If Trump was president this guy would never have gotten into this country in the first place.
Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
21–30 of 232 posts
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#22Would be nice to have a 'loser pays' court system for civil trials. These kinds of trolls would go away quickly.
The problem with 'loser pays' is that it can actually encourage frivolous litigation like this. Often there are civil suits where the defendant and plaintiff agree that there are some valid claims, but they disagree on the specifics and amount of the damages. If the plaintiff knows that eventually they will 'win' their fees and costs regardless, they have an incentive to disagree with settlement offers.
It looks like this:
You sell me a broken printer for $30 and I hire a lawyer to sue you for $30,000. I refuse to settle for less and tie things up as long as possible in court. Eventually I 'win' with a court finding of $30 in damages. Then you pay my attorney $50,000 in fees and costs because you 'lost'.
Edit: Possible improvement would be to pay based on the distance between the award and settlement offers?
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#23> Special Judge J. Jeffrey Edens issued a ruling. He awarded Zavodnik a judgment of $30,044.07 for breach of contract. Holy cow. This guy needs to be fired immediately. That is beyond gross negligence.
Depends: are judges supposed to spot-check claims for whether they're reasonable? Or do they leave that entirely as "the defense's job"? Remember, these were default judgments.
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#24If I'm reading correctly, the key bit is: ----- Because Costello did not respond to all three requests for admissions within 30 days of receiving them, and did not ask for an extension of time, as required by Indiana trial rules, Costello admitted to the liabilities and damages by default. He also did not appear at a July 2013 hearing, according to court records. Costello said he never received the requests for admis…
Default in court is just broken. Facts matter more then did someone show up. This is just broken.
If you can avoid adverse judgements by just not showing up for court, you incentivize people to not show up. That's not any more fair. There has to be something to lose for not showing up and default is what the legal system has chosen.
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#25> Special Judge J. Jeffrey Edens issued a ruling. He awarded Zavodnik a judgment of $30,044.07 for breach of contract. Holy cow. This guy needs to be fired immediately. That is beyond gross negligence.
To be clear, he ran unopposed in 2012 to win his seat on the circuit court. I don't think he can be "fired," but rather "opposed in the next election so he loses his seat."
https://ballotpedia.org/Indiana_judicial_elections,_2012_-_C...
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#26If I'm reading correctly, the key bit is: ----- Because Costello did not respond to all three requests for admissions within 30 days of receiving them, and did not ask for an extension of time, as required by Indiana trial rules, Costello admitted to the liabilities and damages by default. He also did not appear at a July 2013 hearing, according to court records. Costello said he never received the requests for admis…
Ignoring the requests was certainly dumb, and he is at fault for that. But a $30k penalty for that is excessive.
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#27Under a sensible legal system, this is a crime. It's called "barratry": filing baseless lawsuits in order to harass or to extract a settlement. In most US jurisdictions, however, it's not legally recognized as a crime, and so it's widespread. From a defendant's point of view, however, it's basically equivalent to getting mugged.
Which "sensible legal system[s]" are these, and which ones punish plaintiffs for it rather than lawyers?
Edit: I originally said "punish defendants", but meant plaintiffs.
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#28[deleted]
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, like most of the rest of the world. But the trial lawyers send tons of money to one of the parties, so our current legal system stays in place.
That's correct. The Republican party has been trying to pass a loser pays system since the early 1990s at least, when they included it in their so called "Contract with America." The fear mongering has been going on ever since: http://reason.com/archives/1995/06/01/civil-suits
Relevant portion from the Wikipedia article on "Contract with America."
> An act to institute "Loser pays" laws (H.R.988, passed 232-193, March 7, 1995), limits on punitive damages and weakening of product-liability laws to prevent what the bill considered frivolous litigation (H.R.956, passed 265-161, March 10, 1995; passed Senate 61-37, May 11, 1995, vetoed by President Clinton [2]). Another tort reform bill, the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act was enacted in 1995 when Congress overrode a veto by Clinton.
Re: Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
#30Would be nice to have a 'loser pays' court system for civil trials. These kinds of trolls would go away quickly.
'loser pays' has a couple disadvantages:
* It encourages people to pick the best, most expensive lawyer in town for every case no matter the expense, because your opponent will be picking up the tab.
* It discourages people from using the courts to resolve their disputes, which means people without resources tend not to get any justice. If, say, your landlord steals your $1500 security deposit for no good reason, are you really willing to risk $5000 in lawyer's fees over $1500? Of course not, you'll let it slide and some little injustice will remain unresolved.
* It makes the courts a weapon of last resort rather than the standard dispute-resolution mechanism. You used to see people dueling in the streets to resolve their problems.
The disadvantage of course is that people can raise disputes with you, and you have to answer them much the same way you can't ignore filing your taxes.