"Schools are largely insulated from lawsuits..."
Schools should make school safe for children by teaching students and adults better ways to deal with problems. Instead, schools give away taxpayer dollars to lawyers and insurance companies to cover up wrongdoing and mistakes.
More families are taking school bullies to court
Feb. 17, 2006 San Diego Union Tribune
Click HERE to see the original article.
Excerpts:
More families are taking school bullies to court
By Chris Seper
NEWHOUSE NEWS SERVICE
February 17, 2006
School bullies who get a trip to the principal's office could also find themselves in front of a judge.
More parents whose children are beaten or bullied are suing their attackers' families or schools, according to court filings and experts on school violence. Some want money to pay for broken noses or more severe injuries. Others hope a lawsuit provides a sense of justice they didn't get from criminal trials and school discipline.
Violence-prevention centers also are hearing from more parents about whether to take schools and bullies' families to court.
“A lot of parents who take steps to a civil case believe the criminal justice system didn't work,” said William Lassiter, manager for North Carolina's Center for the Prevention of School Violence, one of the country's first school-safety agencies.
The center received one or two calls a week from concerned parents before the 1999 Columbine school shootings. Now it gets about a half-dozen daily. About a quarter of those callers eventually discuss a lawsuit because police and school officials didn't help them, Lassiter said.
“Somebody has got to get serious about this,” said Mike Duitch, whose family lost a suit in 2001 against the city schools in Canton, Ohio. Duitch's son, Nathan, was badly beaten by a group of students during his freshman year, an incident that the Duitches said was part of a school-sanctioned day of hazing.
No one – from the FBI to the U.S. Department of Education to anti-bullying advocates – tracks school violence lawsuits, but anecdotal evidence and interviews suggest civil courts are wading into these murky conflicts as the country focuses more on bullying.
Rachel Mertz tormented Emma Silverblatt during eighth grade at Mayfield High School, according to the Silverblatt family's lawsuit in Cuyahoga County (Ohio) Common Pleas Court. Emma, who is Jewish, said Rachel would threaten her and use anti-Semitic insults.
But Rachel, who like Emma was 13 at the time, told police that Emma called her names and regularly slapped her when they rode the school bus. Neither girl told the school, and each denies picking on the other.
Rachel confronted Emma at Emma's second-floor locker one afternoon in March 2004, the suit said. Emma tried to move Rachel out of the way and Rachel grabbed Emma by the hair. Rachel told police that Emma started kicking her.
Then Rachel dragged Emma to the ground, punched her and banged her head against the school's tile floor several times, calling out insults as she hit her, according to a Mayfield police report and the lawsuit.
Mayfield High suspended Rachel for five days, and she left the school soon after. Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court ordered her to mediation, a type of court counseling meant to work through youth problems.
The Silverblatts want $50,000 for their daughter's head and neck injuries, blurred vision and mental anguish, which required “extensive medical care,” according to the suit, which is pending. However, Emma Silverblatt's main purpose in suing is that “the community have an opportunity to hear what happened,” said her attorney, Robert F. DiCello.
The Mertzes' attorneys did not return phone calls seeking comment, nor did Denise Striker, Rachel Mertz's mother. The Silverblatt family declined to comment.
A settlement hearing is scheduled for March.
Child advocates don't think civil lawsuits would deter future fights or bullying.
There would be less litigation and a better long-term result if schools and juvenile systems created programs that gave attacked students a sense of justice, said Lassiter...
Showing posts with label Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse (CALA). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse (CALA). Show all posts
Friday, January 11, 2008
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Being a mom is NOT what makes Lorie Zapf a fan of defense lawyers
An open letter to Lorie Zapf:
I was fascinated by Emily Alpert's article in Voice of San Diego about Lorie Zapf. Emily wrote:
"Lorie Zapf, president of the [Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse/CALA] group's San Diego chapter, said schools are falling prey to a system that makes it too easy to file lawsuits.
"'Right now anybody can file a lawsuit ... It is so incredibly easy, and there aren't big repercussions for bringing frivolous suits,' Zapf said. 'Then the schools are stuck defending themselves.
"'All that money just makes me sick,' she said, 'being a mom.'"
(The above is from Voice of San Diego, http://voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2008/01/05/this_just_in/595litigation010308.txt)
All that money makes me sick, too, Lorie.
But perhaps you failed to notice that the report from your own organization shows that the abusers of the taxpayers are the school lawyers, who took $10.7 million from San Diego Unified School District budget between 2005 and 2007.
On the other hand, victims received settlements or verdicts of less than one-fourth of that amount: $2.5 million. Some worthy victims received nothing at all except a second mortgage to pay lawyers.
For example, James "Ted" Carter mortgaged his house to pay Veronica Aguilar and her firm, Holben and Associates. A jury awarded him $1.2 million for doing what any mom would want a teacher to do: reporting that a coach had told a boy to take a body-building substance which caused the boy's kidneys to fail. The school did nothing to the coach who advised taking the substance. But then Escondido School District do allowed the wife of the coach who pushed substances to fire the teacher who reported the problem. The jury was right, but California's Court of Appeal is so in favor of business and the status quo in the power structure that it overturned the decision, saying the school.
Who was the lawyer against James Carter? Daniel Shinoff, partner of Leslie Devaney, a past board member of CALA and continuing presence on CALA's TV show.
Schools are disaster areas largely because bad coaches and bad administrators are protected by defense lawyers, and good teachers and administrators are fired because they got in somebody's way by telling the truth.
I don't think most mothers would agree with you, Lorie, if they knew the whole story.
Education defense lawyers are hired to deprive citizens, particularly those who are victimized in a school setting, of their right to protection of the law.
Should the justice system be partisan? Attorney General Anthony Gonzalez thought so. Apparently so do you.
You are outraged that any ordinary person--absolutely anyone--has a right to petition for redress of grievances.
Shocking! Who do they think they are, Americans?
You clearly think plaintiffs should have certain qualifications. And I'll bet you think those qualifications should be determined by the Republican party.
You don't think Leslie Devaney's current lawsuit against me for defamation is frivolous, do you, Lorie?
Your clearly partisan concerns have nothing to do with being a mom. The status quo is harmful to students, and your efforts to undermine the public's respect for plaintiffs are even more harmful to students. Why not just admit that defense lawyers and insurance companies are your backers, and that you are simply a partisan Republican and Member of the San Diego County Republican Party County Central Committee who is using motherhood to spread cynical propaganda?
I was fascinated by Emily Alpert's article in Voice of San Diego about Lorie Zapf. Emily wrote:
"Lorie Zapf, president of the [Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse/CALA] group's San Diego chapter, said schools are falling prey to a system that makes it too easy to file lawsuits.
"'Right now anybody can file a lawsuit ... It is so incredibly easy, and there aren't big repercussions for bringing frivolous suits,' Zapf said. 'Then the schools are stuck defending themselves.
"'All that money just makes me sick,' she said, 'being a mom.'"
(The above is from Voice of San Diego, http://voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2008/01/05/this_just_in/595litigation010308.txt)
All that money makes me sick, too, Lorie.
But perhaps you failed to notice that the report from your own organization shows that the abusers of the taxpayers are the school lawyers, who took $10.7 million from San Diego Unified School District budget between 2005 and 2007.
On the other hand, victims received settlements or verdicts of less than one-fourth of that amount: $2.5 million. Some worthy victims received nothing at all except a second mortgage to pay lawyers.
For example, James "Ted" Carter mortgaged his house to pay Veronica Aguilar and her firm, Holben and Associates. A jury awarded him $1.2 million for doing what any mom would want a teacher to do: reporting that a coach had told a boy to take a body-building substance which caused the boy's kidneys to fail. The school did nothing to the coach who advised taking the substance. But then Escondido School District do allowed the wife of the coach who pushed substances to fire the teacher who reported the problem. The jury was right, but California's Court of Appeal is so in favor of business and the status quo in the power structure that it overturned the decision, saying the school.
Who was the lawyer against James Carter? Daniel Shinoff, partner of Leslie Devaney, a past board member of CALA and continuing presence on CALA's TV show.
Schools are disaster areas largely because bad coaches and bad administrators are protected by defense lawyers, and good teachers and administrators are fired because they got in somebody's way by telling the truth.
I don't think most mothers would agree with you, Lorie, if they knew the whole story.
Education defense lawyers are hired to deprive citizens, particularly those who are victimized in a school setting, of their right to protection of the law.
Should the justice system be partisan? Attorney General Anthony Gonzalez thought so. Apparently so do you.
You are outraged that any ordinary person--absolutely anyone--has a right to petition for redress of grievances.
Shocking! Who do they think they are, Americans?
You clearly think plaintiffs should have certain qualifications. And I'll bet you think those qualifications should be determined by the Republican party.
You don't think Leslie Devaney's current lawsuit against me for defamation is frivolous, do you, Lorie?
Your clearly partisan concerns have nothing to do with being a mom. The status quo is harmful to students, and your efforts to undermine the public's respect for plaintiffs are even more harmful to students. Why not just admit that defense lawyers and insurance companies are your backers, and that you are simply a partisan Republican and Member of the San Diego County Republican Party County Central Committee who is using motherhood to spread cynical propaganda?
Friday, January 04, 2008
Is this why Carl Cohn is leaving in disgust? CALA works to make sure that school money goes to lawyers, not students and employees
Defense lawyers for school districts are bleeding taxpayers dry, instead of telling districts to obey the law and settle cases of wrongdoing before litigation begins, WHICH WOULD RESULT IN A HUGE NET SAVINGS FOR SCHOOL DISTRICTS.
Ironically, these facts are twisted by defense lawyers who work with organizations like CALA (Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse) to bring about legislation to limit just payments to injured students and employees harmed by wrongful actions.
But at the same time, these individuals work TO KEEP UNLIMITED TAX DOLLARS FLOWING TO SCHOOL DEFENSE LAWYERS and the insurance companies who employ them.
The San Diego Union Tribune, with its usual slanted reporting, states in today's paper, "San Diego city schools spent $1.4 million on verdicts and settlements and $3.2 million on outside counsel in fiscal 2005, according to the [CALA] report. That money could have purchased 1.8 million packs of crayons."
What the San Diego Union Tribune article doesn't say:
The entire $3.2 million wasted on ouside counsel for San Diego schools could almost certainly have been saved if the $1.4 million of payouts had been spent on settlements to injured parties BEFORE the lawsuits were ever filed.
This is what the tort claims act is supposed to accomplish: to give public entities a chance to settle claims before they are filed in court.
But the insurance companies who have their hands deep into the pockets of school districts instruct schools to deny ALL tort claims.
Insurance companies want tax money to go to them, instead of students and employees who have been harmed, even though they have to violate the law to do it. This is how law firms like Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz and Parham & Rajcic obtain millions of dollars meant for kids and teachers and administrators.
Ironically, these facts are twisted by defense lawyers who work with organizations like CALA (Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse) to bring about legislation to limit just payments to injured students and employees harmed by wrongful actions.
But at the same time, these individuals work TO KEEP UNLIMITED TAX DOLLARS FLOWING TO SCHOOL DEFENSE LAWYERS and the insurance companies who employ them.
The San Diego Union Tribune, with its usual slanted reporting, states in today's paper, "San Diego city schools spent $1.4 million on verdicts and settlements and $3.2 million on outside counsel in fiscal 2005, according to the [CALA] report. That money could have purchased 1.8 million packs of crayons."
What the San Diego Union Tribune article doesn't say:
The entire $3.2 million wasted on ouside counsel for San Diego schools could almost certainly have been saved if the $1.4 million of payouts had been spent on settlements to injured parties BEFORE the lawsuits were ever filed.
This is what the tort claims act is supposed to accomplish: to give public entities a chance to settle claims before they are filed in court.
But the insurance companies who have their hands deep into the pockets of school districts instruct schools to deny ALL tort claims.
Insurance companies want tax money to go to them, instead of students and employees who have been harmed, even though they have to violate the law to do it. This is how law firms like Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz and Parham & Rajcic obtain millions of dollars meant for kids and teachers and administrators.
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