Many of us think that when litigants win an award of money in court, they actually get the money. All of the money. Most understand that the government does not just cut a check to a winning plaintiff against a losing defendant and then chase the defendant for reimbursement (though that’s an interesting idea and […]
There are almost no advocates in our country or, for that matter, in any industrialized country on earth today, that do not recognize (1) the great strengths of free market capitalism, on the one hand, and (2) the impossibility of unregulated free market capitalism on the other hand. Regulation is a given. The ubiquitous and […]
David Schlesinger, an employee rights lawyer for the Minneapolis employment powerhouse law firm of Nichols Kaster published a remembrance of his lawyer father this week in MinnPost. Attention Minnesota Civil Litigators (and those who love them): If you have not read it, go read it. The punishing expense of civil litigation, the inherent arbitrariness and […]
If you find yourself thinking about objecting to the admission of evidence at trial because it is not “the best evidence,” close your eyes, take three slow long “cleansing” breaths (in for count to 4, hold for 2, out on a count of 6), and think again. If you find yourself appealing a bad result […]
I never met or knew Larry Leventhal and I am pretty sure we are unrelated. But for my twenty years of practice in civil litigation in Minnesota, I have gotten telephone calls intended for Larry. Once, a judge told me, “You look like your father,” thinking I was Larry Leventhal’s son. A few times, over the […]
There are few clichés more common in our civil litigation system than the reviled “trial by ambush.” Basic requirements of our legal system are orderliness and predictability and there are not supposed to be “surprises” at trial. Analogize to a boxing match (or any adversarial “dispute resolution” forum). You have got to have rules — when the […]
On the Friday before the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday, the U.S. government filed its complaint against KleinBank charging the bank with “red-lining” in the U.S. District Court (D. Minn.). Historically, “red-lining” was a practice by which lenders would avoid offering credit to majority-minority neighborhoods. In our economy, cutting off access to credit, whether both […]
From the linked opinion, I gather that Plaintiff Christopher Ayala agreed to settle a case he brought against a Minnesota company, Aerotek, and then he changed his mind. (At least before the so-called “settlement” in the Ayala case, Mr. Ayala’s lawsuit was similar to the unfortunate Mr. Chandramouli Vaidyanathan’s protracted lawsuit, covered at some length in […]
Last week was a bad week for Minnesota-based multi-million dollar wonder-company, “My Pillow,” which got spanked by the Better Business Bureau and sued in a nationwide class action on the same day. (Here is a link to the Star Tribune coverage and here is a link to the class action complaint.) At issue is a “buy […]
Businesses send out and get piles of holiday cards every year but few come close to Merchant & Gould’s cards. What is the value of a cheap card? What is the ROI on holiday cards? (I am not the only or the first one to wonder.)