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

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

#91

Post by ALittleLight » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:16 AM UTC

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…

This seems like an insane opinion to me. The college is extremely wealthy and made a considered choice to repeatedly slander a small business and attempt to bankrupt it. The college acted like a malevolent psychopath, not in the heat of the moment or at the end of some escalatory chain, but after plenty of time to consider and deliberate. The punishment must be a large dollar figure because the college is so rich - if it were small then it would not punish the college. As is, the punishment is much too small.

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

#92

Post by theflyingelvis » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:18 AM UTC

heartbreak wrote: post #74

RhysU wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Can I ask why you’re so upset about something that apparently does not involve you at all?

Some folks have standards and principles.

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

#93

Post by krasin » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:18 AM UTC

fortran77 wrote: post #71

paulryanrogers wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hired and worked with an Oberlin graduate. Great person. Talented engineer. What specifically puts you off their entire student body; past, present, and future?

Well, I just looked on Twitter and see many, many Oberlin grads lamenting the Gibson's judgement and claiming that "everyone always knew" Gibson's was "racist" without any hard facts. Just one example: https://twitter.com/ejdickson/status/1566061809500622848 She's still calling people who pled guilty to shoplifting "alleged shoplifters." That's dishonest. Let's just say I don't hold by that school's accreditation.

It's best to judge individual people for their indiviual deeds. Discrimination by a fact of belonging to a group is too imprecise, almost always. It's okay to be more vigilant based on it, though - statistics does work.

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

#94

Post by eganp » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:18 AM UTC

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…

I'm surprised the insurance will pay for this. The judgment, and actions by Oberlin's administration, strongly suggest they were acting in bad faith. The college's behavior exceed negligence, the typical threshold in these sort of insurance contracts.

Pretty incredible Oberlin can get out of this considering what other insurers will do to avoid paying for incidents with cause.

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

#95

Post by josephcsible » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:19 AM UTC

heartbreak wrote: post #74

RhysU wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

Can I ask why you’re so upset about something that apparently does not involve you at all?

Isn't this basically the same as asking "why do you care about people other than yourself?"

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

#96

Post by mannykannot » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:19 AM UTC

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…

> 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.

That difference is not clear to me. What sort of deterrence to an individual would not also lead others to think that could happen to them as well if they were to commit a similar crime and get caught? - or, to consider the contrapositive, if it does not invoke that thought in others, why would the convicted be deterred from trying again? The fact that they were caught once does not mean they will be next time.

Furthermore, I dispute the idea that deterring people from committing a harmful act, before that harm is done, is not a justifiable goal for a society (note that this does not imply that I must therefore endorse the cutting off of thieves' hands.) Quite often, the perpetrator cannot compensate fully for the harm done, and it is always better if it were not done in the first place.

We should note that what is being deterred here is Oberlin's decision to fight the case rather than accept its obvious responsibility and compensate the plaintiffs for the damage it did. Personally, I think this is a net benefit to society, and if it makes entities in similar situations think twice, so much the better.

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

#97

Post by lajamerr » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:19 AM UTC

xyzzyz wrote: post #84

lajamerr wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should my punishment be more severe because you want to stop others from doing something in the future? That's a disproportionate amount of punishment for the individual. Punishment should be equal to the crime, not have an additional component to be used to deter others who I have no affiliation with. Public prosecution is absolutely terrible way to deal with dealing out punishment. Not all individuals are the s…

I can only say that I thoroughly disagree with this, and I have every single society that has ever existed behind me.

So you should be punished for a crime for more than the harm/compensation/individual deterrence, just so that you can stop future crimes by unrelated people by you being a peg that others can consider if they might commit a similar crime?

I really ask you to consider this from a moral standpoint.

Society isn't always right. Sometimes society just does things because it's easier, not because it's right.

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

#98

Post by happyopossum » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:20 AM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #87

btilly wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A police officer has better legal protections, and in practice can get away with a lot more. But in theory, what they are supposed to be able to do is surprisingly similar. On detaining a random person, quoting https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/citizen%27s_arrest , In general, the ability to perform a citizen’s arrest is the same for a regular person as it is for a police officer without a warrant.

So let’s say that I was going 80 miles per hour in a 55. I stopped at the gas station and you tried to detain me when I got out of the car. Let’s also say I have a licensed firearm. Also let’s say it was caught on camera that I was minding my business pumping my gas when you tried to detain me. How do you think that’s going to end up both right then and in a court of law? This is completely hypothetical, I don’t own…

Driving 80 in a 55 isn’t an arrestable offense, so a Citizens Arrest wouldn’t really be appropriate would it?

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

#99

Post by remarkEon » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:21 AM UTC

fortran77 wrote: post #71

paulryanrogers wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hired and worked with an Oberlin graduate. Great person. Talented engineer. What specifically puts you off their entire student body; past, present, and future?

Well, I just looked on Twitter and see many, many Oberlin grads lamenting the Gibson's judgement and claiming that "everyone always knew" Gibson's was "racist" without any hard facts. Just one example: https://twitter.com/ejdickson/status/1566061809500622848 She's still calling people who pled guilty to shoplifting "alleged shoplifters." That's dishonest. Let's just say I don't hold by that school's accreditation.

Unrelated to your reply, but that twitter thread is truly bizarre.

>The one thing about this that has always struck me as ludicrous is the argument that the student body serves as a tool of the colleges whims. Students fucking hate the administration and resist it at every turn, & always have…much like 19 yos at any liberal arts college

Then why go to these schools? I don't understand why you'd pay $80k a year (just checked Oberlin's tuition for 2022) to go to a place that you hate. It makes absolutely no sense!

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

#100

Post by ncallaway » Fri, Sep 09, 2022, 4:21 AM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #63

scarface74 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

The only reason police can detain people is because they are citizens. They don't have any special status that other Americans don't enjoy.

Qualified Immunity would have a large word with you.

If an Officer makes a wrongful arrest in the line of duty, Qualified Immunity will go a long way to shielding them, whereas a citizen without Qualified Immunity would be subject to wrongful arrest lawsuits and kidnapping charges.