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