Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Two more hot coffee lawsuit data points

Add the Stony Brook University Hospital cafeteria to the list of servers unsuccessfully sued over burns caused by hot coffee. If you recall, the theory of the McDonald’s coffee case (and repeated by such trial lawyer defenders as congressional candidate Bruce Braley) was that McDonald’s, and only McDonald’s, served coffee so hot as to burn. For some reason, the reporter for the New York Law Journal tries to leave the reader with the impression that the original Stella Liebeck case was justifiable (though that opinion is irrelevant to the article itself) which shows how successful trial lawyer propaganda has been within the legal community and press. (John Caher, “N.Y. Judge Cool to Injury Claims Over Spilled Coffee”, New York Law Journal, Nov. 2). We earlier listed other hot coffee lawsuit defendants.

Speaking of which, you may recall the Russian McDonald’s coffee case litigation that we covered a year ago, with identical allegations from a woman who spilled coffee on herself; the press is reporting that the plaintiff has dropped her case. As in the Stella Liebeck case, the Russian McDonald’s had a warning on the coffee cup that the contents were hot. (“Moscow McDonald’s coffee-spill case closed”, RIA Novosti, 1 Nov.).

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Snap a picture, break a contract?

You may imagine that you’re buying a Canon EOS-1D camera, but all you’re buying is actually a license to use it part of what you’re buying is a license to use its software, and a fairly restrictive license at that. “If you let anyone outside your immediate family use the camera — if you lend it to a friend for the weekend or even ask a stranger to take a picture of you and your wife — Canon could technically sue you for breach of contract.” (Clay Risen, “Shutter Bug”, The New Republic, Oct. 31).

Kudos to Judge James T. Warren

Paul Theodore Del Vacchio is the worst kind of gambling addict—the kind that isn’t very good at gambling. He stole $500 thousand from his casino employer, and sought mercy from the court on the grounds that his addiction made him do it to cover gambling losses. (Well, he also bought a $20,000 pool for his 2700-square-foot home.) No dice:

“There are a lot of people addicted to gambling who don’t steal anything. They get themselves in debt, sure. They may lose everything. They may lose their family. They may lose their house. They may lose their cars, but they don’t steal….

“We can’t let everybody who comes in here and wants to use an addiction, whether it be compulsive gambling, whether it be compulsive drinking, whether it be drug addiction, we can’t as a society let them utilize that as a method of getting out of their wrong acts. You know, it’s like my saying I’m addicted to beautiful women and fast cars, so I get to steal from the court’s trust account….

“He’s here because he’s a thief. He’s a thief. That’s the bottom line. He’s a thief. And he needs to acknowledge that, not use the gambling as a crutch. He let down his family. He let down his friends. He let down his employer. He let himself down. But the bottom line is he’s a thief, and he needs to be punished for being a thief.”

Del Vacchio got the maximum sentence of four years. (Ashley Powers, “A gambler with a disorder, or just a plain old thief?”, LA Times, Nov. 1).

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Mick Jagger’s sore throat

Following the cancellation of a Rolling Stones concert in Atlantic City, N.J., a would-be class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of a disappointed concertgoer (who is the wife of the attorney, Martin Druyan) demands $51 million for the cost of nonrefundable hotel tickets and the like. The baby-sitters were expensive, too. (Jose Martinez, “Brooklyn Stones fan seeks 51M of satisfaction”, New York Daily News, Oct. 31)(via Lat).

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Cheaters’ delight

“We have found that graduate students in general are cheating at an alarming rate and business-school students are cheating even more than others,” concludes a study by the Academy of Management Learning and Education of 5,300 students in the U.S. and Canada. …

However, what’s holding many professors back from taking action on cheaters is the fear of litigation.

(Thomas Kostigen, “Survey: M.B.A.s Are The Biggest Cheaters”, MarketWatch/ CareerJournal.com, Oct. 25; Al Lewis, “Wily MBA students lead cheating pack”, Denver Post, Oct. 2).

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Demand to FTC: ban Zillow.com valuations

The National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a coalition of community activist groups, has charged free-home-valuation site Zillow.com with undervaluing homes in black and Hispanic neighborhoods. “It urged the F.T.C. to start an investigation and permanently restrain Zillow from providing home value estimates.” (Damon Darlin, “A Home Valuation Web Site Is Accused of Discrimination”, New York Times, Oct. 31).

October 31 roundup

  • A WSJ Law Blog commenter thinks I’m too restrained in criticizing the plaintiffs’ bar. [WSJ Law Blog]
  • The Bush administration just might accomplish something else reform-related in its last two years. [Point of Law; Ideoblog]
  • 12-year-old California boy tries to jump over five-foot-long Halloween decoration that has chicken wire sticking out, hurts himself, 2-1 court decision says he can sue school district for failing to supervise him. [Los Angeles Daily News]
  • Jaycees may be forced to disband over haunted house lawsuit; they’ve stopped running the haunted house already. [Quad City Times]
  • Judge Easterbrook: “Gobs of judicial (and law-firm) time have been squandered by the combination of sloppy drafting, repeated violations of Rule 65(d), and inattention to all sources of subject-matter jurisdiction. If these lawyers were physicians, their patients would be dead.” [Blue Cross and Blue Shield Assoc. v. American Express Co. via Bashman]
  • Britons vandalize speed cameras. [NY Times]
  • Roger Pilon on California Prop 90. [LA Times via Bashman]
  • How to use a condom optimally, and save $13.5 million a year to boot. [Marginal Revolution]
  • You like me! You really, really like me! Or, if not “like,” a small fraction of you tolerate me enough to download my writings off of SSRN. [Torts Prof Blog]

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Indian-remains law: son of Kennewick Man?

Under California law, if you’re digging on your property and you find prehistoric remains, you must contact the state’s Native American Heritage Commission.

The commission then assigns a person known as the “most-likely descendant” to consult with the landowner. But there’s sometimes tenuous or no ancestral ties between the “descendant” and the uncovered bodies, scientists and American Indians said. … Praetzellis and other researchers said it is more important for American Indians to be involved in the moving of ancient remains than to force them to prove a genetic link after being left out entirely for decades.

“They just have to say, ‘Yeah, I feel culturally connected to those remains,'” said Jeff Fentress, a San Francisco State anthropologist. “It is really up to that person to determine how to handle that burial.”

Landowners often pay consulting fees to persons on the designated “descendant” lists, and some persons of American Indian descent say they would like to be on the lists but were left off because of politics. Some Indian activists are also upset that the state law does not give the “descendant” the right to block development. (Matt Krupnick, “Ancient remains causing problems”, Contra Costa Times, Oct. 18). Earlier: Jul. 16, 2005, etc.

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