. Bloggers who settled wonder: can we get our money back?

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February 15 roundup

  • Artist Jeff Koons drops his lawsuit against maker of resin balloon dogs [Legal Blog Watch, BoingBoing, earlier]
  • The car pile-up happened fast, the come-ons from lawyers and chiropractors were almost as speedy [Adler/Volokh]
  • Andrew Thomas update: former Maricopa County Attorney intends to sue former bar president and ethics investigators [ABA Journal, Coyote]
  • Litigation finance: “Poker Magnate, London Firm Bankroll Chevron Plaintiffs” [Dan Fisher, Forbes] Case for champerty pleaded before ethics commission [Podgers, ABA Journal] The experience in Australia [Karlsgodt]
  • Judge: Kansas City stadium mascot hot dog toss suit can go to trial [OnPoint News, earlier]
  • How National Enquirer matched wits with John Edwards to expose scandal [David Perel, HuffPo] More: Justice Department building a case? [AW]
  • “The Whooping Cough’s Unnecessary Return” [Paul Howard/Jim Copland, City Journal] Theodore Dalrymple reviews new Paul Offit vaccine book [same]
  • Many trial lawyers yank funding from Ralph Nader operations in pique over his role in depriving Al Gore of White House victory [ten years ago on Overlawyered]

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January 21 roundup

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Righthaven update

Having defeated a Righthaven suit filed against the political site Democratic Underground, lawyers from the Electronic Frontier Foundation now would like the court to award attorneys’ fees. [Kravets, Wired “Threat Level”] Among the claims advanced by EFF in that case were that Righthaven had engaged in barratry and champerty, concepts familiar to many Overlawyered readers if in desuetude in some sectors of the legal world these days. It had also pointed out that some of the newspapers facilitating the suits themselves, or websites they operate, appear to engage in or encourage practices that might be considered wrongful under Righthaven’s theories, such as “cutting and pasting” potentially copyrighted text.

Separately, Groklaw has analyzed what happened in one sample case. Of the furor aroused by the lawsuits, “I think the benefits are worth the negative publicity,” said one executive with the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s owner at a September panel.

The entrepreneurial copyright litigation firm has also now signed up the Denver Post as a new affiliate, and has made a splash by suing the owner of the Drudge Report over its use of a photo allegedly swiped from the Colorado newspaper, an offense (if proven) presumably not as readily defended under “fair use” doctrine as some others over which it has sued.

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May 24 roundup

  • Souter’s middle-of-the-road views on litigation didn’t fit conventional patterns [Copland, PoL]
  • Champerty and maintenance watch: new fund invests in commercial litigation for a share of the payouts [Fortune mag via Zywicki]
  • Report: distributor of “Religulous” film “has served a written settlement proposal” to preacher depicted onscreen [OnPoint News, earlier]
  • U.K.: “Homeowner Suit May Stop Village Cricket” [Telegraph via Never Yet Melted]
  • Overlawyered sparks a discussion across usual lines on EMTALA, the federal law on emergency medicine [Kennerly]
  • Federal Circuit: think twice before proceeding with frivolous appeals [David Bennett, Law.com]
  • Father-son duo who have served as key expert witnesses in litigation alleging autism-vaccine link push risky and questionable therapy for the condition [Chicago Tribune and second article and PDF graphic via Orac; Kathleen Seidel]. Waste and harm that go on in the name of treating autism should give pause to many sides in health care debate [Tyler Cowen]
  • One “deadbeat dad’s” story [Amy Alkon]. Forthcoming Lifetime reality show sounds like it will showcase harassment of fathers in child support arrears [Fathers and Families via Instapundit]

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January 26 roundup

  • DOJ subpoenas of online-gambling firms spark UK outrage (Times Online)

  • “Don’ts” for lawyers: don’t supplement your criminal-defense practice by running escort service on the side [NY Law Journal]

  • Maternity-clothing retailer tripped up on pregnancy discrimination claim [Lenard]

  • Filling out a Quicken-software will for an elderly client deemed “unauthorized practice of law” in South Carolina [McCullagh, Giacalone]

  • Champerty ‘n’ maintenance update: New York courts allow suspended lawyer Ross Cellino [Jul. 15, 2005] to resume practice [Business First of Buffalo]

  • Worried about long-dormant restitution or repatriation claims that might arise to put a cloud on your art holdings? Buy art-title insurance [Forbes pay archive]

  • Snatching whole milk from schoolkids not such a great idea, maybe [Musil]

  • Yes, let’s stop slamming lawyers for representing unpopular clients — and let’s start being consistent about it [Ted “no relation” Olson, Katyal via Adler]

  • Pfizer sued on theory its frisky Viagra ads encourage spread of sexually transmitted diseases [AP/WaPo](complaint courtesy Slate)

  • After his experiment in splitting up his blogs, Steve Bainbridge has reunited them again [ProfessorBainbridge.com]

  • Remove Child Before Folding author Bob Dorigo Jones interviewed about wacky warnings (see Jan. 6, Jan. 12, etc.) [Illinois Review].

  • Note: one item originally posted here [on air-show crash] removed as duplicative of one of Ted’s earlier.

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He’s a doctor, a lawyer, and so much more

The Barnes Firm, formerly Cellino & Barnes, is a powerhouse in the personal-injury business in upstate New York, where it is a ubiquitous advertiser. According to the Buffalo News, it’s built one of the largest caseloads of Vioxx lawsuits in the nation by hawking its star attorney, Brian A. Goldstein, who in television ads

described how he was uniquely qualified to represent Vioxx users. Not only was he a personal injury lawyer, he told viewers, he was a former physician and board-certified surgeon….

The lawsuits accuse the drug’s maker, Merck & Co., with failing to tell patients the whole truth about Vioxx.

Goldstein, though, appears guilty of the same charge about his medical background. Georgia’s Composite State Board of Medical Examiners revoked Goldstein’s license to practice medicine on Jan. 10, 1991.

Goldstein was found guilty of providing Georgia licensing authorities with misleading and incomplete information about his education, according to records obtained by The Buffalo News. The licensing board found that Goldstein:

• Attended college and medical school at the same time in the Dominican Republic.

• Graduated from medical school less than three years after he graduated from high school.

• Received credit for courses he had not taken, had not completed or failed.

• Said he attended Tulane University when he had not, falsified his earlier training and submitted a false letter of recommendation for a residency at the Manhattan Psychiatric Center.

The hearing officer in Georgia not only recommended revocation but also said the decision should be published “as a public reprimand for [Goldstein] for his conduct.”

But none of that information was mentioned in the Vioxx ads, or in Goldstein’s biography on The Barnes Firm Web site.

The Buffalo News investigation includes various defenses of his conduct offered by Goldstein, including the following:

He also said Georgia authorities failed to consider the fact he had received an undergraduate degree from Empire State College.

The News confirmed that degree from the college, which grants degrees based on life experience as well as academic studies. But the degree was granted in 1988, three years after Georgia filed charges against him.

The newspaper asks medical ethicist Arthur Caplan about Goldstein’s “selective use of parts of his medical background to recruit legal clients”. Caplan’s response: “I think it’s sleazy”. (Michael Beebe, “Did Barnes Firm lawyer tell the whole truth?”, Buffalo News, Jan. 22). Carolyn Elefant comments at My Shingle (Jan. 22), and the incident also stirs memories for blogger Gina at Together Again (Jan. 23). The law firm of Cellino & Barnes has figured in these pages before: see Jul. 15, 2005.

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“Lawyer sanctioned in Holocaust suit”

Yes, it’s Ed Fagan again. This time the much-publicized reparations impresario “has been hit with sanctions that will run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars for his handling of a lawsuit seeking recovery from an Austrian bank of the value of artwork looted by the Nazis. Employing unusually harsh language, Southern District of New York Judge Shirley Wohl Kram assessed attorney fees against [Fagan], and also fined him $5,000, finding he had committed champerty and misled her.” (Daniel Wise, New York Law Journal, Aug. 23). For Fagan’s earlier misadventures, see Jun. 4 and many links from there.

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Update: staking the Shinnecocks

On the day the Shinnecock Indian tribe filed the first of an expected series of lawsuits laying claim to wide swaths of the Hamptons (see Jun. 13), the tribe disclosed that its courtroom offensive was being underwritten by wealthy Detroit casino investors Marian Ilitch, who with her husband Michael founded Little Caesars Pizza and since then has gone on to purchase baseball’s Detroit Tigers as well as the city’s Red Wings hockey team, and real estate developer Michael Malik. “Gateway Funding Associates, a company backed by [Ilitch and Malik], signed an agreement with the tribe more than a year ago to pay for the lawsuit and other ‘economic development’ initiatives in exchange for a part of any future proceeds, said Tom Shields, a spokesman for Gateway.” Champerty has been defined as the practice of aiding in a lawsuit in return for a share in the benefits being sued over; it was illegal at common law but “the prohibitions have been greatly relaxed in modern times” and in some cases abolished. (Katie Thomas, “Shinnecocks launch legal claim to Hamptons land”, Newsday, Jun. 16; “Lawsuit backers invest in casinos” (sidebar), Jun. 16; James Langton, “Native American tribe lays claim to the Hamptons”, Sunday Telegraph (U.K.), Jun. 19).

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