Sues over having twins

An Australian woman asked that her in vitro fertilization (IVF) result in a single baby but two embryos were mistakenly implanted. Now she wants $A400,000 for the cost of raising the child to adulthood. (“Mother sues doctor over twin birth”, ABC (Australian) News, Sept. 18)(via KevinMD). The local branch of the Australian Medical Association says the law should be changed to prevent damage claims over the birth of unimpaired babies: “We’re very concerned [at] the concept that a healthy life is wrongful.” (“Doctors should not be liable for mistake births: AMA”, Sept. 22). More on wrongful birth lawsuits here.

October 13 roundup

Tug-of-war: a thought on the failure to warn

Gruesome life-changing injuries from tug-of-war matches (e.g., Colorado, Oct. 12; North Carolina, 2003; Taiwan, 1997; Tennessee, 1995) are rare, but not unheard of. Safety measures on tug-of-war ropes are possible. Do everyday ropes, used for a variety of purposes other than tug-of-war, need warning labels? Do previous injuries put the Colorado school district on notice: i.e., does a single publicized injury now make every school district effectively strictly liable if future injuries occur? What happens when tug-warriors disregard safety rules because the obvious risk of wrapping rope around a body part is not clearly spelled out? (Keep in mind in the Stella Liebeck McDonald’s coffee case, the plaintiffs complained that the coffee-cup warning that the beverage was hot wasn’t clear enough about the risk of injury.)

October 12 roundup

  • In Scotland, car repair shop faces music royalty suit because its employees listen to radios on the job [BBC]
  • Pediatricians grill kids about their parents’ drinking, gun ownership and antisocial habits — what, weren’t the hairdressers reporting back enough dirt for the authorities to work with? [Malkin, Szwarc]
  • Watch out for the new ADA Restoration Act of 2007, which would reverse several Supreme Court precedents with the aim of making it easier to file and win suits [Bader]
  • Don’t confuse Hollywood’s idea of lawyering, as in Clooney’s “Michael Clayton”, with the real kind [Lundegaard, MSNBC]
  • “It costs millions of dollars in litigation fees to show that a patent should not have been granted, and most big corporations have learned that the hard way.” [Chachkes @ CNet]
  • Banning all uses of lead from metal assemblies can result in “tin whiskers” leading to catastrophic failures in electronic devices — lucky those aren’t dangerous or anything [AP]
  • Armenian-American writer Garin Hovannisian isn’t an admirer of the Congressional genocide resolution [Boaz @ Cato-at-Liberty; see also Jul. 27]
  • Lynchburg, Va. woman: hey, I invented those pre-moistened cleaning wipes [News Advance via VLW]
  • Don’t listen to trolls like this Olson fellow [Mark Thoma comments]
  • Another round of coverage on libel tourism, SLAPPs and terror-support research [Broyde & Lipstadt @ NYT; Miller @ City Journal, Levitt @ The New Republic]
  • New at Point of Law: Ted on yet another iPhone suit, this time demanding a billion plus; further coverage of the Hofstra/Lynne Stewart affair; after many failures, lawyers score a $143 million verdict against Wyeth over hormone replacement drug Prempro/Premarin; more on the U.S. Navy, WWII and asbestos disease; new Irvine law school’s in the money; and much more.

Car-sharing services sued

ZipCar and FlexCar are violating the Americans with Disabilities Act by not providing special hand controls for disabled drivers, according to a lawsuit which also names the District of Columbia as a defendant because it provides parking spaces to the popular car-sharing services. (Hank Silverberg, “Disabled Woman Files Lawsuit Against Car-Sharing Services”, WTOP, Oct. 11).

Nastygram: don’t you dare post this nastygram on the web

Ted has briefly mentioned (Oct. 8) the recent doings of an outfit called Dozier Internet Law, whose cease and desist letter to a consumer-complaint site not only demanded that the site take down certain statements about Dozier’s client, DirectBuy, but also asserted that the cease and desist letter was itself the subject of copyright and could not be posted in part or full on the web. Eric Turkewitz, having called this approach “chuckleheaded” in an initial post (Oct. 5 — scroll), is now all over the story (Oct. 9 and Oct. 11), especially after attorney John Dozier of the firm in question submitted a comment whose clueless snippiness really must be seen to be believed.

More: from Consumer Law & Policy, Patry Copyright Blog, Legal Ethics Forum, and TechDirt, as well as extensive coverage at TDAXP.

Cory Lidle, One Year Later

The AP brings us up to date on the anniversary of Cory Lidle’s death:

By one estimate, more than $63 million worth of lawsuits now trail the estate of Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, seeking compensation for injuries, damages or insurance payouts that followed his plane’s crash into a New York City apartment building.

A year after the wreck, a federal safety panel has concluded that Lidle and his flight instructor died because they misjudged a turn, but the finding has done little to settle the legal fights that now stretch across the country.

According to the article, Lidle’s estate isn’t nearly large enough to pay all the claims against it… unless, of course, Lidle’s widow wins her $100 million lawsuit against the plane’s manufacturer.

(Previous entries: Mar. 2, Apr. 4, May 2).