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Re: "News" Verizon calls SFLC bluff


From: amicus_curious
Subject: Re: "News" Verizon calls SFLC bluff
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:26:09 -0400


"rjack" <robjack@insightbb.com> wrote in message DbydnUFCnPgAdELanZ2dnUVZ_r6rnZ2d@giganews.com">news:DbydnUFCnPgAdELanZ2dnUVZ_r6rnZ2d@giganews.com...
amicus_curious wrote:

"Linonut" <linonut@bollsouth.nut> wrote in message news:57CDj.11278$%15.9389@bignews7.bellsouth.net...

Then why did they bother?  And, if SFLC was at such a disadvantage, why
wouldn't big ol' Verizon just go ahead and let little ol' SFLC take its
beating in court?

They couldn't object to a voluntary dismissal. That is an action in their favor. They could countersue in some way, perhaps, but the SFLC is just a flea and Verizon has a lot more to do than worry about something like that after it has gone away anyway.

Here's why Andersen and Landley committed legal suicide:

A voluntary dismissal with predjudice is res judicata and a basis for future collateral estoppel claims:

"A voluntary dismissal with prejudice operates as a final adjudication on the merits and has a res judicata effect. Harrison v. Edison Bros. Apparel Stores, Inc., 924 F.2d 530, 534 (4th Cir. 1991) (concluding that a voluntary dismissal with prejudice 'is a complete adjudication on the merits of the dismissed claim.')"; The Travelers Insurance Company v. AlliedSignal TBS Holdings, 2001 FED App. 0357P (6th Cir.)

Under the doctrine of collateral estoppel the BusyBox plaintiffs probably cannot bring a similar suit against any future defendants:

“Under res judicata, a final judgment on the merits of an action precludes the parties or their privies from relitigating issues that were or could have been raised in that action. Under collateral estoppel, once a court has decided an issue of fact or law necessary to its judgment, that decision may preclude relitigation of the issue in a suit on a different cause of action involving a party to the first case.”; San Remo Hotel v. San Francisco, 545 U.S. 323 (2005), fn. 16.

The only thing that may be wrong with this is the fact that the court never actually decided the issue, which limits the res judicata argument. Certainly they cannot ever re-litigate against Verizon on any similar issue, say using some other company's product the same way as the Accutec device. Whether or not they could sue, say, ATT for the same issue, even using Accutec stuff, isn't clear to me. Presumably "once bitten, twice shy" would apply though and they will probably go off to fish in another part of the lake.


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