I'm sorry I never met Bob Kraft when I lived in Texas. His blog, P.I.S.S.D., is chock full of humor, sarcasm, and critical examination of the civil justice system. In other words, he's a man after my own heart. Today, he wrote about a new article in the Dallas Morning News that points out how pro-business, anti-consumer the Texas Supreme Court is. Here's an excerpt from the article:
The incident has added fire to a decade-long debate over whether Texas' highest court favors big business in lawsuits.
The perception is bolstered by data showing that the court's rulings increasingly favor defendants in lawsuits – upward of 87 percent of the time, one study said...
"I'd say that right now Texas is on the forefront of the business-friendly legal environment," said Rogge Dunn at Clouse Dunn Khoshbin LLP in Dallas, who handles some workers' compensation cases. "If you're an insurer here or a large company getting sued, you've got the Supreme Court as your safety net."
What he leaves out is the following excerpt from the opinion:
"As a result of the exclusion of Irwin’s tests, Mahon was not allowed to testify about the results of the tests or its role in shaping his expert opinion. According to the Wrights, this allowed Ford’s attorneys to cross-examine Mahon “aggressively” concerning his lack of testing conducted by him personally supporting his theory that the reverse sensing system was capable of detecting a three-year-old child, creating the impression for the jury that his theory was without basis and easily disregarded."
That sounds fair, doesn't it? Letting Ford beat a guy up for not performing any tests, when he did in fact perform the test?
Law and More suggests that Dan Rather's lawsuit against CBS is going to be the next poster-child for tort reform. I'm doubtful for a few reasons. But first, the relevant excerpts:
On the surface, Dan Rather's lawsuit against former employer, reports Joe Hagan in December 3rd NEW YORK Magazine, "is a mundane contract dispute over whether he received the airtime he was promised in his final year on CBS." But to Rather it's a morality play of how evil attempted to destroy his good name, professionally and personally. In this drama he is convinced good will win out.
But what could win is the common sense realization that it's reckless to try to right individual wrongs with monster lawsuits. Tort reform could take a quantum and unanticipated leap.
After all, this lawsuit is big. Rather is asking $70 million. He is suing CBS, its former parent Viacom, the chairman of Viacom Sumner Redstone, CBS head Leslie Moonves, and former CBS president of news Andrew Heyward. And like everything else Rather it is filled with noise and hyperbole. Conspiracy is everywhere. Likewise for corruption.
First, why is it reckless to try and right individual wrongs with the civil justice system? The alternative is to return to feuds and private wars between individual citizens and between rival corporations. Would the world really be a better place if Dan Rather decided to take a flamethrower to CBS headquarters?
Second, most "tort reform" measures will have little or no effect on contract disputes. For example:
To begin with, contract cases are not torts.
Many contracts have "loser pays" provisions built in to them.
Punitive damages are not available in contract cases. (Absent an additional tort.)
Liquidated damages clauses often take the place of noneconomic damages.
Damage caps won't apply to economic damages.
Contract cases involve questions of law more often than questions of fact, thus there is a greater likelihood these will be resolved by summary judgment than jury trial. And contract cases don't turn into "battle of the expert witness" cases very often, either.
Is Dan Rather entitled to $70 million? I have no idea, and no overall opinion of Dan Rather. But I do know he's entitled to use the court system to settle a contractual dispute with CBS. And I also know there's nothing wrong with using the justice system to right a wrong; that's what it's for.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Rhode Island Hospital has been fined $50,000 and reprimanded by the state Department of Health after its third instance this year of a doctor performing brain surgery in the wrong side of a patient's head.
Today, I came across an interesting study about how well states are positioned to succeed in the new economy:
The 2007 State New Economy Index, released by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), is a state-by-state analysis of how state economies are transforming from an old industrial economic model based on "smokestack chasing" in which economic development success is measured by the number of big company relocations rather than in the creation and retention of high value-added, high-wage jobs.
The New Economy Index was developed by the Kauffman Foundation, which is one of the larger charitable foundations in America; it's not a "front group."
Just for fun, I thought I'd compare this study with the "study" put out by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce earlier this year. That study purports to rank the legal climate of every state. According to the Chamber, a healthy legal climate is essential to a healthy business climate. If that statement is true, the Chamber must have a flawed definition of what a healthy legal climate is.
Here are the top five states in the New Economy study compared to the Chamber's ranking:
And now, here are the Chamber's top five states compared to the New Economy ranking:
I feel absolutely no sympathy for people who defraud Medicaid. Defrauding Medicaid is a nice way of saying "robbing the taxpayers." Here's an interesting case about a man who was such a dumbass that he went to court, admitted he defrauded Medicaid, and asked the court for help:
JACKSON, Miss. (AP) - The state Court of Appeals has ruled that a Jones County man who tried to hide his mineral interest in some land from Medicaid officials has no legal right to reclaim them later.
Rickey Ellzey sued in chancery court for the return of mineral interests which he had transferred to Sherry James in an effort to conceal his assets from Medicaid....
At trial, Ellzey and James both testified that the purpose of the transfer was to conceal Ellzey's royalty income from Medicaid.
Can someone tell me why these people shouldn't lose everything they own in a civil lawsuit?
She told the Meiers that Josh Evans was created by adults, a family on their block. These adults, she told the Meiers, were the parents of Megan's former girlfriend, the one with whom she had a falling out. These were the people who'd asked the Meiers to store their foosball table.
GUIYU, China — The air smells acrid from the squat gas burners that sit outside homes, melting wires to recover copper and cooking computer motherboards to release gold. Migrant workers in filthy clothes smash picture tubes by hand to recover glass and electronic parts, releasing as much as 6.5 pounds of lead dust. ...
This ugly business is driven by pure economics. For the West, where safety rules drive up the cost of disposal, it's as much as 10 times cheaper to export the waste to developing countries. In China, poor migrants from the countryside willingly endure the health risks to earn a few yuan, exploited by profit-hungry entrepreneurs.
Law.com reports on a deal that would make the average reformer's blood boil if the recipient of the funds were Richard Scruggs, Willie Gary, or any other famous plaintiff's attorney.
Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's law firm could earn $52.2 million helping the U.S. Attorney's office in New Jersey monitor a leading maker of knee and hip replacements, according to recent public filings.
Ashcroft's firm is among five legal teams U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie hand-picked to watch the manufacturers, who agreed in September to pay $311 million and hire monitors to settle allegations they paid surgeons to use and promote their devices.
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