The Manhattan Institute, with which I’ve been happily associated for about twenty years now, has lately been celebrating its 25th anniversary, and has now commemorated the occasion with a slender (104 pp.) but impressive volume entitled “Turning Intellect Into Influence: The Manhattan Institute at 25“.
From the monthly archives:
December 2004
The new ABC show may cause the legal profession’s on-air image to sink to a new low, worries Mark Donald in Texas Lawyer (“Lawyer Prestige Hits New Low With Fall TV Season”, Dec. 8) For more on the views of show creator David E. Kelley, an ex-lawyer who also created the shows “Ally McBeal” and “Boston Public”, see Nov. 21, 2000.
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But the lion took the biggest share:
Relatives of an Oklahoma State basketball player killed in a university plane crash in 2001 were awarded a $1.6 million settlement, a newspaper [The Oklahoman] reported Monday….Lawson, a 21-year-old junior guard, was one of 10 men who died Jan. 27, 2001, when an airplane carrying members of the basketball program crashed in a Colorado field on the way back from a basketball game at the University of Colorado….
Lawson’s son, Ramses B. Hereford, received $440,139, his parents, Daniel Lawson Sr. and Phyllis Lawson, each received $223,238 and the remaining money — nearly $730,000 — was awarded to attorneys for legal fees and costs, according to court records.
Contributing to the settlement are North Bay Charter, the owner of the downed airplane; the estate of the late pilot, Denver Mills; Marathon Power Technologies, a maker of airplane parts; and Oklahoma State University. Wichita-based Raytheon Aircraft did not settle, and a lawsuit continues seeking to saddle it with the blame for the crash. (“Legal wrangling not finished”, AP/ESPN, Dec. 19).
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Scotland: In a multi-point program aimed at reducing knife crime, First Minister Jack McConnell has proposed banning the sale of swords; introducing “a licensing scheme for retailers selling knives”; doubling, to four years, the maximum jail term for possessing an offensive weapon; giving police new powers of search and arrest; and raising the age limit for buying a knife to 18, from the current 16. (“Crackdown targets knife culture”, BBC, Nov. 22). And in Yeovil, Somerset, police “have been accused of heavy handedness after arresting two young boys who were playing with toy guns.” The boys, 11 and 13, were wearing Santa Claus and Frankenstein’s-monster costumes and one of them sang the James Bond theme song as they pretended to shoot each other with the toys while rolling around on the floor at a youth club. “One of the boys was held in a cell for five hours.” (Simon de Bruxelles, “Playing with toy gun puts boy, ll, in a cell”, The Times (UK), Dec. 3).
John Gregg of Shaker Heights, Ohio wasn’t satisfied with the $30,000 that an arbitrator awarded him for supposedly slipping on soap and water in the men’s room of a McDonald’s restaurant. He insisted on a jury trial instead, but as the trial date approached the restaurant chain investigated the case further and found that Gregg, “who had a 2002 arson conviction connected to burning a relative’s car for insurance money,” wasn’t telling the strict truth when he said he didn’t know the customer who was serving as his key witness in the claim. In fact, the man had worked with Gregg at a construction firm and the two had both collected payments from Geico two years earlier after claiming that their cars had collided with each other. Calling his actions “fraudulent”, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Timothy J. McGinty found Gregg in contempt of court, “ordered him jailed for 30 days and fined him $250.” (Jim Nichols, “Pass up $30,000, go directly to jail”, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Dec. 17; “Outcome of McDonald’s suit should be modeled” (editorial), Richmond, Ind., Palladium-Item, Dec. 22).
That’s what we are, it seems.
Catching up on some overdue thanks to newspaper reporters and contributors who’ve mentioned this site, quoted me, or done both in the past few months (several of them, alas, without currently active links):
* David Boaz, “New York’s Big Think”, New York Post, Dec. 5 (an excellent piece on the Manhattan Institute);
* Jon Robins, “A pair of lawyers who could change the world”, The Times (London), Nov. 2 (on John Edwards’s debate performance);
* Itai Maytal, “Too Early To Give Up on Edwards’s Star”, New York Sun, Nov. 4 (on Edwards’s prospects on departing the U.S. Senate);
* Heidi J. Shrager, “State’s law guardian system in need of overhaul”, Staten Island Advance, Sept. 28 (on the need for reform of New York’s law guardian system, under which lawyers are appointed to represent the interests of minors and others not able to look out for themselves);
* Kate Coscarelli, “Police protect, serve — and sue”, Newark Star-Ledger, Sept. 12, reprinted at Wilentz, Goldman & Spitzer site (on legal doctrines allowing police officers injured in the course of their duties to sue allegedly negligent private parties (see Aug. 31);
* David Isaac, “USG Corp.: Election And Elation For Wallboard Maker”, Investor’s Business Daily, Nov. 5 (on post-election prospects for asbestos legislation);
* Ed Wallace, “Wheels: You Can Fool Some of the People…”, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Oct. 3 (on network crash-test journalism).
For other press mentions, check our “About the site” page.
The latest installment in the beloved musical spoof series sending up Broadway shows opened this month at the Douglas Fairbanks Theater in New York. As founder Gerald Alessandrini makes clear in his liner notes to vol. II, the series is made possible by the good-natured forbearance of many in the theater community: “Also special thanks to the real composers and lyricists and writers (alive and past) who have let us make mince meat out of their beautiful and well-crafted work. Without their reluctance toward lawsuits there would certainly be no Forbidden Broadway.”
Continuing Broadway Monday at Overlawyered, Eric Idle reports that the musical production of “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” has spent more money on lawyers than the comedy troupe did on the entire budget of the original coconut-laden film. No word on whether last year’s threatened action by “Camelot” producers complaining about possible confusion is behind those expenses. Hormel, producers of food-like substance Spam, has adopted the more productive approach of co-optation, rather than litigation, and is offering a “Collectors’ Edition” Spam tin. (Eric Idle, “The Tale of Spamalot”, Daily Llama, Sep. 6; AP/USA Today, “‘Spamalot’ heads to Broadway”, Dec. 3; Ernio Hernandez, “‘Monty Python’ Musical Spamalot Urged to Change Title by Broadway-Bound Camelot”, Playbill, Nov. 14, 2003; “Monty Python Star Faces Costly Broadway Wrangle”, WENN, Nov. 12, 2003).
Bad news for the disgruntled divorce client in the case reported on here Nov. 17: a state appellate court has ordered San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ronald Quidachay to reconsider his ruling allowing the client to claim emotional distress damages over the attorney’s alleged mishandling of his divorce (which the attorney denies). Ryan Kent of San Rafael, Calif., representing defendant attorney Joseph Pisano, said a claim for emotional distress damages “just opens up a whole bag of worms”. And: “It’s too open-ended. It’s not predictable.” We know plenty of defendants in other professions that must wish they had the benefit of that logic. (Pam Smith, “Calif. Appeal Court Unmoved by Emotional Distress Claim in Malpractice Case”, The Recorder, Dec. 22). More: George Wallace and David Giacalone comment.
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It’s heart-warming enough to be a Christmas tale:
Greg and I still had to sneak into the building. The people in charge of the PowerPC project, upon which [Apple's] future depended, couldn’t get us badges without a purchase order. They couldn’t get a purchase order without a signed contract. They couldn’t get a contract without approval from Legal, and if Legal heard the truth, we’d be escorted out of the building.
Ron Avitzur tells the Graphing Calculator Story: engineers conspire to evade the lawyers and suits and create killer app software (via McIrvin); related Slashdot thread.
David Giacalone (Dec. 20) dedicates to us this one by Kobayashi Issa, translated by David G. Lanoue:
a new year begins–
nonsense
piled on nonsense
Thanks also to readers of this site for countless kind words and acts over the past year, and — if it’s not at this point too politicized a thing to say — happy holidays to you all.
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“‘When I started doing this years ago, I never even thought about liability,’ Nevada [Victor Nevada, 61, a professional Santa Claus in Calgary, Canada] says. ‘But Santas have a pretty good chance of getting sued. You got the obvious things: You drop a child on its head. Then there’s Santa saying the wrong thing?. I had a Santa working for me a couple years ago; he had a girl on his knee, and he commented, “You have nice eyes and nice hair.” She claimed sexual harassment.’” (J.R. Moehringer, “Ho! Ho! Is More Like Uh-Oh”, Los Angeles Times, Dec. 23).
From this August:
Yankee Pot Roast: Which do you prefer (to munch on, not to adorn book covers): Pepperidge Farm Goldfish or chocolate-chip cookies?Tom Perrotta: I prefer chocolate chip cookies. They don’t have as many lawyers.
Background detail: Malcolm Jones, “Fiction: New Snack Attack”, Newsweek, May 24; before-and-after book covers; Perrotta’s Little Children.
Many farmers use anhydrous ammonia as fertilizer, because it provides vital nitrogen nutrients to the soil. The combustible material is produced in Louisiana, and then shipped to the Midwest on barges or through pipelines, and then stored on tanks on farms. However, ammonia is also useful for making illegal methamphetamines, and thefts are a regular problem. (KOMU-TV, “Law Officers Fight Ammonia Thefts”, May 19). If a thief injures himself tampering with an ammonia tank, should he be able to sue the farmer for the injury? Three states, Kansas, Missouri, and Wyoming, say no, and provide immunity for those who store, handle, or own ammonia equipment from suit by thieves. Legislatures are considering the issue in other midwestern states.
The misnamed anti-tort reform Center for Justice & Democracy has noticed the success of the ATRA’s judicial hellhole campaign (Dec. 15; Dec. 3, 2003), and decided to respond with its own report, the “Zany Immunity Law Awards”, intended to single out “special interests” who opportunistically subvert the legislative system to get improper immunity from liability. The cover shows a legislator receiving a statuette, cash in his pocket, and roses with a ribbon labeled “Sleaziest Legislation.”
Exposing sleazy special-interest immunity laws is a noble sentiment–but it’s a sure sign of how few and far between such laws are that CJD singles out the sensible anhydrous ammonia immunity laws for its top ten list. The CJD incorrectly blames the law on a supposed “anhydrous ammonia business lobby”; in fact, it’s groups like the Michigan Farm Bureau that push for laws like Michigan S.B. 786. Indeed, the only group to oppose such laws? Trial lawyers’ lobbying groups. See also Kelly Lenz, “Fertilizer law to help farmers”, Farm and Auction, Jun. 12, 2002.
How ridiculous are the CJD awards? One of the top ten “zany immunity laws” refers to “immunity” granted to placebo manufacturers and distributors. Except the immunity in question isn’t immunity–it’s an exception to a criminal statute prohibiting the sale of fake drugs! E.g., Fla. Stat. 817.564(6)(a). (This is the only appearance of the word “placebo” in the Florida Code. It’s telling that CJD omits the statutory cite in its footnotes.) Perhaps this law is zany, but it’s hardly an example of a special interest group buying sleazy legislation that damages consumers. A subject of a research test who is injured by adulterated placebos (has this ever happened?) will still have a cause of action.
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Madison County: Gordon Maag, the trial-lawyer-backed candidate who last month was defeated in a race for the Illinois Supreme Court in what is said to have been the most expensive judicial race in American history, has filed a $100 million defamation suit against an arm of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce for saying bad things about him during the recent campaign. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch/Edwardsville Intelligencer/Southern Illinoisan/Illinois Leader). Jim Copland comments at Point Of Law. For two other widely noted efforts by Madison County lawyers to silence or intimidate their critics, see Nov. 4 and Nov. 30, 1999 and Feb. 29, 2000 (class action lawyers sue Post-Dispatch columnist Bill McClellan for making fun of them) and Jun. 9, Jul. 12, Jul. 26, 2003 (dragging national tort reform groups to court). For efforts to suppress the airing of ads affecting the Maag-Karmeier race, see Oct. 27. For other watch-what-you-say-about-lawyers cases, see Mar. 16 and Nov. 15, 2004, Nov. 30, 2003, and earlier posts; and Point of Law, Oct. 25 and Dec. 22, 2004.
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A Canadian employer has now been held partly to blame for a murderous onslaught by one of its adversaries in a labor dispute:
A court has awarded $10.7 million in damages to the widows of nine men killed by a bomb during a labour dispute at Yellowknife’s Giant Mine, blaming the mining company and the union almost as much as the man who laid the explosives….Justice Arthur Lutz ruled that none of the involved parties did enough to control the relentless and escalating violence on the picket line that summer. He assigned almost equal blame to the union, Royal Oak Mines and Roger Warren, who was convicted of the murders. Lutz also assigned a share of the damages to Pinkerton’s security, two union activists and the N.W.T. government….
Royal Oak had argued that it couldn’t have predicted the deaths, but Lutz scorned the reasoning. … The judge said violence and threats were rampant during the 18-month strike, including physical injuries, property damage and sabotage. Strikers staked out the houses of replacement workers and stole explosives from the mine, setting off one blast that cut off power to a hospital.
(“Giant Mine widows awarded $10.7M”, CBC, Dec. 16).
Law.com’s The Recorder reports that some in the plaintiff’s bar are understandably upset that Google’s ad program placed their firms’ ads on the lurid site discussed in this space Nov. 15 and Nov. 18. “The ‘million dollars’ site ‘is patently sleazy, but the question is whether it violates the ethics rules,’ said Richard Zitrin, an ethics specialist and partner with Zitrin & Mastromonaco who advises plaintiff firms. ‘I think it’s unethical. And I’m a free-speechist on this.’” Lawyers with Lieff Cabraser and Schneider & Wallace also deemed the site unethical. Others, as in earlier rounds of the brouhaha, complained that too much attention was being paid to the page, including a mention by Sen. Orrin Hatch at a Senate hearing. (Justin Scheck, “Vioxx Web Site Has Law Firms Outraged”, The Recorder, Nov. 30). And in a dispatch a week later, the same reporter found that law-firm ads had been removed from the site and replaced with public service ads (“Controversial Web Site Drops Lawyer Ads”, Dec. 6).
More: David Giacalone, guestblogging at RiskProf, has news of more developments, including a substantial rewrite of the site (Dec. 26).
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