He is permanently disabled, his medical practice long gone. He is now divorced, but can spend time with his kids. He was crushed in court. He has a few bucks left. He is dying.
So what. The $80-billion mobile-phone industry wants its money. Specifically, the $55,000 in court costs wireless carriers and vendors had to absorb in successfully defending an $800 million brain-cancer lawsuit filed by Christopher Newman in 2000.
Industry lawyers sent their bill to U.S. District Judge Catherine Blake of Baltimore on Dec. 1, sparing Newman a thankless Thanksgiving while setting the mood for the joyous holidays ahead. It’s the most wonderful time of the year.
Newman’s attorneys at the law offices of Peter Angelos, owner of the Baltimore Orioles, successful trial lawyer and Democratic Party patron extraordinaire, will be responding shortly to Blake on why making Newman cough up the money is not such a hot idea-irrespective of timing and all.
Of course industry is within its rights to collect from Newman. Well within them. Moreover, it has a fiduciary duty to shareholders-not to mention a moral obligation-to recover every last penny.
Personally, I think wireless firms are letting Newman off easy. Just what is $55,000 going to buy you (other than an H2 Hummer or a year’s worth of nursing-home care) when you have federal mandates-local number portability, enhanced 911, digital wiretap, hearing-aid compatibility, etc.-costing billions of dollars? Or if you’re Verizon Wireless and have agreed to settle a class-action consumer lawsuit that could cost the No. 1 mobile-phone carrier north of $1 billion in free headsets, credits, vouchers and other goodies? Or if you’re Cingular Wireless L.L.C. and may have to shell out $12 million for business practices deemed untoward by the California Public Utilities Commission? Or if you’re Motorola Inc. and losing potential revenue because of camera-phone shipment snags? Or if you’re the Telecommunications Industry Association and your manufacturing members are bleeding because capex spending has been cut to the bone?
Newman should thank his lucky stars industry has a heart. Then again, the law limits how much wireless firms can actually hit Newman up for. But he has only himself to blame. Just what was Newman thinking when he decided to take on the mighty mobile-phone industry three years ago? Who does he think he is, anyway? Just because he has a brain tumor, used a mobile phone for a while and could point to some studies that said there might be something there? What nerve.
Message to the nine or so plaintiffs with Newman-like cancer lawsuits pending before Blake and any others out there: Don’t even think about it.
