Update: Bonds ball

“The fan who originally gloved and then fought to keep Barry Bonds’ 73rd home run baseball may still owe his former attorney more than what the ball fetched at auction, a California appeal court ruled May 24.” Attorney Martin Triano says Alex Popov owes him $473,530; lawyers for Patrick Hayashi, the other disputant in the squabble, agreed to roll back their fees so that he would not come out behind on the episode. (Warren Lutz, “Bonds’ Ball Litigant Strikes Out in Fee Fight”, The Recorder, May 31). See Jul. 1 and Jul. 12, 2003 and Jan. 3, 2004. And independent filmmaker Michael Wranovics has made a documentary about the whole episode entitled “Up For Grabs” which won the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the Los Angeles Film Festival and has been getting good critical reviews (Clint O’Connor, “A record-breaking hit brings out the base instincts in sports fans”, Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 27; Glenn Whipp, “Big hit, comedy of errors”, Long Beach Press-Telegram, May 12; “Film Listings: Ongoing”, San Francisco Bay Guardian, May 4-May 10; Neil Davis, “You gotta catch ‘Up For Grabs'”, Stanford Daily, May 9).

Not such a great place for free speech either

“Welcome to New Jersey. A horrible place to do business,” reads the billboard message [erected by William Juliano, a discontented Mount Laurel, N.J. businessman]…

So far, the state has done nothing about the billboard, and it’s unclear whether it could. “At some point, we’ll have to consider action against him,” [Environmental Protection chief Bradley] Campbell said, implying a potential legal fight.

(Geoff Mulvihill, “A sign of the times: New Jersey ‘horrible'”, AP/Akron Beacon Journal, Jun. 2). More: Ron Coleman also noticed this one (Jun. 2).

State AGs versus smokers’ pocketbooks

AP takes a look at the relentless, money-driven efforts of state law enforcement officials and tobacco majors in league together to suppress competition from upstart cigarette-sellers, a story covered often on these columns (see Feb. 15, 2005; Feb. 28 and May 11, 2004, etc.) “‘It’s 46 state attorneys general, the 200 or so wealthiest trial lawyers in the world and the six largest tobacco companies against a bunch of very small businesses who are losing money,’ said Jeremy Bulow, an economics professor at Stanford University.” (Stephanie Stoughton, “Landmark tobacco settlement faces increasing challenges”, AP/Maryville (Tenn.) Daily Times, May 31).

Latest undignified lawsuits

More wince-making fact patterns in (for all we know perfectly meritorious) litigation: the exploding porta-potty that badly injured a hapless worker at a West Virginia coal mine, allegedly ignited by leaking methane gas (Natalie Neysa Alund, “Porta-John blast victim sues for $10 million”, Morgantown Dominion Post, Jun. 2); the instance of alleged police brutality inflicted on a Western Pennsylvania woman nabbed on suspicion of prostitution and thrown into a cop car with such force that one of her breast implants burst (according to her lawyer, Harry J. Smail Jr., who has figured in these columns before)(Matthew Junker, “Arnold police slapped with federal civil rights lawsuit”, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, May 26). More in the genre: see, for example, Jan. 7-8, 2002.

Aguilar v. Avis and Janice Rogers Brown

Following up on Monday’s post about the controversy over nominee Janice Brown’s dissent from Aguilar, a California Supreme Court decision which extended the reach of harassment law at the expense of free speech: James Taranto notes (May 31) that at the time the court handed down its decision in Aguilar, the San Francisco Chronicle described it as a “blockbuster” that “stunned constitutional experts”. He wonders: “How can dissent from a decision that ‘stunned constitutional experts’ turn in a few years into a view that’s totally ‘out of the mainstream’ [the New York Times’ words]?” And Eugene Volokh (Jun. 1, crediting Hans Bader) points out that while the AFL-CIO now blasts Brown for her “troubling and extreme” refusal to go along with the Aguilar majority, “the National Writers Union — a member union of the AFL-CIO — proudly filed an amicus brief urging the same result that Justice Brown endorsed.”

Grunow gun suit

Another big defeat for the gun-control-through-litigation movement: a Florida appeals court has upheld a trial court’s decision to throw out a $1.2 million jury award against gun wholesaler Valor Corp. over the murder of Lake Worth English teacher Barry Grunow, murdered by a student who had stolen a Raven-brand handgun distributed by Valor from his grandfather. See Dec. 13-15, 2002 and Feb. 4-5, 2003. (Sara Olkon, “Judges: Gun distributor not to blame in death of Lake Worth teacher”, Miami Herald, Jun. 1). More from Dave Kopel (Jun. 2) (Corrected Jun. 2 to fix erroneous description of relationship between gunmaker and wholesaler).