“Timothy Dahl, 35, is suing Yoo-Hoo’s parent company, the Dr Pepper Snapple Group, in federal court because he claims the product’s ‘good for you’ ad slogan is simply not truthful.” The suit is an intended class action. [Gothamist, New York Post, Legal Blog Watch] We’ve covered the many “froot” class action suits alleging that CrunchBerries, Froot Loops, etc. are not particularly healthy things to eat; at least one suit has similarly assailed Cocoa Puffs.
Whoops, there goes another Spitzer prosecution
“A New York state judge has thrown out the convictions of two former Marsh Inc. executives previously found guilty of bid-rigging charges. …The motion was based on ‘multiple forms of exculpatory evidence’ that prosecutors failed to produce during the trial of Messrs. Gilman and McNenney, but did disclose it in a later trial against three other Marsh executives, all of whom were acquitted, according to documents.” Smurfing expert and longer-sentences-for-johns advocate Eliot Spitzer is now attempting to reengineer a return to public life via a CNN talk show gig [David Zurawik, Baltimore Sun] [Business Insurance]
Oz: “Letter bomber Colin Dunstan wins compensation”
Australia: “A man who held the nation to ransom with a letter-bomb campaign has won compensation linked to the failed workplace love affair that sparked the terror reign.” [Herald-Sun] In other Antipodean workplace news, a man currently jailed on child porn charges has won an unfair dismissal case against his former employer, food company Nestle, notwithstanding “allegations that he had routinely harassed women in the workplace, and even attempted sabotage” by placing a sexual drawing into a box of the company’s products. [Herald-Sun]
Extraterritorial application of securities law
Someone must think there’s a big emergency, because Capitol Hill lawmakers are moving remarkably quickly on a partial overturn of the Supreme Court’s new 8-0 Morrison ruling, which was handed down less than two weeks ago. [Julian Ku, Opinio Juris] (& welcome Daniel Fisher, Forbes readers).
Preferring one judge’s courtroom to another
Ken at Popehat cops to an unworthy (but realistic-sounding) reason.
The joys of CPSIA testing
And testing and testing and testing: “This item has been tested I don’t know how many times. Many times in many forms. Every test was a pass. This latest $4,000 test told us NOTHING we didn’t already know.” [Rick Woldenberg] Plus: “It’s raining paper… again,” and who is CPSC going to get to test the test testing testers?
And then went back to “access to justice” chatter
Lawyers in a class action seek a high appeal bond to insulate their fee award. [CCAF]
July 6 roundup
- “Kagan refused to identify anything the government couldn’t do under its Commerce Clause power” and “consciously left herself plenty of breathing room to cite foreign law inappropriately” [Ilya Shapiro, more]
- Multiple civil/criminal hats? “The odd responses of the attorney general to the oil spill” [WaPo editorial]
- Phillies Phanatic, “‘Most-Sued Mascot in the Majors’ Is Back in Court” [Lowering the Bar, which also hosts Blawg Review #271 this week]
- Federalist Society has a new blog;
- California will pay $20 million to woman abducted for nearly two decades [AP]
- Charges dropped against teen who tried to help lost kid in shopping mall [Lenore Skenazy, earlier]
- Two libertarians arrested after videotaping police in Greenfield, Mass. [Balko, earlier here and here]
- “‘Ambulance Chaser’ Lawsuits Hound Apple Over iPhone 4” [Atlantic Wire]
Lab sues Stephen Barrett (QuackWatch)
At his highly interesting QuackWatch site, where he is scathingly critical of many alternative therapies, Stephen Barrett has expressed the view that some tests frequently prescribed by “chelation” practitioners (who address a variety of ills through techniques designed to remove heavy metals from the body) are inaccurate and misleading. Now a laboratory of which Barrett has been critical has sued him and several related entities, demanding $10 million [QuackWatch, Respectful Insolence]
Because liability reform would be too hard
“Let’s just charge more for auto insurance and homeowners insurance to keep the only two malpractice insurers in New York from going bankrupt.” [White Coat; Greg Davis, Crain’s New York Business]