Man sued for $30K over $40 printer he sold on Craigslist
usatoday.com
usatoday.com
Edit: I originally said "punish defendants", but meant plaintiffs.
Edit: Found this article from Sep. 2014. [0]
"The [Indiana] state high court, in an order issued Tuesday, called Zavodnik 'a prolific, abusive litigant' and put him on notice. In the unanimous ruling, the five justices warned the Ukraine-born U.S. citizen that he 'can expect any further abusive litigation practices ... to be met with appropriate sanctions and restrictions.'"
0: http://www.indystar.com/story/news/2014/10/01/enoughs-enough...
If they had the tools to stop it, and chose to use them based on their determination rather than the "rules" (no matter how nonsensical they be), we'd be throwing a fit about activist judges legislating from the bench.
The separation of powers is there for a reason and it's not the judiciary that needs to solve this.
Judges are supposed to use some digression. I doubt very much that the litigants losses for a $40 printer are $30K. Especially since he conveniently lost the printer.
I just don't believe that there are any laws which require the judge to (a) decide in the litigants favor with zero supporting evidence, and (b) allow $30K in damages for a $40 printer.
FTA, the court of appeals pretty much stated the above The $30,000 in damages "had no basis in reality," Chief Judge Nancy Vaidik wrote.
I'm left wondering why anyone supports a position which the judges describe as having no basis in reality.
Yes, and they do, however sometimes their hands are tied. In this case by rule 36 of a series of peer approved rules which states what action the judge in this case has to take. When submitted to appeal the judges who passed the rules then said the ruling "had no basis in reality" about their own rules, hopefully they will fix them and/or future judges will use this as precedent to in cases like this.
This part of the system is functioning correctly, it's the ridiculous litigation from pro-se plaintiffs that's at fault. Most jurisdictions have an equivalent to spam filter that passes down criminal charges on people who act like this.
In most sensible common law jurisdictions being a common barrator was a common law offence; most such jurisdictions have allowed common law offences to fall into disuse, and many have outright abolished effectively all of them in favour of codified criminal statutes.
There is statutory relief available against litigious harassment in most such jurisdictions, either directly in the criminal code, or in the statutes controlling the bodies that regulate the legal profession. Additionally, the codification of rules of practice in litigation also controls what litigants without professionally regulated representation may do without facing their case being struck out on application by the counterparty. There is also often statutory relief against baseless litigation (such as you might find in SLAPP).
The bar for a successful prosecution against egregious litigators is quite high because it is a non-strict-liability criminal offence; you have to prove intent as well as action. For single isolated cases that may have some surface merit, it is easier to get the trial court to strike out the case, or to arrive at an early judgement with costs consequences. If the prima facie vexatious party continues litigation courts are generally empowered to consider indemnity orders on costs (which turns on accelerated interest on all the costs payable by that party) and to require costs deposits (where the prima facie vexatious party must leave with the court the costs that will cover the litigation expenses of the other party on the grounds that an adverse costs order is probable), and finally courts are also generally empowered to make interim costs orders in especially bad cases, wherein the prima facie vexatious party must pay some of the other party's costs before final judgment (this is to avoid a rich vexatious litigator from forcing an adverse settlement upon a party that is likely to ultimately prevail).
Finally, there is usually a modern distinction drawn between a compulsive claimant (who is probably mentally ill) and a vexatious one (who usually targets one or a small group of defendants).
The law in England and Wales offer several means of dealing with both.
As one example, the Civil Rules of Procedure rule 3.1 and Practice Direction 3A allow a district court to impose a civil restraint order on litigants that tightly controls what they may do in the remainder of the current proceedings, or for a period of time in any district court, or generally in the courts of England and Wales. CROs require people served with them to apply in writing to a court before making various applications or claims, and if permission is not obtained, the application or claim is automatically dismissed (with costs consequences).
In issuing CROs courts will generally consider, among other things, the tendency of a subject to engage in frequent litigation, the manner in which litigation is undertaken, the subject's responsiveness to the courts and the other parties during the course of the litigation, whether litigation is being needlessly and wilfully prolonged, and the effect that the litigation has upon the defendant or defendants.
Alternatively, the Attorney-General (of England and Wales), a member of the government, may apply to a High Court for an order under the Senior Courts Act to declare a litigant vexatious. This applies in all courts -- not just district ones -- and may further require a claimant or applicant to seek permission from the Ministry of Justice as well as the Court. A list of people who have had such orders made against them is here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/vexatious-litigants
Few of these people would have been convictable as barrators under the pre-1967 common law definition; and additionally a few of those on this list whose orders date back before 1967 likely would have been the subjects of district court CROs instead.
Most of them, on the other hand, suffer from intractable -- or worse, untreated -- mental illness. :-(
Finally, bringing a ridiculously large claim in England and Wales cannot be done in the district courts, and the High Courts will generally quickly reject -- with costs consequences -- claims that are on their face too large for the damages particularized in the statement of claim. In England and Wales, district courts are used for claims under £10 000. "Go back to a district court and get on the small claims track as you cannot prove the money value in your claim of £millions" is a very expensive order to receive from a High Court, and that is almost certainly what the claimant in the case in the article would have to overcome.
http://www.indystar.com/story/news/2014/10/01/enoughs-enough...
"One example, the court noted, is Zavodnik's penchant for making filings under often "bewilderingly lengthy titles" such as:
"Appellant's Verified Motion to Compel the Clerk of the Trial Court to Provide the Entire Record as Opposed to the Partial Record and to Extend Time for Brief to Be Filed Due to the Fact that the Appellant Does Not Have the Full Certified Record and the Record Needs to Be Complete and Fixed (Which Will Require Time) Because of the Clerk's Error in Providing Only a Partial Record or Alternatively to Relinquish Jurisdiction Back to the Trial Court by Mandating It to Fix the Record (the CCS) and to Provide the Court of Appeals and the Parties with the Corrected Full and Complete Fixed Record or Alternatively to Order the Clerk of this Court to Fix the CCS and to Provide the Complete Record or Alternatively to Allow the Appellant to Use His Own CCS Printed out by Him from the Odyssey Website."
The rambling titles burden court personnel and opposing parties and other attorneys, who must struggle with Zavodnik's filings."
https://www.canlii.org/en/ab/abqb/doc/2012/2012abqb571/2012a...
1. The plaintiff exploited a loophole in the Indiana small claims rule regarding "res judicata," which normally acts to prevent a party from re-litigating a decided matter.
[The rule states](http://www.in.gov/judiciary/rules/small_claims/), "A judgment shall be res judicata only as to the amount involved in the particular action and shall not be considered an adjudication of any fact at issue in any other action or court.
So the plaintiff lost a $6,000 claim in small claims, but somehow he was not barred from bringing claims in superior court on the same set of facts for a larger amount of money. I think the judge should have seen through this...
2. Requests for admission are the most abused discovery tools in modern litigation. There is no limit on the number of requests for admission. They are designed to streamline and focus areas of dispute, but hyperactive litigants are always trying to sneak case-killer facts into them to get "admitted" either by accident or failure to respond, the latter of which happened here.
1. Improper Service of Process; and/or 2. Defenses on the Merits, including, Res Judicata.
Assuming the Defendant can establish Plaintiff knowingly obtained default based on improper service, and show Plaintiff knew or should have known the claims weren't supported by fact or law the Defense should recoup their fees on the Motion to Vacate Default Judgment through sanctions.
This is absolutely ridiculous.
Is anyone familiar with the legal system enough to know how we can help out his current victim or (legally) bring an end to this smug conman's thievery? Could public opinion or data that tells a compelling story help?
'Special Judge J. Jeffrey Edens' is damage in the legal process that I'm sure can be routed around and this story is ripe for the media.
If the courts declare him a "vexatious litigant", he'd have a much harder time filing these suits.
-----
Because Costello did not respond to all three requests for admissions within 30 days of receiving them, and did not ask for an extension of time, as required by Indiana trial rules, Costello admitted to the liabilities and damages by default. He also did not appear at a July 2013 hearing, according to court records.
Costello said he never received the requests for admissions and was not notified of the hearing.
-----
If Costello just ignored these requests for some reason, maybe thinking they'd go away or whatever, that this is kind of on him.
If, though, Zavodnik has figured out a way to serve people requests without them actually knowing about it... Well, that seems like a much larger legal loophole that needs closing.
But without digging into this, the whole article falls apart. If someone sues you and you don't respond, you risk a default judgment against you.
That's not what the parent said though. If you don't show up IMO the court should not take any default position but should decide the case on the facts put before it. That's not avoiding an adverse judgement, that's just not assuming one side is right just because the other side hasn't presented its case.
It actually kinda does... If the other party does not challenge it.
If I show up in court with a bill that shows you owe me a million dollars, I attest that we agreed to it, and you don't challenge that fact? That's the truth as far as the court is concerned.
However, the overall point I believe still stands. Weigh the case based on the evidence presented - if it later turns out that a plaintiff committed fraud to get a favorable ruling you now have actual evidence of foul play on the record.
Absolutely not. A court shouldn't sit on "anything said that isn't challenged is 100% true", it should look in a tort case on the balance of probabilities. IMO courts should attempt to discover what is true and rule on that, not attempt to find who can afford to pay for the best lawyer.
But how do the courts do that when only one party is presenting the evidence? The only way that would work is if you filed a case, a neutral investigator from the court investigated your claim, and the judge ruled on what the investigator found.
Otherwise, the court has to base its decision on the evidence provided. If only half the evidence is provided, unfortunately the decision must be made off that evidence.
IMO, the default judgement is the best solution. It is fairly easy to get a default judgement overturned if you truly want to or believe that it is wrong. Otherwise, you are admitting you owe the amount with a default judgement. So in reality it would be like you showed up and the plaintiff proved you owed the debt. Either way you have to pay.
If that is the case, the reverse would also have to apply. Currently if the plaintiff doesn't show up the case is dismissed. If only one party is required though, now the defendant is left to argue why he/she is not guilty. That doesn't work either.
I think you've lost track of the conversation in this thread.
[1] California Code of Civil Procedure §116.530 http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=ccp&gr...
Except the article talks about Indiana. It helps to read the article. You, did read the article, ... right?
This is what the whole "You've been served" process is about.
The general district court requires notification via posting on the front door of the last known address and delivery via standard 1st class mail. This can be and is easily abused by cherry picking the last known address used. The plaintiff just needs sign an affidavit that it was the last known address they were aware of. You could challenge that they didn't make a reasonable effort to get a good last known address, but the burden of proof is on you and you won't win.
Also if you rented a property and have vacated it, for example if your lease has ended, your landlord can post on the front door and mail notice to the vacated property and this is considered sufficient notice.
Not likely the case. The rules of civil procedure establish the various methods of lawful service of process, as a result there are a lot of safe guards. In fact, it is more likely a Plaintiff's lawsuit is dismissed for failing to properly serve the Defendant within the proper amount of time after filing suit than actually collecting on a default judgment where there was improper service of process.
In this particular case, if the Defendant can show the Complaint and admissions were improperly served, and the Plaintiff knew or should have known his claims were not supported by fact, he could be sanctioned, including, but not limited to: a) all the legal fees it took the defendant to vacate the default judgment; and b) a dismissal of the plaintiffs lawsuit.
>If someone sues you and you don't respond, you risk a default judgment against you.
Definitely. Plaintiffs can also establish to the Court the Defendant is actively evading service, but there are many legitimate reasons one can't serve a Defendant. Still, even in the event of defaults the Courts will readily Vacate (set aside) default judgments in circumstances including, but not limited to: 1. improper service; and/or 2. defenses on the merits.
He only has to try to serve the papers a few times, and then can leave them. If the defendant were out town for a few weeks, he would never get it. He doesn't have to check ID, so someone could say they were the person, he would hand it over, and be done with it. That person might never hand the papers to the right person.
I don't think assuming papers served always get to the right person is a fair assumption.
> Plaintiffs can also establish to the Court the Defendant is actively evading service, but there are many legitimate reasons one can't serve a Defendant. Still, even in the event of defaults the Courts will readily Vacate (set aside) default judgments in circumstances including, but not limited to: 1. improper service; and/or 2. defenses on the merits.
>I don't think assuming papers served always get to the right person is a fair assumption.
It is a fair assumption, because that is what the rules require, and your friend or any other process server must sign an affidavit under oath and penalty of perjury for the exact steps they took to serve a party. Now assumptions be damn, you are right service won't always be done properly, but I mention safeguards such as a Motion to Vacate Default Judgments for lack of proper service.
>He doesn't have to check ID, so someone could say they were the person, he would hand it over, and be done with it. That person might never hand the papers to the right person.
Because you used right person you may or may not be acknowledging the fact that the actual party (defendant) in not necessarily the right person to serve or the only person who can be served to qualify as valid service of process. For example, if I sue a company I don't generally serve the company I serve their Registered Agent (ironically from time to time the Registered Agent is the same company as the defendant); more generally I can serve anyone residing at the defendants residence who is over 15 years old (FL rule); or I can serve a defendant's employer instead of the defendant.
I mean, the simplest example is, "What if someone is traveling in another country for 2 months?"
There are entire companies set up with the purpose of suing people who don't respond. They purposefully use bad law to operate these mills, and absolutely no one seems to actually care. Google pocket filing[1] if you want to see those that abuse this the most.
In my state serving someone (for small claims) is simply tossing a first class letter in the mail (no tracking or registration required) to the "last known" address. Well, last known address is trivial to game - just pull a credit report send that letter to an address you know they no longer live at and attest to the judge you did your best. Or send them something that looks very much like spam mail, so hopefully they don't even open it and toss it into the trash.
When you create massive incentives to cheat what outcome do you expect to get? Legally serving someone without them knowing is trivial, and I'd argue becoming the normal default behavior for petty litigants like debt collection lawsuit mills.
There are zillions of ways around process serving, from petty little games like the above all the way down to hiring corrupt process servers. The latter almost always get away with it, and I've literally recorded them tossing paperwork in the trash without ever knocking on my door while attesting to the court I was properly served. The court seemed to think this was completely normal and didn't blink an eye.
Basically process serving is entirely broken and relies on the plaintiff serving you being an 'officer of the court' who would never even think about doing anything illegal or immoral! Literally that is the sole protection most defendants get - a piece of paper submitted to the court that someone really really totally served you - honest, and they are double-dog dare you not lying, promise! This piece of paper is treated as gospel by judges, even when you have video evidence showing otherwise.
My few experiences with the American legal system basically have shown me the entire process is designed around corruption and getting "free" judgments outside of court by intimidation/shady tactics around having you lose on a technicality before you even show up. Once in court if you have money to defend yourself you generally do alright - but good luck getting there when the entire system is designed to keep you out of court and ensure you are at a disadvantage before you even start.
1: http://caveatemptorblog.com/647/minnesota-is-a-friendly-stat...
Jesus christ, what kind of life do you lead?!? I'd be terrified to even be served once, let alone to feel it necessary to set up a sting to uncover a conspiracy between process servers and evil litigants. Hope you manage to stay sane and safe!
And just a security camera the process server didn't notice :)
"More fundamentally, the plaintiff in General Motors Corp. did not ask the defendant to admit liability 400, 4000, or 8000 times greater than the amount originally in dispute, as Zavodnik did here. Zavodnik’s misuse of Rule 36 is plain. He did not send requests claiming $30,000 and $300,000 and $600,000 in damages because he believes those figures are legally justified and thought Costello might agree; he sent them because he hoped Costello would not respond, rendering the matters admitted by operation of Rule 36. An important purpose of the rule is to more quickly and efficiently reach a resolution based on the actual facts; Zavodnik used the rule as a way to avoid such a resolution. The trial court’s partial denial of Costello’s motion to withdraw served to ratify Zavodnik’s blatant abuse of the rule."
Zavodnik was using these admission of discovery as a weapon. Note that these are not suits themselves; Zavodnik is clearly trying to abuse corners of the legal system for his own benefit. It's unrealistic to assume a lay-person will know the full legal ramifications of such things, particularly after already winning a case related to the matter. The most recent judge recognizes this, disagrees with you, and has overturned these admissions.
I disagree. If someone is trolling outrageously with something that is clearly of no merit ($30000 for a $40 printer) ignoring them should be an option.
That part is about the admissions, where the plaintiff requested the defendant admit damages were 30k (or whatever), and anything not responded to is considered admitted.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Request_for_admissions
You can look at the history of the FRCP to see the changes over the years in how harsh/not harsh this rule has been.
Because Costello did not respond to all three requests for admissions within 30 days of receiving them, and did not ask for an extension of time, as required by Indiana trial rules, Costello admitted to the liabilities and damages by default."
There's no argument anywhere that this is proportional. He just filed that he was liable for the maximum possible in each case. Conceivably he could have been found liable for $600k by default.
What an atrocious user experience.
I can imagine someone suing over a misunderstanding because of an X/Y problem. Person A asks a really obtuse programming question, Person B answers it literally, and then Person A goes on to use Person B's answer to build a nuclear reactor controlled by a raspi. Person B then gets sued by Person A when it melts down.
Obviously that is a bit of an exaggeration, but it isn't hard to imagine a point in the future where programmers will be held to the same standards as certified professionals such as lawyers, doctors, and engineers. While it's really unlikely any particular programmer will be sued over advice they gave online, it would really horrible to be the person that someone chose to make an example of.
No random Craigslist clown is coming into the house where my wife sleeps, even if I escorted them in with a gun to their head because they could scope it out and come back later. I said I'd record a video of it working and send that over. No more replies. :)
Worst case, I would probably have it in the garage and they can look at it there. Probably a risk you have to take to have someone cart off a big old treadmill.
One thing I would definitely do is probably sell it fairly cheap. Just to make sure it moves with the 1st person who is interested. Rather than get a bunch of time online and gazers coming over. People are also less likely to complain about something if they get a deal on it too so it's a win/win. Well other than the cash lost but I'd make that deal.
[0]http://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/carry-on-trailer-me...
One other thought is to use a more localized service like Nextdoor where you are only selling to people in your subdivision/neighborhood. I would think this would cut down on the riff raff, but also cuts down on potential buyers.
The problem is that, legally, Doug Costello (the victim who sold the printer) admitted that he owed the money. The system is set up so that if one party doesn't even show up, they are assumed to have agreed with everything the other party says. They HAVE to have some kind of a rule like this or people would just not show up and then be immune lawsuits. The law DOES say that you must notify them personally so they know about the lawsuit and the court date -- that is normally done by personally handing them the papers, but sometimes it can be done other ways like mailing them. In this case Gersh Zavodnik (the asshole who bought the printer) swears he mailed it (although Doug claims he never received it) so that counts.
The problem here is that the judge believed he didn't have the authority to exercise judgement and rule that this was an abuse of the system. Fortunately, the appeals court DID think the law allowed judges to exercise that judgement, and they did so.
Not really. That's the easy way to do it, but the compromise would be that if the defendant doesn't show up, the plaintiff gets to present their evidence and argue their case, and the judge decides based on that.
Under these rules, in this case, if Zavodnik had shown up, and Costello hadn't, Zavodnik would present the zero evidence he had, and the judge should have thrown it out.
If the other party does not show up then you get a "default judgement". This does NOT mean an automatic win. But it DOES mean (roughly) that the judge has to believe every claim you make (all uncontested claims, and no one is contesting it). Usually that means you win the case.
Holy cow. This guy needs to be fired immediately. That is beyond gross negligence.
https://ballotpedia.org/Indiana_judicial_elections,_2012_-_C...
I am strongly pro-voting, but voting for dogcatchers and low-level judges is really bad.
But the trial lawyers send tons of money to one of the parties, so our current legal system stays in place.
The fear mongering has been going on ever since:
> An act to institute "Loser pays" laws (H.R.988, passed 232-193, March 7, 1995), limits on punitive damages and weakening of product-liability laws to prevent what the bill considered frivolous litigation (H.R.956, passed 265-161, March 10, 1995; passed Senate 61-37, May 11, 1995, vetoed by President Clinton [2]). Another tort reform bill, the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act was enacted in 1995 when Congress overrode a veto by Clinton.
It looks like this:
You sell me a broken printer for $30 and I hire a lawyer to sue you for $30,000. I refuse to settle for less and tie things up as long as possible in court. Eventually I 'win' with a court finding of $30 in damages. Then you pay my attorney $50,000 in fees and costs because you 'lost'.
Edit: Possible improvement would be to pay based on the distance between the award and settlement offers?
Also, the cost of the legal fees may not be the same as what "they" paid. In some countries, I think the judge can determine what the fair price for the legal fees. This way the "loser" of the case isn't burned because the other party chose to hire a $1,000/h lawyer.
That's how it works in Germany, basically (the so-called "Baumbach'sche Formel"). You want $30k and get $30: you'll pay (30,000-30)/30,000 = 99.9% of court and attorney's fees. Also, the amount of attorney's fees that can be reimbursed is regulated and therefore capped at a reasonable amount. Finally, you may be required to make a deposit for the court fees beforehand.
Now, if you were representing yourself...
* It encourages people to pick the best, most expensive lawyer in town for every case no matter the expense, because your opponent will be picking up the tab.
* It discourages people from using the courts to resolve their disputes, which means people without resources tend not to get any justice. If, say, your landlord steals your $1500 security deposit for no good reason, are you really willing to risk $5000 in lawyer's fees over $1500? Of course not, you'll let it slide and some little injustice will remain unresolved.
* It makes the courts a weapon of last resort rather than the standard dispute-resolution mechanism. You used to see people dueling in the streets to resolve their problems.
The disadvantage of course is that people can raise disputes with you, and you have to answer them much the same way you can't ignore filing your taxes.
> It encourages people to pick the best, most expensive lawyer in town for every case no matter the expense, because your opponent will be picking up the tab.
The court determines whether fees being claimed by the winner are reasonable. Bar associations (or the local equivalent) publish fee scales, and the courts will often require winners to cover a portion of their expenses if they determine them to be excessive.
If a litigant was found to be deliberately using the most expensive legal representation in an attempt to bankrupt the other party they'd almost certainly be sanctioned.
> If, say, your landlord steals your $1500 security deposit for no good reason, are you really willing to risk $5000 in lawyer's fees over $1500?
Most loser pays systems offer similar small claims courts, which don't require lawyer. So your $1,500 dispute would go there, rather than to a trial court.
> It makes the courts a weapon of last resort rather than the standard dispute-resolution mechanism
You have misunderstood what the courts are. They are a measure of last resort. Ask any judge or lawyer: courts expect parties in a trial to attempt to settle. That includes going to non-binding arbitration and making reasonable settlement offers. Courts take a very dim view of parties that don't attempt to settle.
In fact, if the loser made a pre-trial offer that was higher than the amount eventually awarded, the courts will often make the winner pay some or all of their own costs. This is on the basis the winner has wasted the court's time: they had a better offer, and they refused to take it.
I've been through the small claims process twice recently. In one, the judge had power to make a binding decision and he put an end to the case against me after 10 minutes. In the other, it was a non-binding settlement meeting where he told the other party that they had no chance in court.
My point is that if you give the judge more power, good luck trying to game him and the system.
The expected value of the lawsuit is therefore (0.751500) + (0.25-5000) = -$125, which means that very few people will go after the crooked landlord. If the leasing company has deep pockets, they could slant the outcome even further in their favor. Spend $10,000 instead and the expected value is now -$1,375. This seems wrong.
On top of this, you also have to worry about the risk of ruin. Imagine a bet where Bill Gates pays you $15M if a coin comes up heads, but you pay him $10M if it comes up tails. This bet has a positive expected value (+$5M), but most people won't take it because the losing outcome is completely devastating (unless someone rich is backing you).
I wonder if anywhere has a rule where the winning side receives min(loser's cost, winner's cost). That seems like it might be reasonably fair (if you can keep both sides from cooking the books).
Where I live (Ontario, Canada), the upper limit of small claims court is $25K ($19.5K USD), so you wouldn't necessarily be required to have a lawyer to sue.
* No one in the UK needs to spend $5k on representation to get their landlord to return their deposit, and I think the court would take a dim view of anyone who tried! The law is pretty simple: if the landlord does not return the deposit, less agreed deductions, then the court will order them to return the money, and in addition award a sum between 1x and 3x the value of the deposit. A tenant in your situation would only be out the cost of a few stamps.
* This is a feature, not a bug! Litigation _is_ the last resort, and should only be attempted after all other attempts to settle have failed. The court will take a dim view of a litigant who has not made reasonable attempts to settle, and/or undergo some mediation or other alternative dispute resolution.
There's also rules about what reasonable legal costs are, to deter major bill padding.
Junior year I decided to teach him a lesson. We were making presentations for science class and you know how they have the steps of the scientific method? Well, for the hypothesis I spontaneously opted to, out of nowhere, rip him a new one in front of the whole class, tying the experiment to the fact that he was a giant fat-ass.
He jumped up and came for me, the class held him back, I got a tongue lashing from the teacher, and he never bugged me again. We even worked together on a shop project later on that year.
Some people are taught respect by their parents, others have to have it taught to them by strangers. I'm pretty good at that when I need to be.
After school, I got similar verbal harassment from the same guy while with his friends while walking home.
Long story short, I got sick of it and one day in History class, grabbed the sides of my chair and waited for him to push it as he walked by. When he did, I sprang up rapidly while holding my chair and pushed back, flipping him over the desk behind me. Huge disruption to the class, etc.
Teacher looked over, made no expression, and continued teaching the class. Never heard a peep from the guy after school the rest of the year, and that was the last time he touched my chair. :)
If you want laws against malicious litigation, campaign for them, but intimidating people because you believe the litigation to be malicious is childish at best.
Sounds like a good way to get a felony conviction.
Exactly. He's probably not that well-versed in physical security. Maybe he's got a gun he shoots once in awhile, that's probably going to be the extent of his precautions. He's not going to be some unassailable hermit with aggressively unreasonable defenses. Guys like that are too busy doing that to earn law degrees.
So I can learn how to effectively harass him faster than he's going to be able to learn how to effectively defend himself. He might be able to win a judgment against me, but not before I've reduced his life to a shambles.
John Boyd, considered by many to be the finest military strategist since Sun Tzu, invented something called the OODA loop. Essentially, the faster you can react and respond to opposing threats, the more control you can exert over the terrain, the greater command you have over the outcome of the battle.
Winning is just the start. John Boyd was one of the greatest pilots who ever lived, and he didn't just beat you in simulated air combat, he utterly trounced you in a way that left no doubt.
If faced with somebody seriously threatening my lifestyle, my secret weapon isn't going to be my willingness to fight dirtier, it's the fact that my 'weapons' work faster than his. The first intimidation attempt is going to communicate, in a way that's absolutely impossible to mistake, that we're not just playing law here. The pen might be mightier than the sword, but only because it's backed up by guys with swords. If you don't have any of those, then you're going to lose, and he won't until he wins his case.
The communication here will be calculated to be overwhelming and total, yet breaking only the minimum of laws. I'd trade a criminal case for assault, the state is going to be more reasonable than this asshole is, over what was described in the article.
If he doesn't go away, then that means I failed and I need to know why. I will have already considered the failure modes as a part of planning the initial intervention. Future interventions will be carefully orchestrated to hit him hard where it hurts while causing a minimum amount of attention-grabbing collateral damage. The idea is that if he complains to law enforcement, they won't have much to prosecute me with. (faced with this, I'll absolutely start making some cop friends, guaranteed they're going to hate him more than they'll hate me. Their input on how to resolve this would be very welcome)
I don't have to actually break laws in order to convey the fact that I am not someone to be fucked with. I can attenuate my response such that likely reprisals are easier to deal with than the actions they were intending to deter.
The idea though, is that he just finds a softer target.
Society in general and legal system in particular would not want that to happen.
So if you execute that intimidation strategy then you are likely to become a prosecution target of legal system.
---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intimidation
Threat, Criminal threatening (or threatening behavior) is the crime of intentionally or knowingly putting another person in fear of bodily injury. "Threat of harm generally involves a perception of injury...physical or mental damage...act or instance of injury, or a material and detriment or loss to a person."
---
But why even go that physical intimidation route at all if there are good legal ways to repel these baseless claims?
Possible? Sure. Likely? Hardly. The same legal system that failed to deliver justice to this asshole's victims, is the same legal system that will fail him when he pokes the wrong bear. He's not the only guy out there with the skills to skirt the law.
What makes violence a viable option is the fact that you're dealing with one person and not an organization. If it's more than one person's efforts you have to counter, then yielding is the better recourse. A group of people will have a goal in mind when taking action against you, all you have to do is help them reach that goal and they'll bugger off. You can fight a group effectively but it's generally not worth it.
Thankfully, speaking from the point of view of maintaining the fabric of society, the real world isn't like TV and movies and the odds of pissing off a genuine bad ass are slim (anonymous Internet tough guys like myself don't count). But $30K is beginning to look like "real money", and for some folks under some circumstances, physical violence begins to look like a viable solution to the problem.
And truth be told, the less enlightened side of me says, "that dude needs a good ass kickin'."
I'm a programmer and all around nice guy, I hold doors for folks. I'll walk out of my way to go open the door for you if your hands are full everytime. And just last night a drunk driver ran into a parked car outside, it wasn't one of mine but I went out and took photos of everything for whoevers car it was (including of the perps license plate that fell on the ground). I gave a statement to the police about it today. I always take time out of my day to help a random person. The poor girl whose car it was hugged and hugged me, she said "people don't do that". I just shrugged. I grew up working on a farm, fairly Earth-salty midwest guy. I'm not a self proclaimed tough guy, I'm actually pretty soft but probably hard by today's standards. My brother is far more rough and tumble than I am.
I do have a lot of stories, but I've done just what you describe. I had a TV stolen when I was in college, I generally knew who did it. I got my band of merry men together, knocked on the door and when they let us in, we blasted in turning it upside down searching the apartment for the TV. One of the occupants pulled a gun out on us, we took it from his hands and beat him to the ground with it. Then we tossed it outside into the snow and continued to pound on the guys.
The TV didn't end up being there, but they knew who took it. They were at their house the night it disappeared. They called who stole it and allegedly said, "I think these guys mean business". That was correct. We were going to hunt them down like animals at their next bonfire/party they had planned and it was going to be very bad for them. And we weren't going to stop there.
Needless to say, I had a brand new TV in the box on my doorstep at 9:30PM that night! Problem solved and I shook on it with one of the guys who stole it. They were drunk and broke in to steal it, I just wanted my TV back.
I've protected many men who have done me harm, financially and physically from being harmed by calling off my goons who wanted to come after people in different situations. They simply hadn't earned what was coming their way so I prevented it.
All that said, this guy if he had done this little racket to my family he would be in very serious trouble. I normally do absolutely zero questionable behavior, I'm absolutely by the book day to day. At work, I'm a non-toxic angel who would never step on anyones toes. I keep my head down, work a hard, honest 8 hours and mind my own business. I'm not even a condescending smartass or funny-guy little punk like most people try to be. I'm live and let live.
But I would haunt this man for the rest of his days. Likely me, my brother and many others who are big, strong midwest giants who are not nice. I've been screwed over in life in many situations, I do not retaliate like this ever or normally.
But stuff like this story is beyond the pale. You're right, people like this need to be handled correctly. This eastern European is one of the people who are not to be dealt with in court. He'd realize we do not live in "new age" where you can say and do what you want to. Something can happen to you. Worse than any stupid Anonymous online hack or geek vengeance. He's laughing at us here in the USA, but I assure you it's not safe for people like him.
This Ukrainian guy simply got very lucky with picking the right victims. If my brother called me in on a situation like this, this Euro trash would be haunted physically, mentally, and materially for the rest of his life.
The immigrant plays with fire that he doesn't fully understand. We do not live in a New Age, where you are safe. Things can happen to you.
Wait, so the occupants hadn't taken your TV, but because they didn't snitch, it was OK to enter their house and turn it upside down??
You're right they didn't snitch, amazingly. They thought they were tough guys. Maybe even as they were beaten to their knees? For the record, they weren't harmed until they pulled a gun out. But they were going to snitch eventually whether they thought they were going to or not.
> For the record, they weren't harmed until they pulled a gun out
It seems reasonable to pull a gun on a bunch of strangers invading your home.
So if anyone attacks his friends or family, alls fair, because they chose to associate with the kind of person that would illegally invade someones house with a mob...
Fairness is not a universal concept. What is fair is determined by who has the bigger clan and the most guns. Some places, that's the state. In far more places than you would believe, the state is too weak to enforce its version of justice, so it's left up to men like Buck and his brother. Are they going to do it to your standards? Probably not. So it's on you to not piss them off.
It wasn't just a "TV". It was my only possession worth anything at all. I've worked nonstop since I was 12. I started working on a farm (not my farm, we had no farm, it was the neighbor's) and delivering papers. No one has ever given me a thing. I was born fighting in my childhood, literally fighting almost daily. My money has come very hard earned. As has any career advancement, skill acquisition. I've never been given a job through a network connection, I don't have a network. I had a full hernia on my right side at 16 from manual labor. And I have a strong sense of justice when something is wrong, like breaking in and taking a poor working guy's $700 television. I was working 35 hours a week to pay for going to school fulltime. That may not have been much money to you, but it was to me. I felt very taken advantage of. You must not know what it feels like to have little and have everything taken from you because it's likely you've had a better existence or maybe life didn't require much grit to get through. I've clawed my way to where I am now. I never had any money. No ones going to take what I have, not a TV, nothing. Even to this day when I have a lot more. Doesn't matter how little it is, over my dead body. Damn right, all for the sake of a "TV".
I am a nice person. I do have some anger but I wouldn't harm a soul that didn't have it coming. I defended the homosexual kids who were bullied in my high school way back when. Verbally and physically. No one did that in the rural midwest. I hated seeing people get picked on. I rarely, if ever picked on anyone. But I have squared off with men who thought I was a target, you'll have to beat me to the ground I'm not quitting. As a developer, I believe people who say "I can't" should be fired on the spot. I feel like I'm ready for retirement and I'm not old. Everything seems like an obstacle. I'm completely sympathetic with poor people in the US and around the world. Hell, I'm a Bernie supporter. But if robbed or my wife is hurt, I'm going to come after you and I'll haunt you like a ghost.
There's a lot of different people on HN. People have different experiences and different perspectives. I think you're over the top with the 'satisfying home invasion' talk though. I know the odds of success when you don't start life at the finish line. People born at the finish line think they've accomplished something. Yeah so what, I've been involved in what is basically gang violence. Not everyone is going to match up with your exact sensibilities.
When we 'blasted in' we didn't kick the door in. We knocked, started quizzing the guy who answered the door about the TV, one of them said to come on in and look around. Then we blasted in.
The gun could've gotten him killed. He pulled it out but clearly wasn't willing to use it, he waved it around as if we were going to be scared. I wasn't, he got it ripped from his hands then he was beaten to the ground his own gun. This kind of non-macho posturing is typical. Then we got that stupid gun out the door and settled it.
Anyway this wasn't that big of a deal, just a robbery resolved as cordially as you can in an efficient manner. It worked out for both parties. Especially well for them, considering they were involved with breaking, entering and theft. Not to mention whatever charge comes with pulling a gun out threatening to kill people. He did say he'd shoot us. I'd say they got off rather easy, other than bruised egos. They were my neighbors and I assure you, they didn't want anything to do with me again.
You seem touchy about it for some reason like you were on the receiving end of a similar situation. I personally don't like to be taken advantage of or have my home robbed? This was a relatively tame story I was willing to post publicly.
Zavodnik, has no idea what waits for him out there. It's not all fun and games when you play with peoples lives as he does. Wait till he finds someone intelligent, aggressive, willing to go to the edge or slightly over the rule of law and with a strong sense of justice. Street justice, not the courts. I could be that man for sure, but like most people reading this- I would only interrupt my life for someone who affected my family. Possibly a local child rapist or similar heinous criminal could face my wrath. It would take something like that to activate my mob violence gene.
That guy just needs some anonymous midnight beatings by some of the victims and their families and he'll stop. Yeah it's the "wrong answer!" even though our nation-state does much worse. He's just gotten off with zero retaliation so far so he's going to continue to stay within the rules but abuse our judicial system.
> Possibly a local child rapist or similar heinous criminal could face my wrath. It would take something like that to activate my mob violence gene
Jesus Christ.
> Especially well for them, considering they were involved with breaking, entering and theft.
You implied that they weren't involved, that some other group was, and they had just stayed there.
I've never had my home invaded, do I need to be personally affected to sympathise with it?
You don't know me either, I'm just taking your post at face-value. it suggested you turned someones place upside down, despite having only the suspicion that they associated with the people that took it.
They definitely made the mistake of inviting us in. We weren't going to break and enter and good chance with a verbal confrontation someone says "come on in!" at some point, which they did. I don't think they knew how serious we were. They weren't expecting us rampaging through. If I was wrong, I was wrong but I either did something or I didn't. I feel like you're asking for perfection when I was just trying to achieve a goal. Bottom line is that I was right and within an hour I had an identical, brand new TV in the box on my front doorstep with an apology. I'm not sure we ever know anything for certain in life right? I had to try.
It is true: I did not have forensic evidence, but I knew it was them. I suppose I could be a bad man but it was a judgement call. I never doubted after that day that I made the right call. It was aggressive but not the worst story I have. Not sure what else to add. I don't remember every detail as time has passed and everything I was told, but I'm pretty sure at least one of those guys helped toss the TV into the pickup truck that carried it away.
They weren't angels right, no one came over to tell me I had been robbed. They were probably going to keep quiet. Maybe bad guys met worse and got an unpleasant surprise.
In a lot of states it would be reasonable to use the gun too.
Vexatious behaviour is not tolerated in the courts here; most of the time.
This is awkwardly similar to the other John Oliver story in today's HN, in which debt buyers exploit this fact to have as many people admitting liabilities as possible.
There needs to be a better system.
If John Q. Public know they will have to jump through legal hoops any time someone makes a claim against them, will this not encourage some folks to take the law into their own hands, thus encouraging actual damages vs. claimed?
I assume once the matter is in front of a court it is only a matter of time before your identity is readily available.
Some form of obfuscating one's name and/or address may raise the bar a bit, but I don't see how this is a solution to the problem of malicious litigation for selling something on craig's list.
What stops an ebay buyer from the same malicious litigation?
And that's just ebay. The comments in this thread were about generic online transactions between strangers, not about any specific site.
Good on this guy for keeping his wits about him through all this. Guy probably needs a long, relaxing vacation.
People dying due to a malfunctioning car or some other kind of unlucky event ... I bet there's a lot of clever and quiet murder that goes on in the world with a plausible deniability, alibis and everything else set up.
The murderer carefully covers up evidence of sabotage or malice and the victim succumbs. People think "oh my, what a tragic accident" and regretfully move on in life - never being the wiser.
Probably every day.
I'd recommend watching The Perfect Murder[0] documentary, although what they detail isn't exactly practical. Less than 15% of murder is committed by strangers [1].
I think if you aren't caught directly after the initial act, you don't have any relation to the victim and no DNA is left, your chances of "getting away" is relatively high.
Your comments on a "malfunctioning car" are misguided, given that any fatal automobile accident, provided the reason the driver "crashed" is not apparent, will result in someone looking at the car to see WHY it malfunctioned. A cut brake line or similar would obviously scream foul play.
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjEBb4LhQdU
[1] https://top5ofanything.com/list/8a1bf3d1/Murders-by-Relation...
http://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-perfect-crime-a-new-frea...
That might be true, but that does not mean that the system referenced isn't the best we've got at the moment.
I was smart enough to realize how stupid that was. Just not savvy enough to draw the line to seeing that I should short the market...
"Oh you like this printer? Well the printer is free, but if you want it, you have to pay me $40 for 1 second of my time."
You meet, say hello. Collect $40. Give the free printer.
True but my way works for craigslist sales and my gigolo side business, so I've got that going for me..