The Acrobat for Legal Professionals blog has a great post called "Add Dynamic Exhibit Stamps in Acrobat using a free stamp set." The electronic exhibit stamp has both a static graphic element and a changing numeric or alphabetic element and permits you to electronically stamp documents with exhibit numbers or letters. The tool is very helpful when filing papers in federal court.
SVMIC – 2008 Financial Results – Part 1
SVMIC continues to enjoy wonderful profitability, even as the number of physicians it insures declines.
SVMIC – State Volunteer Mutual Insurance Company – is a physician-owned insurance company that was created over 30 years ago. It has grown from a company with paid-in capital of $7,500,000 to a entity with a policyholder surplus (think: net worth) of $251,321,321.
Let me explain what that means. Policyholder surplus is determined by subtracting reserves for claims payments and claims expenses from assets. Each time a claim is made a reserve is set. The size of the reserve is based on the severity of the claim, the likelihood of payment and the anticipated defense costs. The amount reserved on a claim changes over time, but the idea is that the sum total of reserves should pay all existing claims and all future defense costs. There is also a category of reserves known as IBNR – Incurred But Not Reported. This is for claims that the company "knows" to be out there but have not yet been reported to the company.
David Mills Does It Again – A Reader Supplies the Caption
David Mills, appellate lawyer and cartoonist from Ohio, supplied the cartoon. A reader supplied the caption. In fact, lots of readers suggested captions, and David choose this one.
I must admit that I was a fan of a caption suggested by Kpawss ("Surprisingly, a lineal descendant appeared during probate.") but I certainly cannot disagree with David’s choice written by J. Whitney.
Thanks, David, for sharing your work with us. See more of David’s work at Courtoons.
Thoughts About Efficiency in Law Practice
For lawyers, time is money. For lawyers who charge hourly rates, inefficiency may result in more fees on the front end but will result in a clients over time.
For contingent fee lawyers, efficient practice increases profitability. This blog post from Litigation Cost Control reminds us of the efficiencies that come from the use of forms and checklists.
The post is geared toward hourly rate lawyers working on complex litigation matters, but hose of us who work on a contingent fee can benefit from these words.
ER Docs in Arizona Get Special Treatment in Courtrooms
Torts Prof lets us know that the elected representatives in Arizona believe that ER doctors should not be held responsible for their negligence unless the patient can prove his case by clear and convincing evidence.
Do You Want to Go Paperless in Your Office?
Or at least move in that direction? Here is a great post from a lawyer who has figured out how to do it.
An an excerpt:
In the three years that I’ve been practicing as a solo lawyer I have been completely paperless. Before that, when I worked in a large firm, I kept the files that I worked on by myself in a completely paperless form. So, when I hear people say that it’s impossible to be completely paperless I know that’s not true. In addition to my own personal experience, I know several lawyers who have completely paperless law practices.
Post-Sale Duties
The current Brooklyn Law Review contains this article by Ken Ross and J. David Prince provides an overview of the post-sale duty sections of the Restatement (Third) of Torts: Products Liability.
The article
provides an overview of the Restatement (Third)’s post-sale duty sections. In addition, it discusses relevant case law and the impact of the Restatement (Third) on developing case law. Part II provides a background of the post-sale duty sections of the Restatement (Third). Parts III-IX look back to case law prior to the Restatement (Third) and analyze how courts at that time dealt with post-sale duty issues including negligence standards, post-sale knowledge, defect timing questions, identification of product users, the duty to inform of safety improvements, and the duty to recall. Part X examines case law decisions that post-date the Restatement (Third)’s drafting, divided according to whether the court accepted, rejected, or adopted some variation of the Restatement sections. And lastly, Part XI provides a brief discussion of regulatory post-sale duties.
Motion to Compel Defense Counsel to Wear Shoes Without Holes in the Soles
You read the title correctly. Apparently Bill Bone in Florida believes that his adversary "wears shoes with holes in the soles when he is in trial." He believed that defense counsel did so "as a ruse to impress the jury and make them believe that [his adversary] is humble and simple without sophistication."
Relief sought? The Court was asked to require defense counsel without holes in the soles of his shoes at trial.
Download file
West Virginia Rejects Claim That Ford Should Have Used Laminated Glass in Side Window
The Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia has ruled that a products liability claim was preempted by FMVSS 205, a safety standard that it says permits vehicle manufacturers to make a choice between tempered glass and laminated glass in side windows.
The court felt compelled to rely on Geier v. American Honda Motor Co., Inc., 529 U.S. 861 (2000), "the guiding law of the land," even though it felt that the decision was "flawed because it requires courts to look beyond the properly-enacted federal statute or law and divine an agency’s intent from extraneous materials to determine the preemptive effect of a regulation."
The bottom line: "the NHTSA gave manufacturers the option to choose to install either tempered glass or laminated glass in side windows of vehicles in FMVSS 205, permitting the plaintiff to proceed with a state tort action would foreclose that choice and would interfere with federal policy."
Medical Research, Anyone?
Here is a list of medical sites created by from Exposing Deceptive Defense Doctors by Dorothy Sims as posted here.
This is the National Library of Medicine/National Institutes of Health, with a great search site.