Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Long sentences for liquor-serving mom and dad

Draconian character of philanthropic legislation, cont’d:

The Virginia Court of Appeals upheld yesterday the convictions of an Albemarle County couple sentenced to 27 months in jail for providing alcohol at their son’s 16th birthday in August 2002.

George and Elisa Robinson were sentenced originally in Albemarle Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court to eight years in prison but received the lesser terms after they appealed to Circuit Court….

The Robinsons have acknowledged a mistake in judgment but said they decided to provide alcohol in a safe environment to make sure that no one at the party would be driving under the influence of alcohol.

Cops had entered the couple’s property without a warrant; according to the Richmond paper, no sentence as high as 90 days had previously been handed down locally for a similar offense. (Alan Cooper, “Court upholds couple’s sentence”, Richmond Times-Dispatch, May 18). Radley Balko has more (May 27).

Filed under: ,

Rip tide warnings might pose legal danger

Putting up signs warning visitors of the dangerous rip currents off New Jersey’s Long Beach might seem like an obvious step. “However, Long Beach Township Attorney Richard Shackleton said there are liability issues to consider. According to the law, the town does not have to warn people about natural conditions, and if Long Beach put up a sign and a jury found its warnings to be inadequate, the town could possibly be found liable for a drowning or injury. Having no signs, he said, reduces the risk of being sued.” (Brian Prince, “Warning: Rip tide alerts not islandwide”, Asbury Park (N.J.) Press, Jun. 15). See Jun. 30, 2004 (similar).

Filed under:

New bloggers at Point of Law

Atlanta attorney Jonathan B. Wilson, author of the newly released book Out of Balance: Prescriptions for Reforming America’s Litigation System, has now begun blogging at our sister site Point of Law and also has his own weblog site which is eminently worth checking out. And next week two guest bloggers — both already well established on their own blogs — are scheduled to begin guestblogging stints there as well. Check it out!

Filed under: ,

“Court Lets Law Graduate Sue GMU Over F”

Overruling a trial judge, the Fourth Circuit has ruled that Carin Constantine can sue the George Mason University Law School in northern Virginia as well as professor Nelson Lund (whose work we’ve cited favorably in the past) over alleged failure to accommodate her disability, in this case severe migraine headaches which led to attendance problems and to an “F” on an exam. Her suit also charges that the university retaliated against her for voicing complaints, chilling her exercise of First Amendment rights. (Jerry Markon, Washington Post, Jun. 15).

Filed under: ,

S.F. softball fields

They’re in pretty sorry shape, but the city government isn’t wild about the idea of letting volunteers spiff them up. “Topping the list are liability concerns — what happens if someone throws out their back patching the gopher holes in the outfield and decides to sue the city?” On top of that, there’s the reluctance to pick a fight with unionized city workers who might feel entitled to be paid for the same work. (Rachel Gordon, “Teams offer help on parks”, San Francisco Chronicle, Apr. 29)(via Common Good Society Watch).

Filed under:

Texas lawmakers modify zero tolerance

Good news for a change: a bill awaiting the signature of Texas Gov. Rick Perry would restore some discretion to school boards, reducing the chances that students will be expelled over inadvertent violations of zero tolerance rules. In particular, according to a newspaper report quoted at Zero Intelligence (Jun. 6),

If the bill becomes law, students still could face severe sanctions for serious offenses, such as bringing a weapon onto a campus or a school-sponsored activity off campus. But if the bill passes, administrators would be able to consider the student’s intent or lack of intent, disciplinary history, a disability that substantially impairs the student’s capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of the conduct and whether the action was done in self-defense.

Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers took active roles in support of the bill. (Helen Eriksen, “Discipline bill on Perry’s desk”, Houston Chronicle, Jun. 4).

Filed under: , , ,

Payne Stewart air crash verdict

After golfer Payne Stewart and several others were killed in a 1999 plane crash, Stewart’s survivors sued a list of defendants starting with the aircraft’s owner and its operator; perhaps the deepest pocket sued was that of Canadian-owned Learjet, which stood its ground, took the case to trial and was entirely vindicated by a jury last week. (“Jurors clear Learjet in Payne Stewart crash”, AP/FoxSports, Jun. 10; “Payne Stewart family sue over air crash”, GolfToday (U.K.), undated 2000). DropZone has a comment thread which includes a discussion of the practice of suing multiple defendants after air crashes (and then working up theories against them individually as needed) and also includes some jaded comment about Instance #785,423 of It Not Being About The Money:

Tracey Stewart, her teenage son and college-aged daughter and Fraley’s widow, Dixie Fraley Keller, said through a statement that “their hope in this effort was to make air travel safer …”

“They brought this litigation not because of money in any capacity; it was always about responsibility,” said attorney Gregory McNeill.

The suit had demanded $200 million.

Filed under: , ,

Sen. Grassley and the hospital litigators

It’s not exactly a secret around Washington that Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Ia.) has been a good friend to the corps of plaintiff’s lawyers who employ the False Claims Act (the so-called “whistleblower” law) to sue universities, defense firms and other federal contractors. But is he also doing favors for the team of lawyers headed by Dickie Scruggs suing many of the nation’s nonprofit hospitals over alleged failure to meet charitable obligations? The American Spectator’s anonymous “The Prowler” assembles some of the evidence (“Grassley, Lott & Scruggs”, Jun. 14).

Filed under: , , ,

Proximate cause, void in N.J.?

David Bernstein and commenters (Jun. 10) discuss a 1999 case (Canesi v. Wilson) in which the New Jersey Supreme Court held that a woman could sue over the “wrongful birth” of a baby with birth defects because the doctor didn’t warn her that a drug he prescribed during the pregnancy was suspected of causing such defects, even though she was unable to offer any expert testimony indicating that the drug had actually caused the defects (and scientific evidence was accumulating that it had not in fact done so).

Filed under: , ,