- “Of all the body parts to Xerox!” Another round of stories on efforts to reduce liabilities from office holiday parties [ABA Journal, Above the Law, and relatedly Megan McArdle]
- New edition of Tillinghast/Towers Perrin study on insurance costs of liability system finds they went down last year, which doesn’t happen often [2007 update, PDF]
- Vermont student sues Burger King over indelicate object found in his sandwich; one wonders whether he’s ruled out it being a latex finger cot, sometimes used by bakery workers [AP/FoxNews.com]
- Good discussions of “human rights commission” complaints against columnist Mark Steyn in Canada [Volokh, David Warren and again @ RCP, Dan Gardner; for a contrasting view, see Wise Law Blog]
- Having trousered $60-odd million in fees suing Microsoft in Minnesota and Iowa antitrust cases, Zelle Hofmann now upset after judge says $4 million in fees should suffice for Wisconsin me-too action [Star-Tribune, PheistyBlog]
- Australian rail operator will appeal order to pay $A600,000 to man who illegally jumped tracks, spat at ticket inspectors, hurt himself fleeing when detained [Herald Sun]
- Lawyers’ fees in Kia brake class action (Oct. 29, Oct. 30) defended by judge who assails honesty of chief defense witness [Legal Intelligencer]
- Who deserves credit for founding Facebook? Question is headed for court [02138 mag]
- Yes, jury verdicts do sometimes bankrupt defendants, as did this $8 million class action award against a Kansas City car dealer [KC Star, KC Business Journal]
- Dispute over Burt Neuborne’s Holocaust fees is finally over, he’ll get $3.1 million [NY Sun]
- So long as we’re only fifty votes behind in the race for this “best general legal blog” honor, we’re going to keep nagging you to vote for Overlawyered [if you haven’t already]
Posts Tagged ‘free speech in Canada’
December 10 roundup
- Joe Nocera’s recent column on the Vioxx settlement infuriated loyalists of the plaintiff’s bar, and they won’t like his new one on lead paint litigation much better [NY Times]
- Trial of Overlawyered favorite Jack Thompson over ethical charges leveled by Florida bar wraps up, but judge won’t rule right away [GamePolitics earlier, more recent posts]
- Two joggers hit by driver alongside Pacific Coast Highway will share $49 million from city of Dana Point — allegedly the bike lane was too wide — so now here come the concrete barriers [LA Times]
- Do makers of anti-PC documentary “Indoctrinate U.” owe cash to Indiana U. for infringing on its logo? [Maloney, OpinionJournal, Coleman] Update Dec. 11: settled.
- Casselberry, Fla. cop who sued parents after boy’s near-drowning in pool has now lost her job following public outcry over the incident [Orlando Sentinel; earlier]
- Lawyer who says he was defamed by commenters on DontDateHimGirl.com is back in court [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Ambrogi, On Point; earlier here, here, etc.]
- Outspoken blog of BU prof Dr. Michael Siegel ticks off “tobacco control” activists [Beam, Globe]
- Warning label alert: old Sesame Street episodes unsafe for children? [Stier, Wash. Times]
- Furor mounts in and out of Canada over “human rights” complaint against Maclean’s over Mark Steyn book excerpt [Wente, Globe and Mail; Eteraz, UK Guardian; Steyn, NRO; Kimball]
- Judge rejects lawsuit by animal rights group challenging UCSF animal testing [SF Chronicle]
- New at Point of Law: How do all those big cases wind up in Judge Jack Weinstein’s court, anyway?; latest Richard Epstein podcast is on antitrust, Microsoft, AT&T, etc.; abuse of the Family and Medical Leave Act; welcome new contributor Marie Gryphon; Yale Law clinic sues Yale-New Haven Hospital; bar official dismisses concerns about cy pres slush funds; breastfeeding accommodation on the job, via lawsuit?; just what New York needs, a new state law school at Binghamton; and much more.
Mark Steyn book excerpt = human rights violation?
Reminding us once again that our neighbor to the north lacks a First Amendment-strength guarantee of free speech, and stands in very great need of one: Canada’s largest non-profit Islamic body, the Canadian Islamic Congress, has launched human rights complaints against the prominent magazine Maclean’s and its editor-in-chief over a book excerpt from Mark Steyn, the well-known conservative columnist. “Complaints were submitted to Human Rights Commissions in B.C. and Ontario on the grounds that ‘the article subjects Canadian Muslims to hatred and contempt,’ according to a CIC press release. In the release, the CIC labels Steyn’s article as ‘flagrantly Islamophobic.'” (Kate Lunau, “Canadian Islamic Congress launches human rights complaints against Maclean’s”, Maclean’s, Nov. 30)(& welcome visitors from Steyn’s own SteynOnline).
Defamation-suit roundup
A hearing officer has recommended a reprimand for Boston judge and libel-suit winner Ernest B. Murphy over those “fascinatingly repellent” letters he sent to the publisher of the Boston Herald demanding a settlement of what proved a winning $2 million libel suit (Jessica Van Sack, “Public reprimand urged for Judge Murphy”, Boston Herald, Nov. 21; see Sept. 28, etc.). The operators of the Irish Pub & Inn in Atlantic City, New Jersey are suing the publishers of Philly magazine over their description of the tavern as a “dive bar”, and aren’t buying the magazine’s claim that the description was intended as complimentary. (Michael Klein, Philadelphia Inquirer “Inqlings”, Nov. 18). And a New York lower court judge has declined to order Google/Blogspot to divulge the identity of “Orthomom”, whom a Lawrence, N.Y. school board member had sought to sue on the theory that it was defamatory to have termed her a “bigot”. (Nicole Black, Nov. 18, with links to other blog coverage).
More: And Eugene Volokh (Nov. 27) posts today on a disturbing case from Canada in which a lawyer involved in the shutting down of “hate speech” websites proceeded to sue for defamation — successfully so far in the Ontario courts — over having been called (among other things) an “enemy of free speech”.
May 8 roundup
- Whoops! Insurer’s lawyer backtracks and scrambles for cover after saying some Miami/Dade judges “are being paid off” [Daily Business Review; possibly related, scroll to mention of Miami near end]
- Climate’s different up there: Google and Wikipedia sued for libel in Canada over user-generated content [Rob Hyndman]
- Lawyers implicated in Ky. fen-phen scandal are owners of Curlin, horse that placed third in Kentucky Derby [Courier-Journal, Sun-Times, Sports Network, WSJ law blog]
- “As a lawyer, I hear stories about lawsuit abuse all the time,” but Judge Pearson’s pants suit takes the cake [Nasty Brutish & Short; also lively discussion at Digg]
- Ramps of gold: serial ADA-suit filers George Louie, David Gunther and others launch wave of sidewalk suits against Northern California towns [Contra Costa Times]
- $250 fine for releasing a balloon into the air in New Hampshire? Criminalizing nearly everything [National Law Journal; also Ayn Rand]
- Helpful, if scary: “12 Important U.S. Laws Every Blogger Needs To Know” [Aviva Directory]
- U.K. lawyers ordered to pay back tens of millions of pounds in excessive fees earned for representing sick miners [Times Online Apr. 16, Apr. 25, Apr. 10; Telegraph]
- Did Rosie O’Donnell come out for loser-pays on ABC’s “The View”? Someone please get a transcript [Bill Boushka]
- Japan doesn’t furnish us with much material, but here’s one about magicians suing TV broadcasters for revealing secrets behind coin tricks [Above the Law]
- Sensitivity vs. sensitivity: female drummers allowed to sue over their (culturally authentic) exclusion from ritual drumming at Native American powwow [five years ago on Overlawyered]
Canada’s hate speech law
Selective enforcement is one of the many problems with a law that can reach out to ensnare David Ahenakew, an elderly aboriginal leader in Saskatchewan, but seems to pass right over preachers of violent jihad. “But hate laws aren’t really about hate. They’re about abusing and stretching the criminal code to criminalize political dissidents.” (Ezra Levant, “Abolish foolish law”, Calgary Sun/Canoe, Jun. 12).
Canadian magazine sued over cartoons
Following up on earlier threats (Feb. 14, Mar. 19), Syed Soharwardy has brought a complaint against the Western Standard before the Alberta Human Rights Commission over its publication of the Mohammed cartoons. Ezra Levant, publisher of the Western Standard, explains (Mar. 29) that defendants in the “human rights” tribunal do not benefit from the protection that the loser-pays principle affords most defendants in Canada against groundless or nuisance litigation:
even if we are successful in the human rights commission, we will not be compensated for our legal fees. It’s not like a real court [! — W.O.], where an unsuccessful plaintiff would be ordered to pay a successful defendant’s costs. So even if we win, we lose — the process is the penalty. Worse than that, the radical imam who is suing us doesn’t have to put up a dime — the commission uses tax dollars to pay lawyers and other inquisitors to go at us directly. Human rights tribunals themselves are illiberal institutions.
More: A. Alan Borovoy, “Hearing complaint alters rights body’s mandate”, Calgary Herald, Mar. 16 (PDF).
In other cartoon-jihad news, it appears that giant book retailers Borders and Waldenbooks have been Boston-Phoenix-ized (see Feb. 10); they say they won’t carry the April-May issue of the magazine Free Inquiry, which reprints Mohammed cartoons, for fear of Islamist violence against their employees and customers (Carolyn Thompson, “Borders, Waldenbooks Won’t Carry Magazine”, AP/San Francisco Chronicle, Mar. 29). Free Inquiry is actually worth subscribing to quite aside from this episode; you can do that here.
P.S. Eugene Volokh has a thread discussing the extent to which Borders/Walden might be subject to later tort liability if its sale of the magazine led to violence that harmed customers (Mar. 30). 
Sued by politico, Canadian blogger backs down
Mark Bourrie, who puts out the blog Ottawa Watch, indulged in some unkind comments at the expense of Warren Kinsella, a prominent operative in Canada’s Liberal Party. Then Kinsella filed a libel action demanding C$600,000. (Jorge Barrera, Ottawa Sun, Feb. 15; Jay Currie, Feb. 15). Although numerous well-wishers urged Bourrie to resist in court, the two sides settled the case within about a week and Bourrie published an apologetic note on his blog. Sequence of posts at Ottawa Watch: first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh.
Calgary Muslims may sue over cartoons
“The head of Calgary’s Muslim community is considering a civil lawsuit against two local publishers for reprinting controversial Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad — images that have sparked deadly riots overseas. “Syed Soharwardy, president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada, said he would consult lawyers to see whether it was possible to sue the Jewish Free Press and conservative Western Standard, which have published the cartoons; the general-circulation Calgary Herald has not. More: Feb. 10, etc. (Emma Poole, Calgary Herald/National Post, Feb. 13).
Why they aren’t running the cartoons
The Boston Phoenix (“World of Pain”, Feb. 9) tells readers that “frankly, the primary reason” it isn’t going to run the Danish Muhammed cartoons:
Out of fear of retaliation from the international brotherhood of radical and bloodthirsty Islamists who seek to impose their will on those who do not believe as they do. …Simply stated, we are being terrorized, and as deeply as we believe in the principles of free speech and a free press, we could not in good conscience place the men and women who work at the Phoenix and its related companies in physical jeopardy. As we feel forced, literally, to bend to maniacal pressure, this may be the darkest moment in our 40-year publishing history.
Somewhere there’s probably an issue of vicarious/employer liability lurking in here — if printing the cartoons did lead to violence, the Phoenix’s owners might well end up having to pay. But of course the venerable alt-weekly’s stance is practically a profile in courage compared with that of editors, publishers, governments and university officials in many other places, including South Africa (bans publication of images), Sweden (reported to have shut down website carrying them), Canada’s Prince Edward Island (university confiscates student newspaper, edict forbids weblog comments) and so on (Michelle Malkin roundup, Feb. 9). Commentaries worth reading: Krauthammer, Kinsley, and, from a different perspective, a commenter at Andrew Sullivan’s. (More on the cartoons here and here.)