The Telegraph profiles a “race equality campaigner [who] has cost taxpayers more than £1 million by bringing a string of discrimination claims – several of them against anti-racism groups.”
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Posts tagged as:
discrimination law
The so-called ministerial exemption to workplace anti-discrimination laws is not very popular in some quarters of legal academia. Were the courts not to recognize a strong exemption of this sort, however, churches and congregations might be forced to employ teachers or even ministers who hew to doctrines they regard as erroneous or sinful, courts would be thrust into intrusive inquiries as to competing claims of fealty to religious doctrine, and the sorts of court orders often issued to bind the conduct of conventional employers might obstruct believers’ freedom to organize church institutions as they see fit. Now the Supreme Court for the first time has agreed to hear a case construing the scope of the ministerial exemption. As public debate proceeds, some might even wind up concluding that the legitimate liberty interest in freedom of association is so important that non-religious organizations should enjoy it too. [Rick Garnett and Chris Lund, PrawfsBlawg]
Even the Ninth Circuit’s not buying that one, note David Lehrer and Joe Hicks at City Journal.
- A San Francisco cosmetic surgeon sues her online critics — in Virginia? [Paul Alan Levy, CL&P]
- SCOTUS ruling in “cat’s-paw” case could gut summary judgment in many bias suits [Hyman]
- Cuomo spokesman’s smart retort to Litigation Lobby attack on Medicaid reform panel [LoHud.com]
- “Tennessee Cops Posed as a Defense Attorney To Get Suspect To Incriminate Himself” [Reason]
- “Illinois golfer not liable for head shot” [Lowering the Bar]
- Trade friction mounts due to anti-India provisions in Zadroga (9/11 recovery workers) compensation bill [PoL]
- Is a tax-funded federal nonprofit entity funneling money to environmental suits against the government? [Ron Arnold, Examiner]
- FCRA class action deemed “lawsuit abuse problem in a nutshell” [Examiner editorial]
- “Fatherhood by Conscription: Nonconsensual Insemination & the Duty of Child Support” [Michael Higdon, SSRN via Instapundit]
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Big Government has been blowing the whistle on the Pigford settlement, which arose from allegations of racial discrimination in U.S. Department of Agriculture programs and has resulted in the allotment of billions in federal taxpayer money as compensation. The series of posts is here and here.
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This one is suing a Florida nonprofit, and, like the Citibank employee in the last such controversy, is being represented by Overlawyered favorite Gloria Allred. [OnPoint News]
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“‘No touch’ rules discouraging teachers from restraining and comforting children are to be scrapped, Education Secretary Michael Gove has said.” [BBC] And the incoming Cameron government is proceeding with a previously signaled broad effort to roll back excessive health and safety rules that discourage harmless goings-on in schools, workplaces and the community [BBC, earlier] On the other hand, the Conservatives intend to go forward with most of a package of new measures devised by the previous Labour government that would expand discrimination and harassment law in the direction of wide-open U.S.-style rights to sue [Telegraph, Daily Mail]
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The University of Windsor wasn’t quite as independent as it imagined, not in the face of a discrimination suit over its choice of law dean. [National Post, earlier]
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- Could bald employees sue under genetic-bias law? [Delaware Employment Law]
- EPA under pressure in bedbug battle [Atlantic Wire, Time]
- “Child Safety Advocates Push for Changes to Prevent Hot-Car Deaths” [Fair Warning]
- Proof of Living Constitution Theory? iPhone Constitution app is now on version 1.3.8 [Magliocca, Co-Op]
- “North Carolina’s Corrupted Crime Lab” [Radley Balko]
- “The folly of needless alcohol laws” [Conor Friedersdorf, The Daily Dish]
- “Judge Posner opinion on overwarning” [PoL, Drug and Device Law]
- Annals of zero tolerance: No scissors allowed at ribbon-cutting ceremony at Pittsburgh airport [eight years ago on Overlawyered]
- International House of Pancakes (restaurant chain) vs. International House of Prayer (church) [CNN]
- “Law Schools Now Require Applicants To Honestly State Whether They Want To Go To Law School” [The Onion, satire]
- “As ENDA Lingers in Congress, a [million-dollar verdict] in Maine” [Michael Fox]
- Fear: On advice of FBI, cartoonist who organized “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” drops out and changes name [Seattle Weekly, Welch, Moynihan]
- University of Windsor lawprof asks Ontario Human Rights Tribunal to overturn school’s decision not to make her dean [National Post]
- Prominent Seattle lawyer arrested, and do-you-know-who-I-am-ery allegedly ensues [Above the Law]
- “Man rushed to hospital after finding tampon in his cereal” [Obscure Store, Macon Telegraph] Update: suit dropped.
- Manufacture iPhones in the U.S.? “I worry America has too many lawyers. I don’t want to spend time having people sue me every day.” [Foxconn's Terry Gau, quoted in Business Week]
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“There’s no doubt delivering food is a risky job — it routinely ranks on the U.S. Bureau of Labor’s most-dangerous jobs list — and after last week’s much-publicized robbery of a Chinese food deliveryman, some restaurants might be inclined to avoid delivery to high-crime areas. But in doing so, restaurants might open themselves up to civil litigation regulating anti-discrimination practices, essentially creating a catch-22 for the businesses, legal experts said.” [Harrisburg Patriot-News]
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“If there are only 39,697 African-American farmers grand total in the entire country, then how can over 86,000 of them claim discrimination at the hands of the USDA? Where did the other 46,303 come from?” [Zombie, Pajamas Media; earlier here and here] More: Dave Zincavage has been checking Wikipedia (“virtually automatic” $50,000 payouts); and lawyers for Native American farmers and ranchers want in too.
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The immediate controversy over Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack’s removal of Sherrod from her post is interesting enough — both the NAACP and many conservatives withdrew their initial support for Sherrod’s firing and began defending her as more context emerged — but perhaps the more durable story worth public attention is the background, which includes a $1 billion lawsuit discrimination settlement of which $13 million went to Sherrod’s advocacy group [Rural Development Leadership Network via Tom Blumer, Examiner, h/t reader Aaron W.; ten years ago] More: FoxNews.com.
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Arlington, Virginia taxpayers have managed to pay a law firm $744,000 to pursue it [Sun-Gazette via Ted at PoL]
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The most curious element is not the alleged fight over a Scrabble game, but Sonya Glover’s allegation that she was retaliated against by being made to “perform heavy manual tasks normally assigned to males.” Isn’t there some sort of potential discrimination suit if tasks are normally assigned to males and a female employee is not asked to perform them? [NYDN]
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- Happy Father’s Day! Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy proposes criminal penalties for parents who skip parent-teacher conferences [WJBK via Welch, Reason]
- Plaintiff’s bar takes to online marketing in big way, Boston’s Sokolove firm has 20-employee team [WSJ Law Blog]
- Stuart Taylor, Jr., “The Myth of the Conservative Court” [The Atlantic]
- Happy Father’s Day, cont’d: that “sex offender” neighbor could turn out to be this poor guy [Stephen Mason, Psychology Today via Alkon]
- Libertarians debate anti-discrimination law [David Bernstein and others, Cato Unbound]
- Despite trial lawyer lobbying push, Congress declines for now to create “aid and abet” securities-fraud liability [Bainbridge] “Overcriminalization in the Financial Reform Legislation” [David Rittgers, Cato]
- As international “human rights” proliferate, they’re being applied for businesses’ benefit too, to some advocates’ displeasure [Bader, Examiner]
- Happy Father’s Day, cont’d: Virginia Supreme Court rules child can sue dad after traffic collision for not strapping her properly into car seat [OnPoint News]
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Radar Online reports that the complainant has hired Overlawyered favorite Gloria Allred, while Eric Turkewitz thinks Ms. Lorenzana might make not make the ideal client. Business Insider has more of the unedifying details, and Richard Thompson Ford explains (contra Deborah Rhode) “why lawsuits based on looks discrimination are a bad idea.” Earlier here.
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