We told you the Kentucky fen-phen scandal — which we’ve been covering since 2005 — was serious. Now it’s resulted in the permanent revocation of the Kentucky license to practice of famed “Master of Disaster” tort specialist Stanley Chesley, whose office is across the river in Cincinnati, Ohio. Two lawyers who directly represented fen-phen clients in Kentucky, “Shirley Cunningham Jr. and William Gallion, are serving prison sentences for bilking clients out of $94 million in settlement money.” While Chesley did not represent Cunningham’s or Gallion’s clients, and denied holding any legal responsibility toward them, he accepted a $20 million fee, far in excess of negotiated sums, for representing the lawyers themselves in the settlement that brought in the cash, a sum that “was unreasonable, especially in light of his professed ignorance and lack of responsibility for any aspect of the litigation except showing up at the mediation and going through the motions of announcing the agreement,” the Kentucky Supreme Court concluded. Chesley participated in the diversion of the pilfered funds into a trust (pleasantly named “Kentucky Fund for Healthy Living“) intended to conceal the skimming, and helped orchestrate the lawyers’ cover-up. Wrote the court: “The vast amount of evidence compiled and presented in this matter demonstrates convincingly that respondent knowingly participated in a scheme to skim millions of dollars in excess attorney’s fees from unknowing clients.” [ABA Journal; court order, PDF; Louisville Courier-Journal; Daniel Fisher, Forbes; David Lat, Above the Law]
March 22 roundup
- $10 million judgment “won’t hit Albuquerque property owners on their tax bills because it’ll come out of [city’s] self-insurance fund” Say what? [Albuquerque Journal via Ed Krayewski, Reason]
- Latest Bloomberg scheme: ban display of tobacco products [Jacob Sullum, Patrick at Popehat, Patrick Basham/Daily Caller, Ira Stoll, Elie Mystal/Above the Law]
- Female? Hispanic? Planted a backyard garden between 1981-2000, while wishing you could have gone bigger with the hobby? Feds’ ag-bias settlement may have bucks for you [James Bovard/WSJ, earlier on Pigford black-farmer settlement here, here, here, etc.]
- Newly published, includes blurb by me: Mark White, The Manipulation of Choice: Ethics and Libertarian Paternalism [Amazon]
- “NYC adopts nation’s toughest law against refusing to hire unemployed” [AP, earlier here, etc.]
- Estate of judge is suing prominent Philadelphia class action lawyer over fall at party in home [Legal Intelligencer]
- For Wisconsin’s left, Roggensack/Fallone judicial contest might be the last hope for derailing Gov. Walker’s labor reform [Rick Esenberg]
Weekend reading: Chevron-Ecuador
Striking new ruling (PDF) from Judge Lewis Kaplan denying lawyers’ request to be excused from a subpoena (courtesy David McGowan, Legal Ethics Forum). “Chevron has established at least probable cause to believe there was fraud or other criminal activity in the procurement of the Judgment and in other respects relating to the Lago Agrio litigation in which that Judgment was rendered and in certain litigations in the United States relating to the Ecuadorian litigation.” Kaplan proceeds to lay out over 70 or so pages the aromatic history of the litigation both in Ecuador and stateside.
Subtitle letdown dept.
“Sex, Drugs, Alcohol, Gambling, and Guns: The Synergistic Constitutional Effects” [David Kopel (Independence Institute/Denver U.) and Trevor Burrus (Cato), Albany Government Law Review/SSRN]
Two makes a trend: Reddit “Ask Me Anythings”
Two personalities often linked in this space, Prof. Richard Epstein and Popehat’s Ken White, were both on Reddit yesterday doing an interactive feature called “Ask Me Anything.” Epstein’s is here, and White’s is here.
More: Epstein in response to a question on originalism: “The style of interpretation used by the founders was much more sophisticated than the attention to text. Implied limitations on government, as through the police power, were part of the picture, as were implied protections of the government, as with sovereign immunity. My new book out later this year, The Classical Liberal Constitution, addresses these issues.”
In response to a question about his rule-utilitarian rationale for libertarian principles: “My view is that the deontological explanations tend to fail because they cannot account for such common practices at Intellectual Property, taxation or eminent domain. The theory has no way to deal with forced exchanges, which is what taxation and eminent domain are about.”
On libertarianism and pollution: “externality control is an essential party of the overall libertarian theory, and that means control of nuisances. … It is a case where it is easier to mischaracterize a system than to understand it. Nuisance law has many distinctive remedial features and at times requires collective enforcement of the basic norm against invasion. But there is nothing about the theory which says that the way to make people happy and prosperous is to choke them.”
Also: why the movie Body Heat got the Rule Against Perpetuities wrong, and why he’s not a fan of the German way to organize legal academia.
And Ken White answers questions about when to talk to the police; pro bono cases he’s proud of having helped on; what to say to someone who wound up going to law school in part because of his blog; how having his identity “outed” affected his law practice; and three kinds of crazy case that result in Popehat posts.
“Driverless Cars May Avoid Accidents, But Not Headlines”
Ryan Calo at Concurring Opinions asks whether, if self-driving cars turn out to reduce overall road risk markedly but also create some new kinds of accidents, the makers will be ready for the public backlash (with its inevitable legal and legislative repercussions).
Schools roundup
- More on court’s enjoining Alabama House from sending schools bill to governor [Joshua Dunn, earlier]
- Connecticut mom’s fibbing to get kid into better school district, interpreted as theft of services, contributes to 12-year sentence (also predicated on four unrelated charges of drug sale and possession) [WFSB]
- Student speech hit by one-two punch: post-Newtown hysteria, campaign against bullying [Hans Bader, more]
- Turn Pell Grants into entitlements? Has the Gates Foundation taken leave of its senses? [Neal McCluskey, Cato]
- “The Dubious Case for Regulating Day Care” [John Ross, Reason, responding to Washington Post coverage of Virginia push]
- Kansas lawmakers push back against court’s power grab on edubucks mandate [K. C. Star, earlier]
- “Call to Ditch Red Tape on Playtime Safety” [U.K. TESConnect via Free-Range Kids]
Court: reselling foreign editions here doesn’t infringe copyright
The Supreme Court ruled that the first-sale doctrine of copyright law protects the rights of someone who buys books abroad for resale here, whether or not the publisher approves. [Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons: Joe Mullin/Ars Technica, SCOTUSBlog, Margot Kaminski/Concur Op (“this is all statutory interpretation” and subject to change by Congress; conflict with existing international trade agreements), earlier here and here] More: Chris Newman.
Judge’s order: “Do not say the word ‘Bingo’ for six months”
A Covington, Ky. man escaped jail time on a disorderly conduct charge after falsely yelling “bingo” in a room of bingo players. The arresting officer compared the offense to falsely yelling “fire” in a theater. [NKY.com, David Frum, Daily Beast (“You Can’t Yell ‘Bingo’ Around a Bunch of Old People and Not Expect to Be Arrested”)]
Maryland roundup
- Legislature won’t pass dram shop liability, lawyers ask Maryland high court to do so instead [Frederick News-Post]
- In St. Mary’s County, new visitor rules for elementary schools ban hugging or giving homemade food to any but own kid [Southern Maryland News]
- Progress: Maryland Senate votes to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana [NBC Washington]
- If it’ll take $1 million for Somerset County (pop. 26,000) to cut stormwater nitrogen runoff by 145 pounds, how’s it going to manage to cut 37,000 pounds? [AP]
- “Fracking Moratorium Falls One Vote Short of Passing Key Senate Committee” [Chestertown Spy] “Bill was more about preventing fracking than studying it.” [@ToddEberly]
- Department of Truly Dreadful Ideas: Del. Ana Sol Gutierrez (D-Montgomery) continues to push bill to establish state-owned bank [Baltimore Business Journal]
- Website attacking Montgomery County’s Valerie Ervin has some union fingerprints [WaPo] Sen. Brinkley blasts union bill to make all Md. teachers pay agency fees [Maryland Reporter]
- Video interview with Hudson attorney George Ritchie on Waterkeeper v. Hudson Farm case [Center Maryland, earlier]
- Added: “Md. Senate votes to outlaw smoking in cars with young children as passengers” [WaPo just now]