Chicago jury decides worth of wife’s love

Chicago jury decides worth of wife’s love

A Chicago-area man who encouraged his wife to have sex with other men in order to spice up their love life sued a man she had sex with on the grounds that the man illegally caused his wife to fall in love with him.

And a jury found in his favor, determining that the wife’s love was worth $4,802.87.

Arthur Friedman of Northbrook, Ill., encouraged his wife, Natalie, to have affairs in order to “keep our marriage going,” Natalie explained. Friedman did not object when his wife had sex with German Blinov, but he alleged that Blinov acted irresponsibly by causing his wife to develop romantic feelings for him.

“This guy ruined my life — he backstabbed me,” Friedman said.

Natalie told reporters that it was “humiliating” to have the value of her affections debated in open court and then calculated down to the penny.

According to jury foreman Eric Heisig, the jurors frequently commented during deliberations that “this is stupid.”

Source: Chicago Sun-Times

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Dentist who implanted boar tusks awarded $1M

A dentist who implanted a pair of fake boar tusks in someone’s mouth as a practical joke was awarded $1 million by the Washington Supreme Court.

The dentist, Robert Woo, temporarily implanted the tusks in the mouth of his assistant, Tina Alberts, while she was under anesthesia, and then took photos of her. Woo apparently thought this was a good practical joke because Alberts frequently spoke of her family’s fondness for raising potbellied pigs.

Alberts, however, was so traumatized that she quit her job and sued Woo for emotional distress.

Woo asked his malpractice insurer to defend him, but the insurer refused. The insurer said that humiliating an employee by implanting fake boar tusks in her mouth was not covered by the insurance policy because it had nothing to do with the normal practice of dentistry.

Woo settled with Alberts for $250,000 and then sued his insurer. The court, in a 5-4 decision, said that the tusk implant had some relation to dentistry and should be covered by the policy. It upheld a jury award that gave Woo the $250,000 he paid to Alberts plus an additional $750,000.

Source: Associated Press

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Men who solicited sex ordered to wear chicken suits

Three men who were convicted of soliciting sex from an undercover police officer were ordered to stand outside an Ohio courthouse from 4 to 7 p.m. wearing a bright yellow chicken costume.

The men were offered the unusual punishment in lieu of 30 days in jail by

Municipal Judge Michael Cicconetti of Painesville, Ohio.

The men also had to hold a sign that read: “No Chicken Ranch in Painesville” — a reference to a legal brothel in Nevada known as the Chicken Ranch.

A local woman who regularly dresses up in a chicken costume to cheer up hospice patients agreed to loan her outfit to the three men for the occasion.

Judge Cicconetti is fond of sentences that involve barnyard animals. In previous cases, he ordered a man who called a police officer a pig to stand next to a live pig with a sign that read: “This Is Not a Police Officer,” and ordered a couple who stole a baby Jesus statue from a crèche to dress up as Mary and Joseph and walk around with a donkey.

Source: Newhouse News Service

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New York City pays topless woman hefty sum

New York City has agreed to pay $29,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by a woman who was arrested for walking around topless.

Jill Coccaro, 27, was stopped by police in 2005 while on a topless stroll on the Lower East Side. She complained that exposing her breasts in public was perfectly legal and that police should not have arrested her or taken her to a hospital for a psychiatric evaluation.

Previously, several New York women had argued in court that a state law against showing one’s breasts in public amounted to sex discrimination because it applied to women but not to men. A New York appeals court never ruled on that issue, but it did say that the law applied only to nudity that was lewd or had a commercial purpose.

Coccaro, who has since changed her name to Phoenix Feeley, said she had no lewd or commercial motives. She explained that when it comes to walking around without a top, “I’ve kind of always done it out of practicality.”

Source: Associated Press

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Court orders neighbor to stop singing in the bathroom

A British court has ordered a woman to stop singing in the bathroom because it annoys her neighbors.

Caroline Bishop, 39, could face five years in jail if she continues to make what was described in court as an off-key “high-pitched noise.”

According to neighbors Alistair and Kerry Law, Bishop deliberately engaged in the singing to annoy them after they burned autumn leaves in their garden and the smoke bothered her rabbits.

Bishop claims she merely sang nursery rhymes as her children were preparing for school in order to “jolly them along.”

But Kerry Law told the court that Bishop also sang Gary Glitter’s “Leader of the Gang” and “told me I was a fat old cow.”

After a three-day hearing, Judge Justin Wigoder of the Lincoln Crown Court ruled, “We find the singing proved,” and ordered Bishop not to croon again until Jan. 21, 2009.

Source: The Daily Mail

— Compiled by Thomas F. Harrison
Thomas F. Harrison is vice president of new business development at Lawyers Weekly.
He can be contacted at tom.harrison@exhibitAnews.com.