Defense Counsel Journal articles from October 2002

Defense Counsel Journal archives from October 2002

American Bar Association oks multijurisdictional practice.
October 1, 2002... In a significant and far-reaching action, the American Bar Association has loosened its strictures against interstate practice in the United States, has made it easier for lawyers licensed in one state to be admitted to practice in another on...

Tort law reform steaming in Australia.
October 1, 2002... 2002 has seen a frenzy of tort law reform in Australia. Prompted by a combination of the collapse of a major insurance company and a medical indemnity insurer and by spiralling premiums, state governments around Australia have introduced...

Implementing the 9/11 victim compensation fund: two steps forward, one step back: while the statute establishing the fund seeks full compensation for victims, the regulations are subject to challenge for failing that mandate in some respects.
October 1, 2002... ON September 22, 2001, just 11 days after the deadly and devastating attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the President of the United States signed into law H.R. 2926, the Air Transportation Safety and System Stabilization Act...

Federal class action reform in the United States: past and future and where next? If the past is prologue, then there will be many proposals, some tinkering, some substantive, some legislative, to change class action practice.
October 1, 2002... PREDICTING the likely future developments in class action practice in the federal courts of the United States must begin in the past. THE PAST: OR WHERE WE'RE NOT GOING NEXT A. The 1966 Class Action The beginning point is the...

Toxicogenomics: new chapter in causation and exposure in toxic tort litigation: this new science has the potential to identify biological clues to disease, and both plaintiffs and defendants will strive to use it to their advantages.
October 1, 2002... CAUSATION and exposure have always been the key issues on which toxic tort cases are won or lost. Most toxic tort litigation involves diseases, such as cancer, for which there are numerous possible causes and where there is little objective,...

What punitive damages message is the U.S. Supreme Court Sending? Gore's three factors are in place, but they are only guideposts along the way to determining whether a punitive award is constitutionally infirm.
October 1, 2002... WHEN is civil punishment too much? When has a jury, swept up in the fervor of the proceedings, let its passion control in awarding punitive damages? How can an appellate court gauge from the cold print of the transcript when furor and prejudice...

Life after SLUSA: what is the fate of holding claims? The pre-emptive force of the 1998 legislation should not upset the long-held balance in the U.S. federal system by trumping all state actions.
October 1, 2002... IN AN EFFORT to protect corporations from abusive litigation, Congress passed the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (Reform Act or PSLRA) in 1995, which made federal securities fraud class actions harder to maintain on a variety of...

Suing the bastard boss: personal liability of supervisors for workplace sexual harassment: federal and state civil rights statutes are poor vehicles to reach offending supervisors. Employers themselves should discipline the transgressors.
October 1, 2002... TO WHAT extent are supervisors individually and personally liable for sexual harassment in employment under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and under state law? What are the alternate causes of action? Civil rights statutes are...

Tort of public nuisance in public entity litigation: return to the jungle? In the wake of the tobacco settlement, public entities have seized on this neither warranted nor appropriate action to avoid product liability law.
October 1, 2002... OVER THE past several decades, difficulties in proving product liability claims against individual manufacturers have caused the plaintiffs' bar to turn to alternative theories of industry-wide liability. (1) The latest theory--the tort of...

Catastrophic building failures: formulating initial strategy and organization: no one expects a building to collapse, but when that happens, counsel representing contractors or design professionals must have plans.
October 1, 2002... A CATASTROPHIC building failure necessitates immediate action. For counsel representing contractors and design professionals, there are number of issues to be addressed promptly. Because these cases almost invariably lead to complex litigation,...

How experts approach catastrophic structural and building failures: experienced technical experts will be able to meet and overcome many of the obstacles that may tend to impair their investigations.
October 1, 2002... IN JUNE 1981, elevated walkways spanning the lobby of the Hyatt Hotel in Kansas City collapsed during a Friday evening social event, resulting in more than 100 fatalities. In April 1987, a bridge carrying the New York State Thruway over...