Legal News

Maryland Legislature Mulls the . . . Pearson-Pants Act?

By Ashby Jones

Will they call it the Pearson-Pants Act? The Maryland legislature is mulling over a bill that would require dry cleaners in Maryland to pay customers for clothing they damaged. The sponsoring delegate, Barbara A. Robinson, a Democrat from Baltimore, said she was inspired in part by the case of Roy Pearson. For all those who have never ever ever read the Law Blog (welcome!), Pearson’s the former Washington, D.C. administrative law judge who sued his neighborhood dry cleaners for $54 million over a lost pair of gray pants. A judge dismissed Pearson’s suit, leaving him with tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees. Click here, here and here for earlier blog posts.

According to the WaPo, Robinson found out earlier this week, however, that the law might not be all that politically popular. Scores of dry cleaners, most of them Koreans, reportedly attended the hearing to oppose the measure. With industry lobbyists in tow, the launderers packed the hearing room, spilled out into the foyer and sought to display strength in numbers.

Chung K. Pak, testifying on behalf of the Korean Americans Association of Maryland, said Robinson’s bill unfairly targets immigrants from Korea, who run many of the dry cleaners. “It’s an additional burden, and this special protection is unnecessary,” Pak said. The bill “stigmatizes the dry-cleaning industry, which is already burdened by lawsuits.”

Robinson said she did not realize her proposal, billed as a consumer protection law, would cause such a stir until last week. “I came to my office last Monday, and my office was filled with Koreans from D.C. and Maryland,” Robinson said. “They see it as me picking on Koreans. They see it as me saying they’re responsible for any damages. And that’s not what I’m saying.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 05, 2008 (boomark / email).