• “Dog owners in Switzerland will have to pass a test to prove they can control and care for their animal, or risk losing it, the Swiss government said yesterday.” [Daily Telegraph]
• 72-year-old mom visits daughter’s Southport, Ct. home, falls down stairs searching for bathroom at night, sues daughter for lack of night light, law firm boasts of her $2.475 million win on its website [Casper & deToledo, scroll to "Jeremy C. Virgil"]
• Can’t possibly be right: “Every American enjoys a constitutional right to sue any other American in a West Virginia court” [W.V. Record]
• Video contest for best spoof personal injury attorney ads [Sick of Lawsuits; YouTube]
• Good profile of Kathleen Seidel, courageous blogger nemesis of autism/vaccine litigation [Concord Monitor*, Orac]. Plus: all three White House hopefuls now pander to anti-vaxers, Dems having matched McCain [Orac]
• One dollar for every defamed Chinese person amounts to a mighty big lawsuit demand against CNN anchor Jack Cafferty [NYDN link now dead; Independent (U.K.)]
• Hapless Ben Stein whipped up one side of the street [Salmon on financial regulation] and down the other [Derbyshire on creationism]
• If only Weimar Germany had Canada-style hate-speech laws to prevent the rise of — wait, you mean they did? [Steyn/Maclean's] Plus: unlawful in Alberta to expose a person to contempt based on his “source of income” [Levant quoting sec. 3 (1)(b) of Human Rights Law]
• Hey, these coupon settlements are giving all of us class action lawyers a bad name [Leviant/The Complex Litigator]
• Because patent law is bad enough all by itself? D.C. Circuit tosses out FTC’s antitrust ruling against Rambus [GrokLaw; earlier]
• “The fell attorney prowls for prey” — who wrote that line, and about which city? [four years ago on Overlawyered]

*Okay, one flaw in the profile: If Prof. Irving Gottesman compares Seidel to Erin Brockovich he probably doesn’t know much about Brockovich.

The automotive innovation (”gently guides the car back in lane if it senses it drifting”) has promising enough safety implications that German insurance companies offer premium discounts of up to 20 percent when it is purchased as part of a package with adaptive cruise control and park assist. No prizes for guessing why Volkswagen isn’t offering it to U.S. buyers of the Passat. “What other cool stuff have auto manufacturers dreamed up, but left on the drawing board because they fear our sharks in expensive suits?” (Edward Loh, Motor Trend, Apr. 17).

(Re-posted from Point of Law.)

Continue Reading »

“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]

• Reversing course, Rhode Island attorney general drops rape charge based on 32-year-old “repressed memory”, thus disappointing some advocates [Volokh; Jul. 10]


• Massachusetts disciplinary panel files misconduct charges against Judge Ernest Murphy over the “bring me a check and keep quiet” surrender-Dorothy letter he sent to Boston Herald publisher during his (successful) libel suit [Ambrogi; Dec. 23, 2005, May 11, 2007, etc.]


• California jury rejects tippling speeder’s lawsuit against landowner, automaker, town, etc. in the case we headlined “Shouldn’t Have Put Its Berm Where He Wanted To Skid” [Dec. 24, 2005; Douglas Domel v. DaimlerChrysler Corp., City of Santa Clarita, and Does 1 to 50, inclusive (PC030045Y), L.A. Superior Court, L.A. Daily Journal, no free link]


• Nominal damages only against German teens accused of scaring ostrich into impotence [UPI/ScienceDaily; Mar. 6]


• Dubious bill authorizing lawsuits against OPEC may be headed to President’s desk [W$J/CattleNetwork; Jun. 8]


• Jury convicts press baron Conrad Black on four counts, acquits on nine [Telegraph; Kirkendall, Bainbridge, Ribstein; Mar. 19, Jun. 5]


• Michigan Supreme Court reinstates reprimand against Geoffrey Fieger over abusive language [NLJ; Jul. 3, Aug. 2, 2006, etc.]

The German government, like others around the world, is being pressed by public health specialists to get into the business of reshaping citizens’ diets and hectoring the populace over its indulgent eating habits. However, reports The Scotsman, there are some distinctive obstacles to this happening, even aside from Chancellor Angela Merkel’s fondness for baking a cake at home every weekend:

…the legacy of Germany’s Nazi past is forcing the Bundesregierung, or federal government, to forget TV adverts giving millions advice on avoiding fatty foods and taking exercise.

The government is banned from buying advertising space on TV by the country’s own constitution, which was framed in the wake of the Second World War. Those who drew up the laws remembered how the Nazis were masters of using the cinema for propaganda and feared giving any government the same kind of power. They were also nervous that governments might use advertising leverage to put pressure on broadcasters.

One insider quipped: “The last time we had a non-smoking vegetarian who wanted to tell us what to do, it wasn’t a happy experience.”

(Murdo MacLeod, “German fatties fear the wurst”, The Scotsman, May 13).

The United States legal system has traditionally permitted significantly more extensive pretrial discovery than other countries’ legal systems have. So what do you do if you’re engaged in litigation in a foreign country, and you want information you couldn’t obtain under their laws? Why, you simply get the U.S. courts to order those who have the information to provide it via American discovery rules, as this China Law Blog post by Dan Harris explains:

“In 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court issued the seminal decision interpreting §1782, construing the language liberally in favor of allowing discovery.  Among other things, it rejected the notion that §1782 was limited to the discovery of evidence that could be discovered in a foreign jurisdiction if the evidence was located there. Intel Corp. v. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., 542 U.S. 241 (2004).

Ponder this for just a moment: The Supreme Court ruled that one could engage in U.S. discovery to gather information for a foreign litigation that one would not be allowed to gather in that foreign litigation.

And as everyone knows, if discovery is good, then more discovery is better, so, as Harris explains, the U.S. courts “tend to ‘interpret §1782 liberally in favor of permitting discovery in aid of foreign litigation.’” He gives examples, including this recent case:

In a further example of this trend, a district court in New York ordered McKinsey Company, the global consulting firm, to produce documents requested by a German litigant in aid of a lawsuit in Munich. In re Gemeinschaftspraxis Dr. Med. Schottforf, 2006 WL 3844464 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 29, 2006). McKinsey argued §1782 did not apply because the documents were located outside of the United States. The district court disagreed, holding “Section 1782 requires only that the party from whom discovery is sought be ‘found’ here; not that the documents be found here.” Id. at 5. The court also rejected the argument that the production would be unduly burdensome because the documents would have to be translated from German into English so they could be reviewed by McKinsey’s non-German-speaking U.S. counsel.

In other words, Germans engaged in a lawsuit in Germany can obtain an order from a U.S. court to require an American company to turn over documents that aren’t even located in the United States, and that they couldn’t obtain from the German courts in which they’re actually litigating. That seems perfectly reasonable.

(Hat Tip: Ron Coleman, my co-blogger from Likelihood of Success.)

• NY trial lawyers furious over state medical society’s plan to put informational posters and postcards in docs’ waiting rooms re: Topic A [Kingston Daily Freeman]


• But can you sue Spider-Man? “Superheroes” linked to multiple pediatric injuries [BlogMD]


• By reader acclaim: German farmer’s suit claims teenagers’ fireworks scared his ostrich Gustav right out of the breeding mood [AP/Jake Young]


• Doug Weinstein is a fan of Edwards, but many of his commenters aren’t [InstaLawyer first, second posts]


• Former Georgia legislator, author of bill that resulted in Genarlow Wilson’s 10-year sentence (see Feb. 8), says he’s sorry [Towery @ TownHall]


• A lesson for grabby New Orleans Mayor Nagin? “In the massive floods of 1993, levees broke up and down the Mississippi — and no one sued. They rebuilt.” [Surber]


• “Defamation of religion” soon to be regarded as contrary to int’l law? [Brayton channeling Volokh](more: Stuttaford)


• Wouldn’t you just know: Bertolt Brecht’s sly legal dodges, at expense of Kurt Weill and other collaborators, still keep litigators busy long after his death [National Post]


• U.K.: “Rectorial liability is a time bomb under every enticing glebe” [Guardian]


• NYC subway system didn’t own or control access stairs, but can be sued over slip-fall anyway [Point of Law]


• Grocery worker with Down’s Syndrome couldn’t follow basic sanitary rule, but that didn’t mean supermarket could fire him [three years ago on Overlawyered]

• Tennie Pierce takes his dog-food settlement to the LA City Council (Nov. 22). I repeat my offer to LA politicians: I’ll eat dog food for a lot less than $2.7 million plus severance pay. [LA Times]
• Bogus $20 million asbestos verdict in NY; Chrysler had previously won 14 consecutive asbestos trials in a row; jury found Chrysler 10% liable, which made it responsible for 80% of the damages under New York law. Studies show no relationship between automotive products and asbestos illnesses. [Point of Law; Bloomberg; AP]
• “Madison County Gets $17.6 Million Windfall Despite Philip Morris’ Escape From $10 Billion Judgment.” Earlier: Jun. 20 and links therein. [Alton Telegraph via Products Liability Prof Blog]
• How tenant-friendly courts hurt tenants. [Point of Law]
• Murnane on Justice Bob Thomas libel verdict. [Illinois Justice Blog]
• One year ago on Overlawyered: $60.9 million cerebral palsy verdict. Arbitrary bench verdict arbitrarily reduced to $40.5 million; case on appeal to Eleventh Circuit. [West's Medical Malpractice Law Report]
• One year ago on Point of Law: Ray Harron, asbestos doctor and Connecticut decision against freedom of contract.
• The unpersuasive case for judicial activism. [Whelan @ Weekly Standard]
• Federalist Society Convention podcasts beginning to be posted. [Federalist Society]
• Are African-Americans “lagging” at major law firms, and if so, why? [Point of Law; New York Times; Lat; Sander]
• Nice PETA expose video. [Penn & Teller @ Google Video]

In asbestos; Chrysler; Connecticut; Germany; Illinois; libel slander and defamation; Madison County; roundups; Tennie Pierce

“A court ruling which ordered a gynecologist to pay child support for up to 18 years as compensation for botching a contraceptive implant was condemned by the German media as scandalous on Wednesday. The Karlsruhe-based federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that the doctor must pay his former patient, now a mother of a three-year-old boy, 600 euros ($769) a month because she became pregnant after he implanted her with a contraceptive device.” (”Doctor ordered to pay for unwanted baby”, Reuters, Nov. 15; “GYN’s “Human” Error Will Now Be Getting Child Support”, Deutsche Welle, Nov. 15). Similar: Apr. 9 (Scotland), May 9 and Jun. 8, 2000, etc.

• Election day is tomorrow; the roundtable is still going on our sister website. [Point of Law]
• One reason the election is important: judicial nominations. Bill Clinton appointed 378 judges; Bush, in six years, 266, with 45 vacancies. [National Law Journal]
• Update: Illinois appellate court rejects Judge Maag’s $110M libel suit. (Earlier: Dec. 23, 2004 and links therein.) [Bashman]
• Does Professor Charles Silver’s single-variable time series on Texas doctor supply tell us anything about reform, as he claims? Did doctors push reform down the throats of an “anonymous and dispersed” group? I argue no. [Point of Law; Silver @ Bizarro-Overlawyered]
• Professor Paul Horwitz questions the convenience of the death-bed statements of the decedent in Williams v. Philip Morris. [PrawfsBlawg]
• More threatened Borat-related litigation (Nov. 29) from Mahir “I kiss you” Cagri and from Gypsies. The latter is resulting in film censorship in Germany. [Wired; Sydney Morning Herald]
• “We live in a very litigious society; it makes it more difficult for a physician to be a good Samaritan.” [MetroWest Daily News via Kevin MD]
• Add Art Bell to the list of people threatening to sue bloggers. [Workbench]
• Twenty years of Scalia. [Weekly Standard]

“A German lawyer hopes to drum up more business by pursuing state compensation claims for people who believe they were abducted by aliens. ‘There’s quite obviously demand for legal advice here,’ Jens Lorek told Reuters by telephone on Thursday. ‘The trouble is, people are afraid of making fools of themselves in court.’” What’s this guy doing practicing in Germany rather than here? (Reuters, Oct. 6).

A court in Hamburg will hear the case (see Mar. 14) in which some 190 athletes from the former East Germany are seeking compensation for the damage done to their bodies by steroids administered by authorities under the pre-1989 Communist regime. The drugs were made by Jenapharm, at that time a state-owned concern, later bought by the Schering corporation, which is the target of the compensation demands. (Luke Harding, “Forgotten victims of East German doping take their battle to court”, The Guardian (U.K.), Nov. 1; “The Quest for Gold Left Lives in Ruins “, Deutsche Welle, Jun. 29).

Ducking a heated controversy, the European Parliament has declined to rule on “whether workers such as bare-chested builders should be required by their employers to cover up to avoid excessive sun.” The issue will now be left up to national legislatures. “MEPs found themselves under siege from angry business groups and German building workers, who staged a shirtless protest.” (David Rennie, “MEPs run for cover in ‘tan ban’ dilemma”, Daily Telegraph, Sept. 8). “Socialists and Greens argued EU legislation was vital to cut skin cancer rates among outdoor workers, but the right denounced it as an example of the nanny state running amok and over-burdening business.” (Aine Gallagher, “Builders and barmaids avoid EU tan ban”, Reuters/Swissinfo.com, Sept. 7). More: Jim Leitzel at Vice Squad has the dirndl angle (Sept. 11).

Good news for the U.S. armed services, which have battled for years for the right to go on using training areas like California’s Camp Pendleton in the face of restrictions arising from endangered species law: “Military exercises are boosting biodiversity, according to a study of land used for US training manoeuvres in Germany. Such land has more endangered species than nearby national parks.” (see Aug. 16, 2004)(via A&LDaily).

A Roanoke Wal-Mart cashier heard of, and convinced her manager to copy, German Wal-Marts’ practice of passing out “red bows” to singles on otherwise-slow Friday nights. Singles would put the bow on their carts to indicate their motive, and meet at specially designated “flirt points” in the store; the events attract hundreds of customers. Roanoke’s “Singles Shopping” program was also a huge success, attracting shoppers who would drive from hours away to attend—until corporate headquarters abruptly demanded the weekly event be cancelled. Alas, the chain doesn’t explain itself, and the AP doesn’t try to speculate, but I’d wager pretty good money that it was the fear of lawsuits like this one or this one that squelched the practice. The AP’s condensed version of the original Roanoke Times story is kinder to Dale Firebaugh, because it omits the fact that he was so heart-broken over the cancellation that he purchased a 26-cent red bow and stood by the door hoping someone would recognize the symbol. Is he another victim of the liability crisis, or is there a different economic reason we’re missing? Perhaps love-smitten shoppers purchase less, though one would think the increased traffic makes up for it given the success of the program elsewhere. Comments open for the limited purpose of inviting readers to use their imagination for what might have motivated this decision other than liability fears. (AP/MSNBC, Jul. 23; Marques G. Harper, “Apparently, the cost of love can’t be discounted”, Roanoke Times, Jul. 22; Courtney Cutright, “Find milk, soap - a mate? at the Roanoke Wal-Mart”, Roanoke Times, Jul. 15; Rex Bowman, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Jul. 23 & Jul. 25; Pete Dybdahl, “Wal-Mart: ‘It was time to move on’”, Roanoke Times, Jul. 28; Parija Bhatnagar, “Lookin’ for a cheap date? Try Wal-Mart”, CNN/Money, Apr. 7; “Wal Mart to Hold Singles Shopping Night”, Chosun (English version), Jul. 7) (hat-tip to PG, whose link to the AP story gave me the idea).

“A big group of former East German athletes is to sue a pharmaceuticals giant over the damage they suffered under the country’s doping program of the 1970s and 80s.” The chief executive of the Jenapharm drug manufacturing group, Isabelle Roth, said the steroids in question were lawful and that the enterprise had no choice but to furnish them under the then-Communist regime: “As a part of a group of pharmaceutical companies, Jenapharm was obliged to collaborate in the State Plan 1425″. (BBC, Mar. 13). More: Tom Palmer comments. (& update Dec. 4).

Nineteen German and Austrian tourists are filing a lawsuit against the government of Thailand and the French hotel chain Accor over the Indian Ocean tsunami. Naturally, the lawsuit has been filed in New York. Another defendant is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; plaintiffs complain that NOAA’s Pacific Tsunami Warning System failed to issue a warning for a tsunami in a completely different ocean. (Aside from the fact that NOAA owes no duty to vacationing Germans in Thailand, NOAA did try to notify other countries of the tsunami potential of the earthquake.) The suits against NOAA and Thailand in a US court are frivolous in the narrowest sense of the word, and will likely be quickly dismissed; Accor will probably have to spend some time and money if it can’t get out on jurisdictional grounds. Edward Fagan (Feb. 5, Aug. 13, Apr. 2, Aug. 8, 2003 and links therein) is the attorney; press coverage uncritically repeats the claim that he is “best known for filing lawsuits seeking reparations for Holocaust victims,” a self-promotion others disagree with. (Jean-Michel Stoullig, AFP/Wash. Times, Feb. 15; cf. also AP, Feb. 13; hat tip to reader D.C.). I’m curious: does Fagan sue his local news weather department if he gets wet because of an unanticipated rainstorm?

At least Fagan isn’t claiming that his lawsuit will stop tsunamis. This site does make that claim for its “lawsuit”; it’s possible that it’s a tongue-in-cheek art project, but the smart money is betting that it’s the work of a full-fledged self-parodying moonbat. It’s not clear if there’s an actual lawsuit; lawsuits by the deranged tend to be more entertaining than socially problematic, except for district court judges unfortunate enough to be in the Ninth Circuit.