Introduction Soerono Haryanto—a wealthy guest at a Marriott hotel—pointed a gun at Mohammed Saeed’s head, demanding that Saeed kneel and kiss his feet.[1] Saeed—one of the hotel’s employees—obliged.[2] Haryanto responded by threatening to kill Saeed while mocking him as a mere “servant.”[3] Not satisfied with threats, Haryanto held Saeed hostage, demanding one million dollars from […] Continue Reading >
Purdue’s Poison Pill: The Breakdown of Chapter 11’s Checks and Balances
Purdue’s Poison Pill: The Breakdown of Chapter 11’s Checks and Balances
Purdue Pharma, the bankrupt drug manufacturer at the center of the opioid crisis, settled its civil and criminal liability for opioid harms with the Department of Justice in a deal that contained a “poison pill” that prevented creditors from objecting to any subsequent plan of reorganization for Purdue: if creditors exercised their rights and pushed […] Continue Reading >
Does Lawyering Matter? Predicting Judicial Decisions from Legal Briefs, and What That Means for Access to Justice
Resilience, Retribution, and Punitive Damages
Does Lawyering Matter? Predicting Judicial Decisions from Legal Briefs, and What That Means for Access to Justice
This study uses linguistic analysis and machine-learning techniques to predict summary judgment outcomes from the text of the briefs filed by parties in a matter. We test the predictive power of textual characteristics, stylistic features, and citation usage, and we find that citations to precedent—their frequency, their patterns, and their popularity in other briefs—are the […] Continue Reading >
Purdue’s Poison Pill: The Breakdown of Chapter 11’s Checks and Balances