Lowering the Bar

New Orleans Docket: Wasp-Related Negligence

John B____ v. Vasamth Bethala, Manager; LQ12 LLC dba LaQuinta Inn & Suites; James River Ins. Co., No. 2011-12066 F (22d Dist. Jud. Ct. La., filed Apr. 7, 2011).

Negligence action. While the plaintiff was staying on the third floor of the defendants' hotel, a wasp flew into his room. While the plaintiff was attempting to kill the wasp, he fell out of the window.

As the submitter accurately notes, this would be "the second in the category of 'Guests at Louisiana Hotels Who Manage to Seriously Injure Themselves While Battling Insects.'" (This was the first.) Or, at least, now that we have at least two examples of that, it's eligible for its own category.

A Tort Causation Puzzler for You

Here's a report of a case filed in New Orleans last month:

Baptiste v. Wyndham Vacation Resorts Inc.; Avenue Plaza Hotel, No. 2011-01688 H (New Orleans 2/17/2011).

Lawsuit for personal injury and negligence. While staying at the defendants' hotel, the plaintiff awoke to a giant roach biting his hand. In an effort to get the roach off, he hit his hand against the adjacent nightstand, sustaining serious injury.

These few tantalizing facts suggest a number of interesting legal issues. For example:

• Has Plaintiff stated a claim against the hotel?
• Is his reaction to the giant roach a superseding cause that relieves Defendants of liability?
• Is the hotel liable for placing the nightstand within arm's reach of the bed?
• Was it foreseeable that a guest might whack the nightstand due to being accosted by a giant roach?
• Is the nightstand manufacturer responsible for not designing a safer product that would break apart on impact, preventing serious injury?
• Should the nightstand have been equipped with an airbag?
• If the giant roach was Gregor Samsa, can he cross-claim against Plaintiff, the hotel, or the nightstand manufacturer?

Please limit your answer to no more than one blue book in length, although you may use both sides of the page. If you see a giant roach trying to copy your answer, please notify your professor.

Man Claims Emotional Distress Due to Bird Insults

The AFP reports that a Taiwanese man has sued his neighbors claiming that they trained their mynah bird to swear at him and that the bird's relentless taunting caused him serious emotional distress.

Few details were available, but it appeared that Wang Han-chin had previously complained to police that his neighbors were too loud, and he alleged that in revenge they had trained their bird to call him a "clueless big-mouthed idiot" when he left for work in the morning. Wang claimed that the bird's insults caused him serious distress, and had affected his concentration at work to the point that he had somehow burned himself. Prosecutors apparently declined to charge the neighbors with anything "due to insufficient evidence linking the bird to his injuries," and that seems to have led to a civil lawsuit.

In a similar case in 2006, which also shows that my database of "similar cases" is getting pretty comprehensive, a 78-year-old Pennsylvania woman charged one of her neighbors with repeatedly meowing at her in retaliation for complaining to police about their cat's infiltration of her flower garden. Alexandra Carasia also claimed the conduct had caused her emotional harm, and even used the word "torture" to describe her experience, completing the final degradation of that word from something that once meant "heinous war crime" into a term that can also encompass repeated meowing.

That case was also similar in that the charges were quickly dismissed.

Plaintiff Claims Potential Landlord Tracked Her in Motorcade

From the San Francisco docket:

Jacqueline J_____ v. Milena Talian; Bobby Bogan; Mission Bay Housing Ptnrs LP; Fillmore
Marketplace LP; Related Mgt. Co. LP, No. CGC-10-505164 (San Francisco Super. Ct. filed Nov. 8, 2010)

Civil rights lawsuit. The plaintiff was tracked, followed and stalked by daily foot patrols with dogs and by a motorcade including trucks and motorcycles after she applied to rent an apartment.  In Pro Per.

I had to fill out a pretty long rental application a while back, but it looks like these tenant-background checks have really gotten out of control.

From the Docket: Satan's Employees, Dangerous Doors

These are third-party summaries of a couple of cases filed recently in San Francisco Superior Court.

This first one seems to involve a party admission of the kind you just don't get that often:

Rabbi ______ v. Mark Hopkins Intercontinental Hotel, No. CGC-10-503909 (San Francisco Super. Ct. filed Sept. 22, 2010)

Complaint for civil rights, negligence and intentional tort. The defendant's manager and doorman both refused to discipline a paying guest who became mad and shoved the plaintiff when the plaintiff told the man that the man's wife had carelessly discarded of a lit cigarette. However, the defendant's security guard agreed with the plaintiff that not disciplining the man just because he was a paying guest means the defendant's employees had "sold their souls to Satan."

A damning admission -- literally -- but don't bother to try bringing Satan in as a deep pocket.

And then this one appears to be a cautionary tale about the hidden dangers of shopping:

Rosamaria Romo ______ v. Neiman Marcus Holdings Inc. dba Neiman Marcus, No. CGC-10-502441 (San Francisco Super. Ct. filed Aug. 10, 2010).

Premises liability lawsuit. The plaintiff walked directly into the defendant's revolving glass door, fell backward and was injured as the door continued to revolve.

I assume discovery will be required in order to nail down just what Neiman Marcus did wrong there. Maybe a clearly posted warning, or instructions, should have been provided? Time will tell.

From the Docket: Alleged Failure to Supervise Knife Use

Aprille Mammone v. Vector Marketing Corporation; Jordan Anderson, No. CV 1003399 (Marin County Super. Ct. filed June 29, 2010).

Complaint for negligence. The defendants were engaged in a sales presentation of kitchen and sporting knives when they negligently allowed the plaintiff to handle a knife without proper supervision; the plaintiff was injured when the knife slid out of its case.

Actually, I guess it's a good thing the plaintiff found out knives are sharp before she got them home, where I assume she was planning to use them without any supervision at all.  What a bloodbath that could have been.

From the Docket: Attack of the Bulb

Eric Wright v. Alliance Residential LLC, Case No. RG10-519746 (filed June 10, 2010).

Premises liability action where the plaintiff was hit in the head by a light bulb in his kitchen at The Courtyards apartments in Emeryville [California]. The plaintiff was so stunned by the bulb that he fell down and sustained a concussion.

You know, I've been warning people for years about dangerous light bulbs that may leap out of their sockets and attack homeowners without warning.  Maybe now people will listen.

On the other hand, this is apparently a premises-liability action, so maybe the plaintiff is alleging negligent light-fixture placement, although it is hard to see how you could be unaware of the placement of any light bulb in your own kitchen.  I think there are only two possibilities here, depending on the on/off status of said light bulb: (1) the light was off, and the room was dark, which might explain why plaintiff ran into the bulb but also suggests it was his fault; or (2) the light was on, in which case plaintiff is claiming that he walked directly into a brightly illuminated object.  (As the tiny psychic said in Poltergeist, don't go into the light.)  It would be difficult for plaintiff to prevail in either of those situations, which may be why the lawsuit appears to blame the bulb itself.

Whether the building owner is responsible for the bulb's actions I think depends on whether the bulb was acting as an employee or an independent contractor, but since I am not an employment lawyer I will leave that question to others.

San Francisco Docket

From today's report of newly filed cases:

Eric Miller v. The Army Review Boards Agency, No. CGC-10-499631 (San Francisco Super. Ct. May 7, 2010)

Contract action. The plaintiff was fired the wrong way and he suffered turf toe, a sports related injury. $26,000. (In Pro Per)

We always advise our clients to fire people the right way so they don't open themselves up to possible turf-toe claims.  You can't be too careful.

Illinois Plaintiffs' Attorney Manages to Sue Himself in Complicated Scheme

It's very complicated, but I think it shakes out like this.

Emert Wyss, an attorney in Alton, Illinois, represented Carmelita McLaughlin when she bought a house in 2002 and also later when she refinanced it. Sometime later, after the mortgage had been assigned to a third party, Wyss advised McLaughlin that she might have a claim against the mortgage holder for some illegal fees she had been charged. McLaughlin thought that sounded like a good idea so she signed a retainer agreement, which provided that the case would be handled by (among others) the Lakin Law Firm in Wood River, Illinois, with whom Wyss was affiliated. Lakin and Wyss then brought a class action against the mortgage holder, Alliance Mortgage.

The problem was that the fees had originally been charged by Centerre Title Company, which Wyss owns. So essentially, Wyss had advised McLaughlin to sue to get back fees that he had charged her in the first place. As far as I can tell, the plan was to wait until the mortgage had been assigned and then get Lakin to bring a class action against the new holder. Wyss would get ten percent of any settlement in exchange for the referral.

I guess that might work, if the mortgage holder is a dummy. It didn't take this one long to find out that Wyss was involved. At Wyss's deposition last year, Wyss claimed that Lakin had suggested that he review Centerre Title's files "to see if his clients were victimized." By him, that is. "So," Alliance's attorney asked, "Emert Wyss, [as] Centerre Title Company, collects the fees from Ms. McLaughlin, and now we have six, seven, eight months later, Emert Wyss [as] Ms. McLaughlin's attorney suggests she file suit over the very fees his title company collected from her, is that right?"

"That is right," Wyss said.  "It oversimplifies it, but that is correct."

In the end, the judge ordered that Centerre Title and Wyss himself be added as indispensable parties to the lawsuit, so that Wyss became a third-party defendant in a lawsuit he filed in the first place. He has had to waive any right to attorneys' fees so he will not be collecting from himself, either.

Update: The judge later dismissed Wyss as a defendant, saying that Centerre Title's corporate status protected him from personal liability. A motion for sanctions against him was withdrawn when he agreed to waive any claim to attorneys' fees.