Lowering the Bar

Another Football-Related Trial Continuance Granted

Last season, a judge agreed to continue a trial date after counsel pointed out that the date would impair the parties' ability to watch the New Orleans Saints play for the NFC championship.  Now a judge in Baton Rouge has granted a similar motion, this time based on a college bowl game.

Specifically, the national championship game, to be played this year in the Superdome between LSU and Ohio State.  Steven Babcock, who is defending an insurance company in the lawsuit, and who has tickets to the game, moved to continue the trial's start date because of the conflict.  The motion was unopposed.

"All counsel to this matter unequivocally agree that the presence of LSU in the aforementioned contest of pigskin skill unquestionably constitutes good grounds [for the continuance]," Babcock stated in his motion.  This unequivocal agreement may have been in part because plaintiff's counsel also have tickets to the game.

"We might disagree on the merits of the case," Babcock told reporters, "but everyone was in agreement on this, for sure."

Babcock said he didn't know if the judge who granted the motion, Judge Alvin Batiste of West Baton Rouge Parish, was an LSU fan.  "[M]ost people around here are," though, he said.  Even if he isn't, it seems unlikely there are many Ohio State fans in the area.

Link: CBS News
Link: Motion to Continue (and order granting same)

Hindu Gods Ignore Court Summons

The New York Times Magazine recently included "Suing God" in its "Year in Ideas" issue, and this story confirms that the trend is international.  And not new.

Last Friday, a judge in the Indian state of Jharkhand summoned two Hindu gods, Ram and Hanuman, asking them to testify in a property dispute involving a plot of land.  There are two temples on the 1.4 acre plot, and ownership of the land is being disputed between a temple priest, Manmohan Pathak, and local inhabitants who say the land belongs to Ram and Hanuman.  Given the latter claim, the need for testimony from the deities is obvious.

But hard to get.  The judge, Sunil Kumar Singh, has previously sent two notices for the gods to appear, but both apparently were returned after the addresses were found "incomplete."  That having failed, Judge Singh decided to try service by publication.  He placed ads in local newspapers demanding that Ram and Hanuman appear and chastising them for not showing up before now.  "You failed to appear in court despite notices sent by a peon and later through registered post," Judge Singh's ad said.  "You are hereby directed to appear before the court personally."  I admit it is sometimes hard to find dependable peons, but based on the picture above you would think Hanuman at least would not be that hard to find.

An initial court ruling awarded the land to the local population, but Mr. Pathak then challenged that verdict in what was described as a "fast-track court."

That was 20 years ago.

Link: BBC NEWS

Cartoon Characters Subpoenaed

Last Friday, a court in Naples, Italy, sent trial subpoenas to Mickey Mouse, Tweety, and Donald and Daisy Duck, in what appears to have been a clerical error.

The defendant awaiting trial there is charged with counterfeiting Disney and Warner Brothers products.  Apparently, court clerks included on the witness list not only the companies' legal representatives, but also their imaginary ones: "Topolino," "Paperino," "Paperina," and "Titti" (that's apparently Tweety in Italian).  A summons went out to each of those cartoon characters care of Disney Italia.

A Disney Italia representative said none of the characters would be appearing at trial.  "Unfortunately they cannot show up, as they are residents of Disneyland," said Fiorenza Sorotto, a vice-president of the company.  Hey, smart guy -- according to this website, the Disney characters can be easily located at Disneyland Paris, which should give a court in the European Union at least transient jurisdiction over these jokers.  If they don't want to get served, they shouldn't be walking down Main Street U.S.A. in broad daylight.

Also, I'm a little suspicious of "Goofy Father Christmas," but I guess he hasn't been indicted yet.

Sorotto continued, "It certainly pleased us that the characters were considered real, because that's what we try to do."  Really?  You try to convince Italians that a six-foot duck wearing a top hat is real?  Well, then, congratulations.

A Disney lawyer said that the summons would have to be reissued, delaying the trial.  She expressed confidence that none of the characters would be prosecuted for failure to appear.

Link: CBS News

Nebraska State Senator Sues God to Protest Frivolous Lawsuit

Angry about frivolous lawsuits, in particular one recently filed against a Nebraska judge, State Senator Ernie Chambers has decided to cut to the chase and take legal action against the source of all his irritation, namely God.

Chambers says he is making a point -- that anybody can sue anybody -- to protest what he says is a frivolous lawsuit against Lancaster County District Judge Jeffre Cheuvront.  Cheuvront was in the news himself not long ago for granting a motion in limine to exclude the word "rape" from a rape trial.  (He decided using that word would be unduly prejudicial.)  The case ended in a mistrial, and the accuser in that case has sued Cheuvront, which is what Chambers is mad about.  He filed his lawsuit even though the judge hearing that case has already suggested there is no legal basis for it.

Chambers called his lawsuit "appropriate," at least in comparison to the accuser's lawsuit.  "People might call it frivolous," he said, "but if they read it they'll see there are very serious issues I have raised."

Okay.

In the complaint, Chambers accuses Defendant of making "terroristic threats" and of directly and proximately causing "fearsome floods, egregious earthquakes, horrendous hurricanes, terrifying tornadoes," and otherwise offering a lot of alliteration in the crackpot complaint pursuing his ponderous point.

Chambers asks the court to waive the personal-service requirement on the grounds that Defendant and His agents are present throughout Douglas County, but Plaintiff cannot determine which agent to properly serve. He says he has tried to serve Defendant by publication (apparently by shouting, "Come out, come out, wherever you are") to no avail.  The court is asked to take judicial notice of the fact that Defendant is omnipresent, and has actual notice of the action by virtue of being omniscient.

Plaintiff seeks a permanent injunction against Defendant.

It is unlikely that Chambers will succeed, partly because there is already a fair amount of precedent rejecting this kind of a claim.  For example, in 1971, a federal court in Pennsylvania dismissed Gerald Mayo's civil-rights action against Satan and various unnamed servants, on the grounds that there was no jurisdiction over the defendants.  United States ex rel. Mayo v. Satan and his Staff, 54 F.R.D. 282 (W.D. Pa. 1971).

I found it comical that, in the Associated Press photo posted on CBS's site, Chambers is posed in front of a fan so that he looks like he's got a halo.

That probably makes him furious.

Ironically, and very probably making him even furiouser, Chambers also looks an awful lot like Morgan Freeman, who has actually portrayed God in at least one movie (Bruce Almighty).

I assume this is just another one of the Defendant's little jokes.

Link: CBS News
Link: Chambers v. God, Case No. 1075/462 (District Court for Douglas County, Neb., complaint filed Sept. 14, 2007).

Motion to Continue GRANTED

Hail to Judge Ernest L. Jones of Orleans Parish, who swiftly granted the motion to continue the trial originally set for Monday.  (According to this article the motion was granted on Wednesday, the same day it was filed.)  This gives the parties, attorneys and those stuck with jury duty the ability to watch the New Orleans Saints fight on Sunday to go to the Super Bowl for the first time ever, and to do it without worrying about next-day consequences.

A "Court insider who asked not to be identified" was said to be gleeful when told of the order.  "The world is safe for Saints football!" he or she reportedly exclaimed.  That might be stretching it a bit, since we still have to find out whether Chicago is safe for Saints football, but the feeling is understandable.

Link: NOLA.com (Times-Picayune)

Motion to Continue Trial on the Grounds that the Saints Are in the Playoffs

A while ago I reported on a motion filed in an Arkansas case seeking a continuance on the ground that trial was set during deer season and so most of the jury pool would be out in the wilderness.  In the interest of keeping you up-to-date on other possible grounds for continuance, and of assisting other Saints fans in the legal community, here's a motion for you.

Defendants in Danos v. Avondale Industries, which is pending in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, moved yesterday to continue trial from its current starting date of Monday, January 22, 2007, to Wednesday, January 24, on grounds of exigent football-related circumstances:

As this Court knows, it was determined just last weekend that the New Orleans Saints will play in the National Football Conference Championship game -- the first such game [as the court very likely also knows] in the franchise's forty-year history -- against the Chicago Bears in Chicago, Illinois on January 21, 2007 at 2:30 p.m.  In order to accommodate all fans, including the great majority of the jury pool, the parties involved in this case, and [last but not least] the counsel involved in this case, and in order to ensure that a full jury pool appears on the first day of trial, Defendants request that the beginning of trial be pushed back two days to January 24, 2007.

Plaintiffs' counsel (also a Louisiana firm) apparently had not responded to multiple attempts to secure agreement to the continuance as of yesterday.

The motion does slightly downplay the fact that the game is on Sunday and trial is set to begin on Monday, it being unnecessary to make the point that nobody in Louisiana, let alone the jury pool in Orleans Parish, is likely to show up bright and early Monday morning to start a jury trial on the day after the Saints play for the right to go to the Super Bowl, win or lose.  Also downplayed was the fact that one of the defense firms is based in New York and the other in Florida, but of course that doesn't mean they aren't Saints fans, because aren't we all Saints fans to some extent as a result of this miracle season that means so much to a hurricane-ravaged community struggling to find some bright spark of hope to help light its way to recovery?  (Guys, feel free to use that if you need to.)  Yes, we are, as long as we don't live in Chicago.

But whether you are pulling for the Saints to win or not, personally I think we should all pull for this motion to be granted, and hopefully without opposition, if you're reading this, Roussel & Roussel firm of LaPlace, Louisiana, plaintiffs' attorney of record.  Jury trials happen all the time, but (so far) the conjunction of Saints and playoffs only happens once every forty years.

Link:  Motion to Continue

Deposition Confirms Suspicions of Drug Use

John Freeman sued for $3 million after he fell off a roof at a job site and broke his left arm.  Defense attorneys were eager to take Freeman's deposition partly because they had learned he had a history of drug use and suspected Freeman had been on drugs at the time of the fall.  They did not, however, get any admissions from him on this topic at his deposition last December.

That was largely because Freeman showed up for the depo completely stoned.

Defense attorneys demanded and got a conference call with Judge Vincent LeBlon (Middlesex County, N.J.), and told the judge that Freeman was slurring his words, "his pupils sometimes rolled backward" and his answers were contradictory.  Ironically, although that wouldn't disqualify him from being President it did hurt his case substantially.  The judge stopped the deposition and ordered Freeman to go to a hospital for an drug test, but he apparently never complied.

He did show up in court again in January, although he had to appear for some hearings in an orange jumpsuit due to having been arrested (on drug charges) earlier that month.  You would think that attire is not likely to make a good impression, but those hearings seem to have gone okay, which is making me wonder why I have to worry about wearing suits to court.  I think ties are irritating and on top of that it is very hard to find matching outfits for my helper monkey.

Anyway, on March 10, the judge sanctioned Freeman and ordered him to pay about nine thousand dollars in fees for the six defense attorneys who had attended the depo (a depo that presumably did not take very long, of course).  The case was dismissed with prejudice last week after Freeman failed to pay.

Link: Yahoo! News

Indiana Judge Detains Five Suspected Ringing-Cell-Phone Culprits

A judge in Lake County, Indiana, held three people in contempt of court on Wednesday after someone's cell phone rang during the morning court call.  It was apparently the third ringing incident that morning, and Judge Boswell was able to determine that the ring had come from a particular row of spectators, but not to identify the actual ringor.  When she asked them whose phone it was, they all refused to say.

That show of solidarity got them all prime seats for the rest of the morning court call, in the chairs normally reserved for inmates who have been brought to court.  They had to sit there for more than an hour until the court call ended, and then were questioned by the judge about the ringing.  Since three of the five were found in contempt, I assume Judge Boswell went down the line until somebody finally cracked and the judge learned who the culprit was.

One of the three admitted her phone was one of those that rang, but that she had not volunteered that information.  The judge fined her $100.  That was in lieu of the 40 hours of community service assigned to the other two, one of whom actually said he had two phones, one of which the judge had heard powering down.  The last of the three got community service because she admitted she knew whose phone it was, but said nothing.  (I conclude from this that community service equates to $2.50 an hour.)

"The next time you come to court," Judge Boswell told them, "don't bring your cell phone.  And when the court asks a question, answer the question."  Good rules of thumb to remember.

Link: AP via My Way News

David Letterman Fights TRO Granted to Crazy Lady

Here's how easy it is to get a temporary restraining order -- a woman in Santa Fe has been granted a TRO against David Letterman apparently based on claims that Letterman has caused her mental cruelty and sleep deprivation for the past ten years through the use of code words, gestures and eye expressions to convey messages to her.

If I ever need a TRO and can't get one, please kill me.

The woman, Colleen Nestler, claimed in her TRO application that she started sending Letterman "thoughts of love" in 1993, and that he responded, in code, asking her to come to New York and be his wife and co-host. The code for his marriage proposal was allegedly Letterman's on-air statement, "Marry me, Oprah."

Nestler says that "Oprah" was the first of many code names Letterman used to refer to her.

If Nestler's request was granted in full, and it appears that it was, the order requires Letterman to stay at least three yards away from Nestler at all times (although he is in New York and she is in Santa Fe anyway), to not think about Nestler, and to release her from his "mental harassment and hammering."

Letterman's attorneys contend that the order is without merit and have asked that it be quashed. Their motion points out that the New Mexico court has no jurisdiction over Letterman, that Nestler never served him with papers as required, and likely at some point uses a legalism for the term "nutbag."

A hearing on whether the TRO will become permanent is set for January 12.

AP via Yahoo.com
Thanks to Rob Bogen for spotting this.