The mother of an East Orange man killed when Denver Nuggets guard J.R. Smith ran a stop sign in Millstone told authorities she didn’t want the NBA player to be prosecuted because she wants closure for her family.
But [she] is continuing a civil suit against the basketball star because Smith has not reformed his dangerous driving habits, which she contends caused the death of her 21-year-old son, Andre Bell, on June 9, 2007, her attorney said. …
Update to Tennessee medmal verdict
Update to the Hamilton County medical malpractice case we discussed in May. Four jurors have signed affidavits claiming that they were “coerced” by the judges’ instructions demanding a verdict into finding for the plaintiff rather than deadlocking the jury; one or two others deny that this happened. (Chattanooga Free Press, Jun. 14, Jun. 24, and Jun. 28; h/t J.T.)
While the “Allen charge” the judge gave appears to violate Tennessee law (which, unlike federal law, disapproves of such instructions), reading between the lines of the news stories, it seems that the defendants sandbagged any objection. As one can see, the journalist did not know enough law to ask the follow-up question “Did you object at the time to the jury instruction?”, which would be the critical inquiry. (Though it is possible that she did know, but had that part of her story cut by editors.) If this is the best grounds of appeal for the defendants, and plaintiff’s lawyers are correct that there was no objection at the time, the defendant is facing a steep uphill battle. Generally, courts don’t like to go wading elbows deep to scrutinize the jury deliberations; otherwise, every trial would be followed by a collateral trial into the claims of jurors, and losing parties would have the incentive to lobby jurors to testify against their verdict. (I learned this the hard way in my first appellate briefing as a junior associate.)
“An assembly-line fraud factory”
A jury convicted three California lawyers and two interpreters who prosecutors said had organized massive fraud in the filing of asylum claims, generating false documents and coaching hundreds of clients to make false claims of persecution in India, Romania, and other countries so as to obtain the right to remain in this country. [Sacramento Bee; Jagprit Singh Sekhon, Jagdip Singh Sekhon, and Manjit Kaur Rai] “Meanwhile, in Boston, federal immigration authorities have begun rejecting dozens of immigration applications filed by lawyer John K. Dvorak, The Boston Globe reports. Officials allege they have found fraud, such as fake employment letters, in a significant number of Dvorak’s cases.” [Ambrogi, LegalBlogWatch]
Around the web, July 3
- Transportation Security Administration detained comic book artist based on art he was carrying with him [Popehat]
- More unease over Federal Trade Commission move to regulate bloggers’ freebies [Citizen Media Law, CEI “Open Market”, earlier] “I could care less that Milly the Yarn Spinner at millysworldofyarn.com is getting free samples of yarn to review on her blog.” [John Dvorak, PC Mag]
- “Judge Calls Frivolous Suits Against Attorneys a ‘Disturbing Trend'” [NYLJ; Staten Island, N.Y.]
- Sad news: Excellent online music service Pandora, unable to negotiate rights affordably, shuts down for customers outside the U.S. [Prefixmag, earlier]
- Joseph Stiglitz says the UN has a key role to play in “reforming the global financial and economic system”, which “is a bad idea. It is a very bad idea.” [Tyler Cowen]
- All assemble for trial: more installments in White Coat’s saga of his malpractice case [Emergency Physicians Monthly, parts seven and eight]
- Netherlands: site gets sued because of the way Google indexed it [TheNextWeb.com]
- Phone company faces grievance after disallowing workers’ metal facial jewelry as electricity-conducting risk [eight years ago on Overlawyered]
CPSIA’s tracking-labels fiasco: T minus six weeks
On August 14, unless the Consumer Product Safety Commission acts to stay matters, a new set of CPSIA provisions will take effect requiring makers of children’s products to affix to their goods tracking labels intended to facilitate future recalls and other safety-related measures. As with many other aspects of this law, the tracking rules impose a burden that is perhaps bearable for many producers who operate on a large industrial scale; as noted in some detail two weeks ago, however, they are causing much hair-pulling — if not thoughts of retirement or bankruptcy — for many others that produce handmade, customized or small-batch items, or items not well suited in size, material, use or packaging to an individual labeling process. Kathleen Fasanella has a short account at Fashion Incubator explaining some of the steps that will be expected of those producing children’s apparel and sewn products, including makers who might have been turning out a dozen hats or cloth dolls a month at their kitchen tables: 
…Each batch needs a unique identifying number.
However, if in the course of making the products, you have to break into a separate box of buttons that has a separate batch or lot number itself, even if the product is otherwise identical, this is a separate batch and you need a separate new label for it with its own batch number that you assign. … It is conceivable [if you incorporate variations into the product] every item you produce is its own batch and each needs its own number and label. …
You will need to do “batch control”. You need to create a separate BOM [Bill of Materials] for each batch. You can keep this electronically in a database or spreadsheet. It is my understanding you need to keep these records for three years.
The CPSC has issued no guidance on the tracking label requirements, which means producers can only guess as to exactly what will prove acceptable, with the price of guessing wrong set very high indeed. A hearing by the commission in May aired a sampling of the expectations of disaster from various affected businesses around the country.
Per ShopFloor, “the National Association of Manufacturers and the CPSC Coalition have submitted another request for an emergency, one-year stay of enforcement” of CPSIA’s Section 103, which imposes the requirement; the commission has (after much agonizing) agreed to stay some of the law’s other impractical mandates for periods of a year or two, but a petition to stay the tracking-label rules failed in March when the then-two-member commission split 1-1 on it. Now, however, a third member has joined in the person of newly confirmed Chairman Inez Tenenbaum, whose opinion may prove decisive. Reform voice Rick Woldenberg argues that the CPSC should adopt at least a one-year stay and indeed go further than that so as to avert a “fiasco” that “creates enormous burdens for industry and is in many ways pointless and unjustifiable”.
Or Congress could step in, admit it went too far last year, and set about fixing things. Just kidding! We know it won’t.
Public domain paper doll images courtesy Karen’s Whimsy.
Third Circuit panel dismisses charges against Judge Kozinski
Ending the brouhaha over Ninth Circuit Chief Judge Alex Kozinski’s having stored off-color cartoons, joke photos and other office humor on a private server inadvertently made available to public access, an 11-judge panel has now issued a unanimous 41-page opinion admonishing Kozinski for his error but declining to employ any reprimand or other discipline. Coverage is everywhere: Volokh, Above the Law, Legal Intelligencer. “A handful of prominent ethics experts, including NYU’s Stephen Gillers, Northwestern’s Steven Lubet and Hofstra’s Monroe Friedman, all sent letters in support of Kozinski.” (WSJ Law Blog). Our earlier coverage of the judge is here.
Mortgage Implode-O-Meter online speech case, cont’d
Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press have submitted an amicus brief in the case, urging the New Hampshire Supreme Court to uphold the website’s position on First Amendment grounds. The popular site Mortgage Lender Implode-O-Meter had published a New Hampshire Banking Department document containing information about a private company; that company proceeded to sue the site demanding that the document be taken down, and also demanded discovery of how the document had come into the site’s possession. Earlier here.
On a bench, “Caution: Seats may become wet”
Britain’s Daily Mail has a pictorial feature on superfluous warning signs (via Free-Range Kids). Another peril to watch out for: “uneven surfaces” on beach sand.
Annals of legal marketing
Our “law firm would be happy to discuss your rape case with you during a free consultation” [The Briefcase, Ohio law blog; original, posted by a Boston law firm, Jan. 2008]
While we’re at it, Above the Law spots a San Antonio lawyer whose advertising leaves something to be desired in the tastefulness department; and Patrick at Popehat enters into communication with the Twitter account @SueEasy (more on which) with lively results.
Statutory interpretation for nine-year-olds
This Green Bag piece is too good not to share, but does demonstrate the problem of failing to adhere to the text of a statute. (h/t M.F.N.)