Re: Jets fan sues Pats, seeks $184 million

On Sep 29, 1:12 am, "Ray O'Hara" <mary.palmu...@xxxxxxx> wrote:

it was a judge suing and it was settled month ago with the judge losing.
nobody had to close anything. do try to keep up and stop listening to howie
carr



Perhaps you should try to keep up Ray. I didn't hear it on Howie
Carr, it was on CNN. Yes, the judge did lose in the end but what he
put these people through forced them to close one of their stores.
Unless you are calling this reporter a liar?


Dry Cleaners' Victory in Pants Lawsuit Still Comes With a Loss

By Marc Fisher
Thursday, September 20, 2007; Page B01

E ven on the day they beat Roy Pearson in the $54 million pants
lawsuit, Soo and Jin Chung looked as if they had taken blows to the
gut.

Yes, after a two-year ordeal that turned a pair of gray trousers into
a global symbol of how easy it is to hijack the U.S. legal system, a
D.C. Superior Court judge ruled that the owners of Custom Cleaners had
not abused their customer in any way.

And yes, an outraged public embraced the couple and donated more than
$100,000 to cover their legal bills.

But that's not the end of the story. Bowing to emotional and financial
burdens created by the legal battle over a $10.50 alteration, Custom
Cleaners has gone out of business. The Chungs announced yesterday that
they have sold their shop on Bladensburg Road NE, let their employees
go and are down to one store, Happy Cleaners on Seventh Street NW,
across from the Washington Convention Center in Shaw.

I found Soo Chung there yesterday, sweeping the floor. She looked a
bit more at ease, but the strain of two years of strangulation by
lawsuit was evident as she wrung her hands and furrowed her brow at
the mention of Pearson. But when the conversation turned to the
couple's return to Happy Cleaners, she brightened.

"This is our first store, first job," she told me. "When we came to
America in 1992, we worked here. Good job. Good store."

"They were just tired of the whole ordeal," said the Chungs' daughter-
in-law Soo Choi. "A lot of people view this comically because the case
is so outrageous, but my mother-in-law has gone down four dress sizes
from this whole ordeal. They just want to put this in their past."

The Chungs, bewildered that one vindictive customer could cause a
small business so much grief, found it hard to go back to the shop in
Fort Lincoln each day. And the lawsuit proved to be a big drag on
revenue at Custom Cleaners.

When Pearson started gathering material in his quest to squeeze a
struggling Korean immigrant family for megamillions in 2005, he posted
fliers on light poles in the neighborhood, asking residents to feed
him horror stories about the company. Business, which had been strong,
declined significantly and never rebounded, said Choi and the Chungs'
attorney, Christopher Manning.


"You'd think the trial and all the publicity would have a good effect
on business," Manning said, "but for a dry cleaner, it really doesn't,
because your customers are from the immediate neighborhood."

Pants Man is appealing his defeat, so the Chungs are not free of him
yet, although Manning said his firm will handle the appeal without
charge. Pearson, who did not respond to a request to comment, is still
technically a D.C. administrative law judge, but the panel that
decides on reappointments has notified him that it intends to cut him
loose.

Pearson's appeal is not expected to be heard until next year. Neither
Manning nor the Chungs have heard from him since the couple dropped
their demand that they be awarded attorney fees, a gesture they hoped
would get Pearson to reciprocate by dropping his appeal. "It obviously
didn't work," Manning said.

The Chung family spent their last days on Bladensburg Road writing
thank-you cards to their regular customers. The prospects for profits
were better at Custom Cleaners because the shop was equipped to clean
clothes on site; at the downtown shop, the cleaning is outsourced and
the margins are tighter, Choi said.

But the new setting is an emotional relief, a physical and
psychological distancing from the customer who would not be
satisfied.

"Far away," Chung said. "Back here, where we started. Where it was
good."





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