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oliveoil posted:Friend of mine is suing a doctor for malpractice. From what he told me, the doctor gave him at best unintentionally disastrous advice, at worst deliberately tried to disable him. Resulted in permanent, incurable, and total destruction of a key factor in basic human happiness. I don't know the general over/under on malpractice, but as soon as you are in front of a jury you've got to convince a bunch of people that she's not credible and that's trickier. It may have taken the case from reasonably close call to not worth the effort
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Dec 7, 2022 17:10
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I guess what's weird to me is why would the plaintiff's credibility even be a factor in the trial. Idk how it works in the US, but when I've had to deal with torts claims there's expert witness to give opinion on whether the plaintiff has been significantly disabled, and whether the physician followed best practices. I can only imagine a non-expert witness testimony's mattering at all if we were talking about strictly psychological trauma like "I don't have any visible scars or injuries, but I can't sleep at night after what happened to me", and even then a psychologist or psychiatrist would have to give their expert opinion on that.
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Dec 7, 2022 18:17
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oliveoil posted:Resulted in permanent, incurable, and total destruction of a key factor in basic human happiness. Tell us what’s wrong with he dick
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Dec 7, 2022 18:20
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oliveoil posted:Friend of mine is suing a doctor for malpractice. From what he told me, the doctor gave him at best unintentionally disastrous advice, at worst deliberately tried to disable him. Resulted in permanent, incurable, and total destruction of a key factor in basic human happiness. only one of the three things you've described as reasons not to believe the wife goes to credibility and would even be admissible to impeach her testimony in any event: she would testify (to the extent she can testify from personal knowledge, from how you're trying to be vague and the other details i assume the problem is "his dick doesn't work anymore" and i expect the wife will be able to assert personal knowledge of if it used to work or not) and he could try to impeach her testimony, but it would certainly lower his chances of winning evilweasel fucked around with this message at 18:24 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 18:22
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Yeah basically he cannot climax anymore following a surgery that he says mutilated his dick in a way he insists any other surgeon would say was done completely wrong. He can physically have sex but not finish. I figured he should be able to just have other surgeons say it was hosed up and maybe his psychiatrist or counselor could chime in. Instead it sounds like the whole thing is about to fall apart for him. It blows my mind that one lady's testimony could change his lawyer's mind from thinking it's an easy $1-2m to wanting to settle for maybe 10-20% of that. dpkg chopra posted:I guess what's weird to me is why would the plaintiff's credibility even be a factor in the trial. Idk how it works in the US, but when I've had to deal with torts claims there's expert witness to give opinion on whether the plaintiff has been significantly disabled, and whether the physician followed best practices. i don't know how any of that works either but that's what I assumed. And even if the ex wife is credible then I don't see why he can't bring in two women he's dated who can support him. oliveoil fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 18:36
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"oh so you're saying he can go for hours, sounds like he wasn't harmed but actually the doctor did him a favor" when you start throwing in more factors you start multiplying the amount of work that needs to be done to control for those factors and theoretically keep things on track and it maybe gets to the point where you're better off accepting the settlement instead of paying the lawyer to spend hours prepping your exgirlfriends
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Dec 7, 2022 18:43
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Oh, maybe that's why his lawyer wants to settle. He's working on contingency, so things are getting more complicated and he's not getting paid for it?
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Dec 7, 2022 18:45
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I'm not sure the legal standard for how many jurors the defense needs to fool but I'm sure he is and weighing that probability against the workload.
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Dec 7, 2022 18:48
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oliveoil posted:Oh, maybe that's why his lawyer wants to settle. He's working on contingency, so things are getting more complicated and he's not getting paid for it? That's starting to sound about right.
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Dec 7, 2022 18:49
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oliveoil posted:Yeah basically he cannot climax anymore following a surgery that he says mutilated his dick in a way he insists any other surgeon would say was done completely wrong. He can physically have sex but not finish. He is not certain to lose. He is more likely to lose, and the amount he can get in settlement is basically a risk-adjusted value of how much money is the case worth. So if the case is worth $1m if he wins, and before he had a 90% chance of winning, then a reasonable settlement is around $900k. If his lawyer now views it as a toss-up if he wins, it's worth $500k. If his lawyer now views it as a toss-up if he wins and his wife's testimony may lower his likely damages to $500k, then the reasonable settlement is around $250k. This is not including the additional costs of trial, etc. Those expert doctor witnesses don't testify for free (or a cut of the award, because that wrecks their credibility). He can absolutely roll the dice anyway and hope he wins. Yes, he can bring in expert medical testimony to support his claims, and that will be reasonably compelling. But when it comes to a sexual disorder there's just so much poo poo a vengeful ex-wife willing to lie can say to torpedo the claim that I can see why the lawyer is panicking.
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Dec 7, 2022 18:50
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gently caress, that's awful. I guess the best I can do is buy him a drink the next time I see him. Sad to see this woman is still able to show up and gently caress with him in ridiculous and unexpected ways. Thank you all for explaining why it's turned out like this.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:02
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What sort of dick surgery was he getting
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Dec 7, 2022 19:03
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Fun fact: in Florida you have to get an expert's opinion that there was malpractice prior to filing suit and the statute of limitations is two years. This bit of "tort reform" has put a cost of entry to medmal suits at $3-5k, so you either need to have that money ready to go presuit or have a strong enough case that an attorney will front those costs on contingency.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:06
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Mr. Nice! posted:Fun fact: in Florida you have to get an expert's opinion that there was malpractice prior to filing suit and the statute of limitations is two years. This fact does not feel very fun at all.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:09
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oliveoil posted:gently caress, that's awful. I guess the best I can do is buy him a drink the next time I see him. Sad to see this woman is still able to show up and gently caress with him in ridiculous and unexpected ways. that level of collapse in the case from $1-2m to 100k-400k seems overreacting to me, but I don't know the facts and the costs involved if i were him i'd sit down and go over the issue in detail with the lawyer and go over what the lawyer is concerned will be said, things that might exist to disprove it, and come up with an idea how you'd litigate it if you went forward, and then start deciding on risk-adjustment
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Dec 7, 2022 19:27
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Traffic court chat: I have a distinct memory of a FL traffic court, and a gentleman arguing against the citation he got for impersonating an emergency vehicle. He flashed his brights, as folks are known to do, as a warning to oncoming traffic of the upcoming speed trap. Another officer then cited him for flashing lights = emergency vehicle. That seems a tenuous argument by the state at best, but would it reach the level of a 1st amendment violation? (Not that taking a traffic ticket to the supreme court would be remotely worth it.) The judge basically told him to eat poo poo and pay the fine.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:29
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toplitzin posted:Traffic court chat: I'd happily make that argument and I'd expect to get about the same result from it. Maybe win on appeal but why bother?
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Dec 7, 2022 19:31
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toplitzin posted:The judge basically told him to eat poo poo and pay the fine. Yeah, an unspoken rule here, as a lay person, seems to be "are the police considered a revenue net positive for the local government," and "do you have a lawyer." If the answers are respectively yes and no, then don't even bother trying to do anything more than making a deal with the local prosector to simplify their life for a larger fine but lower insurance premiums. Volmarias fucked around with this message at 20:22 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 20:19
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Traffic court is a crap shoot that depends on locality. I've seen judges simply dismiss cases when the defendant showed up dressed in their sunday best and offer a sincere apology. I've seen judges dismiss cases because they're creepy old men staring at women's chests (looking at you Dave). Totally depends and there is no universal rule. Stop telling people there are universal rules to traffic court!
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Dec 7, 2022 20:59
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evilweasel posted:that level of collapse in the case from $1-2m to 100k-400k seems overreacting to me, but I don't know the facts and the costs involved Hypothetically, if a lady went to a surgeon for a labiaplasty and woke up with a clitoridectomy, aka female genital mutilation, a practice banned in some places and typically performed only to deliberately ruin sexual enjoyment, would that still seem like overreacting? If you go to a surgeon because you don't like the way your balls look, or hell maybe you just want your foreskin gone, and you wake up to find half the head of your dick is missing, I don't see how even God himself could credibly testify against you. I feel like you should just be able to pull your pants down and have a doctor shine a flashlight on you and then everyone gasps and you're done. Goddamn it, seeing someone get away with this poo poo makes me so angry. I'll ask if they sat with their lawyer and had them explain what they're afraid of but I'm getting increasingly sad that this is gonna be yet another person I know who got their life ruined by some rear end in a top hat completely legally with virtually no consequence.
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Dec 7, 2022 21:34
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oliveoil posted:Hypothetically, if a lady went to a surgeon for a labiaplasty and woke up with a clitoridectomy, aka female genital mutilation, a practice banned in some places and typically performed only to deliberately ruin sexual enjoyment, would that still seem like overreacting? I think you misunderstand what is being described as overreaction, which is the 600k-1900k theoretical payout reduction Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 22:08 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 22:04
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No, that's exactly what I'm referring to. I'm trying to figure out if there's a possibility their lawyer might be overreacting more than evilweasel wondered after clarifying that this was objectively a mutilation, not something that might visually look fine to an observer while ultimately requiring belief in the patient's word that something wasn't right. Like any way you look at it, it's objectively mutilation. For a woman it would be mutilation by definition. For a man, it would be mutilation by... Just looking at it. And I guess what I'm really wondering is at what point one should consider seeking a second legal opinion or if that's even feasible at this point. I don't want to see them give up and then years later find out their lawyer's concerns were invalid. Happened to a buddy of mine who was permanently disabled after a car accident. Lawyer said nothing could be done since the offender stole the car. Years after the statute of limitations expired, it turned out there was no evidence of the car being stolen. Really don't want to see that one again. oliveoil fucked around with this message at 22:24 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 22:10
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oliveoil posted:If you go to a surgeon because you don't like the way your balls look, or hell maybe you just want your foreskin gone, and you wake up to find half the head of your dick is missing, I don't see how even God himself could credibly testify against you. You haven't really given us enough detail. If the guy had a helmet atop his wounded warrior before the surgery to deal with a ball cancer, and did not afterwards, that seems pretty important and physically obvious. Unless there's reason to suspect they may have already doffed their dong defender before the surgery, which seems to sound like the angle they're going for here in their defense? If there's a chance that they could argue that the emperor had no hat before the surgery and there's no evidence otherwise, your lawyer is probably taking that into account in a calculation. This is why your friend needs to bring a parade of ex girlfriends to testify that he was strapped in for a high dive, that the court may be impressed by his sexual prowess that clearly existed even after the divorce. Alternately, introduce your friend to the concept of pegging, and prostate stimulation as a concept, not by sticking something up his rear end unless you're both down with that in which case go live your best life
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Dec 7, 2022 22:45
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drat. I guess no matter how obvious something seems, the other side can think of something to raise doubt. That's so depressing but I guess it makes sense. Thank you. Sadly, I don't know any more details than that. Patient showed up for a simple cosmetic procedure, woke up missing the important parts. "Prove you had anything to remove in the first place" is not a defense I'd have expected but oh well. Still infuriating to think someone gets away with this. Can't imagine what I'd do if it happened to me.
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Dec 7, 2022 22:56
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oliveoil posted:No, that's exactly what I'm referring to. I'm trying to figure out if there's a possibility their lawyer might be overreacting more than evilweasel wondered after clarifying that this was objectively a mutilation, not something that might visually look fine to an observer while ultimately requiring belief in the patient's word that something wasn't right. What I am describing as a (potential) overreaction is the lawyer's adjustment of the likelihood of success of the claim based on that this guy's ex-wife may lie under oath to try to torpedo his claim. What the lawyer is doing there is not judging what ought to happen, but what the likely range of outcomes when this is presented to a jury. I mean, obviously, if the guy has a legitimate claim and what the damages are is unaffected by his ex-wife lying - she is lying, after all - but what a jury thinks about if he has a legitimate claim and what the damages are could absolutely be affected by his wife lying (since, once of the things the jury decides is if she is lying). Because I think the lawyer may be overreacting is why I'm suggesting they work through the whole situation at a minimum. I don't want to say the lawyer is overreacting because I do not know the facts, but that dramatic a change in settlement posture warrants a lot of thinking through. As a practical matter, for a contingency lawsuit, it's hard to get a good second opinion because if you fire your existing contingency lawyer they can assert an entitlement to get paid that competes with the new guy's entitlement to get paid.
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Dec 7, 2022 23:11
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Isn't the ex-wife rather explicitly committing blackmail? Can't the lawyer like depose her or cast one of those other spells and get her on the record and then when she testifies if she testifies differently use the previously created enchantment to impeach her testimony and potentially refer her for prosecution?
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Dec 7, 2022 23:42
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lmao my guy, are you one of my clients why don't we just countersue for harassment????
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Dec 7, 2022 23:48
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pseudanonymous posted:Isn't the ex-wife rather explicitly committing blackmail? Possibly. But this all takes a whole bunch of expensive legal work to fight someone generally kicking up a cloud of dust while calling the guy a who wants a million dollars greedy.
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Dec 7, 2022 23:50
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toplitzin posted:That seems a tenuous argument by the state at best, but would it reach the level of a 1st amendment violation? (Not that taking a traffic ticket to the supreme court would be remotely worth it.) There is some precedent, although it's neither decisive nor federal. It would be entertaining to make that argument on appeal, but not worth it unless an eccentric bored civil rights lawyer decided to do it for free, for fun.
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Dec 8, 2022 01:36
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pseudanonymous posted:Isn't the ex-wife rather explicitly committing blackmail? You have defeated the Evil Wife. She crumples to the ground. >> search wife You rifle through her pockets. You find a small rock, a bit of string, and chapstick. You take the chapstick. >> use chapstick The chapstick is empty.
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Dec 8, 2022 02:57
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Legal advice thread: certified mail yourself a dick pick just in case
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Dec 8, 2022 05:36
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evilweasel posted:He is not certain to lose. He is more likely to lose, and the amount he can get in settlement is basically a risk-adjusted value of how much money is the case worth. So if the case is worth $1m if he wins, and before he had a 90% chance of winning, then a reasonable settlement is around $900k. If his lawyer now views it as a toss-up if he wins, it's worth $500k. If his lawyer now views it as a toss-up if he wins and his wife's testimony may lower his likely damages to $500k, then the reasonable settlement is around $250k. Are you oversimplifying for the thread or is that how you actually calculate reasonable settlement offers? Honestly curious. We go heavily case-by-case basis but certainly my own mental risk math isn't that precise.
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Dec 8, 2022 11:28
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That’s very similar to the calculus when I did plaintiff’s work on contingency. Defense lawyers are doing similar math although they have a much lower presented value regardless of their internal calculations. Lawyers working on contingency have to think about these things because they are sometimes fronting tens of thousands in costs/expenses before ever getting paid. Lawsuits can last years before they reach a payment. A judgment of $80k for your party could easily vanish after appeal in a couple of years. The only guaranteed payout on a reasonable schedule is a settlement. To get that settlement, one side or the other needs to convince the other party they’re getting the most they can out of the deal. The defense will do as much as possible to drive that number down while the plaintiff’s side will do as much as possible to push that number up. Every day that a case doesn’t settle costs both sides a lot of extra money.
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Dec 8, 2022 14:57
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How does that work with people like trump that outright refuse to pay their lawyer after the work is done?
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Dec 8, 2022 15:03
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Azuth0667 posted:How does that work with people like trump that outright refuse to pay their lawyer after the work is done? They're working pro bono for the chance to get into the MAGA grift ecosystem?
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Dec 8, 2022 15:28
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Azuth0667 posted:How does that work with people like trump that outright refuse to pay their lawyer after the work is done? No lawyer is working for Trump on contingency (except Rudy) because they know he's terrible about paying his bills. Also, Trump has hundreds of millions of campaign slush that he can't directly just pay into his own pockets so he uses that money to pay his legal bills.
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Dec 8, 2022 15:41
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Volmarias posted:You haven't really given us enough detail. If the guy had a helmet atop his wounded warrior before the surgery to deal with a ball cancer, and did not afterwards, that seems pretty important and physically obvious. Unless there's reason to suspect they may have already doffed their dong defender before the surgery, which seems to sound like the angle they're going for here in their defense? If there's a chance that they could argue that the emperor had no hat before the surgery and there's no evidence otherwise, your lawyer is probably taking that into account in a calculation. Beautiful. It's clear you feel very proud of this post, but I just want to say that that pride is entirely justified.
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Dec 8, 2022 17:53
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Nice piece of fish posted:Are you oversimplifying for the thread or is that how you actually calculate reasonable settlement offers? Honestly curious. We go heavily case-by-case basis but certainly my own mental risk math isn't that precise. That's the basic way lawyers usually do it in my experience and the basic model we usually use . You've got to remember lawyers are bad at math so it has to be simple. Other factors can go into it - size of insurance coverage, costs of litigation - but the basic idea is a risk-adjusted value of the litigation. More bells and whistles is just more to argue about, so even when we have financial advisors creating multi-page models to justify settlement offers/demands it just generally boils down to risk-adjusted value (or, the number that can be achieved is being backed into and justified that way).
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Dec 8, 2022 19:43
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evilweasel posted:You've got to remember lawyers are bad at math so it has to be simple. Do not underestimate the level of bad at math we're talking about here - I've watched a (respected high-end) lawyer gently caress up "what's the expected value of a 25% chance of a win on a $2,000,000 case."
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Dec 8, 2022 19:47
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Also the tremendous uncertainty involved in litigation covers up a ton of "bad at math" sins. So like sure, in a personal injury case you can get an exact figure for current medical expenses, but future medical expenses are a handwave by an expert that will be "accurate" to approximately the half-million dollar figure over the course of ten years, if you're lucky. And pain and suffering damages are completely unpredictable. So you get a vague ballpark on those, you get a vague ballpark on what you think your chances of success are (handicapping for inherent jury unpredictability, witness issues, etc. etc.) and do some napkin math to come up with a gut feel on what a case is worth. And then you tell your client that this figure is a highly technical settlement estimate based on an expert witness's damage calculation multiplied by your precise estimate of a chance of success. And then you backtrack and do a ton of CYA to avoid a client later telling me "you promised I would win exactly $2.251824 million!"
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