Like all of us, I have experienced bad times for our country over the course of my life. I can recall years of fear and misery. I can recall decades of chaos, drugs and war. I’ve lived through violence and plague. And the overwhelming fear of nuclear holocaust shadowed the world for such a very a long time that it hardly seems credible from today’s perspective.
This is a tricky one. In Hirchak v. W.W. Grainger, Inc., https://ecf.ca8.uscourts.gov/opndir/20/11/192642P.pdf (8th Cir. 11/17/2020), the plaintiff was injured at work when a web sling broke and dropped a load of steel tubing on him. The plaintiff couldn’t sue the manufacturer, Juli Sling Co. Ltd., because it’s a Chinese company, not subject to the jurisdiction of American courts. So he sued W.W. Grainger, Inc. (“Grainger”), which had allegedly sold the Juli sling to the plaintiff’s employer, Weiler, Inc.
Most of the attorneys who contact us are looking for a testifying expert. Presumably that’s because many experts won’t testify (for all kinds of reasons), but are willing to assist attorneys in understanding and preparing cases for litigation, which makes finding consultants easier for attorneys than finding testifiers. Nevertheless, sometimes attorneys do need our help obtaining a consulting expert, and sometimes they even want one of each.
As we prepare for Thanksgiving 2020, I think we all can be thankful that we are approaching the end of this strange year. At one point in late spring I researched the prophecies of Nostradomus to see if he had predicted a year of disasters in 2020 – but alas, he did not. In fact, I have been unable to locate a single prediction of doom for this year anywhere, although several science fiction stories, novels and films have treated this era as one fraught with danger, both earth-based and coming from outer space.
I’ve been in the expert referral business for 15 years, during which I’ve recommended consulting and testifying experts to hundreds of attorneys. I’ve had my share of misses – i.e., either the attorney didn’t engage an expert I recommended, or an expert failed to satisfy the attorney and was replaced. But in the large majority of cases, the expert I recommended was retained and met or exceeded the attorney’s expectations.
I recently had occasion to refer a neuro-ophthalmologist to Jason Rubin, a plaintiffs’ attorney in New York who is one of my regular clients. The plaintiff/patient had increased intracranial pressure (the reason is not important here) that was affecting her optic nerves, with resulting visual impairment. She eventually had a ventriculoperitoneal shunt inserted to relieve the pressure, but by that time she had very significant vision loss that got even worse postoperatively, and she ended up with severe, permanent vision loss. The issue requiring the expert’s opinion was whether earlier p
It’s been just two months (though it seems much longer in this era of what I call “COVID-induced time dilation”) since we first wrote about existing and anticipated litigation arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic, https://www.videntpartners.com/blog/2020/unintended-consequences. At that time, employees had filed 588 lawsuits (69 of which were class actions) against employers alleging labor and employment violations (retaliation, wrongful termination, discrimination, failure to accommodate, etc.) related to the c
Revisiting an old blog is often a useful exercise. For us at Vident, this particular post is always relevant, because our business is providing experts, and we’re always focused on the “why” as well as the “how” when we promote our services. So if you haven’t seen this one, or even if you have, it’s a useful reminder of why we do what we do and how completely you can rely on us to do it right.
This question was recently answered in the affirmative by California’s intermediate court of appeals in Bolger v. Amazon.com (4th App. Dist., Div. One, 8/13/2020), https://static.reuters.com/resources/media/editorial/20200813/bolgervamazon--opinion.pdf, and in the negative by the Ohio Supreme Court in Stiner v.
The Yiddish word “chutzpah” is difficult to translate into English because Yiddish is a nuanced language, with many words that carry several shades of meaning as well as significant emotional content. In English, chutzpah is usually understood to mean audacity (positive) or arrogance (negative). Other English near-synonyms include brashness, brazenness, gall, nerve, temerity. Imagine, then, how much chutzpah it would take to call someone a f***ing Jew and then, when he sues, move for summary judgment on the ground that he actually isn't Jewish.
