Recently in Injury & Tort Law Category

You know what stinks about class-action settlements? Sometimes, the payout for the consumer is absolutely meaningless. This Hewlett-Packard settlement is a perfect example. Consumers sued because HP supposedly misled them about their cartridges' true ink levels (causing premature replacement), hid expiration dates, and engaged in a few other practices that made their wallets sad from 2001 to 2010.

Maybe they were right. Maybe not. They lost a number of pretrial motions, including one of three separate class certifications. The District Court pointed out the weakness of the evidence before accepting the settlement here, despite a handful of objectors (including the great class-action dissenter: Ted Frank).

What was the objection? As always, it was excessive attorneys' fees.

Attorneys have a responsibility to ensure that they don’t represent clients with divergent interests. Class representatives have responsibility to represent their own interests as well as the interests of the other members of the class.

Conditioning a class representative’s award on their approval of the terms of the settlement, therefore would seem to cause a bit of an issue. Will a class representative reject a settlement and risk losing a $5,000 award? What about a situation where the attorneys get $16 million, the class representatives get $5,000 each, and the members of the class get between $26 and $750?

Tarla Makaeff is an angry, angry woman. She attended a seminar presented by Trump University that focused on investing in foreclosed properties. At the seminar, they convinced her to sign up for more "education," which given the rise in tuition across the United States, was a relative bargain at its $34,995 price tag.

Except, she alleged that it wasn't a bargain, nor was it educational. When she was denied a refund, she declared war on all fronts, from Internet message boards to the Better Business Bureau, and eventually, in the court of law via a class-action deceptive business practices lawsuit.

Way back in 2007, Facebook began its march towards what many consider uber-creepiness. Their "Beacon" program connected third-party sites to Facebook and transmitted users' activities to their Facebook profile. One example were rentals from Blockbuster.com - when Jimmy rented "Sex and the City", his entire friends list would find out.

It wasn't intended to broadcast users' private information -- there was a way to prevent broadcast of such information. However, there was no opt-in. That meant a lot of accidently disclosed private info on users' profiles. Beacon was eventually discontinued.

Take a bow, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski.

What's your personal record for insulting people in a single day? Unless you are a tact-less celeb or gaffe-tastic politician, it's probably in the single digits. Judge Kozinski labeled a group of environmental activists "pirates" (using the law to back his assertion), pointed out Australia's impotence in international whaling law, and then questioned a district court judge's ability to perform his duties. In a single opinion.

That's how you run an appeals court - like a boss.

A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled in October that phone books may be obsolescent, but they're still entitled to First Amendment protection.

That decision may end up costing Seattle $500,000, according to The Seattle Times. Thursday, the paper reported that the city has reached a tentative agreement to pay the six-figure settlement after losing its fight against the phone book publishers, according to two unnamed sources.

Veterans' benefits appeals are governed by very specific statutes that confer subject matter jurisdiction upon certain courts.

If a litigant brings an appeal in a different court, he will lose his case.

A recent decision from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals about Filipino World War II veterans' benefits highlights the problems with the trying to circumvent the statutorily-dictated appellate process.

If you’ve ever seen the movie Super Troopers, the tale behind this case will sound very familiar to you. Clark County Deputy Sheriff Edward J. Bylsma ordered a burger from Burger King, drove off, and feeling suspicious, he checked the burger before chowing down. He found a nice fat wad of spit, which DNA testing linked back to a fast food worker.

The worker got 90 days in jail. The officer got emotional distress, nausea, food aversion, and sleeplessness. The restaurant, meanwhile, got a lawsuit. Apparently, spitting on a cop’s burger is a no-win situation. Who would’ve thought?

Eddie Ford was driving to work on July 17, 2007, listening to music, when he noticed a police officer rapidly approach him from behind. He changed lanes to allow the officer to pass. The officer followed. He changed lanes again. The officer followed again. No lights or sirens were visible.

When they arrived at a stoplight, Ford got out of his car and approached the officer to find out why he was following him so closely. Officer Urlacher told Ford to return to his car. After they passed through the intersection, Officer Urlacher initiated a traffic stop. Ford again got out of his car and expressed his dissatisfaction verbally, though he returned to his vehicle when ordered to do so.

A dear relative of mine is an esteemed and well-respected professor at a prestigious university that shall remain anonymous. Of course, as nearly every professor and teacher is required to do, she has to grade student papers. One of her favorites was a student who submitted a series of quotes from studies without any original analysis or commentary.

Is this the judicial equivalent?

The Ninth Circuit issued an opinion reviewing the applicability of sovereign immunity in a case alleging negligence on the Securities and Exchange Commission's part in the Madoff debacle. This is a concise version of the concise opinion.