Chronicling the high cost of our legal system
Chronicling the high cost of our legal systemI’ve got an opinion piece up at Forbes.com on today’s Supreme Court decision in Ricci v. DiStefano, the New Haven firefighter reverse-discrimination case. The title: “Sued If You Do, Sued If You Don’t: Through the Looking Glass on Affirmative Action“. { 1 comment } Speaking of renowned Chicago law professors with reputations that cut across ideological lines: “Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) has blocked President Obama’s candidate for regulation czar, Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, because Sunstein has argued that animals should have the right to sue humans in court.” [The Hill; mostly favorable coverage of Sunstein's nomination and views at my other site, Point of Law]. { 2 comments } Heads are still shaking over what would appear to be a non-satirical proposal from Judge Richard Posner: …Expanding copyright law to bar online access to copyrighted materials without the copyright holder’s consent, or to bar linking to or paraphrasing copyrighted materials without the copyright holder’s consent, might be necessary to keep free riding on content financed by online newspapers from so impairing the incentive to create costly news-gathering operations that news services like Reuters and the Associated Press would become the only professional, nongovernmental sources of news and opinion. More: Jeff Jarvis notices other dubious ideas on enforceable “exclusivity” floating about. { 0 comments } An elderly club that had been meeting for four years every Tuesday at the Eye Library in Eye, Cambridgeshire, were told that they could no longer have hot tea or coffee at their meetings, lest it be accidentally spilled on a toddler. They’ve retreated to holding meetings in members’ homes. [Telegraph] Hat tip to F.R. { 4 comments } Last week the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the parents of an Oregon student diagnosed with ADHD and other problems could send him to an expensive private school and bill the government for the cost, even if he had not previously been enrolled in a public school special education program. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders discusses the case and quotes me on a couple of points: Walter Olson of overlawyered.com nailed the problem with the majority ruling when he opined in an e-mail, “The impulse to get a better shake for one’s kid is universal, but it’s disproportionately wealthy and clever parents, with their hired lawyers and experts, who succeed in using these rules to obtain a private school education at public expense. In this case, the question was whether parents should at least try the public schools’ proffer of special-ed services before declaring them inadequate, which doesn’t seem to me to be too much to ask.” … Noting that Souter’s dissent was joined by conservative Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, Olson noted, “I’m still trying to figure out why being progressive on this issue means siding with the private schools and affluent parents, while the conservative justices are the ones to defend the public school ideal of universal service.” Saunders also quotes my distinguished Manhattan Institute colleague Jay Greene, who takes a different view. It’s worth noting, by the way, that parents of non-disabled students continue to have no right at all to obtain reimbursement for private alternatives should they decide the public schools are failing their kids. More: Tamar Lewin, New York Times; Zach Lowe, American Lawyer. And: Scott Greenfield also takes a different view, and Jay Greene explains his reasoning further in comments. { 11 comments } The practice seems to have been taken to an extreme in Congress with the pending “cap and trade” bill. [David Freddoso, D.C. Examiner] { 4 comments }
{ 0 comments } Yes, I have much to answer for. Like him I’ve forgotten the exact words of our ten-year-old conversation, but his paraphrase sounds right. { 0 comments } Before asking a federal judge to grant preliminary approval for a class action settlement with Ameritrade over alleged privacy breaches, make sure that your “client,” the class representative, isn’t going to tell the court he opposes the settlement. In re TD Ameritrade Account Holder Litigation, Case No. C 07-2852 VRW (N.D. Cal.) ($1.87M for the attorneys, coupons for the class.). { 0 comments } Oz taxpayers spent more than $A1 million securing the conviction of murder defendant/jailhouse lawyer Hugo Rich, who employed many colorful and wearying tactics in his defense on charges of murdering a security guard during a holdup. [Melbourne Herald-Sun] { 0 comments } The news is on the Bloomberg wire. Beck & Herrmann have this to say: “Despite the absence of scientific evidence, juries have repeatedly awarded millions of dollars to folks who developed IBD [inflammatory bowel disease] after taking Accutane. … If you ever need another example of the cost of litigation driving a beneficial drug off the market, add Accutane to your list.” From the Bloomberg account it appears, however, that generic versions of the powerful anti-acne medication will continue to be available — for now, at least. More: New Jersey Lawsuit Reform Alliance (”If you are reading this and currently taking Accutane, trial lawyers owe you an apology. You just lost your drug.”); a curious 2002 Accutane lawsuit. { 10 comments } Influence-peddling at the University of Illinois with state politicians including now-disgraced Gov. Blagojevich, per a Chicago Tribune investigation: What does it cost to get an unqualified student into the University of Illinois law school? Five jobs for graduating law students, suggest internal e-mails released Thursday. The only surprising thing about this stuff is that none of these bigwigs (including a law school dean — apparently she never learned to think like a lawyer) can ever seem to remember that government emails are subject to FOIA requests. Also in Illinois, a furor has broken out over DePaul’s firing of its law dean, Glen Weissenberger (per Paul Caron) “for reporting truthful information to the ABA in connection with its reaccreditation site visit”. John Steele, Legal Ethics Forum:
More: Above the Law (with emails from U. of I.); Prof. Bainbridge (recalling his days on U of I Law’s admissions committee); and see comments below on this post for views of the DePaul episode differing from those linked above. { 4 comments } American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression: There is a disturbing new trend in censorship legislation. Bills have been introduced in Utah and Louisiana this year that give private citizens the right to sue booksellers and other retailers for committing an “unfair” trade practice by selling “offensive” material to a minor. The defendants in these lawsuits would have to hire a lawyer to defend them and could be forced to pay thousands of dollars if they lost. Earlier, the governor of Utah vetoed a similar measure aimed at video and game retailers. { 0 comments } “Nikki Foote of Henderson [Nevada] was sued over comments she allegedly posted charging that the Gucci handbag she purchased for $495 was a fake.” [Las Vegas Sun] { 2 comments } Springfield, Mass.: The parents’ suit charges that the chain wrongfully sent Corey Lind out to deliver pizza to dangerous and unknown addresses; he was ambushed and murdered in 2007. Noteworthy angle: According to the suit, prior to 2000 Domino’s had a policy of not making or of limiting deliveries to certain areas. As a result of discrimination claims against the company, the federal Department of Justice investigated the policy. The result was an agreement between the government and Domino’s establishing procedures Domino’s could use to limit or stop deliveries to certain areas based on safety. The suit said that Domino’s required all stores to implement a Limited Delivery Service Policy which, among other things, would evaluate each store’s delivery and service area and provide for the safety of delivery workers. { 15 comments } More from notorious patent venue E.D. Tex.: litigants and lawyers are reaching out to buy sponsorships and other sources of presumed goodwill with the heavily rural jury pool, thus resulting in “Samsung Stagecoach Days” and the purchase of prize cows by faraway patent holders. [Elinson/The Recorder, Frankel/AmLaw] { 0 comments } The headline at Business Insider puts it more rudely than that. Business Week notes that “The singer faced a near-constant drumbeat of legal troubles in life. He’ll likely cue up plenty of them in death as well.” More: WSJ Law Blog; Eric Turkewitz with an early analysis of the medical and pharmacist liability possibilities. { 2 comments } It is lawful for the 19- and 20-year-old exotic dancers to strip for customers, but a new Atlanta ordinance forbids persons their age to set foot in places selling alcoholic beverages, so they cannot legally enter their workplace, the Cheetah Lounge. [AP/WBBM] { 2 comments }
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Nearly all the outcry about the Consumer Product Safety
Improvement Act of 2008 has focused on its absurd and impracticable rules for products
intended for kids twelve and under, such as 
