It’s a new development in one of Richard Carrier’s lawsuits.
This is the suit against Skepticon and Lauren Lane, not the one against me that we had a recent hearing about…but DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE is a magical phrase right now. One down, two to go.
Here’s the full dismissal, a 6 page PDF. Have fun!
I’m glad this one was dismissed. All of these suits are a waste of time and money.
Yay!
To the attorneys involved, they aren’t a waste of money.
This is excellent news. Hopefully the suit against you will be dismissed in the same fashion.
Does Missouri just process cases faster? Both Missouri and Minnesota have anti-SLAPP legislation, I see.
Hemant twittered a link to the judge’s decision
https://www.dropbox.com/s/cb23xzcay6lr52m/d19bdf67-cec9-4fa3-a68a-cc18031dae42.pdf?dl=0
“Plaintiff has not argued that there was any impediment to him complying with the Missouri statute of limitation and has not indicated that anything prevented from filing in Missouri within Missouri’s two-year statute of limitation. Therefore, equitable tolling will not be applied in this case”
I doubt if Carrier’s ego will allow him to see the handwriting on the wall.
That IS good news! Little hope that the wanker will realise how much of a huge waste of everyone’s time and money he’s been, but sometimes the wheels of justice do turn round.
=8)-DX
Good news for sure.
Next move.
Sue Carrier for attorney’s fees and court costs.
If he wants to waste people’s time and money, it should be…
his own time and money!!!
Seriously, he is likely guilty of one of more of: Barratry, Malicious prosecution, Abuse of Process, violation of Federal Rule 11 i.e. filing a Frivolous lawsuit, and generally the Tort of Wasting People’s Time and Money.
And don’t forget the Tort of Pretending to be a Serious Person.
I think the Missouri case was one that accepted video testimony, so the lawyers (and the “lawyer”) didn’t have to travel, so it got processed faster.
Ah, so SLAPP didn’t even come into play. It was the plaintiff not filing in time, rather than the defendant not doing anything wrong.
Well, I suppose you take what you can get.
At least it was not dismissed with extreme prejudice!
Ah, dismissed with prejudice. The words no plaintiff wants to hear, but sweet music to our ears. Any chance he’ll take the hint and just drop the rest before he wastes more time and money?
The Bayesian prior that Carrier has Dunning-Kruger syndrome with regards to the law remains high, and therefore, the probability that Carrier will not update his own priors about his understanding of the law remains high as well. Therefore, the probability that he will drop the suit(s) is low.
Congrats! That’s another head or two off of the hydra. Remember, according to the myth, Hercules DID kill the hydra. It just wasn’t easy.
I had no idea what this case was about.
So I looked it up on Google.
Here it is.
Not impressed.
Owlmirror @ #14 – :).
[for those who might be unaware, Carrier’s Cargo Cult Bayesian endeavours were his schtick; equivalent to, say, Harris’ Moral Landscape blatherings — impressive to those who are not familiar with the concepts at hand. cf. Velikovsky]
I too was amused by Owlmirror’s drollness, SC.
Glad I could give you the straight line Owlmirror :-)
Jonathan Norburg@3–
Not a lawyer, but I can tell you there are plenty of times I’m getting paid for my professional services when I think it’s a waste of time and money but still has to be done because of the structure of the medical system.
Skepticon and Lauren’s case being dismissed first was a combination of the 8th Circuit being quicker at making decisions and the judge not requiring oral arguments on the motion to dismiss. She decided that the written pleadings were enough. (The Eastern District of Missouri has oral arguments in only 5% of motions to dismiss according to a study I saw, compared with 50% in Eastern Virginia). We filed our final response on July 19th, and it’s been in the judge’s hands since then.
For PZ the clock started last Tuesday, the 24th. So we may get a ruling by Christmas. Yay.
Amy’s case is going to be the long one, I think. The video-conference that PZ mentioned in the comment above was just a status conference on Amy’s case in AZ. No testimony was given as far as I know.
–James
The key piece of information here is not the fact of dismissal, but the judge’s reasoning in denying equitable tolling.
Equitable tolling is always the danger to a defendant in these circumstances (the dismissal elsewhere was not on the merits, but on something else like personal jurisdiction or perhaps even subject-matter jurisdiction). There’s a temptation to give a plaintiff — especially when proceeding pro se — the benefit of the doubt to have the merits at least presented for a decision. (Sometimes, that actually serves “judicial economy” better, because that plaintiff is more likely to accept an adverse result on the merits than one on a “technicality”: Just look at this refiling here!)
Equitable tolling is dangerous because it’s essentially at the judge’s discretion… and can be overturned only for an abuse of that discretion. The most obvious abuse of discretion is using the wrong legal framework, but I don’t see that being an issue here. Before reaching equitable tolling, though, the judge also found that there was no conflict between the Missouri and Ohio savings statutes… if one accepts that a federal court sitting in diversity in Missouri is bound by the Missouri state courts’ interpretation of their procedural rule (the savings statute) to apply only to cases originally filed in Missouri courts (see ruling at 4). At a theoretical level, that’s a somewhat dubious proposition going deeply into the quagmire of Erie theory, Hanson, and whether the means of applying a statute of limitations that is based on the nature of the claim is procedural or substantive law; in the 8th Circuit, this judge is on solid ground. (She wouldn’t be in the 2d, 7th, 9th, 11th, or DC Circuits — it’s much shakier there.)
How badly does Carrier need to bottom out before he realizes that he has serious personal issues that he needs to seek help for? The man is critically lacking in self-awareness and desperate for validation.
It seems like he doesn’t have any more backing from resourceful status quo warriors, with him representing himself. But I suppose that could change.
Or else he’s so convinced of his own brilliance he thinks no-one could present the case as well as he could himself.
Re. John Morales comment.
Velikovsky? Nuke him from orbit!
@Jaws #22:
Thanks for that analysis. I just wish I found law easier to follow than quantum mechanics.