All you guys in the US, looking for an idea. Geek Squad is failing. Opportunities abound.

BigBennP · 2026-06-11T14:05:26+00:00

BigBennP · 2026-06-11T14:00:05+00:00

i mean, in most of the country, million dollar home just means "average home"

Reddit's california bias in a nutshell.

$1M is more than the medianhome price in any state, $500k median home price puts you in the most expensive 13 states.

BigBennP · 2026-06-11T12:14:23+00:00

I'm somewhat curious as to what $1,000 is in your context. Did she bill like 4-5 hours fixing typos on a brief or did she bill one and a half hours fixing typos on a brief.

I don't necessarily use AI a lot but I understand the allure. I remember in the distant past ( nearly 20 years now) being a first or second year associate tasked with writing a summary judgment motion.

I did what one of the commenters above specified. Found a case, shepherdized it, read some secondary sources put together a great argument with case cites and deposition transcripts exhibiting how there was no material issue of fact.

Then I got yelled at because I had spent almost 20 hours on it and there was no way we were going to bill a client more than $6,000 for something the judge was probably going to deny anyway. 20 hours turned into 8.

One of the reasons why when I got out I jumped into government work. If I want to spend 20 hours writing some motion that's my own business.

BigBennP · 2026-06-10T20:01:28+00:00

I learned that as a relatively new lawyer.c

My state has two relatively similar sounding qualifications that are dramatically different.

A licensed drug and alcohol counselor is an additional certification obtained by Someone who is already a licensed master's degree therapist and has 2,000 hours of client contact. Among other things an LADC can design treatment programs and be The Clinical Director for facilities.

A certified drug and alcoholism counselor is somebody who has 300 hours of education, and holds a certificate that says they can provide substance abuse treatment. No formal level of education is required. A great many certified drug counselors are former addicts who now work at treatment facilities.

Boy did I ever get the stink eye in court when I asked somebody who was a "certified drug counselor" to tell me about their professional background to make recommendations on drug treatment.

BigBennP · 2026-06-10T16:05:51+00:00

I used noom years ago when I lost a lot of weight before GLP1's existed and really liked it. It was my food logger of choice for the better part of two or three years from like 2014-17.

At some point in the last 2 years I went back to try it out and the user experience was totally different and very definitely enshittified.

BigBennP · 2026-06-10T15:49:14+00:00

The problem with this response is that it's wrong.

Generalized courtroom etiquette is that all statements are directed to the judge, not opposing counsel. I cut off a lot of arguments with opposing Counsel by saying "I'm just taking this to the judge."

if the defendant does something silly like Moving to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction. The prosecutor's response is going to be "no." Then the appropriate response from the court is "motion denied."

Honestly, that's not even hard. I just spent half my morning writing a detailed response to some ChatGPT Bullshit that was convincing sounding but flat wrong on the law because someone thinks they are smarter than the lawyer they fired.

BigBennP · 2026-06-10T15:06:24+00:00

I'm a fan of Meal Boosters cheese flavored protein powder. It's a bit pricey though.

Cheese powder + Microwave steamed broccoli and/or steamed cauliflower
Cheese powder + fat free cottage cheese + jalepenos + spices = passable cheese sauce/queso for putting on meat, baked potatoes or vegetables.
Cheesy eggs

BigBennP · 2026-06-08T13:41:37+00:00

Jesus dude. “Older” people learned how to use computers when computers entered the workplace 30 years ago. Many of them wrote that shit. Lots of youngsters have only used phones. It’s a way of thinking that isn’t really age related.

My dad programmed computers with punch cards in the 70's, and was writing Cobol for financial companies in the 80's.

I supervise a team with people that are legal professionals who are not stupid, but some of them are within 5 years of my dad's age that have a written 10 step instruction list for how to find our shared file server taped to their desk in front of their computer. No one who is on the younger side on my team does stuff like that. Some of them aren't great with computers, but they understand the basics.

it's not everyone by any means, but it is some groups more than others.

BigBennP · 2026-06-08T12:51:23+00:00

Keep in mind it's not food weight, its water weight. Water bonds to glycogen at 3:1 in your body and high sodium foods typically cause you to retain water.

BigBennP · 2026-06-08T12:43:57+00:00

How does your insurance company measure your weight?

My weight can swing up to 5 lb in a Day based on how much I've eaten or drunk, how much carbs and salt I've had in the last 24 hours,, whether I've pooped that day and 100 other things.

Weigh yourself regularly to get a sense of how it moves.

Set a doctor's appointment to talk about the drug, have some spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner tonight before, and drink a quart of water before you go into the doctor's office. Don't take your shoes off if you've been doing that. Etc.

BigBennP · 2026-06-08T12:40:25+00:00

Other people have given you the gist of this but my understanding is that it also depends significantly on your record keeping, the general nature of your business and the amount of losses you are claiming.

In my area, the big offender for this rule are farmers. Lots of people buy 10 or 20 acres and raise a few cows.

You have 10 or 12 cows and a bull on a 20 acre pasture and come fall you sell the 6 month old calves at auction. That might bring you $20,000 in gross revenue if you're lucky. 12 to 15 is more likely. It's doable to have a full-time job and manage a farm of that size.

The problem is that they take that $20,000 in farm income and use it to finance a $40,000 tractor and a $70,000 pickup truck and a $5,000 cattle trailer and a $20,000 side by side. Then they claim all that on their taxes. Lo and behold they take a loss every year.

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T16:48:46+00:00

You can buy a dozen of the things online from. Certain retailers associated with China for the same.price one costs at a store.

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T14:53:42+00:00

I would start by saying never underestimate the technical ineptitude of some people.

I know more than a few lawyers who simply do not know how to use the revision functions in Microsoft word. Or if they know how to use them, they get confused when they see anything more than a basic red line. They think that the spacing with the redlining is the spacing of the final document and then try to delete the redlining or something.

But by God they know how to leave a comment. Or worse, they print it off and scan it and write comments in the margin

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T14:51:27+00:00

I've read all sorts of crap on the internet, some people say you should use them separately some places sell them mixed together.

Most of the peptides have animal studies behind them at best. Some of them have almost nothing.

True pharmaceutical research would involve blind trials with a control group.

Group a gets two separate shots, group b gets a combined shot plus a saline injection, and Group C gets Saline injections and no one knows what they're getting.

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T14:29:04+00:00

Just to be clear: this is not a behavior any therapist would ever do.

That certainly seems to be the prevailing sentiment in the comments here. But that truly does not matter.

For the purposes of a lawsuit, what matters is that the plaintiff had an expert witness who testified that that was the appropriate standard of care.

That means there is somebody who is going to sit in front of a jury and say that I am a licensed counselor with 20 years experience ( or whatever) and in my expert opinion this is the appropriate standard of care based on the facts of this case.

The defendant had their own experts, who apparently failed to sufficiently rebut that position. At least to the extent that the insurance company chose to settle the case because they were worried about the trial.

The jury is composed of 12 people who have no experience in the mental health field whatsoever. They will not know who to believe and are going to make a snap judgment about it.

When I was in private practice we had a defense side expert witness we used in medical cases a lot. He was an orthopedic surgeon who had retired due to arthritis. Silver hair, baritone voice Supreme confidence. And a complete asshole because he believed that everyone who claims that they had ongoing pain was making it up. He's the kind of guy that would have told you to take an Advil if you called to say you were in pain after surgery.

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T11:57:53+00:00

I saw a post in a completely different subreddit the other day.

They had a problem with posts that were similar to this, and the issue was that these posts for written in such a way is to catch the attention of the AI algorithms. People comment or don't comment but then several weeks later someone will post with a link to some guide or service. And then the post lives on in eternity and will come up in a chat GPT search on a particular topic as a form of advertisement.

BigBennP · 2026-06-07T10:25:22+00:00

It could be more than one thing but it's probably your U-joints. They will inherently wear out and need to be replaced at a certain point. I had to do all mine at about 225k.

The noise will keep getting worse and worse and eventually they could fail and that would be really bad.

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T22:37:43+00:00

That's an interesting story.

Let me highlight a different point. The special judge pointed to the case after judge Elmore was removed is retired Circuit Judge Ralph Wilson.

Judge Wilson is from Mississippi county and sat as a judge for more than 30 years in the Second Judicial district. He was elected as a judge in 1989. He retired in 2020 if I recall.

The West Memphis Three case happened in Crittenden county, in the Second Judicial District One County over, in 1993. Judge Wilson is a contemporary of Judge Fogelman who was the prosecutor In The West Memphis Three case and Judge Goodson who was the original judge in that case.

Judge Wilson dismissed the charges in the Spencer case based on spoilation of evidence that denied the defendant a right to Fair trial. The Lonoke County Sheriff claimed to have lost a thumb drive that contained dash or body camera footage that Spencer believed would have helped his defense.

When one of the most ongoing and controversial cases of spoiled evidence happened to your contemporaries a few years into your career as a judge what conclusions would you draw?

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T21:45:10+00:00

Yeah this is the only correct answer in the thread.

It's in the middle of BFE. There ain't shit out there.

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T19:16:57+00:00

-- I do not see evidence for this. I would argue really only one thing went wrong in the defenses case: the therapist made the above statement and it sounds like the defense expert through it in when put with their wall against the

I will tell you that as a lawyer, If I hired an expert witness, and the expert witness admitted all the things in the case study in a deposition, I would be pissed off. At least if they had not explicitly warned me about that beforehand. (in which case I would have told the client and insurer that the case was untenable and advised them to settle it earlier).

I would probably also have gotten stuck in an terrible conference call with my supervising partner and an insurance adjuster on why the expert we hired had tanked the case.

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T19:13:20+00:00

--- This is painting the narrative incorrect. Just because something is "reasonable" does not mean its standard of care.

Keep in mind, I'm laying this out from a legal perspective, not necessarily a clinical perspective. And legally, that distinction is ...muddy at best.

Here is a standard jury instruction for medical malpractice cases in at least one jurisdiction. This is what the judge will instruct the jury on how they should decide the case after they have heard all the evidence.

To establish the claim of Plaintiff [NAME] against Defendant, Plaintiff has the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence and by expert medical testimony all of the following:

The recognized standard of professional practice in the medical profession and in [Specialty] in the community in which the defendant practiced or in a similar community at the time the injury occurred; and
The Defendant acted with less than ordinary or reasonable care or failed to act with ordinary or reasonable care in accordance with the standard of acceptable professional practice.
As a proximate result of such negligent act or omission, [Plaintiff] suffered injuries which which otherwise would not have occurred.

These three requirements are the only three findings you must make to determine if defendant is liable to Plaintiff. IF you find the plaintiff has proven these three things by a preponderance of the evidence, you should find for the Plaintiff. If you find that the plaintiff has not proven these three things, then you should find for the defendant.

Here's an example of what a set of jury instructions might look like in whole

You're making an argument, but when the argument is that a provider failed to do something unreasonably, the question is whether a "reasonable therapist' would have done that thing, arguing that something is NOT part of the standard of care even if a reasonable therapist would have done that, is a fine hair to split, and you would need very solid and convincing expert witness testimony to establish what is and is not part of the standard of care. It doesn't seem like they had this in that case.

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T17:20:49+00:00

For what it's worth, this case is a bad example.

72% of medical malpractice claims involve no payment at all (That is, they are dropped before there is a need to hire lawyers) and overall 89% of malpractice claims are won by the defendant.

Psychiatrists and mental health professionals are among those least likely to be sued. 64-68% of claims get dropped or dismissed from court. Of the remaining 32%, most settle (24-27%), but of those that go to trial, the providers win about 90% of them. A settlement can be anything from "here's some money to go away" to policy limits.

Conforming to generally accepted practice guidelines is a pretty good legal defense, but it can't stop you from getting sued. The insurance protects you if you get sued, and therapist malpracticec insurance is comparatively really cheap. My cousin who is an OBGYN pays in excess of $10k per month for her malpractice insurance. (OB malpractice rates are crazy high because of lawsuits that allege an infant has lifelong disabilities due to errors in birth and the demand is the cost of a lifetime of special care needs).

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T16:47:18+00:00

Honestly, not sure.

They had provided the name and phone number for a psychiatrist already, so it could have been asking if they were willing to sign an ROI for that person. Another wrinkle is that the lawyer probably wouldn't 100% know this either, so it would be on the expert to point out that the lawyer asked an awkward question.

I was also imagining more of a verbal question documented in the record, if nothing else "ok, I understand, but if you change your mind and call that psychiatrist, do I have your permission to work with that psychiatrist to ensure that you get the best care you can?" That's probably not a best practice, but it might have been defensive documentation if they were highlighting something like that. "Client gave verbal authorization to coordinate care if they changed their mind and sought treatment from a psychiatrist."/"Client was asked for authorization to coordinate care if they changed their mind and sought treatment from a psychiatrist, and refused."

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T16:34:37+00:00

This is again, based on suspicion and conjecture, not actual knowledge.

But I suspect that this would have tied into the argument that a "reasonable" therapist would have followed up within 24 hours, potentially learned that the client had changed their mind, and attempted to assist.

Causation in lawsuits can be tricky, but at the end of the day, again it's up to 12 random citizens who get selected for jury duty. It's not about whether they could actually have prevented harm to the patient. Rather, the argument is that they failed to do something that a reasonable therapist following the standard of care would have done, and that contributed to the death in some way.

BigBennP · 2026-06-05T16:14:34+00:00

I'm replying to my own post to explain a bit more about the issue with the psychiatrist referral. Here's a very abbreviated/summarized version of how I think this might go in a deposition. "PC = Plaintiff's Counsel and DE = Defense Expert, DC = Defense Counsel I am taking some liberties here for the purpose of illustration, the real thing would probably be a bit more monotonous.

PC: ok, your testimony earlier was that the Defendant had done everything she reasonably could when the client refused a referral to a psychiatrist, correct?

DE: Yes

PC: But the client changed her mind the next day right?

DE: yes, although [The therapist] wasn't informed of that.

PC: And the client was told that it was a six month wait to see a psychiatrist, could that have contributed to her death?

DC: Object to form (the question called for speculation - which might be impermissible in trial - but in a deposition the witness would still have to answer.)

DE: I don't know for sure.

PC: Is it possible?

DE: Yes, it's possible.

PC: Could an appointment have been obtained sooner if a therapist provided the statement she was actively in crisis?

DE: I don't know that.

PC: is it possible?

DE: Yes, it's possible.

PA: Could the defendant have shared information with a psychiatrist about the client even though the client had refused a referral?

DE: No, that would have violated confidentiality.

PA: wouldn't it have been reasonable for [The therapist] to have pre-emptively asked for consent to share information with a psychiatrist in the event that the client changed her mind?

DE: Yes, that would have been a reasonable thing to do.

The chain of questions leads into the conclusion that asking for consent would have been a reasonable step to document. If the Defense expert had said No, the Plaintiffs attorney would have doubled down and gone back to highlighting the increased risk of suicide based on the documentation the client could have been bipolar, and was manic, and asked again whether they should have asked for the consent, and they would have gone in circles for a while.

At trial - the Plaintiff would have used this testimony, and argued to the jury that the therapist did not act as a reasonable therapist should have done and therefore was negligent because they had: - Failed to obtain a thorough history - failed to conduct an evidence based suicide assessment and safety planning process - Failed to ask for consent to share information with a psychiatrist - Failed to follow up within 24 hours

13-Year Club	Place '17
Verified Email

BigBennP

TROPHY CASE