It's Good to Be the Prosecutor, But Quite an Ordeal to Be a 4-Year-Old Kid

Two interesting local legal cases that caught my attention.

In the first case, see if you can guess what the punishment will be for a guilty party in a trial.

Here's the background. A woman accused of trying to hire a hitman to kill her husband goes on trial. On the second day of the trial the judge has to declare a mistrial because (emphasis mine):

At the beginning of the trial, the parties presented a Stipulation to the Court admitting into evidence a tape recording of a conversation between the Defendant and her daughter, and agreeing that the contents were authentic. At the conclusion of the District Attorney’s second witness, the People asked to play the tape to the Jury pursuant to the Stipulation. Mr. Carmen, Atty for defendant, objected saying that he did not stipulate the tape into evidence, he only stipulated to the authenticity of the recording if it was admitted into evidence. Based on the language in the Stipulation, the Court granted the District Attorney’s application to play the tape. The tape was then played to the Jury. After the luncheon recess, Mr. Carman moved for a mistrial based on the playing of the tape to the Jury. He indicated that over the lunch hour he realized that the draft of the Stipulation which the District Attorney presented to him, and which he agreed to, was different than the final Stipulation that the Assistant District Attorney presented to him to sign. Mr. Carman produced to the Court a copy of the draft of the Stipulation that the District Attorney had presented to him. The Court reviewed the draft of the Stipulation. The draft of the Stipulation did not contain language that the tape was being stipulated into evidence, it only stipulated that the tape would be marked for Identification purposes, and that the contents of the tape were authentic-supporting Mr. Carman’s argument about the intent of the Stipulation. Upon questioning, on the record, the Assistant District Attorney agreed that the draft of the Stipulation, which Mr. Carman had agreed to, had different language than the final Stipulation. The Assistant District Attorney admitted that Mr. Carman had not been advised of the change in the language before it was presented to him in Court to sign. Based on the fact that the District Attorney’s Office changed the language in the Stipulation after Mr. Carman had agreed to it, and that the contents of the tape could be viewed as prejudicial to the defendant, and would not have been admitted into evidence without the Stipulation, the Court, based on the Law, had no choice but to grant a mistrial. Jury selection is to begin again Monday, November 1, 2010, in Judge Carter’s courtroom.

My guess is that the Assistant District Attorney (ADA) doesn't suffer any legal repercussions for his/her behavior. Of course, it's quite possible that the ADA's, um how shall we put this, darling trick isn't even illegal. Either way, it's good to be the prosecutor, no?

In the second case, see if you can figure out how a 4-year-old can be found guilty of negligence.

In this case, a judge has ruled that a young girl accused of running down an elderly woman while racing a bicycle with training wheels on a Manhattan sidewalk two years ago can be sued for negligence. My question is, how exactly do you explain to a 4 yo the concept of a jury trial, testimony, etc, so that the kid understands what is going on? Is such a thing even possible? Maybe the ADA from the first case can be used to explain the difference between reality and fantasy to the little kid.

Ortho Evra Lawsuit

They're heeere:

Johnson and Johnson's Ortho-McNeil Pharmaceutical Inc. unit is being sued on behalf of a woman who had been using the company's Ortho Evra contraceptive patch.

The suit, filed by Parker & Waichman LLP, alleges the woman suffered a pulmonary embolism after using the patch for seven months.

The law firm said Monday, after the financial markets had closed, that recent reports have indicated that the risk of developing blood clots, pulmonary embolism, heart attack and stroke may be significantly higher with the Ortho Evra patch than with oral-contraceptive use.

The firm alleges that Ortho-McNeill was aware of the increased medical risk and failed to adequately warn patients.

It's not clear what "recent reports" the law firm is referring to. I do hope it's not this [mis]report from last year. Nor this more recent article, AP finds more fatalities from birth control patch than expected (via feministing).

Briefly, from the article:

... since the patch came on the market in 2002 ... the AP found 23 different deaths associated with the patch. The primary cause of death in those reports isn't always clear -- some mention suicide, others abortion. Doctors who reviewed the 23 cases found about 17 that appeared to be clot-related, including 12 from last year.

So, the AP review found:

23 total deaths from 2002-2004

17 clot-related deaths in patch users from 2002-2004

12 of which occurred in 2004

AP's analysis [if you can call it that]: out of all the reported deaths (23), it's not clear six are at all related to patch use (suicide, termination, etc.). [It's quite possible they're referring to these six cases. No way to tell for sure.]

This leaves us with 17 cases, over two years. For these cases, we don't know what the cause of death was. [It's unclear why AP's reviewers were unable to determine cause of death--were the records incomplete, or were they inconclusive? Unfortunately, AP doesn't link to the reports they obtained from the FDA.] However, because most of these cases appear to be clot-related, we assume they are. Moreover, based on this assumption, we go one step further and assume the blood clots were caused by using the patch. Since, in 2004, there were 12 clot-related deaths, the rate of deaths appears to be 3 out of 200,000.

So, does the birth control patch cause more fatalities than expected? This is one question you won't find the answer to by reading the AP article.

Bottom line:

Case reports of deaths need to be fully investigated by formal epidemiological studies. Until this is done, a casual relationship remains questionable. At the present time, no evidence suggests that the transdermal patch is associated with an increased risk of death compared with combination oral contraceptives.*

Not that a lack of evidence should in any way stop lawyers from filling lawsuits.


*Grimes DA, Mishell DR Jr. Assessing Rare Event Reports: A Numerator in Search of a Denominator. Dialogues in Contraception. Fall 2004;8(7):7.