A Montana jury decided that the aluminum baseball bat manufactured by “Louisville Slugger” maker Hillerich & Bradsby was not a defective product, but that the company should have warned of the dangers from its hitting balls at a higher speed, and awarded a family $850,000 for the 2003 death of their son at a baseball game. [Helena Independent Record, AP] Early commentary: Russell Jackson (doubting that a warning would actually have altered the behavior of those in the game) and Eugene Volokh (before verdict). Earlier here. More: Jim Copland discusses on CNN; Above the Law.
Archive for October, 2009
“101 Ways to Improve State Legal Systems”
I don’t agree with every one of the suggestions proposed by this Chamber of Commerce Institute for Legal Reform document authored by Victor Schwartz and Cary Silverman, but I agree with more than 90% of them, and it’s a good starting point for any discussion of tort reform.
John O’Quinn dead in SUV accident
So reports the Houston Chronicle (via ABA Journal). The Texas plaintiffs’ attorney has provided this site with a lot of fodder over the years, and one suspects that the circumstances of his untimely death will be litigated as well.
Pharmacies liable for pill-abusers’ crashes?
A case before the Nevada Supreme Court aims to open up new vistas of liability. [WSJ Law Blog].
Potential bad omens for the defense
When jurors ask for and receive a ten-digit adding machine to assist in their deliberations [Sacramento Bee, on the “Hold Your Wee for a Wii” trial, via Miller]
U.K.: “Council bans parents from play areas”
In England, the Watford Borough Council now bars parents from supervising their own kids at playgrounds unless they undergo criminal record checks. Council-vetted “play rangers” are still allowed to move among the kids, but parents who have not undergone checks must “watch from outside a perimeter fence.” [Telegraph via BoingBoing]
Speaking at Columbia Law tomorrow
The Federalist Society chapter at Columbia Law School is having me in for a lunchtime talk there tomorrow (Thursday, Oct. 29) on problems with the changing (and seemingly ever-more-aggressive) role of state attorneys general. James Tierney, former attorney general of the state of Maine and director of Columbia’s program on state AGs, will be on hand to offer a contrasting point of view. Hope to see a few readers there.
Wrist straps on Wiimotes
Class action plaintiffs claim that all three of Nintendo’s designs are defective [Colin Miller, Evidence Law Prof]
Book pricing antitrust petition
“The American Booksellers Association loves people who buy books. It loves them so much that it wants to protect them from wicked retailers who sell popular titles at affordable prices.” [Jeff Jacoby, Boston Globe] More: Mark Perry.
Related: antitrust laws mostly “used today by one group of competitors to try to hamstring another competitor in their business” [Coyote on IBM mainframe investigation]
The talk of the internet
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s acrostic veto [TechCrunch, language].