Personal Injury Roundup No. 1 (8/1/2008)

Welcome to the first Personal Injury Roundup (and, like Eric, I’ve no idea whether it should be “round up,” “round-up”, or “roundup,” but let’s go with “roundup”) on TortsProf.  We hope to maintain the quality of his year doing it and that of Brooks.  As always, but especially for this, we’d love suggested links; e-mail addresses are off to the left.

It’s getting to the end of summer, with all of us scrambling to finish various pieces, but it’s still an interesting week in TortLand.

Reform, Legislation, Policy

• Public Citizen criticizes the pro-arbitration analysis performed in recent Chamber studies.  [Public Citizen].
• Eric Turkewitz’s op-ed published in regional NY paper; Ted Frank starts a dialogue on the statistics used within; commenters include Turkewitz and people from Public Citizen, originator of the stat in question [NY PI Law Blog, Overlawyered].
• Reforms in New Zealand [SSRN].
• Congress sends president bill banning lead, etc., in toys [AP, see also this week on TortsProf, and two-plus years ago on TortsProf].

Discovery

• In a civil suit, what would have been said about this case without video?  [Simple Justice]
• Six Flags discovery muddles along; 77 deps and at least 18 more months until trial on an accident that happened over a year ago [TortsProf].
• Bad documents from Zyprexa production in Alaska suggest avoidance of diabetes talk by reps [WSJ Health Blog].

Experts & Science

• Ongoing discussion of the “pharma-free expert list” prepared for journalists; most focuses on the import, or not, of it including some who have been paid litigation experts for plaintiffs [TortsProf, Beck & Herrmann, Tort Deform, Pharmalot, and HealthNewsReview.org (the list is there)].

Trials & Settlements

• An update on the Kivalina global warming litigation:  Defendants have moved to dismiss arguing no cognizable tort.  Hearing is scheduled for Dec. 9th. [Point of Law]. 
• Libya & U.S. are close to a settlement relating to 1980s terrorism [WSJ Law Blog].
• Mirapex/compulsive gambling bellwether trials start and one ends with a plaintiff’s verdict [WSJ Law BlogPharmalot (notes $8.2 million verdict, evidently including punitives).

Appeals

• $16 million verdict against Allstate upheld; could have settled the case for $50K limits [KansasCity.com].
• ScotusBlog discusses and links to Sharkey’s Riegel piece and notes Levine’s argument date (Nov. 3) [ScotusBlog].

Damages

• The Tennessee Supreme Court upheld a $13 million punitive damages award against Chrysler in a suit claiming that a collapsing minivan seat caused the death of a eight month old baby.  [Point of Law, Overlawyered, ABA Journal].   Chrysler plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, with Ted Boutrous of Gibson Dunn at the helm.  [AmLaw Daily].

Goofy Stuff

• Real earthquake interrupts fake judge [YouTube].
• Ben & Jerry’s marketing people are pretty sure the lawyers wouldn’t like that video [Turkewitz, and read the URL, Ted].
• How I ended up in a chicken costume [Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child].

Shameless Self-Promotion (favorite posts of this week)

• Bill’s: Okay, it’s before this week, but hey, it’s the first time we’ve done the round-up: And with that, a surgeon’s insurer’s head explodes.
• Sheila’s: No Punitive Damages for NY Smokers.

Thanks

For sending us stuff: Eric Turkewitz, Brooks Schuelke, and anyone else who did.

Hey, that was fun.  See you next week.

–BC