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Lawyer Is Big Winner In Webcamgate Settlement
crimeandpunishment writes "The Lower Merion School District in Pennsylvania has agreed to a $610,000 settlement in two lawsuits over secret photos taken on school-issued laptops. Less than a third of that will go to the students. A total of $185,000 will be put in trust for the students. Their lawyer will receive $425,000."
Tough call for me, on this one.
On the one hand, I don't even bother participating in the various class actions suits I qualify for, because my dignity costs more than a $5 gift certificate. The lawyers in those situations should make far, far less.
In this situation, though, that really amounts to a pittance for even a small legal team, perhaps three lawyers plus their supporting staff, working for a solid two months on the case; Unfortunately, this one had no big corporate pockets to raid, and even in winning, the community (rather than the school administration) suffers. So a bigger payout that might really have given the kids something to enjoy, wouldn't have counted as a win for anyone.
Personally, I'd much rather have seen the school administration facing child porn charges, and no civil penalties involved. Then, and only then, could we have seen a "win" here.
Maybe we can apply some oil company resentment and institute a Windfall Profit Tax, just to spread the wealth around a little. Na, this would take an act of Congress, members of which are mostly lawyers.
Conservative, mod down for violating
Most IT professionals will answer computer questions for free. Hell, even when it goes beyond just answering a question and it actually involves work, a lot of us will still do it for free or at least low cost.
How about if you went to a stockbroker and said "Hey, I know this really hot stock. I can tell you which one it is, and YOU can invest YOUR money into it. On top of that, YOU can keep 70% of the profits!"
I'd like to meet any stockbroker that would go for this sort of arrangement, because I've got some pretty mean ideas for investments, and hell, I'd let them keep 75% of the profits!
-Arthur
Cave ne ante ullas catapultas ambules
It is true that a single-payer legal care system would be more fair. As it is the wealthy with infinite legal resources only have to comply with about 25% of the law, while everyone else is held to a stricter standard. The poor may receive free legal aid and public defenders, but society basically tolerates them as a criminal class anyway. Really the American middle-class is hardest squeezed by greedy legal companies and should demand government recognition of the right to legal care.
Lawyers leaching off clients is not newsworthy. Title of the article should have been "WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON IN AMERICA?". FTA "prosecutors decided not to pursue criminal charges", "took pictures of students even while they were sleeping in their own bedroom".
Prosecutors, the FBI, and Judges are taking a big dump on the constitutional rights of individuals, and you're concern is what the lawyer earns off of this??? Americans are squandering their freedom and have no right to complain when they finally wake up and realize their Democracy is but a shadow of what it once was.
Hope is the currency of fools
As a corporate IT person, I am strictly prohibited from giving out advice to other company employees for personal (non-company) equipment, because the company sees that as a potential liability. And it's also a handy excuse to not have to answer questions for everyone who neglects to run a virus scanner.
Non-employees, though (such as friends and family) not only will impose on my time, but they seem to expect me to drop everything and fix their problems instantly. If I say No, I'm a jerk. If I charge them for the time... well, then I'm an asshole. Maybe I should just offer a work exchange: "I'll fix this problem for you, but you have to mow my lawn" kind of thing :P
psmylie's dictionary: Godzillion (noun) Any number large enough to destroy Tokyo
Here is a well thought out argument for what a government takeover of the legal industry would be like http://www.singlepayerlegal.org/
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.