David Rossmiller—indispensable for matters Scruggsian—has the details of a Judge Michael Mills’s displeasure with Dickie Scruggs’s refusal to submit to a deposition in State Farm’s lawsuit against state attorney general Jim Hood. Scruggs will likely plead the Fifth Amendment for his interactions with the attorney general—which does not reflect well on that attorney general.
Archive for February, 2008
Scruggs scandal developments, February 5
* Pertinacious Scruggs effort to evade deposition by State Farm attorneys results in “testosterone fiesta” of swaggering counsel (Folo; sequel; YallPolitics; Rossmiller); (P.S. Yes, Ted and I independently noticed and posted on this just minutes apart.)
* Remember when Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood declared his political patron Scruggs a “confidential informant”, thus throwing a most useful cloak of protection over him in his battle against contempt charges? It happens that Scruggs was at almost exactly the same moment donating large sums to the Democratic Attorneys General Association which seem to have passed through like a dose of salts to emerge at the other end as donations to Hood (YallPolitics; earlier on DAGA)
* Attorney Ed Peters, tagged with a pivotal role in Langston-DeLaughter branch of scandal, was formerly high-profile local D.A.; his prosecutorial vendetta against an attorney named J. Keith Shelton comes in for scrutiny in a new series by Folo proprietor Lotus [#5 in series; posts tagged Peters; see also YallPolitics]
* Folo co-blogger NMC, looking into Luckey and Wilson fee disputes (earlier here, here, here), is rattled by the prevalence of hearings-without-notice, ex parte judicial contacts, and other Gothic proceduralisms [Folo];
* Implications or non-implications for civil proceedings of Scruggs’s taking the Fifth [White Collar Crime Prof Blog]
* Adam Cohen of the NYT and Scott Horton of Harper’s claim defendants in precursor Minor-Teel-Whitfield scandal were railroaded on vague charges over not-really-illegal stuff; read pp. 6-9 of the indictment and see whether you agree (YallPolitics);
* For Mississippi, it’s already the most far-reaching corruption scandal in a century, aside from the question of how much bigger it might get [Jackson Clarion-Ledger]
Earlier Scruggs coverage on our scandals page.
January 2008: a look back
With all the football and recovery from partying on New Years’ and MLK weekends, you might have missed some of our biggest posts of the month:
- Trial lawyer Mark Lanier visits our comments section to talk about the Vioxx settlement. We had continuing coverage of the $4.85 billion settlement, and Ted spoke at an AEI panel on the subject broadcast on C-SPAN.
- Walter’s phenomenal coverage of the Dickie Scruggs scandal: Jan. 13, Jan. 14, Jan. 15, and Jan. 16 (Joey Langston); Jan. 17; Jan. 21; Jan. 29.
- The “pro-consumer” bills before Congress that hurt consumers.
- Three cases of catastrophic injury to children, three deep-pocketed bystanders asked to pay.
- Racially “targeting” predatory subprime loans? The NAACP and Baltimore suits.
- Another case of employment litigation hurting employees.
- The Nataline Sarkisyan case, and the lies John Edwards (and Wikipedia) tell about it.
- Suit: You kept me from jumping off the Empire State Building.
- The Banita Jacks case and followup.
- Police more likely to sleep with than arrest prostitutes.
- Sangria illegal in Virginia?
U.K.: A one-man bias-suit industry
“For a decade [Suresh Deman] sued universities – usually claiming racial bias over failed job applications – as he collected nearly £200,000 in payouts and cost the taxpayer an estimated £1million”. After he had brought 40 actions he was declared a vexatious litigant and banned from further proceedings, but the ban did not cover Northern Ireland and he was soon there pursuing an 11-year-old claim against the Association of University Teachers and Officers (AUT). (Chris Brooke, “Race-claims lecturer beats legal ban to carry on suing after 40 discrimination claims”, Daily Mail (U.K.), Nov. 19; A Tangled Web, Nov. 19; “In the news: Suresh Deman”, Times Higher Education Supplement, Mar. 21, 2003).
Update: received on Oct. 5, 2015, via comment form from a commenter giving the name of “C Kumar”:
In 2007 a leading national newspapers published defamatory material by putting me into negative light. Initial persuasion with the editor to retract and tender an apology did not work, so matter went to the High Court. After 8 years, persistence paid off and I was vindicated with an agreement to publish an apology as follows:
“In the editions of 21st and 28 January 2007 we published articles entitled, “De-Man for race pay outs” and “De-Man for race compensation is back in Ulster” concerning a Industrial Tribunal cases taken in Northern Ireland by Dr Suresh Deman, on the basis that he suffered discrimination in his employment.
The articles wrongly characterized him as “De-Man” and claimed that Dr Deman was barred from instituting the proceedings in Northern Ireland and did not provide Dr Deman the opportunity to comment on the their content. We are happy to clarify this and apologies to Dr Deman for our error….”
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
My monthly post for NPR’s Talking Justice weblog is about their topic of the week, the Ledbetter Supreme Court case and the associated (and counterproductive) legislation passed by the House.
Online prescribing
Despite promising potential advantages for patient care as well as cost savings, the medical profession has not been quick to embrace technologies that enable online linkage of prescribing doctors with pharmacies. One reason, according to an article in Medical Economics: fear of liability. The feedback flow of information from online prescribing tends to bring to a doctor’s attention that some patients have been failing to pick up or renew their prescriptions and are thus presumptively noncompliant. Once doctors know that, however, they’re open to being sued later on the theory that they knew of a patient’s noncompliance but failed to pursue him aggressively enough to come in for more counseling, etc. Apparently it’s safer not to know in the first place (Ken Terry, “E-prescribing: The rewards and risks”, Medical Economics, Jan. 4)(via KevinMD).
Thread-count class action
The New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town” has a look at that class action against Bed Bath & Beyond over misleading bedding thread counts which resulted in “a series of refunds and discount certificates” to consumers — coupons from Bed Bath & Beyond, imagine that! — $2,500 for the named client, and up to $290,000 for the plaintiff’s counsel, led by Edith M. Kallas (formerly of Milberg Weiss), the whole contretemps summed up as a “dry goods Enron”. (Lauren Collins, “Splitting Threads”, Jan. 28). See also Michael Krauss at PoL; and Peter Lattman got to it first.
Lerach: keep my sentencing briefs under seal
Ah, the hypocritical irony: Bill Lerach moves to keep his sentencing documents for the Milberg Weiss kickback scandal under seal, perhaps to protect the identities of the 150 people who wrote on his behalf. [NY Sun] Any politicians we should know about? Portfolio has the briefing; the DC Examiner comments. Prosecutors have asked for 24 months (out of a possible 33-month maximum under the Guidelines); sentencing is February 11. (Crossposted from Point of Law.)
Prisoner litigation Hall of Fame
Inmate Jorey Lee Brewis, also known as Rebekah Katherine, is suing officials of the Oregon Department of Corrections who allegedly ignored Brewis’s gender identity disorder, leaving Brewis to resort to — details not for the squeamish — do-it-yourself sex change surgery by way of fingernails, hair ties, rubber bands and other implements available in the cell. A spokeswoman for the corrections department “says she can’t discuss Brewis’ case because of medical privacy concerns”. (James Pitkin, “Juicy Suits: Cutting Off Her Own Testicles in Prison”, Willamette Week, Dec. 13).
Deep Pockets File: Great White fire
Innocent bystanders have paid the bulk of settlements to date in the catastrophic fire caused by Great White’s pyrotechnic display that killed 100 people at The Station nightclub in Providence, Rhode Island. The latest victims are a television station, WPRI, and a cameraman who will contribute $30 million to a settlement fund: WPRI’s Brian Butler is accused of impeding the crowd’s exit through the front door, though Butler’s contemporaneous account suggests that he probably saved some lives at the time. “Dozens of defendants remain, including … Anheuser-Busch Inc., which sold beer at the concert; and Clear Channel Communications, which owns a Providence radio station which ran advertisements promoting the show.” (Andrea Estes, “Tentative deal set in R.I. fire case”, Boston Globe, Feb. 2; “Tentative $30 Million Settlement in Club Fire”, AP/NY Times, Feb. 2). Earlier: Feb. 2006 and Nov. 2 (Home Depot pays $5M for failure to warn, though their foam is different than the foam that caught on fire).