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3d DCA Watch -- High Minded Retro Poetic Form Edition

Well it's an idiot wind blowing down the backroads headin' south today, bringing with it 60s radicals, secret Muslims, and lots and lots of things to be afraid of and angry about starting at around 9 o'clock tonight, dont'cha know.

But for just a brief shining moment, let's put our bickering and worries aside, throw caution to the wind, and peer south to the wizards by the highway, those freewheelin' robed hepcat coffee-swillers that rule our world, yes you know it, the good, the bad, and Judge Schwartz -- yes it's that time of the week again, where PCAs are born, born free, born to be you and me, ahhh hail enough already with all this bullcrap it's 3d DCA Watch:

Hialeah Automotive v. Basulto:

Let me ask you: you go to buy a car at Potamkin Dodge. You speak no English, you are presented a blank contract that has an arbitration clause and no numbers filled in, all in English. You are asked to sign, assured the numbers will be filled in later. You agree on terms orally, exclusively in Spanish, but they fill in a number for your trade-in lower than they told you orally. They allegedly explain the arbitration clause to you in Spanish. Potamkin won't honor the agreed-upon trade-in price, and they already sold your old vehicle. You sue for fraud in the inducement and FDUTPA. Potamkin moves to compel arbitration. What happens?

This opinion has led me to seek out poetic expression to fully convey my thoughts. In fact, I must explain my feelings on the outcome using that ancient Japanese poetic form, the haiku:

Cope assayed this he did;
Shepherd not now writing
To the doghouse goes Potamkin.

Gee, that felt good, man good -- let me try another:

consumer arbitration
not friends
its justice unsteady

Wow, now I see why Kerouac got all the chicks!

Let's see what else happened:

Lisa v. Gutierrez:

An interesting opinion dealing yet again with disputed assets that have mysteriously found their way to Miami. As Judge Salter puts it in his crystal-clear and crisply written opinion:

Here, as in many previous cases, Miami finds itself the alleged repository of money and assets purportedly misapplied by wrongdoers in other countries.

So true, and yet that's what keeps so many of us in business! Judge Salter then goes on to perform a fairly straightforward Kinney analysis regarding some in-rem property of the defendant, ultimately concluding:

Because Lisa has not tied the Florida assets to the allegedly-wrongful acts of the defendants and the claims that will now be adjudicated in Guatemala, the Florida circuit court fairly concluded that the Florida assets are not ?at issue in the dismissed case,? as in Kinney System and Mendes. Without such a predicate, there is simply no basis for a Florida court to retain limited and local jurisdiction over the assets as the case itself heads south.

In other words: Man, Miami-Dade is strictly dullsville, let's split to Guatemala, Daddy-O!

Full post as published by South Florida Lawyers on October 15, 2008 (boomark / email).