TortsProf Blog

Mississippi Noneconomic Damages Cap Challenged

A shooting at a store in Belzoni is the backdrop for the challenge.  The AP has the story.

--CJR

Personal Injury Roundup No. 61 (12/18/09)

As you might expect, the Roundup will take a holiday break on Christmas and New Year's Day.  It will return on January 8th.

Reform, Legislation, Policy

• ATRA's 2009 Judicial Hellholes Report is out (pdf).  Responses from:  Turkewitz and The Pop Tort.
• Towers Perrin found tort costs rose by $2.7B in 2008, an increase of 1.1%.  (Insurance Networking News)
• IL Supreme Court delays ruling on constitutionality of damage caps.  (Chicago Tribune)
  

New Lawsuits

• Class action suit filed alleging overexposure from CT scans.  (The Pop Tort)

Trials, Settlements and Other Ends

• Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline has reportedly paid about $1 billion to settle cases; more are on the way.  (Bernabe)
• I'm interpreting "Other Ends" very loosely here:  Mark Hermann has resigned from Jones Day and will no longer write for Drug & Device Law.  His farewell post is here.
• Defense verdict in CA asbestos suit.  (Olson/Point of Law)

Miscellaneous

• Sovereign immunity arguments in the Virginia Tech shootings case.  (VLW Blog)
• Nicole Vincent on Keren-Paz's "Torts, Egalitarianism, and Distributive Justice."  (Solum/Legal Theory Blog)
• H1N1 vaccines for kids recalled; safety not a factor.  (CNN.com)
• Due to custom of baking in a coin or silver piece, British restaurant requires signing a release prior to eating plum pudding.  (Olson/Overlawyered)
• Nate Oman on "Social Insurance and the Autonomy of Private Law"  (Co-Op)

--CJR

Interesting Partnership

Eric Turkewitz, a New York personal injury attorney and blogger, has hired Ted Frank to represent him in objecting to the Yahoo! sponsored search class action settlement.

More at both Eric's blog and Ted's blog.

- SBS

Magliocca on Assumption of Risk & Football

Over at Co-Op, Gerard Magliocca (IU-Indy) discusses assumption of risk and football.

--CJR

Smolla to be President of Furman

W&L Law Dean Rodney Smolla, an expert on defamation, will become the 11th president of Furman University.  VLW Blog has the story. 

--CJR

"Linking Personal Injury Compensation Processes with Adverse Health Outcomes"

Genevieve Grant and David M. Studdert (University of Melbourne) have posted "Poisoned Chalice? A Critical Analysis of the Evidence Linking Personal Injury Compensation Processes with Adverse Health Outcomes" on SSRN. The abstract provides:

Do injured persons whose injuries are potentially eligible for compensation under social insurance schemes experience worse health outcomes and slower recoveries in the medium-to long-term than persons with similar injuries that are not covered by compensation schemes? Epidemiologists and health services researchers have probed that question since the 1970s, but interest in it has accelerated sharply in the last decade. A substantial empirical literature now exists to support the existence of a link between compensation status and health outcomes. A strand of that literature specifically implicates the role of compensation processes, lawyers and adversarialism in producing or perpetuating ill health among claimants.

This article critically reviews research into the compensation-health relationship. Systematic methodological weaknesses are identified – in particular, an inability to come to grips with the legal contours and realities of compensation processes. We conclude that, although there are important gaps in the evidence, profound questions about the impact of compensation processes on claimants’ health have been placed on the table. Legal professionals and policymakers must take these questions seriously. The involvement of legal scholars in multidisciplinary research may improve the quality of the evidence base and facilitate appropriate policy interventions.

Via Solum/Legal Theory Blog.

- SBS

England to Change Libel Tourism Laws?

The New York Times reports that British lawmakers are considering changing the current, generous libel laws that have given London the nickname "a town called sue." 

- SBS

Professor Oscar Gray To Receive 2010 William L. Prosser Award

At this year's AALS meeting in January, Professor Oscar Gray, the Jacob A. France Professor Emeritus of Torts at Maryland, will receive the William L. Prosser Award in recognition of his outstanding lifetime contributions to Torts.  Professor Gray is perhaps best known for his work as editor of the definitive, six-volume tort treatise, Harper, James and Gray on the Law of Torts.  He is also a co-author of the torts casebook, Cases and Materials on the Law of Torts.

The University of Maryland will be hosting a reception at AALS honoring Professor Gray on January 7th at 6:30 p.m. in Grand Salon Section 24 of the Riverside Hilton in New Orleans. 

NOTE:  The time of the reception has been changed to 6:30 pm to avoid conflict with any AALS events. 

- SBS
 

Chinese Drywall Class Action Filed

From About Lawsuits:

About 2,100 people joined in a class action lawsuit for Chinese drywall homeowners filed in Louisiana, alleging that their homes were built with toxic wallboard manufactured by Knauf Plasterboard Tainjin Co. Ltd. (KPT).

The drywall lawsuit was filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana in New Orleans. The complaint was filed as part of an agreement where the Chinese company agreed to temporarily waive its rights to have lawsuits served through the Hague Convention for plaintiffs who joined the omnibus class action suit against the company by December 9.

- SBS