Matt Welch scrutinizes a San Francisco “predatory pricing” antitrust verdict that you’d really think would be raising more alarm in publishing, and other, circles. [Reason]
Archive for 2010
Suit: music festival didn’t deter underage drinking in parking lot
In 2008 a one-car accident killed a Mansfield, Mass. 19-year-old and her 20-year-old friend; their car hit a tree. Now a lawyer for the passenger’s family has sued the town of Foxboro and the Kraft Group, saying the operators of the New England Country Music Festival did not do enough to deter underage drinking in the parking lot outside Gillette Stadium. [Boston Globe]
Camera said to capture $12.8 M winner’s “victory dance”
“The city of Seattle is seeking to overturn a $12.8 million judgment awarded to a former firefighter, who claimed he was permanently disabled by an on-duty fall, after investigators secretly shot video of the man chopping wood, playing horseshoes and bocce ball, and even breaking into a victory dance.” [Jennifer Sullivan, Seattle Times]
August 12 roundup
- “Father demands $7.5 million because school officials read daughter’s text message” [KDAF via CALA Houston]
- How many different defendants can injured spectator sue in Shea Stadium broken-bat case? [Melprophet]
- Prominent trial lawyer Russell Budd of Baron & Budd hosts Obama at Texas fundraiser [PoL]
- DNA be damned: when actual nonpaternity doesn’t suffice to get out from under a child support order [Alkon, more]
- “Sean Coffey, a plaintiffs’ lawyer-turned-candidate for New York Attorney General, made more than $150,000 in state-level campaign contributions nationwide over 10 years.” [WSJ Law Blog] “Days before announcing a shareholder lawsuit against Bank of America, state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli accepted $14,000 in campaign donations from a law firm hired to help litigate the case.” [WSJ]
- Big new RAND Corp. study on asbestos bankruptcy trusts may spur reform [Lloyd Dixon, Geoffrey McGovern & Amy Coombe, PDF, via Hartley, more, Daniel Fisher/Forbes, background here and here] Update: Stier.
- Public contingency suits? Of course the elected officials are in control (wink, wink) [The Recorder via Cal Civil Justice]
- Copyright enforcement mill appears to have copied its competitor’s website [TechDirt via Eric Goldman]
Travel writer’s legal nightmare continues
Joe Sharkey is said to have written with disrespect toward the sovereign state of Brazil and some of its institutions, and how much he’ll wind up paying as a consequence of that remains unknown [Blake Fleetwood, HuffPo, earlier]
“Government finds no electronic defects in runaway Toyotas ‘so far'”
After criticism for not releasing the results of its probe, the administration concedes that NHTSA has found little or no support for the trial lawyers’ electronic-gremlins theory. [USA Today, WSJ, L.A. Times, earlier here, here, etc.]
Why JetBlue can’t crack a smile
The airline’s legal department is almost certainly insisting on a sober demeanor, and as a result JetBlue has to stay on the sidelines as the Steven Slater episode becomes the internet story of the week. [Parekh/Bush, AdAge via Balasubramani]
Newsweek on the ADA’s effects
Ben Adler at Newsweek (Aug. 5) rounds up the recent controversy over the Americans with Disabilities Act after twenty years, and cites my own contribution, as well as quoting a number of disabled-rights advocates who take a differing view.
August 11 roundup
- General Mills sends lawyers after local “My Dough Girl” Bakery [Consumerist via Amy Alkon]
- But he can reapply in five years: “Lawyer Takes Plea in Case Over His Hardball Litigation Tactics, Will Be Disbarred” [ABA Journal, California]
- “Shame on Elie Wiesel” for threatening a lawsuit over his fictionalization in a stage play [Terry Teachout]
- State AGs dive into HIPAA and health privacy enforcement [Nicastro, Health Leaders Media]
- More highlights from Daniel Okrent book on Prohibition [Tabarrok]
- Denver school board investment fiasco [Popehat]
- Russell Jackson on the Yoo-Hoo chocolate beverage class action [Consumer Class Actions and Mass Torts, earlier]
- California court rules state’s Moscone (“little Norris-LaGuardia”) Act unconstitutional [Workplace Prof]
Offering to trade legal services for sexual favors
Over dissents from two justices, the New Jersey Supreme Court has declined to disbar an attorney who made “repeated, demeaning and offensive suggestions to his clients” in “an effort to barter his professional services for sexual favors.” The punishment instead: suspension for a year and required sensitivity training. Solangel Maldonado at Concurring Opinions thinks the court was too lenient, arguing that an employer charged with similar conduct toward an employee would have faced extensive liability under sexual harassment law.