We’ve provided extensive coverage of the Kentucky fen-phen scandal, in which the lawyers who represented fen-phen plaintiffs were found in a civil suit to have misappropriated more than $64 million of their clients’ money. The judge who heard the suit has now entered final judgment against the lawyers, which will allow the plaintiffs to start collection proceedings in 30 days, barring appeal by the lawyers. (The good news: to appeal, they would need to put up an appeals bond, which would make it easier for the plaintiffs to collect. It’s not clear whether they’re going to appeal; they may be too busy defending themselves against the criminal charges which have been filed against them.)
The lawyers’ lawyer calls it a “travesty of justice,” and offers an unusual defense to charges of defrauding clients:
“No one, including the judge, has acknowledged that the attorneys’ fees were ordered by a judge or the fact that each and every client in the case received multiples, and I repeat multiples, of any amount that they would have received if they had not been represented by my clients — Bill and Shirley.”
Since the lawyers did a good job in achieving the initial settlement, it’s okay for them to defraud their clients of some of the money? Pretty sure it doesn’t work that way. (And of course, in claiming that the fees were “ordered by a judge,” she somehow neglects to mention the fact that the judge was paid off by the lawyers, and that as a result he quit just before he was going to be kicked off the bench.)
Tagged as:
fen-phen,
Kentucky,
Kentucky fen-phen settlement fraud,
scandals
The owner of the Longhorn Custom Bodyart Studio in Oshawa says the shop’s sterilizer had a screw misaligned and as a result reached only 128 degrees C instead of the required 132. The regional health department urged patrons to get checkups, which have proved reassuring, with no indication that anyone caught anything. Oshawa resident Kaleb Beaulieu has nonetheless filed an intended class action demanding $C10 million, saying that tests take a while to prove conclusively negative and that in the mean time he lives in fear. (Carola Vyhnak, “Tattoo studio faces $10M lawsuit”, Toronto Star, Aug. 22; Rosalyn Solomon, “More tattoo clients sue”, Toronto Sun, Aug. 23).
Tagged as:
Canada
This from Mike Frisch of Georgetown at Legal Profession Blog (Aug. 6):
The D. C. Court of Appeals disbarred [NB: should be "suspended for three years", as commenter Richard Harrison points out] an attorney last week. The case involved acts of dishonesty including forgery and would be unremarkable but for the amount of time it took to resolve the matter. The firm that had reported the misconduct did so in 1997. Disciplinary charges — which were essentially uncontested — were filed in February 1999. It took 8 1/2 years for the D.C. bar disciplinary system to work its magic — and the lawyer was free to practice throughout that time. Most of the time was taken by the hearing committee (3 1/2 years) and the court (over three years from argument to disposition).
Tagged as:
ethics
The only thing growing faster than the number of videos being shown on Youtube is the number of lawsuits arising from videos being shown on Youtube. The company itself has been sued by every media company in the known universe — led by Viacom — over copyright infringement by users of the website. And when Youtube isn’t being sued, the people who post the offending or infringing clips are.
A few weeks ago, a couple of college students posted a juvenile rap video about their work in a supermarket produce department. They filmed the video in the A&P supermarket where they were employed stocking shelves, but they never mentioned or displayed the A&P name. No matter; someone figured it out, and they were fired.
That could have been the end of that… except that A&P got the brilliant idea to file a $1,000,000 lawsuit against the two, for defamation. (Just a guess, but unless A&P pays a lot better than I suspect, they may not be good for the money.) And, shockingly, the video, which had just 2,500 hits earlier this week before the lawsuit, now has been viewed 60,000 times. Wonder who thought that this lawsuit was a good idea.
Tagged as:
copyright,
libel slander and defamation
“A German court has awarded 3,000 euros ($4,100) in damages to a man who had to have the top of his skull replaced with plastic because of a faulty hospital fridge.” The plaintiff had sought 20,000 euros. [Reuters/MSNBC]
Tagged as:
Europe,
Germany,
hospitals,
medical
The Tennessee Supreme Court confirms that lawyers in that state may publish potentially defamatory material outside the courtroom provided they are acting in quest of an “identifiable prospective client”. The case was filed by a screw maker against a law firm whose client-trolling website had asserted that the company’s deck screws were “defectively manufactured”. Without determining whether the phrase was defamatory, the court ruled that even if it was, the manufacturer would be afforded no legal remedy. (Day on Torts, Aug. 21; Simpson Strong-Tie Company v. Stewart, Estes, & Donnell, Aug. 20 (PDF)).
Tagged as:
chasing clients,
libel slander and defamation,
Tennessee
Litigation or its threat really does seem to wind up as the ultimate deciding weapon in all sorts of controversies, including whether the city of Santa Barbara can install a temporary public art project aimed at raising alarm about global warming. (Instapundit, quoting James Q. Wilson, Aug. 28; Steve Chawkins, “Property value worries sink Santa Barbara art project”, Los Angeles Times, Aug. 26).
Tagged as:
environment,
global warming
David Lat, er, profiles the marketing efforts of attorney and reggae musician Peter “P’Ta Mon” John, who calls himself “The Thugs [sic] Lawyer,” and has a toll-free number with the five-letter combo “NOT ME.”
Tagged as:
chasing clients
Law.com reports in its summary:
Renowned plaintiffs attorney William Lerach, lead partner at Lerach Coughlin, announced Tuesday he’s stepping down from the firm he started when he split off the West Coast offices of what is now Milberg Weiss. Lerach said he’s planning to take some time off. That could include going to prison, or at least the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Lerach is said to be nearing a deal with federal prosecutors related to legally questionable payments Milberg Weiss made to its lead plaintiffs and a former expert witness.
The WSJ Law Blog similarly reports that “Lerach has not been charged, but he is in advanced talks with prosecutors on a plea deal that could be announced in September and involve serving prison time, according to two people familiar with the investigation.” It also has Lerach’s departure memo to colleagues at the law firm that will now be known as Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins (cross-posted from Point of Law).
Tagged as:
Bill Lerach,
class actions,
Coughlin Stoia,
Milberg Weiss,
scandals
“We were issued a writ because, God bless America, if the toilet paper is not thick enough and you come out with a rash on your ass [you’ll get sued].” — Scottish celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay, who is being sued over his upcoming reality-TV show “Kitchen Nightmares”. Martin Hyde sued Ramsay and the show’s producers after being fired during the filming of a “Nightmares” episode which depicted unsafe and unsanitary conditions at the Manhattan restaurant Hyde managed (which was closed by the city health board shortly after the taping); Hyde claims aspects of the show were staged, which Ramsay denies. (James Hibberd, “Ramsay Blasts ‘Kitchen Nightmares’ Lawsuit”, TV Week, Aug. 28).
Tagged as:
broadcasters,
libel slander and defamation,
restaurants,
United Kingdom
At least we can be sure that lawyers don’t treat each other any better than they treat other parties in litigation. Texas Lawyer provides us with a story of how two plaintiffs lawyers, who started out on the same side of a class action suit, managed to turn a dispute amongst themselves over $28,000 in fees into an eleven year fight with an ultimate award of over $250,000.
Via Adam Liptak’s (TimesSelect) column, Judge Dennis Jacobs has given an important speech (published in the Fordham Law Review), describing a problem we have noted here before:
I am not—I repeat, I am not—speaking about a bias based upon politics or agenda, economic class, ethnicity, or para-ethnicity. When I refer to the secret life of judges, I am speaking of an inner turn of mind that favors, empowers, and enables our profession and our brothers and sisters at the bar. It is secret, because it is unobserved and therefore unrestrained—by the judges themselves or by the legal community that so closely surrounds and nurtures us. It is an ambient bias.
The result is the incremental preference for the lawyered solution, the fee-paid intervention or pro bono project, the lawyer-driven procedure, the appellate dispensation—and the confidence and faith that these things produce the best results. It is an insidious bias, because it is hard to make out, in the vast maze of judicial work and outcomes, the statutes, doctrines, and precedents that are woven together like an elaborate oriental rug in which the underlying image of the dragon emerges only after you stare for a while. I discern in this jumble a bias in favor of the bar and lawyers: what they do; how they do it; and how they prosper in goods and influence.
Earlier: Apr. 3; June 2006.
Tagged as:
pro bono
Can a court really issue an injunction ordering someone to refrain from engaging in such disparagement in blog comments and other such public forums? A federal court did so in the case of Freecycle Network, Inc. v. Oey (Eugene Volokh, Aug. 14).
Tagged as:
online speech,
trademarks
Perils of privacy laws, as discussed earlier here, here, here and here:
Fairfax County school officials determined that Seung Hui Cho suffered from an anxiety disorder so severe that they put him in special education and devised a plan to help, according to sources familiar with his history, but Virginia Tech was never told of the problem.
The disorder made Cho unable to speak in social settings and was deemed an emotional disability, the sources said. When he stopped getting the help that Fairfax was providing, Cho became even more isolated and suffered severe ridicule during his four years at Virginia Tech, experts suggested. In his senior year, Cho killed 32 students and faculty members and himself in the deadliest shooting by an individual in U.S. history….
Professors and school administrators at Virginia Tech could not have known of Cho’s emotional disability — Fairfax officials were forbidden from telling them. Federal privacy and disability laws prohibit high schools from sharing with colleges private information such as a student’s special education coding or disability, according to high school and college guidance and admissions officials. Those laws also prohibit colleges from asking for such information.
The only way Virginia Tech officials would have known about Cho’s anxiety and selective mutism would have been if Cho or his parents told them about it and asked for accommodations to help him, as he had received in Fairfax….
Although the only way college officials could have known about Cho’s problem would have been from Cho, experts said that asking for help is an almost impossible task for someone with selective mutism.
(Brigid Schulte and Tim Craig, “Unknown to Va. Tech, Cho Had a Disorder”, Washington Post, Aug. 27). More: Hans Bader at CEI’s Open Market (Aug. 27).
Tagged as:
disabled rights,
privacy,
schools,
Virginia Tech
