8 posts tagged “lawsuit”

I had been under the impression that Red Chinese automaker BYD was a Toyota licensee, though in Autocade I stopped short of making this assertion since I had no proof of it. I did think it was odd that BYD has Mitsubishi-derived engines. It turns out there is no connection, but when you see things like the below you have to wonder.
   Two years ago, BYD issued this photograph of its upcoming model, the F1. It since renamed the car the F0, because it claimed it didn’t to get into a legal dispute with the Formula 1 people.

   Look familiar? While BYD might not want legal trouble with F1, it doesn’t seem to mind legal trouble with Toyota. Here’s a publicity photograph for the Toyota Aygo:    BYD’s general manager, Xia Zhibing, has been quoted as saying, ‘The BYD F1 is a model developed by ourselves and we hold the intellectual property right for it.’
   I guess there’s no shame at BYD, and that the ideals of truthfulness in Confucianism haven’t made a return to parts of Red China.
   Come on, Mr Xia, the only contribution BYD has made to the 2007 photo is in Adobe Photoshop! If you are going to lie about it, don’t make it so obvious by using someone else’s publicity pic first! At least use CAD to generate something new!
   Or this could be some form of getting war reparations from Japan, but that Toyota hasn’t been informed.
   And this is the company that Warren Buffett has put money in to. Somehow I think that if any BYD cars ever make it to the US as Mr Buffett intends, Toyota’s going slap a big court order on them, and not a single one will make it on to the market.
   If you look at the F3 and F6, BYD’s larger models, the doors look identical to those of the Toyota Corolla E120 and Toyota Camry XV30, but the front- and rear-end styling has been modified to resemble some of Honda’s work. I understand the dimensions are slightly different but that an expert should be able to prove objective similarity in the shapes of the doors—or enough to stop BYDs from going on sale in many markets.
   The F3 hybrid, the world’s first plug-in car, beating Chevrolet with its Volt, might have an innovative powertrain, but what is the likelihood that has come from somewhere else?
   BYD shows how out of touch parts of Red Chinese commerce is with, well, honesty and decency. I’m happy to deal with mainland Chinese firms, but only those that I am connected to by blood or referred to by family—and governments should not be signing things like free-trade agreements with the Politburo in Beijing till some of these intellectual property issues can be sorted out.
   New Zealand, of course, is a trifle too naïve, with its free-trade agreement.

I see Mr Dan Rather is suing CBS for $70 million. Wow, for that, he can buy a cranky judge a pair of pants. I originally read the article on AP, but here is a version from the folks at E! News:

In the lawsuit filed in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, Rather accuses CBS of violating his contract by purposely cutting into his allotted airtime on 60 Minutes and of committing fraud by conducting a biased inquiry into the incident that came to be known as “Rathergate,” seriously damaging his reputation in the process.

   I’ll see if I can track the statement of claim down if we get some time here, but the inquiry, from my recollection, was hardly biased.
   At the centre were the Rathergate documents (or Killian documents), which were critical of the service from a young George W. Bush in the US National Guard. They were the subject of one of my articles in Desktop many moons ago, and I was interviewed around that time about my analysis. There are a few records of that interview around the web, but here is a part that I located, which I repost as a reasonably definitive analysis of the documents’ typography:

   Dan Rather, of CBS, claims in his defense of the documents that the Times Roman typeface has been around since 1931. That is true, but the specific cut of the typeface used in the letters is post 1985. According to Mr. Yan, “Every time a font is recut for a different machine, experts are able to tell. Each laser printer, each digital file, has subtle differences.” But, Dan Rather being the professional journalist he is certainly must know more about typeface than all the leading font developers and computer script geeks in the world do.
   Mr. Yan went on to state, “Specifically, the typeface in the letters appears to be Times Roman, as licensed by Linotype of Germany, after 1985. It is not Times New Roman as Mr. Rather claims (as 'New Times Roman' [sic]), which is different again—that is very evident from the PDFs. (Hence in a lawsuit I worked on in 2001, the typeface was designed in 1954 but could only possibly have come off a Hewlett Packard LaserJet III post 1993). Despite reproduction, the proportions and sizes of the letters relative to each other remain the same and are identifiable to any true typographic expert.” Now, I bet you won't hear this full explanation on CBS’s 60 Minutes I, II, or any other number they want to throw out.
   Can CBS find a typewriter hiding somewhere in a barn outside New York City that might be able to produce this exact typeface that Mr. Rather claims was bestowed upon these typewritten documents? Quite possibly they could, but the only typewriter that could of come close to resembling a Times typeface was an IBM Selectric and those letters don’t have the Times cut Mr. Rather is defending. To further the point of the ease of telling forgery typed documents Mr. Yan stated, “Even to a layperson, the Selectric Golfball settings would seem looser (i.e. the type is not so close together).”
   Still Mr. Rather claims that other documents from the White House have superscript. “Superscript letters,” Mr. Yan shared, “on old typewriters were either (a) in the same size but raised or (b) were separate, selected letters in a cut that made them visually the same weight. The 60 Minutes documents have superscript letters that could only have been proportionally and mathematically reduced on a computer.”
   Finally according to Mr. Yan the defenders of these documents make “very fundamental errors, they can be argued against by any first-year design student studying typography. They also seem to be skewing the issue away from the typeface, which the one matter that effortlessly categorizes CBS documents as counterfeit.”

   My view is: Dan Rather was lucky that he lasted as long as he did for a story based on forged documents. He could have gone the same way as his producer, Mary Mapes, who was fired.
   What we cannot comment on, without seeing the contracts, is this additional contention in the claim:

According to Rather's complaint, he extended his tenure as anchor of the network news broadcast in 2002 with a contract guaranteeing him $6 million-per-year and top billing on the midweek 60 Minutes spin-off if he happened to leave his anchor position before March 2006.

   However, the suit does go on about his post-Rathergate experiences:

   Rather's contract entitled him to a regular correspondent's position on 60 Minutes.
   Rather had eight segments on the air in 2005, all of which, according to him, he had to fight tooth and nail for and he still ended up with half as many reports as his colleagues.
   “He was provided with very little staff support, very few of his suggested stories were approved, editing services were denied to him, and the broadcast of the few stories he was permitted to do was delayed and then played on carefully selected evenings, when low viewership was anticipated,” the lawsuit states.

   I remember some press reports at the time that we would see Rather on 60 Minutes even after he stepped down as the anchor of the flagship news programme.
   I imagine that CBS would have been careful about airing his segments because mud sticks, so as an outsider I can’t say that Rather’s claims are without merit.
   But to allege that he was made a patsy for the White House—given the network’s anti-war stance—is a bit hard to believe.
   What does surprise me is this in the E! report:

CBS … forced him to issue a public apology on Sept. 20, 2004—“despite his own personal feelings that no public apology from him was warranted.”

   Personally, I think the apology was warranted. His own reputation was saved in part because of it—but now we learn that he didn’t feel sorry for duping the American public with fake documents, Rather might have to take a hit.
   Apparently, he wasn’t responsible for the errors, according to his complaint. At the time, however, the inquiry panel found:

   He relied on a trusted producer and didn't check the story for accuracy or, apparently, even see it before he introduced it on the program, the panel said.
   CBS rushed the story on the air and then blindly defended it when holes became apparent, said the panel, which was unable to say conclusively whether memos disparaging Bush's service were real or fake.

   As the President’s opponents will tell us, there is plenty of stuff which one can use to criticize Dubya. Resorting to fakery was unnecessary, especially using something that could be so readily exposed.
   The conservative press is already fuming:

Dan Rather’s lawsuit against CBS should be dismissed, both in court and in public opinion, as a shameless and ridiculous effort to retract his on-air apologies for his smearing of President Bush with bogus National Guard documents in 2004. The New York Times reports Rather is suing CBS for what he claims is the network’s “‘biased’ and incomplete investigation of the flawed Guard broadcast.” That’s rich, since it was Rather’s reporting itself that was biased and incomplete.

   The timing of reviews of Mr Rather’s report on the Boeing Dreamliner or 787 cannot do the man much good now, either. On Wired yesterday:

By taking a cheap shot at Boeing, Dan Rather may be headed for a comeback less graceful than Britney Spears' performance at the MTV Music Awards.

Aaron Rowe at Wired, who is trained in researching materials’ engineering, investigated Rather’s 787 report. He calls those summarizing his report to be ‘misleading’, but stops short at doing the same to Mr Rather. It does seem he’s been found not guilty by Mr Rowe, who raises the possibility that ‘Perhaps this is part of an attempt by Rather to make a comeback after the debacle that resulted in his departure from CBS News.’
   That may be all it is. Rather knows how the media work. He has been part of them and he has been the subject of them. And just a few triggers can get people re-reporting things inaccurately.
   It’s certainly getting him in the headlines, to be sure. Just like another person we thought we would not hear from again.
   In that context, Rather is still a pretty shrewd chap in his mid-70s.
   And now that the President is so unpopular, through the vagaries of the MSM, Rather might actually wind up looking more innocent.

[Cross-posted] It appears that Tamsin Cooper and Trelise Cooper have settled their lawsuit and trade mark dispute as of an hour ago.
   The release reads:

As this issue has evolved, and with the significant amount of media attention it has attracted, both feel that customers now have a better understanding between the respective brands.
   Both Trelise Cooper and Tamsin Cooper have agreed that to continue with the case is neither productive nor beneficial and energies are better focused on building individual brands and their future success.
   Tamsin Cooper will continue to trade under her name in her current form without restriction and all legal proceedings will be withdrawn by Trelise Cooper.

   On my main blog first. I might check with the parties if I can comment more. I hated having to pick sides, but I had to, and not let that interfere with our working relationships. I don’t play favourites when it comes to the law.

The Washington Post knows a good blogging story when it sees one. Marc Fisher has updated his blog after the second day of the crazy judge and the missing pants saga.
   I’m sure it has crossed more than a few minds: a future where all news articles come via blogs. Scary. Though at least there are some professional journos making a good job of it.
   But it sounds like Christopher Manning, representing Custom Cleaners, is on the right track. As Mr Fisher reports:

Pearson told the defense lawyer that if the tables were turned and he were in the place of the Chung family, the owners of the Northeast Washington cleaners who purportedly lost Pearson's pants, he would have immediately written a check for $1,150—the replacement value of the Hickey Freeman suit to which the pants belonged—to provide the satisfaction that the store's “Satisfaction Guaranteed” sign promised.
   It took more than 10 minutes and numerous attempts by both Manning and Judge Judith Bartnoff to get Pearson to answer a question about whether anyone has the right to walk into any cleaners and claim $1,150 simply by saying that their suit had been lost. Finally, Pearson said that the law requires that “The merchant would have an obligation to honor their demand.“
   “So your answer is Yes?” Manning asked.
   “Yes,” Pearson said.
   The courtroom, in which it's hard to discern any support for Pearson except from his mother and her friend, broke up in laughter. Derisive laughter.
   Manning pushed ahead: Does Pearson believe that people should interpret signs “in a reasonable way?”
   “Depends on the circumstances,” Pearson said.
   Asked to answer yes or no, Pearson said, “No.”

   I have to agree with Mr Fisher’s thoughts about the presiding judge: ‘This is known as giving someone all the rope they need to hang themselves.’

Just to show how distraught he is at having the wrong trousers which necessitated him to sue a hard-working Korean couple for $54 million, Judge Roy Pearson burst into tears in court today.
   Ah, so he’s not just a vindictive prick: I happen to share the Chungs’ attorney’s viewpoint here.
   My opinion: what a goddamn phoney. It’s not like the trousers were being controlled by an evil penguin or rooster or something.
   I hope that all dry-cleaners in the Chungs’ region have little signs of Judge Pearson in their shops with, ‘Do not serve this vindictive bastard’.
   The Judge may find, to his surprise, that signs in consumer law are to be interpreted through the eyes of the reasonable person, not unreasonable, over-the-top, over-the-hill, overreacting morons, and that the quantum of damages is likely limited by that.
   Not everyone is as vindictive as he is, certainly not his colleagues on the bench who will feel this man has made a mockery of everything the US justice system is meant to stand for.

Got this in the feedback form from my main site last night, from the law firm representing a Mom-and-Pop dry-cleaning outfit. If you recall, a Korean family was being sued for $65 million by an American judge because they lost his favourite pants. It looks like they are about to have their day in court, with an amended claim from the judge after outcries. Still, he wants $54 million—that’s some amendment.
   I’ll post more if Manning & Sossamon inform me of developments. My best wishes go to Jin Nam Chung and Ki Chung. No prizes for guessing what I want to happen, especially to Judge Pearson. I think I share most people’s feelings, especially those Americans who feel Judge Pearson is giving their entire nation a bad name.

Update: $67 Million Dry Cleaning Case

On May 31, 2007, D.C. Administrative Law Judge, Roy L. Pearson, filed a Pre-Trial Brief in the Pearson v. Chung dry cleaner case. In the brief, Pearson shifts the focus of his claims from his allegedly lost pants to claims related to signage in the Chungs’ store. One sign reads “Satisfaction Guaranteed” and another reads “Same Day Service.” Pearson claims the signs are somehow misleading and apparently continues to seek over $54,000,000 in damages from the Chungs. Pearson had previously sought $67,000,000 in compensation from the Chungs.
   Christopher Manning, of the law firm Manning & Sossamon in Washington D.C., represents the Chungs and made the following statement in response to Pearson's recent actions:

"Although it is always encouraging to see claims withdrawn, it is simply baffling that Mr. Pearson continues to assert that he is entitled to tens of millions of dollars as a result of two completely harmless, completely straight-forward signs. Mr. Pearson's claims are not founded in common sense and are extraordinarily abusive towards the Chungs. As a result, the Chungs' terrible ordeal continues. The Chungs' decision to move to and build a business in America began with the classic American dream. Mr. Pearson has turned that dream into an American nightmare."

Mr. Pearson's lawsuit has cost the Chungs tens of thousands of dollars in defense costs. Donations to a defense fund set up by the Chungs may be made at www.customcleanersdefensefund.com.
   This case will be tried in courtroom 415 of the District of Columbia Superior Courthouse on June 11th and 12th beginning at 9:30am each day.
   All questions regarding the matter should be directed to the office of Manning & Sossamon at:

Manning & Sossamon PLLC
1532 Sixteenth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
(202) 387-2228 (voice)
(202) 387-2229 (fax)
chungdefense@manning-sossamon.com

Viacom is suing YouTube and trying to get its material off the video-sharing service. Mean-spirited, really. While copyright law is technically on Viacom’s side, I can’t see how YouTube would patrol it. But with the Napster case as precedent, it’s going to take Google a lot of money to fight.
   So you may as well enjoy my Mission: Impossible clips before they disappear.
   Meanwhile, the BBC is taking the opposite approach, as with numerous others. It’s put on its own material for sharing, and I’m glad they did. Below is John Simm’s video diary for the second season of Life on Mars (still five episodes away in New Zealand, but we are catching up, since BBC One took the programme off last week to broadcast the football).