Nice Pants!

Admittedly, this is the kind of thing that makes people hate lawyers:

When the neighborhood dry cleaner misplaced Roy Pearson's pants, he took action. He complained. He demanded compensation. And then he sued. Man, did he sue.

Two years, thousands of pages of legal documents and many hundreds of hours of investigative work later, Pearson is seeking to make Custom Cleaners pay -- would you believe more than the payroll of the entire Washington Nationals roster?

He says he deserves millions for the damages he suffered by not getting his pants back, for his litigation costs, for "mental suffering, inconvenience and discomfort," for the value of the time he has spent on the lawsuit, for leasing a car every weekend for 10 years and for a replacement suit, according to court papers.

Pearson is demanding $65,462,500. The original alteration work on the pants cost $10.50.

Where does lawyer bashing material come in, specifically?

By the way, Pearson is a lawyer. Okay, you probably figured that. But get this: He's a judge, too -- an administrative law judge for the District of Columbia.

That's right - a DC judge/lawyer has taken a trivial dispute with his dry cleaner and turned it into a multi-million dollar lawsuit. To be fair, most damage claims in civil suits are meaningless - you get what your prove, not what you ask for (it's not an either/or proposition) - and are included for shock value. But that doesn't justify this dingess (who has turned down three offers to settle, the last for $12,000) taking a small business couple to court over a customer service claim.

The only positive thing for my profession I can say about this is that Pearson is acting as his own attorney - no other lawyer has been dumb enough to sign on and help him.