TortsProf Blog

Federal Judge Dismisses Economic Damages Claims Against Toyota

Behind a free registration wall, the National Law Journal reports that Judge Selna has "tentatively dismissed" the economic damages claims of Florida and New York consumers in the sudden acceleration litigation on the ground that they had not actually experieced any SUA problems.

- SBS

Top 10 Recent SSRN Torts & Products Liability Downloads

RECENT HITS (for all papers announced in the last 60 days)
TOP 10 Papers for Journal of Torts & Products Liability Law eJournal
February 26, 2012 to April 26, 2012

Rank	Downloads	Paper Title
1	288	Poetry as Evidence Gregory Scott Parks, Rashawn Ray, Wake Forest University School of Law, Unaffiliated Authors - affiliation not provided to SSRN, Date posted to database: February 27, 2012 Last Revised: February 27, 2012
2	167	The Empirical Effects of Tort Reform Theodore Eisenberg, Cornell University - School of Law, Date posted to database: April 2, 2012 Last Revised: April 2, 2012
3	139	Statutes in Common Law Courts Jeffrey A. Pojanowski, Notre Dame Law School, Date posted to database: March 19, 2012 Last Revised: March 28, 2012
4	90	Four Conceptions of Insurance Kenneth S. Abraham, University of Virginia School of Law, Date posted to database: March 6, 2012 Last Revised: March 6, 2012
5	82	Quasi-Property: Like, But Not Quite Property Shyamkrishna Balganesh, University of Pennsylvania - Law School - Faculty, Date posted to database: March 2, 2012 Last Revised: March 25, 2012
6	80	Why Courts Make Orders (and What this Tells Us About Damages) Stephen A. Smith, McGill University - Faculty of Law, Date posted to database: February 22, 2012 Last Revised: February 22, 2012
7	66	Forcing Forgetfulness: Data Privacy, Free Speech, and the 'Right to Be Forgotten' Robert Kirk Walker, University of California - UC Hastings College of the Law, Date posted to database: March 19, 2012 Last Revised: April 4, 2012
8	65	Graduated Consent in Contract and Tort Law: Toward a Theory of Justification Tom W. Bell, Chapman University - School of Law, Date posted to database: February 27, 2012 Last Revised: February 27, 2012
9	65	Protecting Reputation: Defamation and Negligence Eric Descheemaeker, University of Edinburgh - School of Law, Date posted to database: February 12, 2012 Last Revised: February 12, 2012
10	63	Of Frightened Horses and Autonomous Vehicles: Tort Law and its Assimilation of Innovations Kyle Graham, Santa Clara University School of Law, Date posted to database: February 21, 2012 Last Revised: February 21, 2012

--CJR

BP Proposed Settlement Agreement

...has been filed.  George Conk covers it at TortsToday.

--CJR

House Republicans Continue to Push Tort Reform

From the Blog of the Legal Times:

House Republican leaders continued to push a medical malpractice reform bill this week that caps non-economic damages at $250,000 and limits lawyer contingency fees, arguing that it would save taxpayers $41 billion and prevent defense spending cuts.

BLT has more. 

Thanks to Lisa Smith-Butler for the alert.

- SBS

Judge Awards $65k Damages for Loss of Pet

A Colorado judge has awarded $65,000 for the negligent death of the plaintiff's 18-month old dog.  A cleaning service mistakenly let the dog out, where she was hit by a car.  The dog crawled back into the house, and the cleaning service left the dying dog - knowing it had been hit - under the dining room table, where the owner found her dead upon returning 2 hours later.  

 Colorado News9 and Channel 7 have more.   

Thanks to Lisa Smith-Butler for the alert.  

- SBS