There’s no shortage of lists on the Internet on crazy lawsuits that are filed each year. But what’s much more serious for the nation’s future are those crazy suits that actually do or nearly result in huge settlements or judgments, in the process bringing enormous costs to defendants and making trial lawyers rich.
Just below the surface of what seems like a respectable profession, trial lawyers have found dozens of ways of making good money by manipulating the court system to get rich quick. Not only do they use tried-and-true tactics like venue- and judge-shopping, but they also take advantage of jurisdictions where trial-lawyer-friendly legislators are loath to implement reforms. The recent examples below are all mentioned in Judicial Hellholes, an annual publication of the American Tort Reform Foundation. Each has also been independently researched in the local press and/or court filings.
CHEAPTER TO SETTLE
Donald Driscoll, a trial lawyer in the San Francisco Bay Area, made a quick $1.1 million last October in attorney’s fees that he extracted from 30 California public school districts. He did it by filing lawsuits alleging that they weren’t providing their students with the required amount of physical education. Incredibly, this was allowed as a matter for civil court, and the districts decided it was cheaper to settle and pay him off rather than do all the work of proving that they were in full compliance with state law.
The second wave of 90 districts that Driscoll sued, however, got lucky. The California state legislature, extremely slow to respond when unscrupulous lawyers target business in a similar manner, was very quick to pass a law in response, establishing an administrative complaint system to keep such lawsuits out of civil court.
DISABILITY SUITS
Forty percent of all the Americans with Disabilities Act lawsuits in the U.S. are filed in California. And of more than 7,000 such cases filed in California between 2005 and 2015, more than half were filed by just 31 frequent-flier plaintiffs.
The reason: Unlike in many other states, such claims in California allow for damages and attorneys’ fees under state law. That makes it worth the time and effort to deploy a small wheelchair battalion to go from small business to small business, checking the angles of ramps and the height of toilets and sinks in restrooms, just in case a lawsuit can be filed. They typically ask for a few thousand dollars for each violation, and the defendants in these cases, many of them immigrant small-business owners, are usually forced to settle because they lack the means to fight in court.
Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed legislation that would have at least given businesses notice before they were actually sued, so that they could remedy ADA non-compliance before getting hauled into court or bullied into a settlement.
LUMBER LABELS
Lowe’s, the home improvement store, chose to settle for $1.5 million rather than fight a lawsuit over two-by-fours in Marin County, Calif. The lawyers in this case discovered and took advantage of a common industry practice of labeling lumber. Lumber sizes, by long and universal custom, refer to the rough boards from which the finished and squared boards are cut — so a 2X4 is really 1.5 X 3.5 inches. That bit of knowledge led to a nice payday for some clever lawyers. Since the lawsuit, Lowe’s has begun posting both the common name for this variety of wood (2×4) and beside it the actual product dimensions.
ATTORNEYS’ FEES
In Pottawatomie County, Okla., a group of trial lawyers won a class-action judgment for what ended up being a grand total of $45,780, to be split up between 310 owners of Volkswagen Jettas. The lawsuit had alleged that the vehicle’s plastic front spoiler, which costs $140 in parts and labor to replace, was too easily damaged while parking.
Fair enough — but then the judge in the case awarded the trial lawyers $7 million in attorneys’ fees, 155 times what they had recovered for all of their clients combined.
The Oklahoma Supreme Court overturned the award, returning the matter to the same judge, who then turned around and awarded the trial lawyers a paltry $1.1 million, only 24 times what they had won for all their clients combined.
‘GERMAN QUALITY’
Did you ever buy Beck’s beer because you were certain it is made in Germany? Its packaging does say it has “German Quality” (debatable) and that it was originated in Bremen, Germany (true). But in fact it has been made in St. Louis since 2012.
Tucker Ronzetti, an inventive trial lawyer, brought a class-action lawsuit in Florida court against Anheuser-Busch, which makes Beck’s. When the trial judge refused to dismiss the case, the company settled.
Under the terms of the settlement, customers who kept old receipts for their purchases of Beck’s (doesn’t everyone keep old beer receipts?) are eligible for up to $50 in refunds. Customers who didn’t keep their receipts can get $12.
Oh, and Ronzetti, for his heroic work in protecting consumers from any inauthentic implications of German-ness, got $3.5 million in court-awarded attorneys’ fees.
ASBESTOS EXPOSURE
One-third of all asbestos exposure lawsuits in the United States are filed in Madison County, Ill., and 90 percent of those cases are filed by out-of-state plaintiffs. The reason? Madison County judges are extremely favorable to plaintiffs and hostile toward out-of-state companies. They refuse to dismiss cases on the grounds that neither the companies nor the plaintiffs have any connection to Madison County.
Their reputation has led plaintiffs to file so many cases there that one judge considered 316 cases in a single day. Not that there were actually that many trials — companies already know that they have to settle all but most egregious asbestos cases without a second thought when they’re filed in Madison County. So high is the rate of out-of-court settlements that, according to the Madison-St. Clair Record, not a single asbestos case there resulted in a verdict for the plaintiff between 2005 and at least August 2015. Nearly all plaintiffs get settlements. Only eight cases resulted in judgments for the defendant during the same period.
