The Consumer Product Safety Commission helps defuse an unfounded toxic-toy scare about one of the year’s toy trends, hamster-like Zhu Zhu pets. [Washington Post via Adler, Volokh, Woldenberg/AmendTheCPSIA.com, Trevor Butterworth/Forbes, Christopher Palmeri/Business Week]
From the monthly archives:
December 2009
Judge Gertner blasts the defense handling of the Sony v. Tenenbaum (P2P file-sharing) case. [Nate Anderson, Ars Technica] More: Charles Nesson’s response [Legal Blog Watch].
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The Yelp! website is better known for restaurant and hotel reviews, but is branching into reviews of attorneys, which generates from me a reaction mirroring the site’s exclamation point. Facebook friend M.F.B. found one that was tellingly revealing, and can be paraphrased as “I was guilty as Tiger Woods in a Las Vegas cocktail lounge, but ‘[t]hanks to Mr. _____ I have my license back and was not found guilty for a DUI.’”
The New York Times publicizes a possible new front for product liability litigation [sidebar, yesterday's p. 1 story]
P.S. A long, must-read post from Russell Jackson, who was quoted in the article: “Various Defenses Should Make Cell Phone Suit Untenable“.
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A wrongful-death suit claims the TV host’s badgering drove a woman over the brink. [AP/L.A. Times, Brian Cuban; more on Grace, and our earlier coverage of this suit; OnPoint News]
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A federal agency once famed for its anti-employer zeal is quickly returning to an activist stance. [Workplace Prof; my earlier take on the criminal-record issue, in Reason]
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Why there’s a “Keep out of the reach of children” label on a can of Glade. [WAFB Baton Rouge, Louisiana]
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- Woman jailed for “camcordering” after recording four minutes of sister’s birthday party in movie theater [BoingBoing]
- Senate hearing airs trial lawyer gripes against Iqbal [Jackson and earlier, PoL, Wajert, Beck & Herrmann (scroll)] Franken and other Senators sidestep substance, browbeat witness re: “study” terminology [Alison Frankel, AmLaw]
- Still time to cancel? “2009 is also the first year of global governance” — new EU president [Small Dead Animals]
- Miller-Jenkins battle: judge orders custody switch to law-abiding spouse [Box Turtle Bulletin, background]
- Speedy by government standards? 17 years ago DoT proposed Southeast high-speed rail on existing rights of way, ruling on environmental impact statement is expected next year [McArdle]
- “New York’s New DWI Bill: Compounding Stupidity” [Greenfield; felony to drive intoxicated with passenger 15 or younger]
- “Apple Told To Pay Patent Troll OPTi $21.7 Million” [Business Insider]
- This year’s ABA Blawg 100 listing left out some legal blogs that aren’t half bad [Turkewitz]
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Illinois: “A Hillside police dispatcher who was fired after telling a supervisor she suffered from narcolepsy– which can cause its victims to fall asleep unexpectedly — has tentatively settled her lawsuit against the west suburban town.” [WGN Chicago; & welcome Above the Law readers]
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And now the heir to a Nebraska party-favor fortune has a lawyer. [WSJ] More: Above the Law.
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Following a huge outcry in Louisiana and elsewhere (see Oct. 28; Slashfood, Washington Times, Ryan Young/CEI), the agency will reconsider the rule. The uber-nannyish Center for Science in the Public Interest was dismayed at the delay [BayouBuzz], while the New Orleans publication Gambit, which calls the episode “a glaring example of bureaucratic overkill,” warns that after finishing further study the FDA “could still return with its faulty reasoning.” Nancy Leson at the Seattle Times passes on word from a Northwest shellfish official: “We were told by FDA officials that initially, they were planning to mandate post-harvest treatment of all oysters, and at the last minute they decided to just stick to Gulf oysters — for now.” And ubiquitous food-poisoning lawyer Bill Marler, whose publicity juggernaut rolls on* (recent Seattle Times profile — “I represent poisoned little children against giant corporations”), feels like he’s been wasting a fortune:
…let me make clear that I dumped a lot of “change” into the Democratic change wagon – I have given or raised millions of dollars for Democratic candidates over the last several years. My goal was to put people in office that did good public policy. Well, I guess I needed to wake up literally and figuratively. … Now, the FDA runs and hides from the Oyster industry. … Democratic candidates – do not bother calling, this “change” machine is out of order.
*Marketing disclosure for the FTC’s benefit: when I spoke at the recent AEI food safety panel an employee of one of Marler’s journalistic enterprises presented me with one of his promotional t-shirts.
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“Two former lawyers whose firm earned £136 million by handling compensation claims for sick miners lost their appeal yesterday against being struck off for dishonesty.” ["struck off" = disbarred] The firm secretly kicked back more than $1 million to a union official to get the work, and made improper deductions from the sums owed to clients. “Mr Beresford banked more than £30 million — which bought him a jet, Aston Martins and a Ferrari — from fees paid to his firm by the Government for its work on coal health claims.” [Times Online]
After an Ohio man’s 2005 arrest for huffing gold spray paint, his gilt-chinned police mugshot raced around the Internet, ensuring him “worldwide infamy”. Now he’s represented by a lawyer who’s suing entities that have used his visage on “T-shirts, coffee mugs and even a billboard in Europe.” [AP, Legal Blog Watch]
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Should his child support payment remain unchanged? [WFTV Orlando, Robert Franklin/GlennSacks.com via Amy Alkon]
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- Insurance mandate or no, New Jersey specialists tending to duck out of high-legal-risk procedures like mammography [Amy Handlin, Gloucester County Times via NJLRA]
- Audi redux, or something different this time? L.A. Times endorses charges of sudden acceleration against Toyota [Holman Jenkins/WSJ, FindLaw "Injured"]
- Ghastly idea of the year: Rep. Waxman wants federal government to be “responsible” for fixing journalism [Coyote, Bainbridge]
- “Arkansas Judge Tosses Defamation Lawsuit Against Dixie Chicks Over ‘West Memphis Three’ Letter” [Citizen Media Law, Longstreth/American Lawyer]
- Judge Weinstein: falsification by arresting officers seems “widespread” in NYPD [Balko, Greenfield]
- U.K.: Carbon ration cards? [Krauthammer]
- Nova Scotia, Canada: “A Couple in their 70s Wave at A Kid…And In Swoop the Cops” [Free-Range Kids]
- Barbra Streisand loses suit over aerial photo of her Malibu home taken by environmental group; by suing, she ensures that many thousands more people will see the photograph, in what is dubbed “Streisand effect” [six years ago on Overlawyered]
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Lowering the Bar (channeling Dave Eyvazzadeh at Wired/Autopia) has some word on other unusual lawsuits filed by that Hillsborough, Calif. man who’s suing multiple defendants over San Francisco Airport noise and congestion [earlier]
You may have seen some of them before, but probably not all six unless you hang out on YouTube a lot. [Erin Geiger Smith and William Wei, Business Insider]
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Everyone else in the country has been talking about it, we may as well too. [Hanna Rosin, Slate via WSJ Law Blog] Another view: Cathy Young, Real Clear Politics.
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