Posted on 06/14/2006 6:53:25 AM PDT by freepatriot32
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - A nanny who was arrested after police viewed hidden camera video recordings that appeared to show her shaking a 5-month-old baby is suing the recording system's manufacturer.
Claudia Muro, 32, alleges that distorted camera footage wrongfully led to her arrest and imprisonment. She was arrested in October 2003 and spent two years awaiting trial before prosecutors dropped the case because of concerns about the tape.
The footage was broadcast on television around the country.
The lawsuit was filed against Boca Raton-based Tyco Fire & Security, according to a report in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.
Broward County prosecutors in March said experts they had consulted concluded the footage was not reliable as evidence because its videotape was time-lapsed, meaning that the movements that appeared to be rough shaking might not have been as violent as they appeared.
Robert McKee, Muro's civil attorney, told the Sun-Sentinel that the footage was misleading and caused his client to spend a long time in jail. He said there should be a warning to the consumer about the images.
Messages left by The Associated Press early Wednesday for McKee and Allison Gilman, Muro's criminal defense attorney, were not immediately returned.
Nor was a message left for the communications department of Tyco. A company official had told the Sun-Sentinel it does not discuss pending litigation.
Is this suggesting that the broadcast was not the source of the tort? How can the manufacturer be held responsible for what the buyer did with the property?
Knock, knock??
We knew this was coming.
Yep, and next will be the book about the suit about the hidden-camera manufacturer. And then after that will be the movie about the book about the suit...
Oh jeeze, I definitely have to start a "Stupidity out of Florida" ping list.
How would they have made the payments on their new BMWs???
The critical missing piece of information is whether or not the infant suffered any sort of injury or trauma, and that should have been determined by any medical examination, either by the child's pediatrician or via hospital records.
This doesn't pass the sniff test, IMHO.
Tort reform = loser pays.
This is the reason for tort reform.
This is 100% an intimidation suit.
Keep in mind if there are punative damages the state gets a significant piece of that award.
The camera maker's attorney fee award should be charged to the plaintiff lawyer PERSONALLY.
I wonder if she had an explanation for the full body slams? Lens malfunction making objects look more wobbly from a distance or something?
This is exactly why my child will never be in day care.
Uhhhh, so the fact this Nanny's handa and the baby's shoulders were shown to be eight inches behind the baby's bend over head on one frame and then eight inches in front of the baby's bent back head in the next means absolutely nothing?
Why not sure George Eastmann's estate for inventing the camera? How about John Logie Baird's estate since it was shown on a TV?
I have always said you can't pay someone to love your children.
I am also aware that single parents need daycare...
In Florida there are many areas of law where the user pays the lawyer fee.
The problem is that it DOES NOT MATTER AGAINST A PENILESS PLAINTIFF.
This is a suit the lawyer should never have taken. What this is about is extending the "proximate cause" concept to absurdity. (ie suing a ski mask maker for a bank robbery)
The goal here is to force a settlement and use the PR to push BIGGER suits for the law firm.
If people want to be USEFUL, file "friend of the court" memoranda when the camera company files a motion to dismiss.
"Warning: There is a hidden camera above this warning label. The images it takes may..."
Absurd...
The lawyers bringing this case to court should be disbarred.
Given that it was time-lapse, she wasn't "slamming" the child on the floor -- in reality, she was gently lowering the child to the floor, raising the child, then gently lowering the child to the floor, over and over.
That's her story and she's sticking to it.
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