V for Victory for the Chung family:
A U.S. judge ruled Monday in favor of a South Korean dry cleaner who was sued for $54 million (€40 million) over a missing pair of pants in a case that garnered international attention and renewed calls for litigation reform.
The owners of Custom Cleaners did not violate the city’s consumer protection act by failing to live up to Roy L. Pearson’s expectations of the “Satisfaction Guaranteed” sign that was once placed in the store window, District of Columbia Superior Court Judge Judith Bartnoff ruled.
Bartnoff ordered Pearson to pay the court costs of defendants Soo Chung, Jin Nam Chung and Ki Y. Chung. Those costs came to just over $1,000 (€744), according to the Chungs’ attorney. A motion to recover the tens of thousands of dollars they spent in attorney fees will be considered later.
Here’s hoping that they get their attorney fees back, too.
(HT to reader)
15 Comments
Pearson was stupid and an a hole. He was offered a decent amount of money, substantially more than the pants were worth. Instead of taking it he got too gready, now he gets nothing, and is out of pocket (probably pants pocket!)
Two lawyers can live in a town where one can’t.
I thought when I heard on TV just now that “court costs were awarded to defendant” that this would have meant they were awarded the attorney fees too.
I guess there’s still a chance, but it’s a separate motion. I hope the fact that a fund to accept donations was established for the defendants won’t affect the judge’s decision; the fund could send the donations back.
You didn’t mention the quote from the link that said that Pearson was expected to appeal, so I guess court costs and attorney fees aren’t done being added up yet.
I gather Pearson’s previously pending reappointment to his current $100,000 per year job as a DC administrative law judge is now in jeopardy as a result of this irrational lawsuit. Maybe if Pearson agrees to drop the appeal, the Chungs should drop the motion to recoup legal fees, assuming the fund has a prospect of meeting most or all of their legal bills to date.
If they win the motion for legal fees, but he loses his job and declares bankruptcy, it won’t do them much good.
I hope he gets his butt nailed to the wall and has to pay them back for every nickel they were forced to spend on lawyers for this ridiculously frivolous suit. Why didn’t the judge just throw this crap out of court in the first place? This guy doesn’t sound like judge-ship material, so I hope he doesn’t get reappointed to his job. A judge should have a sense of fairness, prudence and rationality, three things this guy definitely does not have.
“I thought when I heard on TV just now that “court costs were awarded to defendant” that this would have meant they were awarded the attorney fees too. ”
What’s going to come of the money people contributed to their ‘defense fund’?
He man should have known better than to sue. It is impossible for a black man to get an impartial court in AmeriKKKa.
#6, True. That’s why he needs to keep his own court.
yeah, OJ sure got robbed of justice in AmeriKKKa.
“Court costs” refers to the literal fees you pay to file documents with the court, usually not amounting to more than several hundred dollars.
It’s good to know that reason and good sense triumphed this time around.
#5 I heard the Chungs were going to use the defense fund money to buy galbi for everybody that rooted for them.
Alex,
As long as they don’t make a donation to the Unification Church in my name…
I belive Pearson did achieve his goal. I don’t think he expected to win in court. But I think he did expect to ruin the dry cleaners (they, having to attain expensive legal counsel to defend their case).
Chung’s business has also suffered due to the bad publicity, with the area’s African American customers in solidarity with their ‘consumers’ rights advocate/champion. “Way da go, to put those rude blood sucking ill mannered Korean merchants out of business. That’ll teach em to exploit our black neighborhoods while giving nothing back to the communities.”
You know, expecting a mom and pop business to ‘give back to the community’ is a concept that’s so foreign to me…and I’m supposedly a communist since I’m from Canada (you know, our ‘evil’ universal health care, etc.).
Isn’t opening a business ‘giving back to the community’ in that a business provides a needed service for a community? Giving back to the community implies that a business only takes, but people freely give their cash for something they value offered by a company. A fair trade between willing participants. Why then should a company feel obligated to ‘give back to the community’? They shouldn’t, though it’s certainly nice and good PR to do so.
#5 someguy: “What’s going to come of the money people contributed to their ‘defense fund’?”
I’m going to guess that it’s been already drawn down and regularly paid out to the defense lawyers, any time an appreciable amount accumulates.
When I took a look at the link a while back, it (the web site) appeared to be run by somebody at (or contracted by) the Chungs’ legal firm.
Haven’t looked again to reverify, but if I remember correctly there were no details posted as to how many donations, average size of donations, amount accumulated to date, what it had gone for, etc.
I don’t expect the defense lawyers would have taken this case on “contingency”, since legal fees aren’t normally reimbursed in the US legal system.
I gathered vaguely that the Chungs already were out tens of thousands of dollars before the big late-breaking nationwide/worldwide publicity hit. I think the site listed a paypal account but that was all.
I guess you wouldn’t expect the defense to provide the plaintiff intelligence on their resources, but once the appeal process is (presumably) finally exhausted unsuccessfully, IMO they ought to post the details on accumulated donations.
I wouldn’t have a problem with the Chungs using any excess to refund themselves for their own previous legal costs (prior to the beginning of any donations), but they ought to post the details on this.
And if there ends up being any excess above and beyond the total legal costs (ie in the unlikely event they ever recover any legal fees from the plaintiff), such excess ought to go back to the donors on a pro-rate basis.
I hope the Chungs won’t “award” themselves any possible, eventual large excess of reimbursed and/or donated funds, as “compensation” for their own “pain and suffering”. The Chungs ought to make an ostentacious and public display on their web site of accounting for, and refunding to, their donors, as a further rebuke to this plaintiff.
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