daily Justice

Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings

That you may retain your self-respect, it is better to displease the people by doing what you know is right, than to temporarily please them by doing what you is wrong.

Love is a promise, love is a souvenir, once given never forgotten, never let it disappear.

Love is an irresistable desire, to be desired irresistibly,

"True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have ever seen"

Desperation

Is that you, did you fall, again,

is that you, that lies before me in pieces

again, again

let me clean you up, I have become the glue

that can fix you, I will put you

together again,

over and over again, when does this end,

what am I expected to do,

even all the kings men

couldn’t put humpty together again,

maybe they too didn’t know what to, but I wont leave you broken,

why is it this happens over and over again,

I promise you we’ll get through ,I won’t let you fall again,

I love you, this time we will try something new,

this time I will discard your shattered heart and then put you together again.

Lois 12/1/2006

It's time once again to review the winners of the Annual "Stella Awards." The Stella Awards are named after 81 year-old Stella Liebeck of New Mexico who spilled hot coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonald's. That case inspired the Stella awards for the most frivolous, ridiculous, successful lawsuits in the United States.

Here are this year's winners:

7th Place: Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $80,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving little toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.

6th Place: 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbour ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbour's hubcaps.

5th Place: Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, and Mr. Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

4th Place: Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbour's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams, who had climbed over the fence into the yard and was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.

3rd Place: A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms.Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.

2nd Place: Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighbouring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms.Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

1st Place: This year's runaway winner was Mrs. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mrs. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On her first trip home, (from an OU football game), having driven onto the freeway, she set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back & make herself a sandwich. Not surprisingly, the RV left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mrs.Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising her in the owner's manual that she couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded her $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons around.

or here

and certainly not here

please, please for the last time CLEAN YOUR ROOM !

The Sunday Times January 15, 2006

Bid to curb the 'jailing judge'
Dearbhall McDonald and Enda Leahy



A DISTRICT court judge whose refusals to grant bail cost the state €1m last year has been threatened with having to foot the bill himself.
Justice John Coughlan, who has already been in trouble with the Supreme Court over his colourful turn of phrase, has incurred the wrath of the office of the director of public prosecutions for imprisoning defendants awaiting trial.



After a spate of cases last year in which he refused bail, decisions that were immediately overturned by a higher court, the DPP’s office threatened to seek the cost of the appeals cases from the judge. The threat was only lifted after a senior colleague intervened and had a quiet word with Coughlan.

One of Ireland’s busiest judges, Coughlan has had an unusually high number of successful habeas corpus appeals made against his judgments by people he has imprisoned.

His reasons for refusing bail are “the stuff of legend”, according to lawyers who have appeared before him.

Last year he imprisoned Eric Leahy, who allegedly posed as a charity collector. When Leahy’s solicitor indicated she would appeal the refusal of bail, the judge said: “You can tell them in the High Court precisely what I think. He is the scum of the earth.”

Leahy was freed hours later following a successful habeas corpus application, which cost the state about €20,000.

Last March even the Supreme Court noted the “unusual”, “improper” and “wrong” remarks Coughlan had made about defendants.

Coughlan’s appeals record is understood to have caused concern in the DPP’s office following an almost unprecedented four habeas corpus applications filed after one sitting of Kilmainham district court last year. The office of the DPP, which cannot interfere with the independent functions of the judiciary, indicated that it would, nevertheless, seek the costs of the successful appeals.

A senior judge is understood to have met with Coughlan, and while neither would discuss the meeting last week, legal sources said the number of appeals arising from Coughlan’s decision has since dropped.

“He was a significant problem in the past,” said one barrister familiar with the DPP’s appeals cases. “Everyone was aware of the number of ‘habos’ emanating from his court, but he has calmed down considerably.”

Four years ago, following the May Day riots, Coughlan jailed 12 young demonstrators for public order offences. Although they had no previous convictions, the judge ordered that the protesters be kept in custody for a week. They were released on bail hours later by a High Court judge, on certain conditions.

In another case, two travellers were charged with assault causing harm and were refused bail by Coughlan who said his decision was based on “whether the man is going to go out and murder someone”.

Last September the high costs of appeals was impressed upon DPP staff in a special lecture on bail proceedings given by a leading barrister. Despite only lasting half an hour in court, each application lost by the state costs up to €25,000 in legal fees.

“Habeas corpus should not be used as a routine bail remedy,” said Kevin Costello, a lecturer in law at University College, Dublin. “It’s an emergency procedure that supersedes all other remedies and is a windfall for applicants who secure release.”

The procedure is also a windfall for lawyers. In recent months some judges have started to take a tougher line by turning the applications into regular High Court bail hearings, amid concerns that huge fees are creating a cottage industry for criminal lawyers.

The difference in legal fees is huge. A defence lawyer earns €207 to appear on behalf of a client who appeals refusal of bail through the High Court. But a senior counsel is paid €8,000 for a successful habeas corpus application, while lawyers get €10,000 and junior counsel €6,000 for each successful case.

I do my best and let go of the outcome.

"I love affirmations! If you use them often enough, so will you! Right now, repeat this affirmation ten times (even if you don't believe it!) and continue to do this throughout the day. (To practice creating and using affirmations, consult Feel the Fear...and Beyond.)"

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.

Such is the prestige of the Nobel Award and of this place where I stand that I am impelled, not to speak like a grateful and apologetic mouse, but to roar like a lion out of pride in my profession and in the great and good men who have practised it through the ages." -- John Steinbeck