Judge Orders Illinois to 'Pay Up'

After the state of Illinois lost its bid to ban violent games, they were slapped with the legal fees incurred by the ESA, Video Software Dealers Association, and the Illinois Retail Merchants Association. Now, the Judge has come back to collect the tab: "Turns out Judge Kennelly doesn't play chicken. As the Chicago Tribune has recently reported, Illinois has been given an ultimatum: come up with a way to pay back $510,250 by December 18th or we will figure out a way for you ... 'They have answered the plaintiffs' entreaties with what amounts to shoulder-shrugging and finger-pointing,' Kennelly wrote in an opinion. 'Specifically, they have made no real suggestion about what the plaintiffs need to do to collect what they are entitled to, largely leaving that up to one's imagination.'"

Comments

There are two problems with a "loser pays" system:

[JayBlalock]

1)It would do nothing to change the current situation where, generally, whoever has the most money wins. In fact, in a lot of cases it would add insult to injury. eg, the RIAA sues you for downloading you never did, wins in court anyway due to extended litigation and a far larger lawyer pool, and then gets to hit you with thouands (or hundreds of thousands) MORE in legal fees above the verdict. For the very rich, it could actually become an incentive to launch MORE frivolous/questionable lawsuits. Or at least remove a disincentive. If they were thinking about launching a suit with questionable ground, the idea of being able to recoup all their fees removes a reason not to do it. and 2)it would unfairly punish people in truly contentous situations. The law ALWAYS has grey areas. There are ALWAYS cases where the law is NOT clear and both parties in a suit could legitimately claim to be in the right, depending solely on interpretation of the wording of the law. The only way to make clear those muddy issues is to have a trial and to have a judge or three determine exactly what the scope of the law is. So it would, in effect, punish the public for Congress's failure to write clearly-worded laws. While I know it's a tempting thing to advocate to get rid of "frivolous" suits, there are just too many exceptions. Unless you can come up with a way to remove the power of money in the legal system, and then filter truly "frivolous" suits out from legitimate ones, all this would do is tilt the system even further against the underdogs and the disadvantaged.

Re:There are two problems with a "loser pays" syst

[BlueBlade]

Hum, as I understand it, the "loser pays" thing nearly always apply to the prosecuting party, not the defendant. At least, that's how it works in most European countries. If you sue someone and lose, you have to pay the defendant's legal fees, when it makes sense. The judge has a lot of discretion about when to apply or not this rule. There are also caps, so that an individual isn't going to pay a corporation's team of 26 lawyers. I know where I live, the caps are twice your own legal fees (roughly, lots of exceptions and such). So if you sue a corporation and lose, and you have to pay legal fees, you're only going to pay a maximum of twice your own fees.

It's not perfect, and it can be abused, yes. But there are some fairly good safeguards so that ridiculous situations like the ones you described don't happen.