Work_Writing

WRITING SAMPLES

Demand letter

JANE DOE v. DOCTOR & OUTPATIENT CLINIC: Discusses the merits of the claims of a young woman who had recontructive breast surgery for a congenital breast deformity. The young woman had made great efforts to keep both the deformity and the surgery secret. However, when she returned to school, a classmate passed her a note asking her how Ms Doe liked her recontructive surgeon. It was later recalled that the classmate's mother worked at the Outpatient Clinic where the surgery was performed.

Meet & Confer

PLAINTIFF v. LANDLORD OIL COMPANY: Meet & Confer Letter. Plaintiff stepped out of his truck into a puddle of gasoline at a gas station. Plaintiff slipped and fell on his back, breaking a twenty year old cervical fusion. Landlord Oil Company threatened to bring a Motion for Summary Judgment with Sanctions because it asserted that it had no control of the premises. However, there was a duty to maintain the gasoline pumps which Plaintiff argues it breached.

PLAINTIFF v. DOCTORS: Meet & Confer Letter. Discusses objections based on attorney work product protection to DOCTORS' discovery requests.

Arbitration Complaint in Whistleblower Case

Motions in Limine & at Trial

HORN v. MONTGOMERY: Subcontactor fell while climbing ladder at construction site while preparing an estimate for Contractor. Key issue in case was whether Contractor's ladder being used was defective due to worn "skids" on the ladder's feet. At issue in this motion was a statement in the EMT's report, stating that Plaintiff/Subcontractor lost his balance.

RICHARDS v. ALMOND TERRACE: Tenant slipped and fell in Apartment complex's laundry room. Key issues in case were whether Apartment was on notice of accumulated machine oil in front of washer and washer's tendency to discharge water in which tenant slipped. At issue in this motion was the deceased Apartment manager's report on the incident with alleged admissions by party-opponent Tenant.

Oppositions to Motions to Strike & Tax Costs

These were my first excursions into the issues of award of costs. Opposing the following motions on Defendant's Motion to Strike and Tax Costs made me somewhat of a local authority on statutory CCP 1032 and CCP 998 costs. The case involved Mr. Lusk, a plaintiff with garden variety soft tissue injuries, whose claims rode piggyback on Ms. Musselman's Superior Court claims for her herniated L4-L5 disk. On behalf of Ms.Musselman, many experts were retained to explain the mechanism of her injury through torquing from her turned neck down her spine to her low back. However, a previous attorney had disclosed many of these experts as retained also on behalf of Mr. Lusk.

The PROBLEM: Mr. Lusk could not be present at trial, and a sceptical jury did not award an amount over Lusk's 998. Ms. Musselman did receive an award over her 998. Defense was arguing that the experts' fees be split in half. I attempted to show that Mr. Lusk's statutory 1032 costs when added to his jury award, did get Mr. Lusk over his 998. The court did not buy many of the arguments, but eventually did grant Ms. Musselman most all of her costs for experts and exhibits.

LUSK v. APPLEGATE: Interesting discussion of determination of whether plaintiff beat his CCP 998 offer by adding statutory 1032 costs to jury award. Another interesting discussion on whether plaintiff A is entitled to charge an ordinary witness fee as a statutory cost for experts retained on behalf of a coplaintiff B when these experts also render an opinion as to plaintiff A.

MUSSELMAN v. APPLEGATE: Interesting discussion of award of costs for jury questionnaires.

A SECOND PROBLEM was that Defense also argued that new revisions to CCP 998 only allowed expert fees incurred in preparation for trial. Therefore, Ms. Musselman's award should be further reduced for costs paid to experts during trial. On first reading, I saw the merits of Defense's argument, but I was sure that this was not the Legislative intent, especially after checking the Legislative records on the Internet. I wrote to State Senator Kopp, the author of the revisions. Senator Kopp did me the honor of responding to my queries, and sent me a full file of the Legislative record and correspondence with Governor Wilson. I have included both my letter to Senator Kopp, and the cover letter of Senator Kopp in response.

LAW SCHOOL

Law School Criminal Appeal Excerpt - This an excerpt from a brief I prepared for my appellate advocacy class. My professor was Susan Sola, research attorney for Justice Arabian. She was very impressed with my writing style, and she put my brief on file at the John F. Kennedy University Law Library. I like the brief because it was assigned to me as a "loser" case, and I found a way to distinguish the controlling case from the assigned case. I also summoned the nerve to ask the court to reconsider its holding in the light of a California Supreme Court decision that was at odds with the lower court's earlier decision.