Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Posts Tagged ‘Canada’

Canada: McDonald’s to pay C$55K for firing non-handwashing employee

The British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal has ordered McDonald’s to pay $55,000 for failing to do enough to accommodate an employee whose disabling skin condition prevented her from complying with the restaurant’s hand-washing policy. Among other grounds for its decision, the tribunal cited the following:

There was no evidence of:

* the relationship between food contamination and hand-washing;…

(HRHeroBlogs/Northern Exposure, Apr. 15; Ezra Levant).

More: Commenter Bill Poser finds the decision “much more reasonable” than the reporting makes it sound and says, in particular, Northern Exposure cut off a relevant last word from its quote: “…hand-washing frequency“.

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April 11 roundup

  • Plenty of reaction to our Tuesday post questioning the NYT school-bullying story, including reader comments and discussion at other blogs; one lawprof passes along a response by the Wolfe family to the Northwest Arkansas Times’s reporting [updated post]
  • Geoffrey Fieger, of jury-swaying fame, says holding his forthcoming criminal trial in Detroit would be unfair because juries there hate his guts [Detroit News]
  • Another Borat suit down as Judge Preska says movie may be vulgar but has social value, and thus falls into “newsworthiness” exception to NY law barring commercial use of persons’ images [ABA Journal]
  • Employer found mostly responsible for accident that occurred after its functionaries overrode a safety device, but a heavy-equipment dealer also named as defendant will have to pay more than 90 percent of resulting $14.6 million award [Bloomington, Ill. Pantagraph]
  • New Mexico Human Rights Commission fines photographer $6600 for refusing a job photographing same-sex commitment ceremony [Volokh, Bader]
  • “Virginia reaches settlement with families of VA Tech shooting victims” [Jurist]
  • Roger Parloff on downfall of Dickie Scruggs [Fortune]
  • Judge in Spain fined heavily and disbarred for letting innocent man spend more than a year in jail [AP/IHT, Guardian]
  • Hard to know whether all those emergency airplane groundings actually improved safety, they might even have impaired it [Murray/NRO “Corner”, WSJ edit]
  • “Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don’t give it any value” — tracking down the context of that now-celebrated quote from a Canadian Human Rights Commission investigator [Volokh]
  • Who was it that said that lawyers “need to be held accountable for frivolous lawsuits that help drive up the cost of malpractice insurance”? Hint: initials are J.E. [three years ago on Overlawyered]

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Activist sues Canadian conservative blogs

We told you it was dangerous to criticize Ottawa lawyer and “human rights” commission enthusiast Richard Warman, and we were right: he’s now sued four leading conservative bloggers in Canada and one website, Ezra Levant, Jonathan Kay/National Post, Kate McMillan/Small Dead Animals, Kathy Shaidle/Five Feet of Fury, and Free Dominion. Lawsuit target Ezra Levant has details, as does Michelle Malkin, not yet a target perhaps because she is American. [2010 update: Patterico, Ken at Popehat]

In related news, the Ontario Human Rights Commission has decided not to pursue a complaint against Maclean’s, the country’s best-known magazine, for publishing a book excerpt by well-known writer Mark Steyn. (Press release via Small Dead Animals, SteynOnline).

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March 25 roundup

  • Speaking of patients who act against medical advice and sue anyway: doctor who advised against home birth is cleared by Ohio jury in $13 million suit [Plain Dealer and earlier via KevinMD]
  • UK: “A feud over a 4ft-wide strip of land has seen neighbours rack up £300,000 in lawyers’ bills, and left one family effectively homeless.” [Telegraph]
  • Last of the Scruggs judicial bribery defendants without a plea deal, Dickie’s son Zack, takes one [Folo]
  • By reader acclaim: securities trader sues over injury from lap dancer’s attentions [AP/NY Sun]
  • Amid the talk of FISA and retroactive telecom immunity, it would be nice to hear more about the actual lawsuits [Obbie]
  • Australian worker loses suit over firing despite a doctor’s note vouching that stress of worrying about upcoming football game made it medically necessary for him to take day off to go see it [Stumblng Tumblr]
  • Megan McArdle and Tyler Cowen toss around the question of federal FDA pre-emption of drug liability suits, as raised by Medtronic;
  • Should Coughlin Stoia have bought those stolen Coke documents? For one lawprof, question’s a real head-scratcher [David McGowan (San Diego), Legal Ethics Forum] And WSJ news side is oddly unskeptical of trial lawyers’ line that the affair just proves their power to go on fishing expeditions should never have been curtailed [Jones/Slater]
  • Dashboard-cam caught Tennessee cops red-handed planting marijuana on suspect, or so Jonathan Turley suggests — but could it be a little more complicated than that? [WSMV, AP/WATE] (& Greenfield)
  • “Heck Baptists don’t even sue you for disagreeing with them,” though no doubt there are exceptions [Instapundit; NYT on Danish cartoons; Ezra Levant with more on those Canadian speech tribunals]
  • Bestselling authors who sue their critics [four years ago on Overlawyered]

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Suing teachers in Canada

“A British Columbia father has sued his son’s Grade 2 Montessori teacher claiming that she ‘purposely and maliciously worked to damage the self-esteem’ of his son over such things as failing to encourage the child’s spelling, not sending home a daily homework list and, in one case, displaying an unfinished poem in the school hallway. …Similar issues will arise in a Montreal courtroom next Tuesday, when a teacher at Westmount’s prestigious Roslyn School will face the first of two lawsuits by aggrieved parents.” Canada’s National Post is kind enough to quote me on the U.S.-style trend (Zosia Bielski, “The new golden rule”, National Post, Mar. 20).

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March 19 roundup

  • UK: Paramedic twists ankle on steps responding to emergency call, plans to sue elderly couple [Daily Mail]
  • Critics say litigiousness is part of the business plan for rental outfit Leasecomm, which has sued its customers more than 92,000 times [Boston Globe, Daily News Transcript]
  • Great big predators of the alternative press? Jury awards $15 million against SF Weekly to its main competitor, Bay Guardian [SF Chronicle]
  • Tacoma public schools sued after mentally ill student brings gun to school and kills classmate [KOMO]
  • How the parties traded positions with each other on trade [Gordon, Commentary]
  • Now Canada has its own “human rights” complaint against plastic surgeon who declines to undertake transgender-related surgery [Steyn, Macleans; earlier Catholic hospital case from California]
  • Florida Supreme Court hears appeal of Joe Anderson $18 million “false light” defamation verdict against Gannett’s Pensacola News-Journal [WSJ law blog; earlier]
  • Ottawa lawyer Richard Warman keeps suing bloggers and dragging websites before those Canadian hate-speech tribunals, so no criticizing him please [Levant, Five Feet of Fury (& more), Steyn]
  • Discontent continues over judges’ standardless discretion in granting alimony awards [NLJ]
  • Death of widow Alice Lawrence isn’t expected to end her litigation with law firm Graubard Miller over contingency fee [NYLJ; earlier]
  • Labor arbitrator tells Florida school to rehire employee who reported to work with cocaine in his system [six years ago on Overlawyered]

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Annals of chutzpah?

In Nova Scotia, Astrid Margaret Literski is locked in a battle with Revenue Canada over whether she is entitled to child tax benefit checks associated with her late daughter Eveleigh. Literski is incarcerated after pleading guilty to second-degree murder for killing the girl, then 4, in 2003. The tax agency says it wants back some of the money it sent Literski because it learned after the fact that the girl was actually living with her father, her primary caretaker, at the time. (Chris Lambie, “Killer mom fights to keep child tax credit”, Halifax Chronicle Herald, Mar. 1).

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March 1 roundup

  • Oregon Supreme Court plays chicken with SCOTUS over $79.5 million punitive damages award in Williams v. Philip Morris case. [Sebok @ Findlaw; Krauss @ IBD; POL Feb. 1]
  • Speaking of punitive damages, I did a podcast on Exxon Shipping v. Baker. I can’t bear to listen to it, so let me know how I did. [Frank @ Fed Soc]
  • Arkansas case alleged legal sale of pseudoephedrine was “nuisance” because meth-makers would buy it; case dismissed. [Beck/Herrmann]. This is why I’ve stockpiled Sudafed.
  • Lawyers advertise for refinery explosion victims before fire goes out. [Hou Chron/TLR]
  • Connecticut Supreme Court: cat-attack victim can sue without showing past history of violence by animal. [On Point] Looking forward to comments from all the anti-reformers who claim to oppose reform because they’re against the abrogation of the common law.
  • Op-ed on the Great White fire deep pockets phenomenon. [SE Texas Record; earlier: Feb. 2]
  • “FISA lawsuits come from Twilight Zone.” [Hillyer @ Examiner]
  • Legislative action on various medical malpractice tweaking in Colorado, Hawaii, and Wyoming. [TortsProf]
  • Request for unemployment benefits: why fire me just because I asked staffers for a prostitute? [Des Moines Register]
  • “So much for seduction and romance; bring in the MBAs and lawyers.” [Mac Donald @ City Journal; contra Belle Lettre; contra contra Dank]
  • Where is the Canadian Brandeis standing up for free speech? [Kay @ National Post]
  • In defense of lobbying. [Krauthammer @ WaPo]

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January 24 roundup

  • Longtime Overlawyered favorite Judy Cates, of columnist-suing fame, is using large sums of her own money to outspend incumbent James Wexstten in hard-fought race for Illinois state judgeship; Democratic primary is Feb. 5 [Belleville News-Democrat, Southern Illinoisan]

  • City council told: we’ll cancel your liability coverage if you throw all meetings and city records open to public [Seattle Times]

  • Attorney member of Canadian Senate in spot of bother after revelation that she billed client for 30 hours in one day [Vancouver Province, edit]

  • A public wiki just for Scruggsiana? After Keker’s minions swoop in to do their edits, the Mississippi attorney may wind up portrayed as the next Mother Teresa, and not the Hitchens version either [WikiScruggs]

  • Same general category of point, my Wikipedia entry now suddenly describes me as “controversial”, when but a month ago I wasn’t;

  • $28 to $52 million in 18 months for serving as a DoJ “corporate monitor” sounds like nice work if you can get it, and former AG Ashcroft got it without competitive bidding [Lattman, St. Pete Times edit, PolitickerNJ, NJLJ]

  • The Amiable Nancy (1818), admiralty case that could prove crucial precedent in Exxon Valdez punitive appeal, has nothing to do with The Charming Betsey (1804), key precedent on international law [Anchorage Daily News; Tom Goldstein/Legal Times]

  • “First do no harm… to your attorney’s case” [Cole/Dallas Morning News via KevinMD]

  • Probers haven’t come up with evidence of more than middling tiger-taunting, and attorney Geragos says he’ll sue zoo’s p.r. firm for defaming his clients [KCBS; SF Chronicle; AP/USA Today]

  • UK’s latest “metric martyr” is Janet Devens, facing charges for selling vegetables in pounds and ounces at London’s Ridley Road market [WSJ; earlier]

  • Lawyer can maintain defamation suit over being called “ambulance chaser” interested only in “slam dunk” cases, rules Second Circuit panel [eight years ago on Overlawyered]

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January 22 roundup

  • “Woman who ‘lost count after drinking 14 vodkas’ awarded £7,000 over New Year fall from bridge” [The Scotsman]

  • Bar committee recommends disbarment for Beverly Hills lawyer who “played the courts like a bully in a child’s game of dodgeball” [Blogonaut (with response by attorney) via ABA Journal]

  • Shot and paralyzed in parking lot of South Florida strip club, cared for back home in Tunisia, Sami Barrak is now $26 million richer by way of his negligent-security suit [Sun-Sentinel] Earlier Florida negligent-security here, here, and here.

  • Canadian government orders airlines to stop charging the severely obese the price of a second seat [Winnipeg Free Press; earlier]

  • Study of head-injury victims in Spain finds “nearly half of the people who go to court feign psycho-cognitive disorders with the objective of profiting from this in some way.” [Science Daily]

  • Federal judge vacates $1.75 million verdict, questions reliability of expert testimony in Nebraska recovered-memory sex abuse case [Lincoln Journal-Star, AP/Sioux City Journal]

  • Confess your thoughts, citizen: Ezra Levant on his interrogation by official panel in Canada for publishing Mohammed cartoons [Globe & Mail; earlier]

  • Class-action lawyers continue to hop on glitches with Xbox Live, Halo 3 and related Microsoft gaming systems [Ars Technica, News.com; earlier here and here]

  • Bay Area proposal to ban much burning of wood in fireplaces and stoves (Nov. 30, etc.) draws strong reactions both ways [SF Chronicle]

  • Harder to get into Ringling Bros.’s Clown College than law school, says man who attended both [six years ago on Overlawyered]
P.S. Whoops, that’s what I get for posting while drowsy: earlier roundups by Ted already had the Scottish-tippler and obese-flyer items.

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