Overlawyered » Willie Gary

December 1 roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:51:46 +0000

Hertz drops libel lawsuit against investor research outfit that claimed its solvency was at risk [Crain's New York, earlier]
Report: New Jersey blogger jailed for threats against federal judges was on FBI informant payroll [AP]
“Bentley Photos Are Props in Willie Gary’s High School Motivational Speech” [ABA Journal]
Australian personal injury lawyers evade ad ban [Sydney Morning Herald]
Scott Rothstein’s alleged Ponzi scheme “targeted people who invested in law suits” [Steele/Legal Ethics Forum] “Two Inside Looks at Rothstein’s Firm, Lifestyle” [Ambrogi/Legal Blog Watch]
O’Quinn driving nearly twice speed limit on rainy pavement at time of crash [Chron]
“Support for UN religious defamation rule drops” [Media Watch Watch] On the other hand? “Envoy’s Speech Signals Softening of U.S. Hostility to International Court” [AP]
Rudely titled new book on how to avoid getting sued [Instapundit]

Tags: Australia, bullying businesses, chasing clients, international human rights, John O'Quinn, judges, libel slander and defamation, Scott Rothstein, United Nations, Willie Gary

D.C. Metro crash client-chasing

Walter Olson — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 04:14:48 +0000

Yes, the online ads are already up. Washington’s City Paper tracks down one California-based law firm marketer: “This is the only marketing I do — it’s the highest cost per click online. What else can you do, a young guy like me? I don’t want to do porn [sites].” According to one report via Twitter, “the Google ads are running on the WMATA Web site.” More: Maryland Daily Record (first suit filed); Eric Turkewitz. And Ron Miller, on the dilemma of the young man quoted above: “Dare I suggest this is a false choice? There has to be a third option after porn and train wreck chasing, right?”

Also: Overlawyered favorite Willie Gary is in the case.

Tags: chasing clients, train, Washington D.C., Willie Gary

Willie Gary and the IRS

Walter Olson — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 13:49:38 +0000

The big-shot Stuart, Fla. injury lawyer, who’s provided this site with a steady source of material over the years, apparently isn’t going to be prime Cabinet nominee material any time soon given his run-ins with tax authorities.

Tags: Willie Gary

Update: Florida Supreme Court rejects “false light” theory

Walter Olson — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:41:45 +0000

The Florida high court has rejected the invasion-of-privacy tort theory under which a defendant can be held liable for a publication setting forth individually true facts which collectively create a misleading impression. We’ve extensively covered one of the two lawsuits on which the court ruled, in which famed attorney Willie Gary obtained an $18 million jury verdict against Gannett for investigative journalism it perpetrated against one of his clients. An appeals court later threw out the verdict. (WSJ law blog, Pensacola News-Journal, St. Petersburg Times editorial).

However, Marc Randazza at Citizen Media Law Blog (Oct. 24), analyzing the second of the two Florida cases, Rapp v. Jews for Jesus, warns that the decisions fell far short of being the free speech victories some have taken them as, because the Florida court endorsed and strengthened theories of “defamation by implication” which will usually be available in suing over the same fact patterns, the difference being that suits alleging “defamation by implication” must overcome more robust First Amendment defenses. Similarly: Elizabeth Spainhour, Newsroom Law Blog, Oct. 24.

Tags: false light, Florida, libel slander and defamation, privacy, Willie Gary

August 7 roundup

Walter Olson — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 05:12:50 +0000

Speech tribunal in Alberta, Canada, acquits Ezra Levant over publication of Mohammed cartoons, and it only cost him C$100,000* [National Post, his site, Daimnation]
Must not cover John Edwards-Rielle Hunter story … must not cover John Edwards-Rielle Hunter story … oh darn!
U.K. version of a story we’ve seen stateside: noise restrictions threaten roving musical ice cream trucks [Telegraph, Times Online, earlier from NYC]
“Lawyer Who Says She Was Chastised for Not Being Sweet Is Allowed to Sue” [ABA Journal]
More thoughts about “going on disability” [White Coat Rants]
Willie Gary perhaps less than gallant (though undeniably hard-hitting) in countering woman’s claim of sexual assault [WPTV, ABA Journal, Ambrogi]
Arguing against release, federal prosecutors say millions in assets of two Kentucky fen-phen defendants can’t be traced [Lexington Herald Leader]
Virginia restaurantgoers looking forward to sangria on sultry evenings [Lindsay Nair, Roanoke Times]
“It’s true that [veep-buzzed Sen. Bayh] sided with Republicans on tort reform … but do Democrats really want to be the kind of party that makes litmus tests out of those issues?” [Patashnik, TNR "Plank"]
Third Circuit strikes down ban on “depiction of animal cruelty” as unconstitutional, protecting both bullfight travelogues and those bizarro-fetish “crush videos” [Volokh, our 1999 report]
Sen. Lieberman brought an outspoken pro-legal-reform voice to the Democratic ticket [eight years ago on Overlawyered]

*Levant can recover nothing from his tormentors because the so-called human rights tribunals are given a special dispensation from the normally prevailing Canadian rule of loser-pays.

Tags: free speech in Canada, John Edwards, Kentucky fen-phen settlement fraud, loser pays, politics, Rielle Hunter, Virginia, Willie Gary

Update: Willie Gary case against Motorola

Walter Olson — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 17:42:03 +0000

Per AmLaw Daily, his trade secrets case against Motorola, on behalf of a now-defunct client named SPS Technologies, has settled for a sum far short of the $10 billion he sought. The case made headlines when a judge granted the Florida-based plaintiff’s potentate $23 million in sanctions against his opposite number, the law firm of Shook, Hardy & Bacon, though Gary had asked for $200 million in all. Reports AmLaw Daily:

The rising cost of fuel also has forced Gary to lease out his private jet — an aircraft appropriately named the “Wings of Justice II,” which includes an 18-karat gold sink and $1.2 million sound system — for $150,000 a month.

In late July, Gary told Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers that fuel for the 32-passenger Boeing 737 costs $250,000 a month. A routine roundtrip flight to a city like Atlanta can run $35,000.

Tags: Willie Gary

Roundup, March 15

Ted Frank — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 11:25:36 +0000

Speaking of prostitutes and politicians, Deborah Jeane Palfrey has come to recognize that Montgomery Blair Sibley (Oct. 29; May 4; etc.) may not be the best lawyer for her. [WTOP via BLT]
Update: Nearly two years later, trial court gets around to upholding $2 million verdict in lawn-mower death we covered Jun. 16 and Aug. 18, 2006. [Roanoke Times (quoting me); opinion at On Point]
In other lawn mower news, check out Jim Beck’s perceptive comment on a Third Circuit lawn-mower liability decision.
Update: Willie Gary wins his child-support dispute. [Gary v. Gowins (Ga.); Atl. Journal-Const.; via ABA Journal; earlier: Nov. 2]
Tobacco-lawyer Mike Ciresi drops out of Minnesota senate race. [WCCO]
Belfast court quashes libel ruling against restaurant critic. [AFP/Breitbart]
Trial-lawyer-blogger happy: jury returned $1.25 million med-mal verdict for death of totally disabled person suffering from end-stage renal disease, pulmonary hypertension, oxygen dependent lung disease, and obesity, after rejecting businessperson from jury “for cause” because he was head of local Chamber of Commerce. [Day]
Car-keying anti-military attorney Jay Grodner faced the law in January; here’s the transcript. [Blackfive]
Anonymous blog post not reliable evidence of factual allegations. [In re Pfizer, Inc. Sec. Litig., 2008 WL 540120 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 28, 2008) via Roberts, who also reports on fee reduction in same post]
Clinton’s nutty mortgage plan. [B&MI (quoting me)]
A supposed DC cabbie’s take on DC v. Heller. [DC Cabbie blog]

Tags: Atlanta, child support, DC v. Heller, Hillary Clinton, jackpot justice, lawn mowers, libel slander and defamation, Michael Ciresi, Minnesota, Montgomery Blair Sibley, PSLRA, restaurant critics, roundups, tobacco, Willie Gary

Party like it’s a Vioxx settlement

Walter Olson — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 00:15:25 +0000

Actually, attorney Mark Lanier’s massive bash, for thousands of attendees “including, seemingly, every judge and politician in Texas”, would have gone forward whether or not Merck had plunked down billions, and with Lanier saying he expects only $30 million in fees plus $10 million in expenses in the affair, which was once expected to yield a much bigger payday, the atmosphere might even be subdued. (Lattman, Nov. 13). Earlier coverage of Lanier Christmas parties here and here; the only parties we’ve heard of to compare are Willie Gary’s.

Tags: Mark Lanier, product liability, Willie Gary

November 2 roundup

Ted Frank — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 11:35:37 +0000

Curlin gets 400 new owners, as the Kentucky fen-phen plaintiffs ripped off by their attorneys get the right to seize Shirley Cunningham Jr. and William Gallion’s 20% share of the Preakness Stakes winner. [AP/NYT; earlier]
As Lerach pleads guilty, LA Times editorial defends class action abuses, incorrectly says that the PSLRA fixed everything and that Lerach didn’t act illegally after it was passed. [LA Times]
That $10.9 million verdict against the Westboro Baptist Church was “not about the money.” [Reuters] Really, now, this case imposing bankrupting damages for a protest on a public sidewalk is appalling. Granted: Phelps is bigoted scum, and rude bigoted scum at that. But Albert Snyder’s claimed physical injury is that the protest exacerbated his diabetes: what sort of junk science is that? NB that Snyder was not even aware of the protest at the funeral until he watched it on television. Why not liability for the news program? Even those happy to see the anti-gay bigotry of the WBC punished should take pause: Snyder testified at length that the protest upset him particularly because his son was not gay.
Overlawyered favorite Willie Gary (Apr. 29, Oct. 2004), on the hook for $28,000/month in child support for love child. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
Deep-pocket search in Great White fire case. [Childs]
Lawsuit over which school 9-year-old can play football for. [Tulsa World (via TMQ G. Easterbrook)] Worse, the judge rewarded the plaintiff by second-guessing the league decision. [Tulsa World]
It only takes ten months of legal proceedings for Cal-Berkeley to evict trespassers squatting on university property. [SF Gate]
Don’t hold your breath: who’s watching the trial lawyers? [Examiner]

Tags: Atlanta, Bill Lerach, Curlin, deep pocket, fen-phen, junk science, Kentucky, Kentucky fen-phen settlement fraud, not about the money, Rhode Island Station nightclub fire, roundups, Shirley Allen Cunningham Jr., William Gallion, Willie Gary

Willie Gary asks for moon, gets 1/4 moon

Walter Olson — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 00:04:48 +0000

As David noted the other day, Florida attorney Willie Gary, whose doings are often mentioned on this site, had asked that a court award fees of $11,000 an hour for his work in a trade secrets suit against Motorola. Readers may be interested in the sequel: Circuit Judge Leroy Moe awarded Gary and other lawyers only around a quarter of their request, amounting to $23 million of the asked-for $96 million in fees and costs. The judge also passed over a request that Motorola be hit with $100 millions in sanctions and restitution, though Gary might be able to obtain further consideration of that request. (Adrian Sainz, “Motorola ordered to pay $22.9 million”, AP/Miami Herald, Apr. 20)(via Ashby Jones, WSJ Law Blog).

Tags: technology, Willie Gary

Overlawyered » Willie Gary

December 1 roundup

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