Patterico has a knee-slapping interesting post about two Tampa lawyers who can’t agree on a deposition location ordered by a judge to resolve it by playing rock, paper, scissors. Even though their offices are in the same building!
NEW YORK (FORTUNE) – Faced with the inability of two bickering attorneys to resolve even the most innocuous scheduling questions without his intervention, a Florida federal judge yesterday ordered the two to meet on the steps of the federal courthouse and resolve their latest quarrel by playing “one (1) game of ‘rock, paper, scissors.’ ”
Judge Gregory A. Presnell of Orlando ordered the unusual measure, which he characterized as “a new form of alternative dispute resolution,” after the two Tampa attorneys had proven unable to agree upon where to hold a deposition, even though both of their offices are just four floors away in the very same building in Tampa.
Defense attorney D. Lee Craig, of Butler Pappas Weihmuller Katz Craig, proposed holding the deposition in his office, but plaintiffs’ attorney David J. Pettinato of Merlin Law Group wanted it to take place at the court reporter’s office down the street.
The Solomonic ruling comes in an insurance dispute filed last September by Avista Management against Wausau Underwriters Insurance Co.
The order–and the story that inspired it–reads like something you’d see in an episode of “The Practice.” Wouldn’t you love to listen in while this was going down in Judge Presnell’s chambers? The article notes he declined to comment; he probably couln’t think of anything that wouldn’t be classified as the full truth about these bozos an inappropriate statement.
As I stated in the comment section, “These fools will probably sue each other anyway…after their [five-minute] timeout in [a corner of] Starbucks.”
Reality and Sanity 
Leave a comment