You Be the Judge

[TGJB]

Appeal - Thoro-Graph v James Lauffer

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[HP]

That Don Brauer is some stand-up guy.  

HP

[Rich Curtis]

Post should be titled \"Lauffer Curve.\"

[SoCalMan2]

Very much enjoyed reading the brief!  Good Luck!!  That guy seems like a real bad guy.   I agree with the brief\'s point that if this guy gets away with only paying $25k then everybody in the world (or at least Kentucky) would start cheating service providers just to get a special court ordered discount. If $25k is supposed to be reasonable value because that is what other people normally charge, then the lower court judge is actually aiding and abetting the theft of services that he found occurred.

Imagine if somebody did not pay Wachtel Lipton for legal services rendered?  Does anybody think that the reasonable value of Wachtel Lipton\'s time is the rates that Jacoby & Meyers and the rest of the firms in the yellow pages charge?  Of course not.  Nobody should be able to go to the best service provider and then say they should only have to pay what average service providers charge.  It is ludicrous and the brief is right that it will only encourage people to try to steal services from the best so they can later get a discount from the judge. (If this were the law of the land, all clients would actually benefit from trying to steal from their lawyers).

To find that Thorograph was cheated out of payment for its services and then decide that the just payment for the stolen services is an unprecedented enormous discount is just the height of capriciousness -- it is giving convicted thieves a huge discount on something they stole while law abiding customers have no way to get the same discount for the same product (short of turning criminal). Sheesh.

[SoCalMan2]

HP Wrote:
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> That Don Brauer is some stand-up guy.  
>
> HP


I agree

[TGJB]

That\'s the public policy argument, all right. I actually used the same analogy about legal fees in making the case to my lawyers originally.

You would think Kentucky courts would want to protect the thousands of people in the thoroughbred industry who would get screwed regularly if this becomes precedent. We\'ll see.

[Flighted Iron]

\"The kill of the pack is the meat of the pack. Ye must eat where it lies;
And no one may carry away of that meat to his lair, or he dies.\"The Law for the Wolves  
 
 
 by Rudyard Kipling

mankind has twisted justice.lauffer is lucky he\'s not on all fours.

[TGJB]

Flighted-- you got me where I live this time, big Kipling fan.

[Leamas57]

Great movie called Lakeboat. It\'s actually  based on early David Mamet play. Awesome cast. This stanza from a Kipling war poem figured in the movie.

The Mine-Sweepers --By Rudyard Kipling
 
DAWN off the Foreland—the young flood making
Jumbled and short and steep—
Black in the hollows and bright where it's breaking—
Awkward water to sweep.
"Mines reported in the fairway,
Warn all traffic and detain.
Sent up Unity, Claribel, Assyrian, Stormcock, and Golden Gain."

Leamas

[TGJB]

This is the final word (unless it ends up going to the Kentucky Supreme Court). I\'m not going to post their cross appeal and I\'m not going to characterize that bunch of _____ because I might get in trouble. We answered everything they said in this brief.

[SoCalMan2]

Pardon my ignorance if I missed something -- but weren\'t we expecting a decision on appeal about 4 or 5 months ago?

[TGJB]

Yeah. They give out decisions on Fridays at 10:00 A.M., the past 4 months of Thursday nights have been tough. We did find out they sent the trial record back in late September, so presumably someone is writing the decision.

Go to the Kentucky Court Of Appeals \"Minutes\" section. They handle some UNBELIEVABLE cases, incredibly entertaining. In the last two weeks they\'ve had a white supremicist case (you don\'t hear too much about Grand Cyclops\' around here) and a case featuring an atheist group against the Dept. of Homeland Security. About a month ago there was a case where Footnote One said (paraphrasing) \"His daughter was apparently killed in an unrelated incident where she tried to take another woman\'s unborn child\".

I thought my case was really interesting until I read that stuff...

[SoCalMan2]

TGJB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yeah. They give out decisions on Fridays at 10:00
> A.M., the past 4 months of Thursday nights have
> been tough. We did find out they sent the trial
> record back in late September, so presumably
> someone is writing the decision.
>
> Go to the Kentucky Court Of Appeals \"Minutes\"
> section. They handle some UNBELIEVABLE cases,
> incredibly entertaining. In the last two weeks
> they\'ve had a white supremicist case (you don\'t
> hear too much about Grand Cyclops\' around here)
> and a case featuring an atheist group against the
> Dept. of Homeland Security. About a month ago
> there was a case where Footnote One said
> (paraphrasing) \"His daughter was apparently killed
> in an unrelated incident where she tried to take
> another woman\'s unborn child\".
>
> I thought my case was really interesting until I
> read that stuff...

Apologies if I have missed anything (am currently in Mongolia).....Any word on this case?  Isn\'t it highly unusual how long this case is taking?  Any reason to think there is anything going on behind the scenes?  Are all the judges the same?  has there been any changes on the bench?

[Rich Curtis]

SoCalMan wrote:

\"am currently in Mongolia\"

Who isn\'t?

Inner or Outer?

[SoCalMan2]

Rich Curtis Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> SoCalMan wrote:
>
> \"am currently in Mongolia\"
>
> Who isn\'t?
>
> Inner or Outer?


Outer....Ulaan Baatar....staying at the Ramada.....Election Day today....city quiet.