“In my head, everything was so bogus that he’d been doing, I don’t know why, I just didn’t think it was real or something,” Norton told the local ABC News affiliate, KOMO-TV. That’s why, even when she was served with papers, Norton simply didn’t respond.
Unfortunately for Norton, however, the suit was very real, and because she didn’t challenge her neighbor’s claims, Thompson — who has not spoken to the press — won $500,000 by default.
“The sheriff comes, puts the papers on the garage and the wall and everything and saying they were going to put the house up for sale,” Norton said. Now she and her family are fighting to reverse the decision — spending a good chunk of their savings on lawyers — before they lose their home.
Monday, February 16, 2015
"Barking dog could cost Seattle family their home" (Video at Link)
"Her neighbor Woodrow Thompson filed a lawsuit alleging that the sound of barking from Norton’s dog, Cawper, was intentionally causing him “profound emotional distress.” In his detailed, 36-page complaint, Thompson claimed that the canine’s “raucously, wildly bellowing, howling and explosively barking” was capable of reaching 128 decibels. For context, the U.S. Occupational Safety & Health Administration — the Labor Department agency tasked with enforcing safe working conditions — says a person should not be exposed to a noise of 115 decibels for more than 15 minutes a day. That said, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Noise Meter, Thompson’s claim would mean that Cawper’s bark is louder than an ambulance siren and just slightly softer than a jet engine at takeoff."
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12 comments:
"Your Honor, you should grant my petition to open the default judgment because I thought the complaint and the notice to plead were stupid."
Hey, good luck with that.
I used to have a bad habit of not opening my mail. There was no one opting it behind me thou, so I got a few surprises over the years.
Sorry but they are friggin idiots and their dog is likely a big pain in the ass.
That said, default judgments are routinely reversed for idiots like this. The judge does not have to do it, but he or she may do it. The defendant may get sanctions.
If the dog owner was half a human being she would've put a simple collar device on the dog that emits a super high frequency sound when the dog barks which startles the dog and breaks the barking habit. But it probably gave her pleasure that the barking was destroying her neighbor's life. Yes, I've been there.
I hope she gets this unjust and frivolous claim on her property overturned ...
and I hope it costs her plenty.
Dog whisperer to the rescue.
I took a quick skim of the first couple pages of comments... not a single one was in sympathy to the dog owner. Not one.
We had a neighbor with a barking dog (at least I think it was his... I'm not even sure which neighbor it was) and when the windows were open in the summer there would be dogs barking and occasionally coyotes, which are super noisy, and then we'd hear this man bellow louder than all of it... "ShaaaaddddUUUPPpp!"
Yes, it's annoying getting woke up at night but sometimes it's sort of amusing, too.
It is simply immoral to take someone's home over a dog barking, and doing so is far worse than having an obnoxious barking dog. The plaintiff should know this. The judge should know this, and the law should appreciate that it can itself be unjust. Just because you can do something does not make it right.
In Seattle, most people have their windows open at night in the summer (low humidity, cool temperature) which makes the neighbor dog barking more of an issue too.
There is no sympathy for stupid. You get served with a lawsuit, you better respond (even on your own with a handwritten NO would avoid a default judgment).
Among the comments...
"Some people would have just poisoned the dog...."
What was the guy thinking when he filed the lawsuit?
I wanna take their house? or
I want them to do something about their dog?
The woman did zip about a lawsuit... chances she responded to any other complaint about the dog?
I like john's answer.
I don't want her to lose her house. That would be wrong.
Am I sympathetic to her? Not by much.
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