July 9-19 -- Overlawyered.com
takes a summer break. We'll be taking off the next week
and a half or two weeks and may update the site sporadically, or more likely
not at all; the same goes for reading email. We reserve the right
to come back in if we get even more upset than usual about something.
Looking for reading material in the mean time? This makes the perfect
chance to catch up on our voluminous archives, dating back to July 1999.
Most of this older material is (in our opinion) pretty much as pertinent
as the newest entries, since so little ever really seems to change in the
beats we write about. (Jump in: 7/99,
10/99,
1/00,
4/00,
7/00,
10/00,
1/01,
4/01, 7/01)
July 7-8 -- Update:
Alabama high court reverses conviction in campaign-tactics case.
In an 8-1 decision, the Alabama Supreme Court overturned the misdemeanor
convictions for criminal defamation and witness tampering of Jasper attorney
Garve Ivey and ordered him acquitted. The case arose (see Aug.
26, 1999; Sept. 1, 1999; Aug.
31, 2000) after an ex-prostitute leveled lurid sex charges against
Lieutenant Governor Steve Windom. "The Supreme Court said the convictions
can't stand because Alabama's criminal defamation law is unconstitutionally
worded and because the witness tampering charge was brought in the wrong
county," reports AP. "'Because of this disposition, this opinion
cannot and should not be viewed as vindication of Ivey's version of the
evidence,' Justice Champ Lyons wrote in the majority decision. ...Ivey's
attorney, Barry Ragsdale, said the decision shows the Republican- dominated
court can rise above politics to rule in favor of someone who has been
a big supporter of Democrats." Civil suits by Ivey and Windom against
each other remain pending. (Phillip Rawls, "Supreme Court reverses
attorney's conviction in 1998 lt. gov. race", AP/AlabamaLive, July
6).
July 6-8 -- The
rest of Justice O'Connor's speech. Supreme Court Justice
Sandra Day O'Connor's speech earlier this week to a group of Minnesota
women lawyers got front-page publicity because of its reflections on the
shortcomings in the administration of the death penalty. That was
not the only topic of her remarks, however. "O'Connor also said she
is bothered by contingency fees
that allow for big payoffs for victorious lawyers, especially in class-action
lawsuits. 'Such arrangements have made more overnight millionaires
than almost any other businesses and the perverse incentives and the untoward
consequences they are creating within our profession are many," O'Connor
said, adding that lawyers become 'business partners of plaintiffs in seeking
large-dollar recoveries rather than act as objective servants of the law.'
O'Connor also said she is worried that zero
tolerance laws were too willing to sacrifice common sense for the politics
of public safety." ("O'Connor, in Speech, Blasts Death Penalty, Lawyer
Fees and Zero Tolerance", AP/ FoxNews.com, July
3).
July 6-8 -- Batch
of reader letters. Another large
sack of correspondence in which readers send us moral support in the
"Love Your Neighbor" affair; propose what to do with the trial lawyers
who held secret what they knew about Firestone hazards while motorists
perished; ask why Florida is investing in those demon tobacco companies;
explain why the "tipsy topless dancer" injury case wasn't one for the workers'
compensation system; criticize local TV's coverage of the Manhattan drugstore
handicapped access suit; and discuss the bagpiper "zero tolerance" case,
Ohio auto insurance, and loser-pays. Two readers take us to task
for our qualms about the negligent-homicide prosecution of the Tennessee
mom who let her ill-fated two-year-old sit in her lap during a car ride;
and a "proud lawyer" writes in to say "I think your website sucks", and
the rest of his letter doesn't get any more complimentary from there.
July 6-8 -- Research
for lawyers, courtesy of their targets. A rash of age-discrimination
suits is expected to follow recent business layoffs, especially given the
impact of a federal law called the Older Workers Benefit Protection Act
of 1990 which "requires companies to provide workers with age-specific
data about who is targeted and who remains on the job after layoffs or
early-retirement buyouts." Put differently, the law requires employers
to compile and hand over statistical ammunition so as to make life easier
for lawyers who want to take them to court. It even requires them
to inform workers of the exact, not just approximate, age of their departing
colleagues -- doesn't that count as some sort of privacy violation?
(Adam Geller, "A gray area", AP/Austin American-Statesman, July
5). And the Sacramento Bee provides more details on that
California legislation, authored by former state senator Tom Hayden, which
furthers the cause of reparations litigation by "requir[ing] insurance
companies doing business in the state during the 1800s to hand over archival
records of insurance policies issued on the lives of slaves" and also directs
the taxpayer-backed University of California to conduct research linking
the modern California economy to the efforts of slaves. ("Slavery
reparation movement advances with state legislation", Fahizah Alim, Sacramento
Bee,
June
30). Gee, who do you think lobbies for laws like these?
July 6-8 -- Estate-law
temptations. According to Dominic Campisi, a San Francisco
litigator who heads a committee on estate malpractice for the American
Bar Association, 'there are lots of attorneys that steal from estates.'
... Bad estate lawyers can
easily skate free because their clients aren't around to oversee them."
And do be extra careful around lawyers who are willing to be named beneficiaries
in their clients' wills. (Brigid McMenamin, "Lawyer Take All", Forbes,
May
28)(reg).
July 5 -- Welcome
Slashdot readers. Our coverage of Barney's blustering
lawyers is here. Also check out Declan
McCullagh's article on Wired News for more details ("Lawyers: Keep
Barney Pure", July
4). And another
Slashdot poster points out that satire site Cybercheeze,
the target of Barney's lawyers, has its
own permissions page which purports to ban linking to its site without
using its logo -- whoops, looks like we've just violated that policy. Or
have we?
July 5 -- Disparaging
stadium nickname leads to suit. "Invesco Funds Group,
which bought the naming rights to the new Denver Broncos stadium, announced
Sunday that it plans to sue The Denver Post and sports columnist Woody
Paige over Paige's column in Sunday's newspaper. Paige wrote that
an unidentified Invesco executive told him some people in the company call
Invesco Field at Mile High 'The Diaphragm' because they say it resembles
the birth-control device." The company says none of its execs would
talk that way, even in private. Conclusion: it's been defamed.
("Invesco to sue over column", Denver Post, July
2).
July 5 -- Harvard
Law's new Bob Barker program in animal rights. In recognition
of a $500,000 gift, Harvard Law School has established the Bob Barker Endowment
Fund for the Study of Animal Rights -- the esteemed Mr. Barker, of course,
being the longtime host of the TV game show "The Price Is Right" and a
prominent supporter of the animal rights movement. "The Fund will
support teaching and research at the Law School in the emerging field of
animal rights law. The income generated by the gift will fund periodic
courses and seminars at the Law School on animal
rights taught by visiting scholars with a wide range of views and perspectives."
(HLS press release, June
13). Despite the nod toward "a wide range of views and perspectives",
we wonder whether Harvard would really have welcomed a mirror-image endowed
fund on the study of animal law named after, say, Fred the Furrier.
And if not, can we doubt that its imprimatur is effectively going to one
side of this debate? Bonus: polymathic judge Richard Posner
engages Princeton's Peter Singer in a recent Slate online dialogue
on critters' entitlements (June 11: parts -1-,
-2-,
-3-,
-4-)
(via Arts & Letters Daily).
July 5 -- "Scruggs
interested in buying Saints". "A multimillionaire
trial lawyer says he would buy the New Orleans Saints and move them to
Mississippi if it becomes an option. Richard
Scruggs, a Mississippi plaintiffs lawyer who made several hundred million
dollars from tobacco settlements, said he is interested in buying the team
and moving it to Mississippi." That money must just be burnin'
a hole in his pocket -- or is it Angelos
envy? And one of the rival groups of investors interested in the
team is headed by another plaintiff's lawyer, Walter Leger Jr. (AP/Jackson
Clarion
Ledger, June
29).
July 5 -- Connecticut
to "mainstream" retarded kids. In a recent disabled-rights
court settlement, the state of Connecticut has agreed to educate many more
retarded students in regular classes alongside other kids. There
are good reasons to fear that such placements will often lead to serious
disruption of the class for other students and the teacher -- and also
a slower learning pace for many retarded kids themselves than if they were
in a class tailored to their needs. But given the binding nature
of a court order, schools
will probably find it hard to undo placements on a case-by-case basis when
they don't work out ("State agrees to mainstream more disabled kids", AP/Christian
Science Monitor, June
19). This site's editor was on the Fox News Channel last Thursday
predicting that (alas) lawyers in the rest of the country will soon be
trying to bring the new Connecticut system to their states (see Heather
Nauert, "Connecticut Agrees to Teach Some Mentally Retarded Children in
Regular Classes," FoxNews.com, July
6).
July 3-4 -- "Reflections
of a Survivor of State Judicial Election Warfare". In
this speech to the Manhattan Institute, Justice Robert Young of the Michigan
Supreme Court, who with two colleagues survived vicious attacks to retain
his seat in last fall's elections, argues that the mounting acrimony and
expense of state judicial campaigns
arises from a philosophical clash between activist and traditionalist views
of the judicial role, made worse by interest-group warfare, with trial
lawyers intent on keeping state judiciaries in the hands of their friends
(Manhattan Institute Civil Justice Report #2, June:
html,
PDF
formats)
July 3-4 -- "Lawyer
says Yellow Book ad made him look bad, sues for damages".
Attorney Harvey W. Daniels of Greensburg, Pa. has sued the publishers of
the Westmoreland County Yellow Book "for $500,000 in punitive damages and
an unspecified amount in compensatory damages. ... Daniels alleges the
advertisement
in the 2000-01 Yellow Book failed to mention that he is a personal-injury
lawyer. He also claims that a photo with the previous year's ad was
'so grotesque that the plaintiff looked like an albino and discouraged
any client from contacting' him." (AP/Boston Globe,
June
29) (sorry, no illustration).
July 3-4 -- "You
get a coupon, he gets a fortune". Vince Carroll of Denver's
Rocky
Mountain News on the Blockbuster Video class
action settlement (June
13).
July 3-4 -- "Court
Says Tipsy Topless Dancer Can Sue Club". A Texas
appeals court has ruled that dancer Sarah Salazar of San Antonio, who left
work tipsy and had a car
accident, can sue her employer, the
now-defunct Giorgio's Men's Club, for encouraging her to drink with customers
"so they would buy more drinks at inflated prices." If she was employed
by the club, shouldn't this be a workers' comp claim rather than a lawsuit?
Or are we missing something? (Reuters,
June
28) (& letter to the editor, July
6).
July 3-4 -- Welcome
Online
Tonight listeners. Our editor was a guest Friday
night on the radio show hosted
by David Lawrence. Also: Virginia Postrel's "The
Scene", congratulating us on our second birthday; Slithy Tove's Live
Journal (scroll
to May 23); GrassRoots
GunRights South Carolina; Infodrome.nl
(in Dutch); San Francisco law firm Cox,
Wootton, Griffin & Hansen; Declan McCullagh's politechbot, June
26.
July 2 -- Two views
of Microsoft ruling. Richard Epstein finds the court of
appeals' unanimous ruling to be reasonably good news for Microsoft,
and in line with the market's expectations; but Jonathan Groner says the
company is now in more trouble on the private suits and might still face
a breakup down the road (Richard A. Epstein, "Phew!", Wall Street Journal/
OpinionJournal.com, June
30; Jonathan Groner, "Not Good News for Microsoft", American Lawyer
Media, June
29; U.S.
v. Microsoft (PDF -- courtesy Law.com)).
July 2 -- Facial-jewelry
discrimination charged. Phone company Ameritech has told
three line workers that it
will not let them go to work with eyebrow rods and other inserted facial-piercings
jewelry, which it worries could obstruct their vision or conduct electricity
in an accident. The three say they're being discriminated against
and have filed a grievance. However, the company may risk being sued
if it does let them wear the metal items, given OSHA rules calling for
technicians who work near power lines to forgo wearing anything that conducts
electricity, even wedding rings (Jon Van, "Piercings pit workers against
Ameritech", Chicago Tribune,
June
21).
July 2 -- Bounties
for ratting out taxpayers? For nearly 10 years private
San Francisco attorneys Michael Mendelson and Wayne Lesser have been goading
the city to pursue IBM over its alleged use of property transfers to underpay
city real estate taxes. The city did investigate and negotiated a
deal in which the giant computer maker agreed to fork over more tax money,
but that deal has been rejected by the board of supervisors and the eventual
outcome remains uncertain. In the mean time, Mendelson and Lesser
say they want "attorneys' fees of about $14 million -- 25 percent of the
$56 million in back property taxes, interest and penalties they say the
city is owed" -- for having pushed the issue onto city lawyers' agenda.
Deputy City Attorney Owen Clements says the city neither needed nor wanted
their help and "says city officials were on top of the matter before the
two attorneys started making noise." He's also "adamant that, whatever
the outcome of the case, the two lawyers have no fee due them. 'There's
no such thing as tax bounty money.'" (Dennis J. Opatrny, "Battle Over Big
Blue", The Recorder, June
5).
