Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Overlawyered

September 22nd, 2008 at 9:52 am

Don’t

More things it would be better to avoid doing if you’re a lawyer:

  • Claim to be assetless and thus unable to make restitution for the largest theft of state money in Massachusetts history even though you live in a $1.5 million Florida house with a $70K BMW and other goodies [Boston Herald, Globe, disbarred attorney Richard Arrighi]
  • Botch appeals and then refrain from telling clients their cases have been lost [Clifford Van Syoc, reprimanded by New Jersey high court; NJLJ; seven years ago]
  • Attempt to deduct “more than $300,000 in prostitutes, p0rn, sex toys and erotic massages” on your income tax returns, even if you are “thought of as a good tax lawyer” [NY Post] Nor ought you to accept nude dances from a client as partial payment for legal fees [Chicago Tribune; for an unrelated tale of a purportedly consensual lap dance given by secretary to partner, see NYLJ back in April]
  • Introduce a patent application purportedly signed in part by someone who in fact had been dead for a year or two [Law.com/The Recorder, Chicago's Niro, Scavone, Haller & Niro, of blog-stalking fame, client's patent declared unenforceable] Or pursue a patent-infringement case based on what a federal judge later ruled to be a “tissue of lies” [NYLJ; New York law firm Abelman, Frayne & Schwab and lawyer David Jaroslawicz, ordered to pay opponents' legal fees; earlier mentions of Jaroslawicz at this site here, here, here, and here]
  • Demand ransom for a stolen Leonardo da Vinci painting [biggest U.K. art theft ever, all defendants have pleaded not guilty, LegalWeek via ABA Journal]

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September 17th, 2008 at 9:09 am

September 17 roundup


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September 16th, 2008 at 9:27 am

Jockey sues track owner over fall

Maryland jockey Christopher Martin was thrown from his horse during a 2005 race and filed suit three years later claiming permanent disability, contending “the irregular shape and poor maintenance of the racetrack caused his thoroughbred, ‘Miner Distraction,’ to collide with another horse and stumble.” (Bill Childs, TortsProf, Sept. 15).


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September 11th, 2008 at 12:09 am

September 11 roundup


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September 9th, 2008 at 7:33 am

Massachusetts gun control law strikes again

The Bay State’s notoriously draconian laws have tripped up author Peter Manso, a 67-year-old Cape Cod resident. Manso claims the prosecution is retaliation for his writing on highly publicized crimes, but whether or not that premise is borne out, the story is an unnerving one: ten years ago the state changed an earlier provision making firearm identification cards valid for life to one requiring four-year renewals, and since then old holders who failed to get with the program have been getting tripped up, facing the prospect of long prison terms even over their protest that they never had the change called to their attention. (Jonathan Saltzman, “Writer on Cape slaying indicted on gun charges”, Boston Globe, Aug. 23; J.D. Tuccille/Examiner) (via Never Yet Melted).


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September 5th, 2008 at 10:35 am

Watch what you say about lawyers: Marina Tylo, Paul Revere III, Jones Day

Lawyer/blogger Andrew Lavoott Bluestone, in his New York Attorney Malpractice Blog, noted and quoted a case in which Brooklyn lawyer Marina Tylo was (unsuccessfully) sued by a client for “serving a summons before buying the index number,” that being the wrong order in which to do things in New York. Tylo has proceeded to sue Bluestone for $10 million and several blogs have already 1) mentioned the strong privilege that attaches to fair reports of court proceedings and 2) suggested that Tylo will before long be well acquainted with the phrase “Streisand effect“. Coverage: Scott Greenfield, Eric Turkewitz, Mike Cernovich (more), Citizen Media Law Project, Ambrogi/Legal Blog Watch.

In March Peter Robbins, a retired homicide detective who blogs for Cape Cod Today as the Robbins Report, ran an item criticizing the law offices of Paul Revere III (yes, a descendant of you-know-who) and various local residents he represents, for having filed a procedural action seeking to stop the dredging of Barnstable harbor on environmental grounds. Robbins opines (to quote the post in its current form):

In my opinion this, NIMBY, frivolous, malicious action is doing nothing but stalling the inevitable and costing us the taxpayers unnecessary time and money. Millway Beach and Blish Point were pretty much created by past dredging. Perhaps if the town didn’t have to waste its time with foolish actions such as these, they would have been able to concentrate on the real issues and the bulkhead could have been saved. Who knows?

Robbins mocked the lawyer as “Paul (the dredge isn’t coming) Revere III” and, in the original version of the post — now altered — described one of the local abutters filing the dredge action, Joseph Dugas, as “infamous” with an added, unprintable opinion-based expletive. Now Revere and Dugas have sued Robbins and an anonymous third party who posted further hostile comments about the two. (James Kinsella, “Defamation suit filed against CC Today blogger, commenter”, Cape Cod Today, Aug. 29). Robbins is being represented by our very own Overlawyered guestblogger and Boston-area lawyer Peter Morin, who wrote in a response, “This matter is a textbook example of the justification for an anti-SLAPP statute that protects the right of individuals to comment on matters of significant public concern.” David Ardia at Citizens Media Law Project has an analysis which mentions Massachusetts’s existing anti-SLAPP provisions, and Dan Kennedy at Media Nation (via Ambrogi) takes a look at the case, observing that it’s hard to evaluate the merits of the defamation claim since we don’t know exactly how the blog post read before the publisher made deletions to it at the demand of the plaintiffs.

Finally, Chicago’s BlockShopper is a site that reports on real estate transactions in in-town neighborhoods, often with descriptions of the professionals buying and selling the homes and condos, a practice that has now drawn a lawsuit from the giant international law firm Jones Day. “The suit alleges trademark infringement and unfair trade practices, based on Blockshopper’s use of the firm’s [Jones Day's] service marks, links to its site and use of lawyers’ photos from its site.” Although BlockShopper removed all references to Jones Day, “the law firm continues to seek an injunction shutting down the site”. Unauthorized use of photographs and service marks presumably might give rise to valid claims, but the reference to “links to its site” may suggest a broader sweep, and in negotiations Jones Day is reportedly trying to extract a commitment from the site not to conduct journalism about its member lawyers’ real estate transactions at all. (R. David Donoghue, Chicago IP Litigation Blog, more; Ambrogi, Legal Blog Watch; Citizen Media Law Project).


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August 21st, 2008 at 7:07 pm

Judge Ernest Murphy to step down

His libel suit against the Boston Herald may have been a lucrative success, but the “fascinatingly repellent” letters he sent to the paper’s publisher drew the adverse attention of the state’s Commission on Judicial Conduct. [WSJ law blog, Aug. 21]. Full saga here.

More: Globe (Murphy, “who has said he suffers from post-traumatic stress because of his legal battle with the Boston Herald and the newspaper’s stories about him, has been on a paid leave of absence since July.”). The Herald’s coverage includes side stories on Murphy’s wish for a taxpayer-provided lawyer and the question of whether his cases will need to be reopened, as well as an unsparing Howie Carr column on the ins and outs of “involuntary disability” pensions for judges (”ask yourself this: If you or I wrote ‘allegedly threatening’ letters to somebody, would we get a disability pension, or a visit from the cops?”).


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August 5th, 2008 at 9:02 am

Pet rentals

Now banned in Boston, perhaps because of the risk that they might bring too much happiness to the humans involved. (WSJ, Newsweek, FindingDulcinea, Globe, Herald).


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July 26th, 2008 at 8:05 am

Med-mal: Massachusetts adopts “loss of a chance” doctrine

In a key victory for plaintiffs and their lawyers, the Massachusetts Supreme Court has for the first time adopted the “loss of a chance” doctrine, which allows plaintiffs to recover money without having to show that it was more likely than not that the charged medical negligence made the difference in their recovery or survival. (Denise Lavoie, “Doctor held liable for a ‘loss of chance’”, AP/Boston Globe, Jul. 24). When Medical Economics surveyed the field two years ago, they found that about half the states had accepted the more liberal doctrine, which runs counter to the Anglo-American “more likely than not” prerequisite for establishing causation. More on the inexact and contradictory standards used in such cases here.

Readers of this site will not be the least surprised to learn that American courts have shown little or no interest in extending the “loss of a chance” doctrine for the benefit of plaintiffs in legal malpractice cases filed against attorneys whose inattention might have (but probably didn’t) deprive their clients of a favorable outcome in court proceedings.


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July 13th, 2008 at 2:32 pm

July 13 roundup

  • Nothing new about lawyers stealing money from estates, but embarrassing when they used to head the bar association [Eagle-Tribune; Lawrence, Mass., Arthur Khoury]
  • Unusual “reverse quota” case: black job applicant wins $30K after showing beauty supply company turned her down because it had a quota of whites to hire [SE Texas Record]
  • Who knew? Per class action allegations, pet food contains ingredients “unfit for human consumption” [Daily Business Review]
  • U.K.: “A divorcee who won a £1.4million payout from her multi-millionaire husband is suing her lawyers because she claims she should have got twice that amount.” [Telegraph]
  • UW freshman falls from fourth-floor dorm window after drinking at “Trashed Tuesday”, now wants $ from Delta Upsilon International as well as construction firm that put in windows [Seattle P-I, KOMO]
  • After giant $103 million payday, current and former partners at Minneapolis law firm are torn by feuds and dissension — wasn’t there a John Steinbeck novella about that? [ABA Journal and again, Heins Mills]
  • Small firm that used to make Wal-Mart in-house videos sets up shop at AAJ/ATLA convention hawking those videos for use in suits against the retailer [Arkansas Democrat Gazette, earlier]
  • When the judge’s kid gets busted [Eric Berlin; Alabama]


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June 10th, 2008 at 8:23 pm

“Liability concerns and high water bills”

They’re why the Weymouth, Mass. housing authority is banning residents from using inflatable kiddie pools at municipal housing. The state housing department sent a memo to town authorities five years ago recommending a ban on pools as well as trampolines and swing sets: “Housing authorities routinely get sued for incidents even when a tenant is the responsible party,” it said. (Jack Encarnacao, “Weymouth bans kiddie pools at public housing”, Quincy Patriot-Ledger, Jun. 7).


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June 5th, 2008 at 11:06 pm

Annals of zero tolerance: empty bullet casing

In Winchendon, Mass., ten-year-old Bradley Geslak brought to school an empty bullet casing he’d brought home from the town Memorial Day celebration, in which blanks were fired. Although an empty casing is, of course, empty, he was charged with a weapons offense and after his five-day suspension may be assigned a probation officer. (Gail Stanton, “Souvenir rifle shell gets 4th-grader suspended”, Worcester Telegram, May 29; “Silence on lock and load”, May 30)(via Zincavage).


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May 22nd, 2008 at 9:50 am

Marc Rodwin and the Massachusetts medical malpractice crisis

» by Ted Frank

A Health Affairs paper by Suffolk University Law Professor Marc Rodwin et al. has been generating a lot of press and blog attention for its claim that there is no medical malpractice crisis in Massachusetts.  He and I have been debating the paper at Point of Law (Frank; Rodwin; Frank); as I show, that conclusion is highly suspect and seems divorced from the underlying data.


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May 19th, 2008 at 10:08 am

May 19 roundup


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May 9th, 2008 at 8:29 am

Careful what you sue for: “Airline bans tips for skycaps at Logan”

When American Airlines instituted a $2 per bag charge for skycap service at Boston’s Logan Airport, the workers’ tip income dropped, some travelers seeing the change as a reason to stop tipping. A lawyer representing the workers sued American and a month ago a federal jury awarded them more than $325,000. In addition, the Massachusetts legislature recently enacted a law providing that businesses can be hit with triple damages in wage/hour disputes. Now American Airlines has decreed a complete ban on tipping at check-in at Logan, while also ordering its contractor to raise the skycaps’ wages from the former nominal $5.15 an hour to $12-$15, well above the minimum wage but well below what they had been getting in tips. The workers’ lawyer is of course charging retaliation and has asked a judge to forbid the change. (AP/Boston Herald, Boston Globe; Boston Herald editorial).


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May 6th, 2008 at 9:03 am

Rape by fraud, cont’d

Further discussion of how lying about your past to avoid alienating a romantic partner could become a felony in Massachusetts if a state lawmaker has his way (Volokh, May 5; see Mar. 12). More: Greenfield (feminist law professors’ proposals).


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May 2nd, 2008 at 12:03 am

May 2 roundup

  • Contriving to give Sheldon Silver the moral high ground: NY judges steamed at lack of raises are retaliating against Albany lawmakers’ law firms [NY Post and editorial. More: Turkewitz.]
  • When strong laws prove weak: Britain’s many layers of land use control seem futile against determined builders of gypsy encampments [Telegraph]
  • “U.S. patent chief: applications up, quality down” [EETimes]
  • Plenty of willing takers for those 4,703 new cars that survived the listing-ship near-disaster, but Mazda destroyed them instead [WSJ]
  • “Prof. Dohrn [for] Attorney General and Rev. Wright [for] Secretary of State”? So hard to tell when left-leaning lawprof Brian Leiter is kidding and when he’s not [Leiter Reports]
  • Yet another hard-disk-capacity class action settlement, $900K to Strange & Carpenter [Creative HDD MP3 Player; earlier. More: Sullum, Reason "Hit and Run".]
  • Filipino ship whistleblowers’ case: judge slashes Texas attorney’s fee, “calling the lawyer’s attempt to bill his clients nearly $300,000 ‘unethically excessive.’” [Boston Globe, earlier]
  • RFK Jr. Watch: America’s Most Irresponsible Public Figure (r) endorses Oklahoma poultry litigation [Legal NewsLine]
  • Just what the budget-strapped state needs: NY lawmakers earmark funds for three (3) new law schools [NY Post editorial; PoL first, second posts, Greenfield]
  • In Indiana, IUPUI administrators back off: it wasn’t racial harassment after all for student-employee to read a historical book on fight against Klan [FIRE; earlier]
  • Fiesta Cornyation in San Antonio just isn’t the same without the flying tortillas [two years ago on Overlawyered]

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April 22nd, 2008 at 10:03 am

Update: judge quashes Seidel subpoena

[Bumped on breaking news: A federal court in New Hampshire has quashed the subpoena and ordered attorney Clifford Shoemaker to show cause why he should not be subjected to sanctions. Also: Orac. Earlier Monday post follows:]

Autism blogger Kathleen Seidel reports that the online free speech project at Public Citizen has agreed to provide her with legal assistance in responding to vaccine lawyer Clifford Shoemaker’s subpoena (see earlier coverage here, here, and here). One way to read this is as a fairly devastating commentary on just how weak Shoemaker’s position is, since there is ordinarily no more potent public presence on behalf of the plaintiff’s side in pharmaceutical litigation than Public Citizen. Seidel also has discovered that as a Shoemaker target she is in distinguished company:

I learned that on March 26, 2008 — the same afternoon that I was greeted at my doorstep with a demand for access to virtually the entire documentary record of my intellectual and financial life over the past four years — Dr. Marie McCormick, Sumner and Esther Feldberg Professor of Maternal and Child Health at the Harvard School of Public Health, and Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, was subjected to a similar experience at her Massachusetts home.

From 2001 to 2004, Dr. McCormick chaired the Immunization Safety Review Committee of the Institute of Medicine (IOM), charged with analyzing and reporting on data regarding the safety of vaccination practices. …As a result of her voluntary work on the committee, Dr. McCormick has found herself a frequent target of suspicion by plaintiffs, their attorneys and advocates, and opponents of vaccines, who disagree with its conclusions, and whose legal and political positions are not supported by its reports.

McCormick’s lawyers are likewise seeking to quash the subpoena. Much more here (& Beck & Herrmann, Orac, Pharmalot).


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