Toyota Class Action Lawsuit (MDL) - Plaintiffs' Lead Counsel Decided This Week by Judge Selna

Today, May 13, 2010, a hearing began to decide which attorneys are going to be running the show for the plaintiffs in the big, big class action lawsuit that is gearing up against Toyota Motor Corporation. The court's ruling is expected on or before this Monday, May 17th.

In early April, the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (MDL) already decided that U.S. District James Selna of the Central District of California would be presiding over the consolidated Toyota lawsuits, which some expect will exceed $7 billion (with a b) in damages.

Late last month, Dan Becnel Jr. of the Becnel Law Firm in Reserve, Louisiana, became the first lawyer to formally apply for the job of Top Lawyer. Actually, Becnel has asked the court to approve him as co-lead, or at least a member of the lead counsel committee.

Here in Texas, we would say that Becnel is definitely not a man with a hat and no cattle:  he's got the resume to back up that request.

However, so do the other 99 or so trial lawyers who are tossing their hats in the ring.  Pros like Mark Lanier of Vioxx fame.  Apparently, over 100 attorneys have filed formal applications with the federal court for this job -- with one application exceeding 100 pages in length.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall of that California courtroom today ....

What is the Cloud - as in Cloud Computing?

Here's a great overview of what the "Internet Cloud" entails, and what it means to you and your business:

Wall Street Journal's "Cloud Computing: What Exactly is it, Anyway?"

If you want more details, but not geek-talk, then try these articles, too:

Wikipedia's article on cloud computing;

The Cloud Tutorial;  and

(somewhat geeky) InfoWorld's "What Cloud Computing Really Means."

The Massive Confusion of US Estate Taxes - Attorney Seminar to "Enlighten and Depress"

This morning's inbox included the following seminar invitation from the State Bar of Texas:

A Look at the Current State of the Estate Tax: Massive Confusion

Approved for State Bar College Credit and Texas Board of Legal Specialization Credit in Estate Planning & Probate and Tax Law.
Live Via Webcast
Thursday, February 11th
10:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.
1 hour MCLE credit


With the failure of Congress to do something with respect to the one-year suspension of the federal estate tax and generation skipping transfer tax and the one-year return of carryover basis, followed by a return to 2000 law, we are in a situation of having no reasonable or rational way to advise our clients. Two experienced lawyers (who remember the original carryover basis and generation skipping transfer tax in the Tax Reform Act of 1976, both of which were repealed) discuss the alternatives in how they and others are dealing with this uncertainty and highlighting some issues that are not immediately apparent and other problems if Congress does nothing before 1/1/2011. A fun filled hour guaranteed to enlighten and depress you simultaneously.

Now, mind you - this is an invitation to legal practioners in the field of estate planning to come and listen to experts in this area discuss "a situation of having no reasonable or rational way to advise our clients."

What's going on here?  Congress didn't act, even to patch things up by passing a bill that said "everything stays as is until we do something else," so some tax laws died - their effective dates passed on December 31st - and now, we're apparently in a huge, fat mess.

Toyota in the Hot Seat: First it's the Gas Pedal, now it's the Brakes?

It was only Monday when all this big news was popping up regarding Congressional Committees getting involved, investigating Toyota about its "sudden acceleration" problem. 

Just this past Sunday, the New York Times wrote a great article, giving an overview of this gas pedal acceleration problem in both Toyota models as well as Lexus vehicles -- something that's been a known issue since 2002.  Known issue, as in stuck accelerators have been causing wrecks and killing people for several years now.

So, as an attorney, I was already expecting to read about new Toyota lawsuits - heck, I was ready to see the television commercials.  All about the gas pedal slamming down, think how creative those ad agencies could be ....

And then, today, whattha????

Because today, first I read that the Secretary of Transportation reported before Congress to give his testimony today, and he's said that folk should just stop driving their Toyotas until they can get their dealers to fix them. 

(Plaintiffs' lawyers smile like Cheshire Cats when they hear something like this -- and it's even better when there's video of the head of the Department of Transportation telling this to Congress.  Oh, the glee....)

But wait.  Wait. 

Now, I learn there's also some big problem with the BRAKES made by Toyota.  Apparently, the brakes in the 2010 Prius hybrid are malfunctioning, too.  Ye Gads. 

Brakes, gas pedals ... there's gotta be a lot of jokes in all this.  And so, so many lawsuits ....

One Smart Fox