Loose Cannon: A Boy Named Sue
News item: The nation’s largest class-action law firm, Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach, was recently charged with kicking back more than $11 million to individuals who served as lead plaintiffs in class-action lawsuits, despite a New York law that prohibits attorneys from promising anything of value to induce a person to bring a lawsuit. Milberg Weiss itself realized hundreds of millions of dollars in fees, according to court documents….
One will rarely lose friends by picking on a law firm in trouble, but here I must tread carefully. You see, dear readers, my hands are not entirely clean in this matter: During the past two decades I have served as a lead plaintiff in a number of direct marketing-related actions launched by Milberg Weiss. The details of three such suits follow.
A while back, I attempted to launch a career in sales. Beguiled by the promise that I would “Make Money! Win Friends! Earn Prizes!,” I responded to an American Seed Co. ad in the back of a comic book that promised the way to riches was through selling packets of seeds to my neighbors.
What the ad failed to make clear was that the market for seeds in midtown Manhattan is about as robust as that for bit and spur saddle sets. The ad also did not point out that a 30-something-year-old going door-to-door taking orders for seeds would not be looked upon as an entrepreneurial go-getter.
Despite the ad’s claims, I not only failed to make money or earn prizes through the venture, but the promised friends never materialized either, although one prospect who called himself Super Joel made the friendly request to “hold this package for me for a week,” which I obliged.
It wasn’t until Milberg Weiss stepped in that I saw any form of compensation from the seed company for my troubles. True, the law firm’s share of the settlement was enough to enable it to cover the state of Texas in Venus flytraps, while mine was limited to three packages of Morning Glory seeds. Super Joel, if you’re reading this, I still have your package. Given your apparent affinity for organic matter, when you do come to claim it, I will be happy to finally take your seed products order.
I next worked with Milberg Weiss when the firm sued on behalf of people who participated in telecom MCI’s “Friends and Family” loyalty program. Participants in Friends and Family designated up to 20 people to be in their calling circle. These select individuals could call each other at substantially reduced rates.
After a particularly vicious fight with my sister’s husband, I tried to substitute someone else for the slot he occupied on my plan. But MCI maintained that while we might not be “friends” at that moment, he was still technically “family” and would continue to be counted against my 20-person maximum.
I explained to MCI that if my sister’s husband were ever to call me to apologize, I would want the call to be billed at the highest rate possible. But it wasn’t until Milberg Weiss stepped in that I received satisfaction. For our troubles, those of us in the designated plaintiff class received a free “Neither One of Us Wants To Be The First To Say Goodbye” ringtone for our cell phones. Milberg Weiss’s attorneys had to settle with a sum roughly equivalent to what one would pay for a thousand 50-year-long person-to-person collect phone calls from New York to Tonga.
My most recent interaction with Milberg Weiss was in response to a McDonald’s fast-food sweepstakes contest. (A little-known fact: Every time a fast-food chain is sued, a lawyer earns his wings.)
I actually qualified for three separate class-action suits against McDonald’s stemming from this sweepstakes. In the first suit, I was the lead plaintiff for a group of sweepstakes participants who had sustained entry-related injuries. Like others in the plaintiff class, I tried to obtain a game piece by sending a 3” x 5” index card with the words “McDonald’s Game Piece” written on it to the company.
In my case, the edge of the index card inflicted a particularly nasty paper cut on my thumb, rendering me unable to hit a computer keyboard space bar with my usual élan, and thus preventing me from working as a writer.
The second case stemmed from discrimination statutes: There was no provision for foreign-language entries, and as my submissions to Direct are occasionally met with the snarled comment, “Is this even English?” I felt justified in claiming cultural discrimination, and Milberg Weiss was able to round up a number of linguistically impaired fast-food customers with ease.
The third suit claimed that McDonald’s sold entrants’ names and addresses to a pharmaceutical firm that markets a sodium-blocking drug. I actually wasn’t sorry when this suit was dismissed out of hand: A clever marketing ploy like that should be met with, if not accolades, grudging respect at very least.
As a “threesie” litigant against McDonald’s, I got the biggest personal payoff from any of my suits: Each member of the plaintiff class received an entire box of foil ketchup packets, the majority of which were not past their expiration date. Milberg Weiss’s share? Let’s just say that the firm’s partners will be able to supersize their next 25 million Happy Meals without feeling a financial pinch.
So there you have it, folks. Yes, I’ve been a shill for Milberg Weiss on direct marketing issues for several decades. And yes, I’m not particularly proud of it. But given the revelations of their gains, more than anything else I’m vexed over the disparity in my compensation from these various cases versus theirs. In fact, I’d sue – if only I knew where to find a good law firm.
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