Lawyer Spends $10,000 Fighting $65 Ticket

WNBC-TV, Channel 4 ^ | 6/15/2007 | staff

[mimaw]

There are too many greedy thieving lawyers out there. I think the decent ones are few and far between.

[NoGrayZone]

If he had the extra cash to spend on principle, why not?

[jdub]

"There are too many greedy thieving lawyers out there. I think the decent ones are few and far between."

And what do you base this opinion on? the propaganda you get from the insurance industry?

Is it really a conservative point of view to believe that someone who was harmed by a corporation should either be forced to bear the costs themselves, or that society as a whole should pay and let the corporation skate?

[COBOL2Java]

Where did the 10k figure come from? Probably made-up BS like applying his “hourly rate” to the time he spent fighting the ticket.

Precisely. Dumb reporter probably just dictated the figure given to him. Now, if this lawyer had been identified with the Republican party, the line would have been "...alleged to have spent $10,000..."

[CGTRWK]

Normally I would side against the lawyer on principal, but I think even less of the traffic and parking shakedown industry. A pity they can’t both lose.

[Verginius Rufus]

As Roger Thornburgh (Cary Grant)'s mother tells him in North by Northwest, "Roger, pay the two dollars!"

Apparently that was an allusion to a play from some time earlier, the plot of which revolved around someone refusing to pay a $2 fine when he was innocent.

[TheBattman]

I don’t know - I took the advice of a lawyer once regarding a ticket. I was 19 years old and driving home from visiting my girlfriend. My car has been having some mechanical problems and literally was not capable of doing the speed I was pulled over for doing, under the circumstances.

But it was a training stop - the State Trooper had a young trainee with him. He wrote me a ticket for 10 MPH over the posted speed limit. My car was literally unable to attain the speed I was accused of - verified by 2 mechanics.

Spoke to family lawyer and was advised that I would probably win, but the cost of winning would be higher than the cost of the ticket.

Of course, he didn’t factor in the increase in auto insurance.... nor the fact that I was letting yet another “generation” of state police officers be trained to write fraudulent tickets.

[TalBlack]

“No mistake, according to your billing records, you are 90 years old.”

I’d be willing to wager that it was a Lawyer who INVENTED that joke.

[mimaw]

The John Edwards of the world. The reason why is medical care so expensive. The torte lawyers who fee’s can take 30% or more, the class action lawyers who file enormous suits and the victims get paltry dollars while the scummy lawyer cleans up. My own attorney who when ever I have to call him chargers me 100’s of dollars for simply clarifying something he had sent me for which he already received 100’s of dollars for. I could go on and on.

[keepitreal]

Did he hire an attorney? If he did, I bet he ends up contesting the bill. Old lawyer wisdom: never take a client who only wants to fight for the principle. They never pay their bill.

[Buckeye McFrog]

if he wins he will probably get tens of millions of taxpayer money as punitive damages...probably sees it as an investment.

[GregoryFul]

A few days ago, I parked at a meter to go into my bank. Put a dime in the meter for 10 minutes, when I came out 5 minutes later the meter reader was preparing a ticket, foot on my rear bumper reading the tag. He left as I opened my door. Eager beavers, eh?

[Red in Blue PA]

No exaggeration- He could have built a school with that money. What a waste of resources!

http://www.cambodiaschools.com/

[VRing]

“Lawyers are different. An idle lawyer will make work for himself and two or three others and force others to pay the tab.”

How does a lawyer, that doesn’t work for the state, force anyone to do anything?

[Dinsdale]

How does a lawyer, that doesn’t work for the state, force anyone to do anything?

By filing frivolous lawsuits, forcing you to employ another land shark to fight off the first one.

Personally I believe lawyers should not be allowed to hold public office. They have setup a system that only benefits the lawyers.

[newguy357]

Wait a minute. You need to get your anti-lawyer talking points straight. I thought you guys always said there were too many lawyers? Econ 101 says that you can’t have an excess of supply and too-high prices. Which is it?

Great sophistry. You must be a lawyer.

Yes, you can't have an "excess" of supply and too-high prices. But this depends on the definition of excess. Do we have an excess? Literally, no. As you said.... That said, the fact is, the only reason demand is as high as it is is because of all the BS laws that get passed and the resulting huge cost of regulation-compliance. So yes there is an excess--i.e. there is an excess of moronic regulation--and no, there is not an excess, according to what is needed to meet all the moronic regulations.

[newguy357]

Do you feel the same way about all mechanics, heating and air guys, doctors, contractors, etc., because some of them screw people over claiming to do work they never did? Most lawyers aren’t getting rich and most of them aren’t screwing anyone over.

The difference, of course, is that most of those same lawyers only have jobs because of government regulation.

[Atlas Sneezed]

So yes there is an excess—i.e. there is an excess of moronic regulation

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So blame the legislators (Shakepeare’s villain did).