Scruggs indictment V

Roger Parloff at Fortune Legal Pad is out with some informative analysis based on an interview with attorney John Griffin Jones, who filed the fee suit against Scruggs. Among the questions explored: how high were the stakes in that suit, and why might the defendants have been keen on an arbitration order? Relating to the latter point, Parloff writes:

Scruggs’s lead counsel, John Keker of Keker & Van Nest, adds that the notion that Scruggs might have wanted to keep the case out of public view by putting it into arbitration is “absurd as a motive” for a bribe, since the case “was certainly going into arbitration” and that was “the only place it could possibly be.”

Which raises the question: if an order for arbitration was a foregone conclusion, why are Scruggs chums floating the theory that attorney Timothy Balducci thought he could impress Scruggs by getting such an order from Judge Lackey?

The WSJ law blog reports that Balducci was arraigned Tuesday and has asked to withdraw his law license. On the location of his arraignment, see Mississippi blogger Folo (earlier). (Update: Whoops, actually Mississippi expatriate, see comments.) Balducci was named to represent himself, drawing many puzzled reactions. (Update: NE Mississippi Daily Journal has more on Balducci’s arraignment and likely cooperation, via Folo.) Also, the WSJ law blog interviews David Rossmiller (who himself has several new posts up) and reports that the Scruggs firm may be withdrawing from Scruggs Katrina Group cases after all. (Update: confirmed in this Sun-Herald story).

This Sunday profile of Judge Lackey in the Sun-Herald notes that he’s “a deacon at First Baptist Church and a member of a state commission charged with ensuring judicial integrity,” which as several commentators note might indicate that he was a risky one to approach with a proposal for corruption.

A commenter at David Rossmiller notes whose interests are served by the pre-emptive “character assassination of Balducci” in recent coverage and also writes:

Patterson resigned Oct. 18, 1996 after pleading guilty to filing false documents to avoid paying taxes on a Range Rover. And Grisham thinks these folks are super sophisticated, why?…

And how bad does the spin from last week look? The FBI did not find “the document” and Scruggs is not withdrawing from Katrina cases, and then a few days later he is withdrawing. By the way, the FBI removed computer data which is most likely being analyzed right now, so who the heck knows what they have found. Maybe “dead bodies”? …

Earlier coverage of the indictment here, here, here, and here.

December 5 roundup

  • Fear of “retribution” and “legal action” among reasons docs don’t report hazardous colleagues and conditions [WaPo on new Annals of Internal Medicine study]
  • Judge rips Milberg for high Chiron fee proposal, questions Skadden’s conflict [The Recorder]
  • Felony murder rule is an American exception with results that can be hard to defend [Liptak, NYT]
  • UK: “Man broke girlfriend’s leg in damages fraud” [Times Online]
  • Often driven by defensive medicine, CAT scans may pose their own risks to patients who undergo them [Newsday on NEJM study]
  • Commentator is glad post offices are lawyering up their Operation Santa gift programs [McDonough, CalLaw LegalPad; earlier; possibly related]
  • Quebec judge nixes suit by Concordia University mass murderer against former colleagues [Canadian Press]
  • Update on Kennewick man and Indian-remains legislation [WashTimes; earlier]
  • Magic of compound interest? Uncollected 1977 award for victim of Evel Knievel attack said to have mounted by now to $100 million [AP/Yahoo]
  • School discipline now a heavily lawyer-driven affair [Charleston Post & Courier courtesy Common Good]
  • Complaint: Cleveland housing authority should have done more renovations to accommodate extremely obese tenant [four years ago on Overlawyered]

Gauer Distinguished Lecture

I’ve been blogging a bit less in the last few months because in September, the National Legal Center for the Public Interest merged into AEI and I’ve been heading up the combined AEI Legal Center for the Public Interest ever since. Tonight, AEI continues the NLCPI’s long tradition of the Gauer Distinguished Lecture in Law and Public Policy when SEC Chair Christopher Cox speaks tonight on government investment in the private market. In today’s American, I discuss the history of the NLCPI.

Scruggs indictment IV

The WSJ law blog’s Peter Lattman is now reporting from Scruggs hometown Oxford, Miss. and (with co-reporter Paolo Prada) is in today’s paper with “It’s Party Time For Dickie Scruggs In Oxford, Miss.” (WSJ, Dec. 4, sub-only). Among its newsy items: “People familiar with the investigation” confirm what was widely surmised, that attorney Timothy Balducci “began cooperating with prosecutors at some point after offering the judge money”. Balducci’s whereabouts are not immediately apparent and a “neighbor said no one had been [at his home] for a more than a week.” How much heat is attorney Balducci getting for his role in the case? The WSJ-on-paper quotes Deborah Patterson, wife of Balducci’s business partner and co-defendant Steven Patterson, as saying of Balducci: “He’s a short midget…and he has some sort of complex.” In the online version of the article this quote is shortened (so to speak) to “He has some sort of complex,” but with no correction or other explanation of whether the midget reference was repertorial error or what, exactly.

As emerges fairly clearly in the piece, the Scruggs camp is encouraging a line of defense that portrays Balducci, who has worked extensively with Scruggs in the past and has represented him in earlier lawsuits charging unfair fee division, as a clueless wannabe who pursued the bribe scheme on his own in hopes of impressing the senior lawyer — “a young man wanting to endear himself to Dickie Scruggs”, as one Scruggs intimate is quoted as saying. Famed novelist and Scruggs buddy John Grisham is quoted in the article (and in a separate WSJ blog interview) as saying that the scheme “doesn’t sound like the Dickie Scruggs that I know,” Mr. Grisham said yesterday. “When you know Dickie, and how successful he has been, you could not believe he would be involved in such a boneheaded bribery scam that is not in the least bit sophisticated.” But this is to assume that the payments starkly presented by the indictment as cash-for-the-judge were not intended to be dressed up in some more sophisticated guise, such as eventually forgiven loans routed through some fellow lawyer’s office, made to a relative of the judge, or both. That was the way things were handled in the Paul Minor cash-for-judges affair, in which Scruggs himself was involved, and one should not assume that no such overlay of sophistication would not have been poured over the Lackey payments.

Read On…

Judean People’s Front v. People’s Front of Judea Dept.

You remember last year, when the Association of Trial Lawyers of America tried to hide their identity and changed their name to the considerably less accurate American Association for Justice. (Aug. 2006; July 2006, etc.) Well, a new organization, led by J. Keith Givens, a former partner of the late Johnnie Cochran, has attempted to usurp the old acronym with an organization called The American Trial Lawyers Association, arguing that ATLA abandoned the name. “The name defines who we are and what we do,” which is very similar to the remark made by AAJ when they surrendered the Trial Lawyer title. Litigation, of course, ensued. (Jeffrey H. Birnbaum, “A Case of Trial Lawyers v. Trial Lawyers”, Washington Post, Nov. 30; commentary from Murnane, Lattman, Adler @ Volokh, Scheuerman). The Association of Trial Lawyers of America surrendered the American Trial Lawyers Association name decades ago when the American College of Trial Lawyers complained it was too similar, and the ACTL is also unhappy with the new ATLA’s use of the name. The fact that the previous sentence is so confusing suggests that the plaintiffs have a point.

AGs: Don’t count sale as class-action remedy

Retailer TJX (Marshall’s, Bob’s, TJ Maxx, etc.), facing lawsuits following its exposure of more than 45 million customer records in a gigantic credit-card security breach, has agreed with class-action lawyers to a settlement that includes, among other concessions, the holding of “Customer Appreciation” sale events at its stores. Ten state attorneys general have now objected to the deal, pointing out that store sale events can and routinely do work to the benefit of the retailer and not just the buyer. Massachusetts AG Martha Coakley’s “objection was not so much with the sale itself, but with having it included as a part of the official settlement. The difference? If it’s in the official settlement, it increases how much money the consumer lawyers involved in the case get for their fee.” (Evan Schuman, “Massachusetts AG Slams TJX Consumer Settlement Sale”, EWeek, Nov. 19; Mark Jewell, “Coakley not excited about TJX’s plan for repayment”, AP/Worcester Telegram, Nov. 21; John O’Brien, “Ten AGs don’t want class action attorneys fees boosted by sale”, LegalNewsLine, Nov. 20; Keith Regan, “TJX to Shell Out $41M in Data Breach Settlement”, E-Commerce Times, Nov. 30).

“Grandma got run over by a lawsuit”

“A feud involving the man who sang ‘Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer’ could wind up in court, just in time for Christmas. Elmo Shropshire was sued for breach of contract Monday by a company that claims he interfered in a $1 million-plus deal to sell musical trucks, bobblehead dolls, snow globes and cookie jars featuring characters from an animated show based on the novelty song.” (AP/San Mateo County Times, Nov. 28).

December 3 roundup

  • Drunk driving by St. Louis Blues hockey player Rob Ramage killed his passenger in a Toronto crash, and now Missouri verdict puts car rental company on hook for $9.5 million [Post-Dispatch]
  • Consumers trust lawyer ads in phone book, or at least so say the Yellow Pages people [WV Record]
  • Latest flip in marine-mammal litigation: Ninth Circuit orders curbs on Navy’s sub-hunting sonar [L.A. Times; earlier coverage]
  • More on colorful Judith Regan suit against News Corp. [Carr, NYT]
  • Lesson for law-firm “foreclosure mills”: don’t file the action before your client actually acquires the instrument being sued on [ABA Journal]
  • John Fund on Salvation Army and English in the workplace litigation [WSJ/OpinionJournal; earlier]
  • Comstock Act for the web is one of departed Rep. Hyde’s less happy legacies [McCullagh, CNet]
  • A view from Boston on Lone Star State med-mal reforms [Globe]
  • Shaker abstinence, cont’d: FDA mulls petition to crack down on salt in foods, and AMA has joined busybody brigade [L.A. Times; earlier, see also]
  • Texas tort tycoon John O’Quinn probably isn’t winning prizes these days from historic preservationists [ABA Journal]
  • Run for your lives! Toxic chocolate! [six years ago on Overlawyered]