Blog III (FALL)

Hookem and Crookem Law Firm, L.L.C.

____________________________________________________

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Date: May 11, 2012

To:  Ambulance Chaser Task Force (J. Pilarski, A. Cyrus, D. Davis)

From: Michael J. Hookem, Senior Partner

Subject:  Palsgraf v. Trans Florida Railroad

Our client, Annie Palsgraf, underwent plastic surgery last week.  Unfortunately, the package of fireworks, carelessly dropped by a TFR-employed porter, exploded, causing rockets to shoot from the fallen cardboard box.  One such rocket hit Mrs. Palsgraf right between the eyes, knocking her several feet from the commuter rail.   Her face, nearly blown off from the rocket's impact, became the least of her worries.  Other travelers, alarmed by the explosion, started pushing and shoving, ignoring our client as she stumbled to the ground.  As more rockets continued firing from the package, commuters began running for shelter, trampling Mrs. Palsgraf in the process.

Our client wishes to sue TFR for twenty million dollars.  I believe if we use proximate cause, we will win this case. Remember, as lawyers, we must have an argument that passes the laughter test.  This particular fact pattern suggests unforeseeable events.  For that reason, we should employ Cardozo's formula for negligence.  In case you've forgotten this is the formula for negligence:

·        
-em and Crook-em Law FirmExistence of Duty

·         Breach of Duty

·         Causation and Proximate Cause

·         Injury

To determine if there was an existence of duty, we must see if the severity of harm (SH) added to the likely hood of harm (LH) is more than the cost of precaution (CP).  Next, to determine whether a breach of duty existed, we have to determine what a reasonably prudent person would have done in the defendant's shoes.  Now we need to prove causation and proximate cause.  The standard we use is more likely than not.  So in this case, we would say, "More likely than not, but for the TFR porter dropping the package, the rocket would not have flown into Mrs. Palsgraf's face."  Second to last, we must prove proximate cause.  If we are using Cardozo, we must look from the defendant's perspective and use the foresight approach.  Then we must characterize the risk before determining the zone of danger.  The risk of a rocket firing from a fallen box and hitting someone in the face is moderate during a regular work day at the station.  Finally, we determine the zone of danger.  We want the incident to be foreseeable and zone of danger to be remote enough to include the plaintiff.  Lastly, we need to say that is clear Mrs. Palsgraf sustained injuries from the flying rocket.

I have confidence that there is more than a 50% chance we can win this case.  If you have any questions, please email me at hookem@scam.com

Blog Question:

Suppose you are council for TFR.  You are working with three other attorneys.  Discuss how you would organize a rebuttal to Hookem's claims.  Look to Chapter 3 and talk about your defense using strategic planning (subject, purpose, readers, and context).  Finally, discuss what, as a group, your project outcome would be.

*For extra credit:  Above, I have given you the entire formula for negligence.  This is just how J.P. Morgan or any plaintiff's lawyer would argue before a jury.  See if you can apply the negligence formula to brief fact pattern I've laid out for you.  Let me know if you need extra help.  Good luck!

Existence

Blog II (FALL)

It's been a long time coming, but you finally finished school.  You have approximately six months to find a job before Sallie Mae asks for her alimony check. Divorced from the cozy   Reality begins to set in; you forgot about cutthroat world you left behind when you started school.   Refusing to be part of the human pile who squandered their academic careers partying, you begin researching your chosen career.  For this blog posting, you are to do the following:

(1) Name your chosen career.  If you don't have one, then pick one.

(2)Discuss what qualifications you need for that specific job:  How many years of school do you need, or what degree do you need to get your job?

(3)Find out what the average salary is for your chosen job.  Does this salary support your lifestyle?  Remember, it's not always about the money; however, unless you are already independently wealthy, your career will dictate your future lifestyle.  Will you be satisfied with that amount of money? Be honest because you are the one who has to live on it.

It is the year 2120.  The US Constitution, under the intellectual opinion of an idiot administration, has been rewritten.  However, feeling the language of our forefathers to be too archaic, Congress revamped the Constitution using an easily readable type of English. Under Federal Law, the US government requires every citizen to own a SmartPhone.  Upon changing the Constitution, the US government texted its citizens this message regarding the new First Amendment.  It reads as follows: "The rite [sic] to speak your mind freely, whether it be orally or written, must be restricted in some sense to the surrounding circumstances—whichever they may be? Whenever possible, it is best to use coded language.  Long-winded phrases are unacceptable.  Moreover, most people cannot comprehend the big words or the complex sentences of that which make all men and women think abstractly.  Such big words make for a subversive society with a free-market system—a relic of the dreaded past!  Abbreviated, coded speech symbolizes the sensible economics of modern communication.  Anyone caught using big words or sleek eloquence shall be prostituted [sic] under the full extent of Federal Law.   Do not say or write anything you would not text to a deer [sic] friend. "

XOXO,

Uncle Sam, 2120.

                                                                                                                  

        

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Center for Journalistic Communication (CJC)
_________________________________________________________________________________

Reliability and Fact-Checking Division

1473 News Worth Blvd

Creep Side, CA 93456

To:          Allison Cardeau, Assistant Editor

From:     Vincent Dawn, Editor-in-chief

Subject: ?^

Dear Allison:

4yeo: Asyk, aml,  igws < 3!  Please don't  </3.  Despite you being :-)(-: , 143 4EAE!!! 2nite, gnblfy:  \_/, l8r? Lfti >:-), :-x  Don't worry :-# T+  I'm not a :8) like the others.  O-G-<  d8:)! ) 0:-)

Afaic, wywhima.  2bcntd. @->->---
01100011011101010010000000110010011011100110100101110100011001010010110000100000010000010110110001101100011010010111001101101111011011100010111000100000010010010010000001101011011011100110111101110111001000000111100101101111011101010111001000100000011011010110000101101110001001110111001100100000011011110111010101110100001000000110111101100110001000000111010001101111011101110110111000100000011101000110111101101110011010010110011101101000011101000010111000100000001000000101011101101000011001010110111000100000011101110110010100100000011001110110010101110100001000000110001001100001011000110110101100101100001000000100100100100111011101100110010100100000011001110110111101110100001000000111011101101001011011100110010100100000011000010111010000100000011101000110100001100101001000000110100001101111011101010111001101100101001011100010000000100000010010010111010000100111001001110110110001101100001000000110001001100101001000000110000100100000011000100110010101100001011101010111010001101001011001100111010101101100001000000110111001101001011001110110100001110100001011000010000001100001011011100110010000100000011101110110010100100111011011000110110000100000011001000111001001101001011011100110101100100000011100110110111101101101011001010010000001101101011011110111001001100101001000000110111101110101011101000111001101101001011001000110010100100000011000100110010101101110011001010110000101110100011010000010000001110100011010000110010100100000011100110110100101101100011101100110010101110010001000000110110101101111011011110110111000100000011000010110111001100100001011100010111000101110000011010000101000001101000010100101100101101111011101010010000001100011011000010110111000100000011001100110100101101100011011000010000001101001011011100010000001110100011010000110010100100000011100100110010101110011011101000010111000100000001000000100001101101111011011100110011101110010011000010111010001110011001000000110100101100110001000000111100101101111011101010010000001110100011100100110000101101110011100110110110001100001011101000110010101100100001000000101011001101001011011100110001101100101011011100111010000100111011100110010000001101000011010010110010001100100011001010110111000100000011011010110010101110011011100110110000101100111011001010010111000100000001000000101100101101111011101010010011101110110011001010010000001100100011011110110111001100101001000000111001101101111011011010110010100100000011000110111001001101001011101000110100101100011011000010110110000100000011101000110100001101001011011100110101101101001011011100110011100100001001000000100100100100111011011010010000001101001011011010111000001110010011001010111001101110011011001010110010000101110001000000010000001001001011100110110111000100111011101000010000001110100011010000110010100100000010010010110111001110100011001010111001001101110011001010111010000100000011000010110111000100000011000010110110101100001011110100110100101101110011001110010000001110100011011110110111101101100001111110010000000100000010001010111100001110100011100100110000100100000011000110111001001100101011001000110100101110100001000000110011101101001011101100110010101101110001000010010000001010000011100100110111101100110001011100010000001010000 

Vincent

This one is for all the texters: What is this message saying? Is Vincent requesting something from Allison?
Is this in fact a technical document? Do you think this type of message symbolizes a breakdown in of our own communication? Would it have been better if Vincent had written this the old-fashioned way?
Explain why or why not?
To help you answer that question, think about the differences between technical writing
and regular literature as discussed in last Thursday's class. Your answer should be at least one paragraph.

For extra credit, try to decipher the coded message. Best of luck!

For this assignment, you get to be bad.  You are a debit collector for Annie May, a new student loan company.  Your company offers private student loans at almost outrageous interest rates.  You trick hapless students by offering an additional three-month forbearance on their repayment plan if they friend Annie May on Facebook.  Most of your chump-student-borrowers add you to their page, unaware of your sinister plot.  For any student who goes into default, you, as well-paid representative of Annie May, get to flood his or her Facebook page with messages regarding owed debt.   Here's what you need to do for full credit:

 (1)Write a brief action plan of how you intend to legally taunt your borrowers on their Facebook page.

(2) Compose a brief post, FB-style, in which you demand your money.  Make this as threatening as you can without crossing the harassment line.

(3)As a creditor, you have rights as well.  Discuss how your borrower might accidentally reveal his or her bad spending on Facebook?

(4)In Chapter 4, we covered ethics.  Do you think a bill collector's taunts violate any of the four social ethics discussed in the text?  Why or why not.

*Remember, this is worth 40 points.  I wish you the best of luck.

Hookem and Crookem Law Firm, L.L.C.

____________________________________________________

­­­

Date: May 11, 2012

To:  Ambulance Chaser Task Force (J. Pilarski, A. Cyrus, D. Davis)

From: Michael J. Hookem, Senior Partner

Subject:  Palsgraf v. Trans Florida Railroad

Our client, Annie Palsgraf, underwent plastic surgery last week.  Unfortunately, the package of fireworks, carelessly dropped by a TFR-employed porter, exploded, causing rockets to shoot from the fallen cardboard box.  One such rocket hit Mrs. Palsgraf right between the eyes, knocking her several feet from the commuter rail.   Her face, nearly blown off from the rocket's impact, became the least of her worries.  Other travelers, alarmed by the explosion, started pushing and shoving, ignoring our client as she stumbled to the ground.  As more rockets continued firing from the package, commuters began running for shelter, trampling Mrs. Palsgraf in the process.

Our client wishes to sue TFR for twenty million dollars.  I believe if we use proximate cause, we will win this case. Remember, as lawyers, we must have an argument that passes the laughter test.  This particular fact pattern suggests unforeseeable events.  For that reason, we should employ Cardozo's formula for negligence.  In case you've forgotten this is the formula for negligence:

·         Existence of Duty

·         Breach of Duty

·         Causation and Proximate Cause

·         Injury

To determine if there was an existence of duty, we must see if the severity of harm (SH) added to the likely hood of harm (LH) is more than the cost of precaution (CP).  Next, to determine whether a breach of duty existed, we have to determine what a reasonably prudent person would have done in the defendant's shoes.  Now we need to prove causation and proximate cause.  The standard we use is more likely than not.  So in this case, we would say, "More likely than not, but for the TFR porter dropping the package, the rocket would not have flown into Mrs. Palsgraf's face."  Second to last, we must prove proximate cause.  If we are using Cardozo, we must look from the defendant's perspective and use the foresight approach.  Then we must characterize the risk before determining the zone of danger.  The risk of a rocket firing from a fallen box and hitting someone in the face is moderate during a regular work day at the station.  Finally, we determine the zone of danger.  We want the incident to be foreseeable and the zone of danger to be remote enough to include the plaintiff.  Lastly, we need to say that it is clear Mrs. Palsgraf sustained injuries from the flying rocket.

I have confidence that there is more than a 50% chance we can win this case.  If you have any questions, please email me at hookem@scam.com

Blog Question:

Suppose you are council for TFR.  You are working with three other attorneys.  Discuss how you would organize a rebuttal to Hookem's claims.  Look to Chapter 3 and talk about your defense using strategic planning (subject, purpose, readers, and context).  Finally, discuss what, as a group, your project outcome would be.

*For extra credit:  Above, I have given you the entire formula for negligence.  This is just how J.P. Morgan or any plaintiff's lawyer would argue before a jury.  See if you can apply the negligence formula to brief fact pattern I've laid out for you.  Let me know if you need extra help.  Good luck!