And Then, There Were The Lawsuits...

And this has been a banner year for them, so far.

Here are a few of my personal favorites, in no particular order.

Jeffrey Doles, of Gillette, Wyoming is trying to recover over 130 bongs the city confiscated from him in a botched attempt to put him in jail for trafficking in drug paraphernalia. Astonishingly, considering they confiscated over 130 bongs from him, they FAILED to secure a conviction, and prosecutors are planning to file a civil lawsuit asking for permission to destroy the pipes, as they are in fact clearly meant for use as dope smokin' tools.

David Little, an anti-abortion activist in Canada, is seeking a continuance in his trial for tax evasion so that he can get his wife and stepdaughter exorcised. Yeah, as in "Judeo-Christian ritualized casting out of demonic possession." How long is he asking for? Well, as long as it takes -

Little said some exorcism rituals resolve the problem after only one session, but he's also aware of one exorcism that has been ongoing in Rome for 16 years.

"Lucifer was the most intelligent of all the angels," he said, and the Devil won't be "pigeonholed" into a timetable.

James R. Robinson, a program executive with NASA's In-Space Propulsion labs, was arrested and is being charged with kiddie porn possession - on his WORK computer. Maybe he didn't think that they'd really check. I mean, it's only NASA. They don't, like, know anything about computers, or anything. Fortunately, TheSmokingGun was there!

Delphi, GM's former subsidiary and main parts supplier, is bankrupt. They are currently in Chapter 11 - as a part of which, they have requested a court injunction to allow them to void their union contracts with UAW. UAW, in a completely normal total lack of good sense, is vowing to strike:

"Today it appears there is no basis for continuing discussions," UAW President Ron Gettelfinger and union VP Richard Shoemaker, the top negotiator with Delphi, said in a statement.

"In the event the court rejects the UAW-Delphi contract and Delphi imposes the terms of its last proposal, it appears that it will be impossible to avoid a long strike," they said.

"The UAW has worked diligently in good faith to resolve the Delphi situation through collective bargaining instead of through a lawyer-driven court process or confrontation. Regrettably, Delphi has chosen another path."

Of course, if Delphi gets shut down by a strike, this will drive GM into bankruptcy as well, causing.... well... thousands, anyway, of Dodge Neon owners to shriek in anguish at the sudden total lack of repairs available for their vehicles, as well as essentially bankrupting UAW as well. Too bad UAW can't see past their $27/hr salaries to realize they're killing the Golden Goose.

An Australian appeals court proved its worth by upholding the ruling of the traffic Magistrate, who said that a speed camera photo depicting two cars did not constitute proof as to which of the cars was the speeder, and therefore threw out the case. The appeals court went one better, though, and not only explained at some great length WHY the car could not be proven to be the offender, but went on to demand that the prosecution pay the defendant's costs for wasting his time. That's pimp. I wish our judges were smart, and stuff. Maybe, then they'd be able to say things like this:

"So I have to say I am not convinced ... that the Authority has identified the Lexus [the defendant's motor vehicle] as being the offending car."

Thomas Burns, of New Castle, PA, is suing PennDOT for malicious prosecution after flipping the bird at a construction worker who was working on an interminable-delay-causing construction site, and getting cited for it. The original case was dropped after the worker and the citing officer never bothered to show up in court when Burns asked for a trial.

This isn't really a "trial," per se, but Aftab Ansari, of New Delhi, India, has been divorced from his wife, over his objections and hers, after his wife told a friend that he had mumbled the word for divorce three times in his sleep. Maybe next time she'll keep her mouth shut: the friend ran to a mullah, and now the couple is being ostracised by their village for violating the Shar'ia (Islamic law,) which states that they are divorced, must remain apart for 100 days, and cannot remarry until the wife marries another man, sleeps with him, and gets divorced from him, too.

For some odd reason, the Supreme Court of Canada didn't buy the bullshit story of the Mountie who claimed he shot his girlfriend to death because he was a mentally deranged robot. You think I'm kidding? I never kid™. I will say sarcastic things about this kind of news, however. Not kidding, though. Don't the Canadians have enough problems, without dreaming up all new and different mental disorders to suffer from? Maybe not, they DO spend an awful lot of time snowbound up there.

A German court prescribed Viagra for a horse. Apparently, the horse was sold as a stud, but was then unable to perform, and the buyer sued the seller.

Pepsi, demonstrating a whole generation of executives with too much free time, sued Coke over an ad depicting a Amish drag race.

"In other words, Coca-Cola is telling consumers that Powerade Option's fewer calories literally make you go faster. However, Coca-Cola cannot possibly substantiate this overall superiority claim," the suit says.

Of course, just to continue the ridiculousness of this whole item, Coke caved, agreeing to change their advertising to one that doesn't feature Amish drag racers, or presumably, any information about their product, as that might make it sell, or something, and that would be bad.

"Our advertising will maintain the central theme of the campaign, which is that Powerade Option has fewer calories than Gatorade," Garrett said.

Barry Bonds' lawyers are suing the authors of "Game Of Shadows," a book about steroid use in baseball, not because they lied about Bonds using juice, but because of where they got their information.

This isn't a lawsuit yet, but soon will be: Vonage put a 911 caller on hold long enough for his house to burn to the ground before the Fire Department was called.

Fire department officials say that by the time fire crews arrived on the scene, the fire had become a five-alarm blaze. No one was injured, but they described the dwelling as a total loss.

A woman in Cardiff, Australia, got a massive breast enhancement, and promptly sued her boss for staring. She went - no kidding - from a B cup to a DD cup, and is somehow surprised that he's having trouble focusing. Fortunately, the court decided she was full of crap.

And then, there's this, which gives you a bit of a rundown of the current state of insanity reigning over U. S. intellectual property law today.
I'd say most of these people deserve a lovely gift from AssInTheBox.com. Won't you send them one?