The flight attendant sought a whopping $405K for the alleged assault. This demand seemed unreasonable based on the description of the injuries, even if they occurred as alleged (“Jury says no assault, agrees with Osteen’s wife”, MSNBC, Aug. 14, earlier).
We express no opinion as to exactly how badly Victoria Osteen, wife of a celebrated evangelical minister, may have behaved on that Continental Airlines flight in 2005; “The Federal Aviation Administration fined [her] $3,000 for interfering with a crew member.” Readers keep writing in, however, to call our attention to the financial demands that flight attendant Sharon Brown is making in her lawsuit, which just went to trial. It seems Brown wants compensation not only for such things as hemorrhoids and damage to her religious faith but also, by way of punishment, “10 percent of Victoria Osteen’s net worth”. Wouldn’t we all! (”Joel Osteen’s Wife on Trial in Flight Attendant Assault”, AP/FoxNews.com, Aug. 7).
Another story in a genre we’ve covered before, namely the lawsuit against a church whose congregants commonly faint or swoon during worship, the grounds being that more or better assigned “catchers” would have helped avert injury. This one was filed by Matthew Lincoln against Lakewind Church in Tennessee (Smoking Gun, Jun. 5; Childs, Jun. 5). Our earlier coverage has included the Michigan woman who successfully sued her Pentecostal church on similar grounds, and an Australian plaintiff who lost.
In order to enhance diversity, it was necessary to suppress it, cont’d: The GuideOne Mutual insurance company offers, in 19 states at last report, what it calls a “FaithGuard” policy rider with features it believes are valued by some churchgoers. In particular, to quote its critics, the rider
waives insurance deductibles if there is a loss to personal property while it is in the “care, custody and control” of the insured’s church; pays church tithes or donations if the insured suffers a loss of income from a disability; and doubles medical limits for an injury received while sponsoring an activity conducted on behalf of the church.
All three provisions might make a family feel more confident about pledging material support or volunteer time to its church, by limiting the potential financial downside in case of accidents or misadventure. But now GuideOne is on the receiving end of a lawsuit filed by the National Fair Housing Alliance, on the grounds that the rider discriminates against non-churchgoers — which is to say, by providing benefits they would have no interest in purchasing. In particular, complains NFHA,
The benefits of FaithGuard are not available to persons who suffer a covered loss or disability while engaged in similar activities but who are not religious, who do not belong to a church, or who do not attend church or participate in religious activities.
Of course people in these latter categories would never be inclined to purchase FaithGuard in the first place, any more than people who never step on airplanes would go out of their way to buy flight insurance. Instead, if they worry about the financial risk of accidents, they would select one of the innumerable insurance products readily available with no particular religious component. But to achieve religious nondiscrimination in the eyes of NFHA, it’s apparently crucial not just that we non-churchgoers have access to every sort of risk coverage we might take a notion to buy, but that FaithGuard’s customers not have access to one they might like. Will the result of this lawsuit if successful be more diversity? Or, again, less? (earlier). More: Rick Armon, “Akron suit claims insurance for churchgoers discriminates”, Akron Beacon Journal, Nov. 27; Religion Clause (Howard M. Friedman), Nov. 28.
The brutalist-modern Third Church of Christ Scientist is one of the most widely disliked buildings in Washington, D.C., not least by its own congregation, which groans at the impracticalities of maintaining the concrete monstrosity: “According to one church official, you’ve got to build scaffolding just to reach some of the [light] bulbs [to change them].” But Washington’s local architectural-preservation authorities forbid the congregants from replacing the building, which dates all the way back to 1971. (Charles Paul Freund, “A Brutalist Bargain”, American Spectator, Dec. 18).
In both of which cases the hospital is being targeted for blame:
About a year ago, Linda Long was attending the East London Holiness Church in London, Ky. That’s one of a handful of churches in the country that practice snake handling, which is exactly what it sounds like it is — congregation members handle venomous snakes in the belief that the faithful will not be harmed.Long was bitten in the cheek by a rattlesnake and died — and now her family is suing the hospital where she was brought for treatment.
In a suit filed earlier this month, Long’s family alleges employees of a London, Ky. hospital ridiculed Long when she was brought there after the attack and failed to treat her in a timely manner. She later was airlifted to the University of Kentucky Medical Center, where she died.
(”Family of ’snake handling’ victim sues hospital”, USA Today “On Deadline” blog, Nov. 9; Michelle Cottle, New Republic “The Plank”, Nov. 11).
Meanwhile, in Britain, Anthony Gough, 24, says he is considering legal action in the death of his wife, Emma, following the birth of twins at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital. The Goughs are members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses sect which opposes blood transfusions on religious grounds and Emma had refused such a transfusion; doctors had in vain urged Gough to override his wife’s wishes. Gough says a machine would have permitted self-transfusion of his wife’s blood but that hospital staff did not know how to use it. (Andrew Parker, “Jehovah hubby: I blame doctors”, The Sun (U.K.), Nov. 7)
More newspapers are covering the story raised by our January 31 post about the NFL forbidding Super Bowl parties and promotions. Notwithstanding the NFL threats, my heavily-blogger-attended annual Super Bowl party is still going forward, complete with the title “Super Bowl” on the Evite. (Stephanie Simon, “No sanctuary for Super Bowl flock”, LA Times, Feb. 3 (churches); Liz Benston, “Casinos not best seat in house for big game”, Las Vegas Sun, Feb. 2 (casinos)). (OT personal note: the latter story quotes my friend “Steve Fezzik”, who I knew when he was just an actuary with a real name, and who almost convinced me to leave the law in 2001 to team up with him as a professional gambler.)
In Spokane, Wash., where the local Roman Catholic diocese has declared bankruptcy under the pressure of sex-abuse lawsuits, a recent ruling by a federal judge deemed individual church parishes “unincorporated associations” that could themselves potentially be sued. Now plaintiffs in the cases are talking about suing the local parishes “and might even explore the legal liability of individual churchgoers”. (John Stucke, “Abuse victims may sue parishes”, Spokane Spokesman-Review, Jul. 27). More: PoL May 5, etc.
“Lawyers who have been representing survivors of Canada’s residential school system are expected to get the biggest payment ever recorded for a Canadian class action case.” The federal government will pay about C$80 million in fees, of which half will go to the Regina-based Merchant Law Group and half to a consortium of other lawyers. (”Lawyers set to be paid $80M in school abuse deal”, CTV, May 8; “School abuse deal includes $80M for lawyers”, CBC, May 8). The fees are part of a $2 billion deal intended to resolve portions of the litigation over the federally-sponsored, church-run Indian schools, which were originally accused of permitting the infliction of physical and sexual abuse on some of their students; later the litigation expanded to include charges of “cultural deprivation” and alienation on behalf of thousands of Native Americans who attended the schools, which were geared toward assimilation into Canadian culture (FAQ from CBC on settlement). More: Aug. 23-24, 2000.
Realizing that there were no good plans in place for evacuating the 100,000+ sick or impoverished residents of New Orleans in the event of a hurricane, the Red Cross and a local poverty-action group had been developing a plan to “enlist churches in a vast, decentralized effort to make space for the poor and the infirm in church members’ cars when they evacuate,” according to Bruce Nolan in the July 24 Times-Picayune (reprinted by Brad DeLong). However, Operation Brother’s Keeper had only managed to enlist four churches as participants as of this July. Logistical difficulties posed by the idea were one challenge, but according to Nolan’s reporting another factor was also at work:
although the Archdiocese of New Orleans has endorsed the project in principle, it doesn’t want its 142 parishes to participate until insurance problems have been solved with new legislation that reduces liability risks, Wilkins said.
In churches
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Under the Civil Rights Attorney’s Fees Award Act of 1976, plaintiffs collect fees if they win even in part, but pay no fees if they lose. That puts a bludgeon in the hands of objectors in church-state lawsuits (as well as in many other kinds of lawsuits characterized as being about civil rights). Rep. John Hostettler of Indiana has introduced the Public Expression of Religion Act, a bill that would attempt to level the playing field as regards claims of religion-related civil rights violations by public officials. It would do so, however, by eliminating fee entitlements entirely; that would indeed deprive long-shot suits of much of their in terrorem effect, but at the cost of undercutting valid claims brought under the act. Why not take a look at moving toward full two-way fee shifting instead? (Christopher Levenick, “High Noon at Sunrise Rock”, WSJ/OpinionJournal.com, May 27).
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The Indiana legislature turns out to have banned them and is now scrambling to fix matters (Robert King, “Heavens! Potlucks are illegal”, Indianapolis Star, Feb. 13)(via Balko). See Apr. 15, 2004.
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Just when you thought it was safe to run inside and pray: “Air inside churches may be a bigger health risk than that beside major roads, research suggests.” Candles and incense are deemed likely culprits for the prevailing high levels of polycyclic hydrocarbons and particulates, the latter of which were found at 12 to 20 times permissible EU levels. (”Church air is ‘threat to health’”, BBC, Nov. 20). Libertarian Samizdata has a rather drastic suggestion for what to do about the new findings. Another possibility, of course, is that the official EU hazard limits are set at a super-cautious level that has little to do with the amount of risk most people would consider it reasonable to bear. More on the candle menace: Jun. 19, 2001 (EPA advisory); Nov. 4-5, 2002 (Calif. “right-to-know” suits against candle makers).
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“A former member and longtime critic of the Church of Scientology has been ordered by a Marin County judge to pay the church $500,000 for speaking out against the controversial religious movement.” Scientology defector Gerald Armstrong, in a 1986 settlement of earlier litigation with the church, had agreed to “maintain strict confidentiality and silence with respect to his experiences with the Church of Scientology” with a penalty of $50,000 for every offending utterance. “The church maintains that Armstrong has violated the agreement at least 201 times and owes it just over $10 million.” Armstrong’s “lawyer noted that his client had declared bankruptcy to avoid paying past damages won by Scientology, and Armstrong still vows to never pay a penny to the church.” (Don Lattin, San Francisco Chronicle, Apr. 13). See also Mar. 25-26, 2002; May 3, 2000.
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CNSNews.com reports that an American Trial Lawyers Association publication, “ATLA’s Litigating Tort Cases,” an $800 manual advertised as “the inside track to establishing and maintaining a successful tort practice,” recommends quizzing jurors on their religious beliefs during the “voir dire” procedure meant to exclude biased jurors.
The chapter classifies certain individuals as “personal responsibility” jurors. “The personal responsibility jurors tend to espouse traditional family values.” Often, “these jurors have strong religious beliefs.” Because “personal responsibility jurors” hold values such as “People should be self-reliant, responsible, and self-disciplined. When people act irresponsibly and are not self-disciplined, there are consequences. People must be accountable for their conduct,” they may not be sufficiently sympathetic to the plaintiffs.
Thus, “the only solution is to identify these jurors during voir dire and exclude them from the jury.”
A spokesman for Americans United for Separation of Church and State objects: “‘Certainly a good lawyer will try to ferret out any evidence of prejudice, whether it’s religious prejudice or racial prejudice, prejudice against women, whatever, that’s legitimate,’ [Rob] Boston said. ‘But, for a lawyer to simply assume that certain religious beliefs will dictate certain behaviors is naive and I think it does a disservice to our legal system.’” (Jeff Johnson, “Trial Lawyers Question Jurors’ ‘Strong Religious Beliefs’”, CNSNews.com, Dec. 18).
Alas, the article uncomfortably and unnecessarily singles out the Judaism of the author of the book chapter in question. But the identification of trial lawyers’ strategy in such bald terms provides interesting insight.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers are fond of accusing tort reformers of attempting to remove certain decisions from “the people”. But under the current tort system, jurors in many cases are not so much “the people” as a hand-picked group selected to favor a certain result. When one combines this biased sampling with random variation, and then combine that with the possibility of jackpot damages awards, it takes only a small minority of “the people” to create a jury pool that creates dramatic shifts in wealth to lawyers from the rest of society.
In a widely awaited decision, the European Court of Justice has ruled that a Swedish woman can be fined about $500 for identifying and publishing personal details about fellow church volunteers on her personal web site in breach of “data protection” privacy laws. Bodil Lindqvist of Alseda parish had published online “some full names, telephone numbers and references to hobbies and jobs held by her colleagues. In relation to one lady, Lindqvist also revealed that the volunteer had injured her foot and was working part-time on medical grounds.” A Swedish court found that she had violated data-privacy law in posting the page and the European Court agreed. (”Identifying people on-line violates Data Protection laws, says European Court”, Out-Law (UK), Nov. 7). We originally reported on the case Sept. 20, 2000.
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Point of Law Volokh