… here come the cheesy lawyer solicitations. [AnnMarie McDonald, NJLRA]
Posts Tagged ‘New Jersey’
Is that a whistle in your pocket?
Or are you just glad to sue me? “A New Jersey appeals court … overturned a $3.6 million whistleblower award to a Wachovia worker who claimed he was fired for revealing corporate fraud rather than for passing around revealing photographs.” [Michael Booth, New Jersey Law Journal]
The Times covers ADA filing mills
Although you might say they’re a little late to this story, it’s still a welcome development. I discuss the piece and its background in a new Cato post (& welcome Glenn Reynolds/Instapundit readers). Hans Bader and Jacob Sullum also weigh in.
While we’re at it, here are some more links not yet blogged in this space on this busy extraction industry: Hackensack, N.J. has its own serial ADA filer [Bergen Record; letter from Marcus Rayner, NJLRA]. California small businesses continue their protests [Lodi News-Sentinel, background on George Louie; ABC L.A. (Alfredo Garcia, who’s filed hundreds of ADA suits, described as “illegal immigrant and convicted felon”; background on his attorney, Overlawyered favorite Morse Mehrban)] And in case you were wondering about the enabling role of the courts, here’s a recent Ninth Circuit decision ruling it an abuse of discretion for a trial court to have cut a lawyer’s fee award in an ADA barrier case [Bagenstos, Disability Law] Much more at our ADA filing mills tag.
Passes out drunk in snowbank, bar said to be liable
“Surveillance footage suggests that [Azcona] was heavily intoxicated, stumbling several times before he fell into a snow bank and didn’t get up.” Later a snowplow hit him. His survivors are suing the Trenton, N.J. bar that allegedly should have cut him off earlier, along with the city. [Ann Marie McDonald, New Jersey Lawsuit Reform Watch; Trenton Times]
Dharun Ravi on trial for “bias intimidation”
Assuming the Rutgers roommate/consummate jerk should be facing criminal charges in the aftermath of Tyler Clementi’s suicide — a big if — it shouldn’t be over purported “bias intimidation,” argues Jacob Sullum [Reason, more; Jersey Conservative] Earlier on the Clementi case here, here, and here. And a Boston case has prompted questions about the reach of hate-crime law: “Are Lesbian Gay-Bashers Guilty of a Hate Crime?” [Atlantic Wire]
Related: At Psychology Today, Israel (Izzy) Kalman writes a blog critical of the rise of the “anti-bullying industry” and attendant efforts to criminalize for the first time many personal interactions both verbal and behavioral.
February 29 roundup
- Jackpot justice and New Jersey pharmacies (with both a Whitney Houston and a Ted Frank angle) [Fox, PoL, our Jan. 3 post]
- New Mexico: “Trial lawyers object to spaceport limits” [Las Cruces Bulletin]
- Dodd-Frank: too big not to fail [The Economist] Robert Teitelman (The Deal) on new Stephen Bainbridge book Corporate Governance After the Financial Crisis [HuffPo] Securities suits: “trial lawyers probably won’t be able to defend a defective system forever” [WSJ Dealpolitik]
- Uh-oh: U.K. Labour opposition looks at unleashing U.S.-style class actions [Guardian] “U.K. Moves ‘No Win, No Fee’ Litigation Reforms to 2013” [Suzi Ring, Legal Week]
- More on controls on cold medicines as anti-meth measure [Radley Balko, Megan McArdle, Xeni Jardin, earlier here, here, here]
- Recognizable at a distance: “In Germany, a Limp Domestic Economy Stifled by Regulation” [NY Times]
- Fewer lawyers in Congress these days [WSJ Law Blog]
N.J.: town “official bemoans $12K in paperwork to remove tree from creek”
New Jersey: “The state Department of Environmental Protection requires permits and engineering work totaling $12,000 before the township can pull a tree out of a creek near Pittstown, Committeeman Scott Bauman told the Township Committee on Feb. 9.” The tree fell on private property and is causing a drainage problem by obstructing the creek. [Hunterdon County Democrat]
“The court that broke Jersey”
Steve Malanga on New Jersey’s perennially activist Supreme Court [City Journal]. We’ve periodically discussed the court’s lamentable jurisprudence in its Abbott (school finance redistribution) and Mount Laurel (towns given quotas to build low-income housing) decisions. The court has also nullified constitutional limitations on borrowing by the state.
Tyler Clementi suicide case
It launched a hundred “anti-bullying” initiatives at all levels of government, but much of what you think you know about it is probably wrong [Andrew Sullivan on Ian Parker, New Yorker](& Hans Bader, CEI “Open Market”]
January 5 roundup
- Big business vs. free markets again: light bulb makers “fuming” over GOP effort to restore consumer choice [Sullum] Large grocery chains like DC’s bag tax [Tim Carney]
- Eeeuw! Bystander can sue train fatality victim whose body part flew through air and hit her [Chicago Tribune]
- “Recommended Cell-Phone Ban Comes as ‘Shocking,’ ‘Heavy-Handed’ To Some” [Josh Long, V2M]
- “Exploding churros are newspaper’s fault, Chilean court rules” [AP]
- In New Jersey and North Carolina, GOP friends of trial bar block legal reform bills [Armstrong Williams, Washington Times]
- Kozinski vs. ill-prepared lawyer in case of Sheriff Arpaio vs. newspaper that covered him [The Recorder; Phoenix New Times case]
- Federal judges block cuts to in-home personal care services in California, Washington [Disability Law, San Francisco Chronicle, KQED]