PLC

This whole series of posts really only serves to illustrate the different point of views of lawyers versus property owners. From the lawyers perspective, it's all about the legal code and it's almost always better to fight. From the property owners perspective, it's all about risk aversion and it's almost always better to settle.

If you're a property owner who has been sued a dozen times or more, and all the other property owners you know have had similar experiences, and you've settled cases that you knew where baseless, just to save attorney fees, then this law will not likely make you more willing to allow climbing on your property. If you've had these types of experiences you will likely see no upside from allowing climbing and potentially huge downside. Even if the case if baseless and you get it thrown out by following Rodchester's arguments, you're looking at several thousand dollars down the drain. So, it doesn't matter if there are no climbing lawsuits - property owners will still not tend to feel comfortable allowing climbing on their property without real tort reform (a limit to the damages would be a great start). Also, mattp - it's almost never just a slip and fall - usually, they try to make up some negligance or, even worse, discriminatory aspect to the case. Most lawyers might be nice guys (not my experience), but the threat of massive damages from losing (however slight the odds) and the cost of legal fees make property owners highly risk averse. Sometimes you settle for a few thousand bucks, sometimes you fight and it costs you a quarter million dollars (when you win!), sometimes you settle for a lot just to avoid the hassle and risk.... Here's a best case scenario - I sold some property on Queen Anne and the buyer ran out of money on the remodel job, so their lawyer started sending my letters, "suggesting" that I might want to send them $10,000 to "settle" things. My lawyer basically told them to kiss off and that if they sent me any more such threats, that she'd have him disbarred. So, it all worked out well - except, it cost me $750 for three letters.

Matt: I actually know a little about this issue from personal experience.... what I can tell you is that if you own any significant amount of land (say 3 apartment buildings, or a couple small strip malls), you can expect to be sued once or twice a year. Nearly every single one of these lawsuits will be completely without basis. However, to fight the lawsuit would cost, say $250K, where-as the settlment offer might be $15K - and if you lose the case, you could lose everything you've worked for all of your life. The lawyer gets $5K for a couple dozen hours work - bringing a winnable case to court might cost a lot, but filing suit and using the defendent's own legal fees to justify a quick settlement is nearly free. Also, in the very few instances I've seen where the case actually went to court and legal fees were awarded, they were never paid. And the fight to get the legal fees often costs nearly as much as they are worth. Also, beyond the fact that the vast majority of these suits are settled out-of-court, most of the remaining cases go to binding arbitration. So, I'm not surprised that you never saw many of these cases working for a judge. What I'm proposing is actually vociferously opposed by the bar association, and for good reason - their membership would lose a lot of money.

Laws such as these don't really make any difference to landowners or insurance companies, because lawyers and plantiffs have no significant negative consequences from filing suit. Most landowners will still settle for some "nominal" amount if sued, to avoid the costs of trial and risk of massive damages - even if they are 99% sure they will win. For a law like this to have teeth, plantiffs AND thier lawyers must be held personally liable for filing frivilous suits. How 'bout disbarment for filing more than one frivilous suit in any five year period? This issue doesn't just matter to landowners and climbers - if you're a renter, keep in mind that a significant portion of your monthly rent goes straight to the insurance companies, due to our ridiculous legal system.

Also, what about chronic lurkers whose wife/partner just had a baby and has now decided that climbing was an idiotic idea after all so now they are looking for someone to climb with?

The wife (and climbing partner) has come down with pregnancy and given up her belay duties... If anyone is looking for a partner for this (Labor Day) weekend, send me an email (paulcallo@hotmail.com) - I'd prefer something in the North Cascades, but I'll even consider driving down to Smith for sport routes... or pretty much anything in between. Swell.