When word arrived that the American Tort Reform Association had named Madison County, Ill. (Oct. 7, Jul. 12, etc.) the worst of its “judicial hellholes” nationwide (Nov. 20) and the least fair in according due process to accused defendants, “Randy Bono, a plaintiffs’ attorney with The Simmons Firm in East Alton, led a group of lawyers in his office in a mock cheer of the announcement Wednesday afternoon. ‘We’re number one! We’re number one!’ chanted the lawyers, who were preparing for asbestos lawsuit trials next week.” (Paul Hampel, “Report rips Madison County as top ‘judicial hellhole'”, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Nov. 6). More on Madison County: David Bailey, “Illinois county court a corporate ‘hellhole'”, Reuters/Forbes, Oct. 5; Jon Sawyer and Eric Morath, “Senate debate on class actions spotlights Madison County”, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Oct. 21 (county is a place “near and dear to me”, says Sen. Dick Durbin — we’ll bet).
Archive for December, 2003
“Trend Is To Mediate, Not Litigate, Bias Cases”
Key factors: the disputants often wish to repair their relationship, and “many people who feel aggrieved want recognition from their employers rather than just money, officials said, noting that about 13 to 20 percent of all mediated cases involve nonfinancial settlements.” The EEOC is encouraging the trend. (Kirsten Downey, Washington Post, Dec. 3).
California’s antispam law
I’ve got an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this morning on the remarkably bad legislation that California passed this year ostensibly banning spam, which in fact creates a right to sue unwary businesses for $1000 per email over all sorts of communications that aren’t regarded as spam by most recipients. Fortunately, the pending federal SPAM-CON bill, whatever its other merits or demerits, would override the California law, which otherwise is due to go into effect Jan. 1. (Walter Olson, “Spamifornia”, Wall Street Journal, Dec. 3) (sub). I’ll probably be returning to this subject in print again, since the space available in the WSJ didn’t permit me to explore some of the pertinent litigation precedents that make the California bill so scary, notably the antispam law passed by Utah last year and the record of class action suits under the federal “junk fax” law (Jul. 19 and links from there).
NYC: tickets for ashtrays
Since Nurse Bloomberg’s crackdown on smoking (see our article of Oct. 22, 2002), New York City has issued more than 200 tickets to businesses found with ashtrays on their premises, including some found in areas not accessible to the public and even individual employees’ offices. “It doesn’t matter if it is used as a decoration, or to hold paper clips or M & M’s. No ashtrays are allowed, period.” (Clyde Haberman, “No Smoking, and Don’t Try Putting It Out”, New York Times, Dec. 2).
In Inuit country, fear of U.S. lawyers
Arctic outfitters and small tourism operators in Nunavut, the far northern territory of Canada that is home to the Inuit people, are suffering the effects of a liability insurance crisis which is also affecting major landowners in the area such as Parks Canada and the Government of Nunavut. “These organizations are especially fearful of multi-million-dollar lawsuits launched in U.S. courts by aggressive trial lawyers on behalf of hurt or angry clients. ‘The landowner is always named in any lawsuit against a tourism outfitter, and as these organizations generally have the deep pockets, they will be targeted by the lawyers,’ Nunavut Tourism’s discussion paper says.” (Jim Bell, “Skyrocketing insurance batters tourism operators”, Nunatsiaq News, Nov. 28).
Med-mal roundup
Massachusetts: “The Romney administration and the Harvard School of Public Health, seeking to address soaring health care costs driven by medical malpractice lawsuits, are working on a sweeping proposal to move malpractice claims out of state courts and into a new administrative framework much like the state’s workers’ compensation system.” (Ralph Ranalli, “Malpractice plan would limit trials”, Boston Globe, Nov. 13). “Defense and plaintiffs’ lawyers agree that, in recent memory, no medical malpractice verdict in excess of policy limits has resulted in the seizure of a Connecticut doctor’s house, savings or other personal assets”, reports Thomas B. Scheffey of the Connecticut Law Tribune. But now following a series of high awards “more aggressive collection strategies may come into play” as trial lawyers at Bridgeport’s kingpin tort firm of Koskoff, Koskoff and Bieder are “exploring other options” with regard to collecting a $10 million judgment against a Stamford physician insured for only $1 million (“Med-Mal Awards Put Doctors on Alert”, Nov. 18). And a judge in McDowell County, W.V., has dismissed Dr. Julie McCammon’s lawsuit against the West Virginia Trial Lawyers Association and its former president for causing her malpractice insurance rates to rise, ruling that the defendants owed her no duty of care. (Nora Edinger, “Doctor’s suit dismissed”, Clarksburg Exponent Telegram, undated, appx. Nov. 26).
Update: Texaco $33.8 M punitive damages award tossed
A jury had found that the plaintiffs had not suffered compensable damages, but went ahead and awarded $33.8 million in punitives against ChevronTexaco for the actions of a fired salesperson (Jul. 3). The Miami trial judge threw out the award November 12. (Laurie Cunningham, “$33.8M Jury Verdict Against ChevronTexaco Thrown Out”, Miami Daily Business Review, Dec. 1).
Canada: What it takes to get fired from a public service job
New Brunswick, Canada: “The City of Moncton thinks that showing up drunk at work toting a loaded, sawed-off shotgun in search of the boss is a firing offence. The city’s union disagrees. Seven days after George Pavlovsky was fired from his job as a senior tree cutter with the City of Moncton, the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 51 filed a grievance to his employer challenging the dismissal.” Mr. Pavlovsky is unavailable for immediate service since he is currently serving a two-year prison term over the incident, but he “is hoping to get his job back when he is released.” (Shawna Richer, “Gun-toting, drunk Moncton employee grieves firing”, The Globe and Mail, Nov. 28)
Alabama jury to Exxon Mobil: pay the state $11.9 billion
In a retrial of a case which earlier led to an exorbitant punitive damages award, an Alabama jury two weeks ago ordered ExxonMobil to pay $63.6 million in compensatory damages and $11.8 billion in punitive damages to the cash-strapped state government in a dispute over natural gas royalties (“Alabama jury orders Exxon Mobil to pay $11.9 billion in dispute over natural gas royalties”, AP/San Francisco Chronicle, Nov. 14; Phillip Rawls, AP/Miami Herald, Nov. 13). A former state administration had hired two of the state’s most successful private trial lawyers, Jere Beasley and Robert Cunningham, to take the case on a 14 percent contingency, which in this case would amount to $1.6 billion in fees; the two lawyers are also important campaign contributors. Earlier verdict: Dec. 20, 2000. Editorial reactions: “The truly ridiculous”, Huntsville Times, Nov. 17; “Exxessive verdict”, Birmingham News, Nov. 19; “Don’t over-celebrate ExxonMobil verdict”, Mobile Register, Nov. 17. Update Apr. 18: judge cuts verdict to $3.6 billion. Further update Nov. 8, 2007: Alabama Supreme Court throws out punitives.
“Lawsuit alleges alcohol marketed to teens”
The lawsuit, which seeks class-action status, was filed by the Armonk, N.Y. firm of Boies Schiller & Flexner LLP and by “David Boies III, of the Fairfax, Va., law firm Straus & Boies,” who is the son of Boies Schiller’s David Boies (Nov. 6, earlier cites). Although it claims not to be (yet) a broad-scale assault on the liquor industry a la tobacco, the suit seeks to recover “unlawful profits” made by Coors, Heineken, Brown-Forman, Diageo, and others for such supposed atrocities as employing the Captain Morgan character to sell rum and advertising in rock music magazines. Also being sued is the trade association The Beer Institute. (AP/Salon, Nov. 26). As we noted in July, liquor companies “have been curiously absent from the list of targets of mass litigation campaigns in the U.S.A. in recent years; but see Mar. 22, 2000.”
Juan Non-Volokh notes (Nov. 28) that Miller Brewing Co., which has been a client of Boies, Schiller & Flexner in the past, “is not among the named defendants in the suit. … Boies claims this is because Miller is not one of the ‘more egregious’ actors in the industry”. Julian Sanchez (Reason “Hit and Run”, Nov. 28) discerns the ripple effects of anti-alcohol agitation by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and other Safety Dry forces. Jim Leitzel (Nov. 19) takes note of a study suggesting that alcohol advertising probably does raise the rate of underage drinking. Professor Bainbridge (Nov. 28) has some thoughts on the regulation-through-litigation angle. Further: for more on the Neo-Drys, see Radley Balko, “Back Door To Prohibition”, Cato Policy Analysis #501, Dec. 5. (Update Feb. 16: second suit targets brewers).