Posted on 03/16/2024 4:24:58 AM PDT by MtnClimber
Climate bully Michael Mann, with mixed results, has been suing those who criticize his “hockey stick” graph of climate history. This 1998 graph purported to show that global temperature was stable until about 1900 when human-induced warming struck. In February, Mann scored a $1 million libel judgement against Canadian columnist Mark Steyn in a court in the District of Columbia. Steyn has responded with an appeal.
Punitive damages are typically calculated as a ratio to actual damages. With only $1 in actual damages, the ratio in this case is a staggering million to one. This amount is so excessive that there doesn’t seem to be any precedent for it, according to Steyn’s appeal.
On the other hand, the appeal does cite numerous precedents to support a decision to reduce an excessive award. In one example, the DC court of appeals referred to a 1:145 ratio as “staggering.” An award can be overturned based on DC law, on the First Amendment, or as a violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. A more reasonable five-to-one ratio would result in Mann taking home $6 instead of a million.
Steyn called Mann’s graph “fraudulent” and compared him to a child molester. Opinions are protected free speech, a principle that should cover both of these statements.
Mann’s lawyer stressed the need for punitive damages to punish “climate deniers.” This is a propagandistic description designed to encourage association with “holocaust denier” and “election denier.” To punish a defendant for his political opinion is to turn the First Amendment on its head.
Steyn’s case has been before the courts for twelve years. Nobody involved lives in DC. Mann won through the use of court shopping. In 2019, he lost a similar case against Tim Ball in the Supreme Court of British Columbia.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Punishing the political opposition of the left used to be done by firing squad. It seems we may be returning to those days.
I’d love to get the skinny on why Mann left PSU and went to Penn...
Nice find for the geologist’s video clip..
Says it all right there.
I am stunned that no wealthy Conservative or political organization stepped forward to assist Steyn with this hugely important issue.
This happened in a DC court. The case is political because 1) Mark was a host on Rush’s show and Mann’s lawyers made sure the “jury” knew this 2) Mann is all in on the hoax of humans causing climate change and Mark thinks it is not.
Therefore, the verdict was known at the time the case was filed in DC. No amount of money and no talented lawyer or team of lawyers would ever be able to win a political case for a conservative in DC.
Fundamentally for an academic its prestige, moving from a land grant school (cow college) - PSU to an Ivy League school - Penn is always a step up for any reason.
This also likely figured into his reasoning with the PSU president’s (Spanier) conviction, resignation and 2-month prison sentence. Mann lost his “anything goes” permissive top cover. Ivy League is much more permissive and has deep pockets.
“I’d love to get the skinny on why Mann left PSU and went to Penn...”
Penn is IVY LEAGUE!
‘Niff said...
I am stunned that no wealthy Conservative or political organization stepped forward to assist Steyn with this hugely important issue.
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That needs to change for the appeal and everyone who cares about this needs to open their wallet.....
In 2019, he lost a similar case against Tim Ball in the Supreme Court of British Columbia.
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Man might have lost but he bankrupted the Great Tim Ball and the stress of the whole thing killed him...as Steyn said on Sept. 26, 2022, “I am in a cold rage, which is never the best temper in which to write....” https://www.steynonline.com/12840/ball-bearing
Go, Mark!
Sorry don’t have time to go get it and post it here, but Supreme Court precedent hold that punitive damages in excess of about 20 times actual damages are unconstitutional. Again by memory I think the jury found about $1k damages. The punitive damages award is unconstitutional as a matter of law
In China, Russian, North Korea or other relatively free society, you can have opinions on science and not be imprisoned or bankrupted. This happens in sh*thole failed nations.
The current American government and system are unconstitutional as a matter of law. It’s likely irreversible.
Steyn did have attorneys when this nonsense began. He mentioned that just filing a motion was 50K, and there were many motions to file and respond to, and it was bankrupting him. Since then, he decided to represent himself since Mann was supported by a number of rich liberals.
Yes, but the frivolous action destroyed Tim Ball's health and ultimately eliminated him:
Mark Steyn on Death of Climatologist Dr. Tim Ball: ‘He had all the qualities of a true warrior: courage, integrity, indomitable resilience’By Marc Morano September 26, 2022 2:58 pm https://www.steynonline.com/12840/ball-bearing
Ball’s Bearing Tim Ball, 1938-2022
I am in a cold rage, which is never the best temper in which to write. But over the weekend came the news from his wife Marty that Tim Ball had died.
Tim was a Canadian scientist who dissented from the global warm-mongering that has deranged our politics, and put out the lights at the Eiffel Tower, and is on course this winter to freeze and starve Europe’s elderly. In the course of his pushback against the madness, Tim reprised an ancient Pennsylvanian jest and applied it to the creator of the famously dodgy global-warming “hockey stick”, Michael E Mann: Dr Mann, he remarked, belongs not at Penn State but in the state pen.
Cute. But any joke about Mann is no laughing matter. So the warmatollah determined to destroy a retired University of Winnipeg professor.
Mann filed suit against Ball in British Columbia, and then just sat it out, knowing that (to reprise my old line) the process is the punishment. Three years ago, Mann lost the case for failure to prosecute. As in his suit against me in the District of Columbia, the plaintiff had refused, for years, to do the elementary things necessary to settle a legal matter, such as providing evidence of damage. In the craphole of American justice, at least as evidenced by my own experience, judges let him get away with that. But in Canada the court wearied of the obvious delaying strategy, and ruled against the vengeful climate mullah.
He lost; Ball won.
That is a fact, even though Mann and his doting Mann-boys continue to deny it. For anyone more sentient than the average Mann groupie, you can read the BC Supreme Court judgment for yourself.
As is customary in civilised jurisdictions (ie, not the American courts), the prevailing party’s legal bills are paid by the loser – or, as they say in Canada, “costs follow the event”. Roger McConchie, Mann’s counsel, accepted his client’s liability for Dr Ball’s expenses. See page six of Mr Justice Giaschi’s ruling:
MR MCCONCHIE: Costs follow the event. I have no quarrel with that.
By then, both Tim Ball’s retirement savings and his health had been drained and depleted by a decade of Mann’s frivolous, dilatory litigation. He was broke in both body and bank account.
Had Mr McConchie’s client been an honourable man (I know, I know, we are dealing with unimaginable hypotheticals here), he would have paid Tim a seven-figure sum.
Instead, Tim’s family now requires a GoFundMe campaign to cover the costs of his modest burial. His friend Anthony Watts will be posting details of that later today.
I had not thought it possible for me to loathe and despise Michael Mann any more than I did. He chose the jurisdiction in which he sued Tim Ball, as he chose the jurisdiction in which he sued me (the District of Columbia, where justice goes to die). And, when that jurisdiction found him liable, he simply rejected the plain meaning of the judge’s decision and holed up beyond the court’s reach. The contemptible Mann has had three years to remit what he owes, but he has not paid Dr Ball a penny.
And no doubt this evil man and those who abet his vile schemes are laughing at the penury unto death they forced on a brave man. Michael Mann filed a frivolous suit he had no intention of bringing to trial, but he succeeded in hounding Tim Ball into the grave.
Tim bore all this with great fortitude. The last time I saw him was at a “denialist” gala in Washington where all the Commonwealth wallahs – UK, Canuck, Oz, Kiwi – had been seated together, presumably so the Yanks didn’t have to risk being exposed to some unfortunate social faux pas like an accidental Loyal Toast. Despite being visibly ground down by Mann’s frivolous litigation, Tim was on grand form that night, full of life and full of laughs. He had all the qualities of a true warrior: courage, integrity, indomitable resilience, and, in his quiet dignified bearing, a rueful acceptance of the costs they impose. The ugly husk of a human being that is Michael Mann could destroy Tim’s savings and his health, but he could not destroy Tim’s spirit.
There will be a reckoning for the slug Mann. In the meantime, you can gain a sense of Tim Ball and his enviable inner strength from this Heritage Foundation awards night not so long ago:
Tim Ball Receives the Lifetime Achievement in Climate Science Award
There will be more to say about Tim Ball with Marc Morano later this week on The Mark Steyn Show
Did someone refute the allegation of removal of the data from The Little Ice Age?
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