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After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

nytimes.com

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Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#51

Post by jerrya »

From the nytimes article, the judgment will be paid by Oberlin's insurance company, it will not come out of the endowment, they have not apologized, they are not accepting they were wrong, there have been no resignations.

Meredith Raimondo, the Dean of Students at the time, who was passing out flyers and far more, nine months ago to accept a position as Vice President of Student Affairs at Oglethorpe University https://oberlinreview.org/25680/news/former-dos-meredith-rai...

From the NYTimes:

> In a statement, Oberlin said that “this matter has been painful for everyone.” It added, “We hope that the end of the litigation will begin the healing of our entire community.”

> The college acknowledged that the size of the judgment, which includes damages and interest, was “significant.” But it said that “with careful financial planning,” including insurance, it could be paid “without impacting our academic and student experience.” Oberlin has a robust endowment of nearly $1 billion.

So what has Oberlin really learned?

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#52

Post by unwise-exe »

lajamerr wrote: post #34
unwise-exe wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should carefully consider the crime based on the individual and how much punishment is appropriate for that individual to compensate the victim/deter that single individual/company from continuing that future behavior. Not to stop others. I'd think that having your standard practice be to make sure it wasn't worth it would find the same amount as the threshhold for both deterring the current perpetrator and dete…

There's a clear difference between deterring a individual and putting a amount so high it will get taglines so people will pay attention and think that could happen to them as well if they were to commit a similar crime and get caught. It's all about intentions. And I don't want my government prosecuting people and giving them high sentences just to deter other people. It's barbaric behavior. Like cutting the hand of…

> amount so high it will get taglines so people will pay attention and think that could happen to them

That's not how it works, it's about getting the accountants or lawyers or whoever to tell that person's boss "this can be expected to cost us $XXXX".

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#53

Post by Georgelemental »

lajamerr wrote: post #34
unwise-exe wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We should carefully consider the crime based on the individual and how much punishment is appropriate for that individual to compensate the victim/deter that single individual/company from continuing that future behavior. Not to stop others. I'd think that having your standard practice be to make sure it wasn't worth it would find the same amount as the threshhold for both deterring the current perpetrator and dete…

There's a clear difference between deterring a individual and putting a amount so high it will get taglines so people will pay attention and think that could happen to them as well if they were to commit a similar crime and get caught. It's all about intentions. And I don't want my government prosecuting people and giving them high sentences just to deter other people. It's barbaric behavior. Like cutting the hand of…

> And I don't want my government prosecuting people and giving them high sentences just to deter other people.

Deterrence is the whole point of punishing crime. Every society in human history has done this. It's not "barbaric," what's "barbaric" is allowing criminals to do horrible things to innocent people without any incentive against it.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#54

Post by scarface74 »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #43

> Carmen Twillie Ambar: archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests. If you witness a crime you can arrest the criminal. It's basic civics. Something you might find about in an institution of higher learning. Don't know if they have one of those in Oberlin.

Yes, what could possibly go wrong giving private citizens the right to detain other private citizens

https://www.nytimes.com/article/ahmaud-arbery-shooting-georg...

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#55

Post by atdrummond »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #43

> Carmen Twillie Ambar: archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests. If you witness a crime you can arrest the criminal. It's basic civics. Something you might find about in an institution of higher learning. Don't know if they have one of those in Oberlin.

If the individual involved hadn’t broken the phone of the worker, the chase never even would have occurred. The culpability being placed 100% on the bakery is illogical no matter how I look at it.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#56

Post by RhysU »

jerrya wrote: post #41
phnofive wrote: post #24

Out of its three comma endowment, it will pay a settlement of about six hundred student's annual tuition, which is a little less than a quarter of their undergrad population. After a six year smear campaign, sounds like money well spent!

Apparently, Oberlin's President sent out the following email which states their insurance will pay > Dear Obies, > Today, Oberlin College and Conservatory initiated payment in full of the $36.59 million judgment in the Gibson’s Bakery case, an amount that represents the awarded damages and interest owed. Please see the college’s public statement below. > While this outcome is a disappointment, our financial plans for…

> Like me, the majority of the campus was not here at the beginning of this matter in 2016.

The buck stops with my predecessor. Delightful executive engineering of the slimiest sort. One gets paid to own the past at that level. Accepting the job requires due diligence on the past and being paid to own any uncertainty. That is one disgustingly cowardly sentence meriting immediate action by the board to throw this bum out.

Notice, I don't care about the outcome but only the integrity that such an exec should show.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#57

Post by atdrummond »

scarface74 wrote: post #54
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #43

> Carmen Twillie Ambar: archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests. If you witness a crime you can arrest the criminal. It's basic civics. Something you might find about in an institution of higher learning. Don't know if they have one of those in Oberlin.

Yes, what could possibly go wrong giving private citizens the right to detain other private citizens https://www.nytimes.com/article/ahmaud-arbery-shooting-georg...

Not what happened here at all.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#58

Post by soared »

lajamerr wrote: post #31
dmitrygr wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is what punitive damages are - they are not required to be connected to the size of the damage, they are meant to punish the defendant for royally (in the judge's view) fucking up, and send a message to other similar defendants to not do such things And $5M in compensatory damages seems about right for 2 years of a successful small bakery

Honestly I'm not very keen on pinning blame/monetary responsibility on single individuals/companies to 'prevent/deter' unknown future crimes. We shouldn't be signaling with big punishments bigger than the crimes call for. We should carefully consider the crime based on the individual and how much punishment is appropriate for that individual to compensate the victim/deter that single individual/company from continuin…

By your logic rich organizations can purposefully commit crimes against small businesses knowing the fines will be incredibly small.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#59

Post by lajamerr »

unwise-exe wrote: post #52
lajamerr wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a clear difference between deterring a individual and putting a amount so high it will get taglines so people will pay attention and think that could happen to them as well if they were to commit a similar crime and get caught. It's all about intentions. And I don't want my government prosecuting people and giving them high sentences just to deter other people. It's barbaric behavior. Like cutting the hand of…

> amount so high it will get taglines so people will pay attention and think that could happen to them That's not how it works, it's about getting the accountants or lawyers or whoever to tell that person's boss "this can be expected to cost us $XXXX".

Lawyers are sophisticated bunch they know these amounts will garner taglines. Do you honestly believe that these lawyers/judges don't incorporate public perception into their accounts of what they think a fitting punishment is and use them as a way to lead public policy/deterrence for particular crimes?

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#60

Post by spaetzleesser »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #43

> Carmen Twillie Ambar: archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests. If you witness a crime you can arrest the criminal. It's basic civics. Something you might find about in an institution of higher learning. Don't know if they have one of those in Oberlin.

Statements like “archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests” is why a lot of people think the left has lost their collective minds. They are making perpetrators into victims and blame the real victims for any bad consequences.
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