“A jury has awarded about $41,000 in damages to a homeless man who was shot by an Oregon State University fraternity member in 2006.” The Association of Alpha Beta Chapter of Alpha Gamma Rho had expelled the member after his arrest for the .22 caliber rifle shooting, but witnesses said members had been known to fire BB-gun shots from the fraternity’s windows in the past. A lawyer unsuccessfully sought punitive damages on the theory that the fraternity had tolerated “animosity against the homeless”. [AP/OregonLive]
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
guns,
Oregon
- Annals of discrimination lawsuits: a Tennessee cop contests his firing [Chattanooga Pulse]
- New book on lawsuits against universities: Amy Gajda, “The Trials of Academe: The New Era of Campus Litigation” [Harvard University Press via Stanley Fish, NYT]
- Bernard Kerik’s bail revoked because he used Twitter to promote a website put up by his friends flaying the prosecution? [Scott Greenfield] Plus: More complicated than that, says Bill Poser in comments;
- Another big setback for birther litigation [Wasserman/ Prawfsblawg, Little Green Footballs, earlier]
- “I won’t be able to function,” says Missouri woman after judge rules her monkey is not a service animal [On Point News, Molly DiBianca] More: service ferret gets owner kicked out of North Carolina mall [DigTriad]
- Eleventh Circuit agrees that U.S. cannot prosecute criminal defense lawyer Ben Kuehne for money laundering charges for having written opinion letter saying untainted money was available for legal fees [WSJ Law Blog, coverage (and update) at Scott Greenfield's site, Miami Herald]
- One for the Coase Theorem literature? Cranky neighbor forces closure of famed South Carolina recording venue [Ribstein]
- Hallowe’en is safe [BoingBoing, earlier on Pennsylvania town's trick-or-treating ban] “Toronto schools: Hallowe’en insensitive to witches” [four years ago on Overlawyered]
Tagged as:
Barack Obama,
child protection,
colleges and universities,
defense lawyers,
Missouri,
music and musicians,
police,
prosecution,
service animals,
South Carolina,
Tennessee
- Liability protection for doctors, premised on “best-practices” medicine: a proposal to address the federalism difficulties [Bernstein/MacCourt, MI Center for Medical Progress, PoL]
- Fraud in immigration law victimizes both U.S. and aspiring immigrants [NYT]
- Paralyzed while tackling opponent, high school footballer now suing Barre, Vt. school system [Barre-Montpelier Times Argus]
- Memo to Sen. Edwards: voters forgave Grover Cleveland the paternity, but they do mind lies [Mickey Kaus]
- Issue in New Orleans case: defamatory to call tour guides “thugs”? [Times-Picayune]
- No more Lux et Veritas: Yale press
wimps out on Mohammed cartoons [NYT, Moynihan/Reason "Hit and Run", Steyn/NRO "Corner", Hitchens]
- More on NYC woman’s “wasted-tuition” suit against college [Mark Gimein, NY Mag via Genova, earlier]
- Do we really want to let CPSIA’s drafters within a mile of redesigning our health care system? [Inoculated]
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
federalism,
football,
immigration law,
John Edwards,
libel slander and defamation,
medical,
medical malpractice,
New Orleans,
schools,
Vermont
According to Manhattan Institute adjunct fellow Diana Furchtgott-Roth, the Obama administration may (or may not, it’s hard to tell for sure) be backing off its ambitious plan to arm-twist universities into goals of male/female proportionality in math, science, engineering and technology courses [Real Clear Politics]. We’ve covered the controversy here, here, and here.
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
Title IX
The Columbus Dispatch (national, local angles; via WSJ Law Blog) claims universities are using the federal student-privacy law, FERPA, to evade disclosure of information about league violations and other embarrassments in college sports programs. Others say given the law’s incentives it’s natural for administrators to err on the side of not sharing information of possible benefit to the public, as notoriously happened in the case of student/mass murderer Seung-Hui Cho.
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
privacy,
sports
A controversy had erupted at Washington State University over whether it was really a good idea to require all freshmen to read and discuss Michael Pollan’s impassioned attack on the American food industry, “The Omnivore’s Dilemma”. (The word “indoctrination” might even have come up.) Then famed Seattle-based injury attorney Bill Marler, whose practice focuses on suing over food poisoning and who has extensive ties to the university, offered to foot the bill himself for the program’s cost. Which, as the New York Times reports, seems to have made everything okay.
I wonder what the various personages decrying the “commercialization of the university” will have to say about all this. (Fixed name of university, originally mistakenly given as U-W, thanks Jason Barney in comments. And see response from attorney Bill Marler in comments).
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
food safety
“A Massachusetts federal judge recently ruled that Americans with Disabilities Act and related claims against New England Law | Boston can move forward in a lawsuit against the school for expelling a student with learning disabilities who failed two courses. … According to court papers, the plaintiff, Seva Brodsky, was expelled after failing two courses in the spring of 2005, and later learned from medical testing that his ‘memory and organizational deficits’ likely stemmed from an accident in the early 1980s.” He was denied readmission even though, he alleged, he presented medical evidence of his disability and had completed satisfactory work in a law program in Israel. [Sheri Qualters, NLJ]
Tagged as:
colleges and universities,
disability & schools
- Hospital can be sued for releasing mental patient who killed his wife ten days later [ABA Journal, Michigan]
- Pet-sitter draws probation on animal cruelty charges after letting pig overeat and get too fat [AP/Austin, Minn. Post-Bulletin]
- The government pressured states to raise drinking age to 21. So why didn’t the move save lives? [Miron/Tetelbaum, Forbes]
- “Goldman Sachs Tries To Bully Blogger” [Marc Randazza, Cit Media Law and Legal Satyricon; Ron Coleman, Likelihood of Confusion; Brian Baxter, American Lawyer; Martin Schwimmer, Trademark Blog ("I Don't Think It's The Dumbest Trademark Demand Letter I've Ever Seen")]
- Dangers in using Title IX to go after sex imbalances in science and engineering, as Obama is said to want to do [Christina Hoff Sommers, Washington Post]
- Thomas Mundy and his attorney, frequent Overlawyered mentionee Morse Mehrban, have filed more than 200 ADA lawsuits against California merchants and other businesses, settling them for an income that opponents estimate as in excess of $300,000 a year each [L.A. Times back in January, California Civil Justice] But an Orange County jury took 18 minutes to dismiss Mundy’s suit against Del Taco [OC Register, MoreLaw, Ken @ Popehat and his followup] Noni Gotti’s 45-day spree of 41 lawsuits against 111 businesses and landlords in Santa Ana area [Jan Norman, OC Register; more on ADA filing mills]
- Police payouts up but hospital payouts down: “[New York] City Paid Out $568 Million for Lawsuits Last Year” [NY Politics; Ted yesterday]
- Another lawyer disclaimer with a sense of humor [Nicole Black/Legal Antics citing Kelly Phillips Erb/TaxGirl; earlier]
Tagged as:
ADA filing mills,
alcohol,
animals,
colleges and universities,
Morse Mehrban,
nastygrams,
NYC,
psychiatry,
Title IX,
trademarks
- Topic we’ve covered before: should the MCAT exam for prospective M.D.s grant extra time to applicants with learning disabilities? [KevinMD]
- Virginia blogger Waldo Jaquith fighting subpoena seeking identities of anonymous commenters [Citizen Media Law, earlier]
- A free marketer’s case for why fired professor Ward Churchill might deserve to win his case against the University of Colorado [Coyote Blog]
- She videotaped cops arresting her son. They took her camera. Could she have it back, please? [Ken @ Popehat]
- Despite Obama campaign hints of Second Amendment truce, lower-level appointees far from gun-friendly [Dave Kopel] And new State Department legal advisor Harold Koh pushed international curbs on small-arms trade [Fonte, NRO "Corner"]
- U.K.: “Man Who Attempted Suicide Sues Hospital that Saved Him” [Telegraph via Lowering the Bar]
- National media jump on Luzerne County, Pa. judicial scandal, some details I hadn’t seen in earlier coverage [NYT, ABA Journal]
- Atlanta jury — of 11 women and one lone guy — awards $2.3 million for circumcision injury [Fulton County Daily Report]
Tagged as:
bloggers and the law,
colleges and universities,
disability & schools,
guns,
Luzerne County judicial scandal,
police,
suicide,
United Kingdom
- Asks to have $12.6 million verdict set aside because juror Twittered about the case [Little Rock, Ark.; AP/Yahoo]
- Florida legislator opposes “animal husbandry,” thinks it’s sin forbidden in Book of Leviticus. And “Larcenia” is probably the most perfect first name for a politician I’ve ever heard [Popehat]
- Eleventh Circuit upholds most charges against Alabama ex-Gov. Don Siegelman [AP/New York Times, earlier]
- D.C. Council member bullies tiny non-profit paper, says advertiser “will be held responsible” [Marc Fisher, WaPo; Brookland Heartbeat]
- “Worst teachers are rarely formally removed from the classroom” [Denver Post]
- Blogger calling fashion model a skank makes an unsympathetic figure, but the implications for blog anonymity could be serious [NY Post, Scott Greenfield, (Cit Media Law, earlier]
- Barbie says, “Governing West Virginia is hard!” [@cathygellis; Lowering the Bar; earlier]
- Student journalists are blogging dismissed professor Ward Churchill’s lawsuit against the Univ. of Colorado [Race to the Bottom via Ambrogi, Legal Blog Watch]
Tagged as:
Alabama,
colleges and universities,
Denver,
Florida,
teacher tenure,
Twitter
