chuckbrown

I doubt this would happen in the US. Since our legal system is based on the English model, I'm also surprised this happened in the UK. There's a concept in the law called criminal intent which seems to be missing here. You have to intend to do the act which broke the law. It doesn't seem like he intended to lose his luggage. Hopefully he'll appeal.

Better yet: when a cop drowns in the line of duty and his family sues the city because they failed to properly train him knowing he would be exposed to water.

All you have to do is live there (or here) to establish residency (or more precisely do all of the things that one normally associates with where you are living). Now if you don't have legal residency status, the immigration authorities can kick you out once you've overstayed your visa. But you are still a resident, albiet an illegal resident. If you're saying that you can't get in-state tuition unless you have legal residency, then that sort of makes the bill moot because it only addresses illegals aliens (people who don't have legal residency status). I think what the bill is saying is that if you are a resident (but an illegal one) you should get tuition assistance.

Miami is a port. What if they respond to a call near water (likely) and get thrown in the harbor? If they can't swim, they die. Seems like a necessary skill to me. To encourage more minority applicants, maybe what they should do is drop the swim rule to get into training but require swimming proficiency to graduate. That would make some sense. Edited to add: I just saw North Miami's police web page. They have boats. But they don't need to learn to swim???

Residency (also called domicile) and citizenship are two different concepts. You can be a citizen of a foreign country, but you're a resident of whereever you're living. If I go live in France, I'm still an American citizen, but I reside in France. Home is where the hat is. Hey, I remembered something from my conflict of laws class, woohoo.

If they have kids, you better believe they'll be able to collect welfare benefits. They're going to be here, so it makes sense to have a public policy that makes them more productive persons even if they're not citizens.

Illegal immigrants are a major source of labor in the US. Your food prices would be much higher if producers didn't have this source of cheap labor. So they do benefit the country and they benefit by making more money than they could ever make in their home country. Also, they generally perform jobs that Americans don't want, so US citizens aren't losing employment opportunities. I think encouraging them to go to school is great. They'll be more productive. I'd rather pay to see them go to school than pay for their welfare benefits. Besides, who here isn't descended from illegal immigrants? Since our forefathers took this land by force from the natives, doesn't that mean we're all illegal immigrants? Just getting stirring the pot.

IIRC, the F-16 pilots that mistakenly bombed the Canadian patrol in Afghanistan a couple of years ago were raising this issue at their court-martials. They were arguing that the prolonged use of speed affected their judgment and caused them to mistake the Canadian patrol for an enemy one that was firing on them.

Be around your home DZ on May 21-23 for the Toadsuckers CRW boogie. You'll see some really cool stuff & you may get a CRW Dog to take you on a learning jump although with your number of jumps your instructor will have to find a BIG canopy since CRW Dogs jump in the 1.3-1.4 WL range. We can't expect you to increase your WL, so an instructor would have to decrease his. Even if you don't do a CRW jump, hang out and have fun. You should also check out Wendy's web page (Wendy a little help) for a beginner camp -- highly recommended, I've done 2 throughout my career and it never hurts to have the safety fundamentals reinforced. I did my first CRW jump on number 52, but that doesn't mean you can't start sooner. Again the issue is going to be finding a canopy that you're comfortable landing given your experience and having an instructor flying a similarly loaded canopy. I would encourage you to learn from somebody who's experienced. Be careful though, many who've seen the Dark Side never return.

You'll probably just need to file a NOTAM (Notice to Airman) advising of parachute operations over a certain area, or you might have to file for a Certificate of Authorization/Waiver to permit you to land in or near an open air assembly of persons (depending on the distance to landing obstacles). You might have a bigger problem with the local zoning officials.

My vote was give it adequate time to heal. On some injuries you may not recover 100%. I broke a tib & fib on a bad landing. Lots of metal and 7 months later I was jumping, but I didn't jump until I was comfortable running across rough ground (to simulate off DZ landings). If you rush back you may end up taking LOTS more time off.

You rock, girl. Mom's a lucky one.

I hate to change your impression of the Land of Plenty mate, but the overwhelming majority of US dzs fly 182s. The 182 IS the backbone of the US skydiving industry.

If he's really stupid he'll wear the jersey to a game in Philly and be obnoxious if the Leafs win.

I am a lawyer, and Skydive Chicago's attorney is correct that a some courts will apply a doctrine called "piercing the corporate veil" to impose liability on corporate owners/directors. Courts in PA are reluctant to apply this doctrine unless the corporation is being used to perpetrate fraud or some other illegal conduct. The whole point behind the corporation is to provide protection from liability. If an individual sets up a corporation and follows all the corporate formalities, e.g. bylaws, corporate meetings, corporate books and accounts, files corporate tax returns (sub-chapter S to avoid double taxation), etc., courts will be very reluctant to pierce the corporate veil even if there is only one shareholder, employee, etc. On the other hand if a corporation is being used to rip people off, you bet a court will pierce the veil. Don't have the corporation hold your assets. Set up the corporation to run your skydiving business (instruction). That way if something goes wrong, your defense will be you were acting as an employee/owner of the corporation and have no liability for any acts of the corporation. Your absolutely right though, when you talk about lawyer fees. Even to win on the waiver issue you're probably looking at $5,000 in lawyer fees. Fortunately the waiver issue should be decided before you get to a trial in front of a jury. The effect of the waiver is something that a judge would decide, not a jury.

My response didn't mean to imply that instructors are living in tents on the DZ. The only instructors/TMs I know are already successful individuals who got into the teaching side of skydiving for personal enrichment. If you're a poor instructor/TM, no worries. If you've got assets, there are many, many ways to protect them. Tom's post pretty much summed them up in a nutshell. There's a reason he's a greenie. Considering the strength of the waivers, this discussion is sort of academic. Gross negligence is a pretty high threshold to meet; you have to do something that you know will likely result in serious injury or death, and serious injury or death does result from your actions (or the probable consequence of your actions). You should worry more about the legal bills you can incur in defending a lawsuit, rather than the more remote possibility of having a judgment slapped on you.

Plaintiff's attorneys don't waste time on someone who has no assets even if there is liability. Civil lawsuits are about money. Period. They will name the poor employee as a defendant, but if that employee has no assets, the judgment creditor won't even bother trying to collect from the employee. They'll go after the deep pockets.

All of the above posts, especially Tom's, highlight the various strategies to protect your assets. In non-community property states (pretty much everywhere but California) putting things in your wife's name will protect you even if you get a divorce. Equitable distribution laws don't consider in whose name the property is, rather they consider as marital property all property owned by either spouse irrespective of who holds legal title. Having said that, you don't absolutely need to put your assets in your spouse's name alone; joint ownership will prevent a judgment creditor from selling your property to pay any law suit award. Since a judgment would be against the skydiver, the judgment can't be satisfied against property that a non-skydiver spouse has an interest in. The best way would be to incorporate yourself even if you're the only employee. Another method is to be in debt up to your eye balls. Judgment creditors are last in line. Call a lawyer in your home state. He'll probably charge you $100 but he can give you an idea of what works best in your home state. If you're in PA, send me a PM.

Go with a rice eater. They don't break down.

I watched a guy on a CRW load have a spinning malfunction right out of the plane. He rode it down 10,000 ft. before he had to chop. The canopy was fine which made me think that it was a tension knot which kept the canopy from inflating on one side.

You keep it a big secret and avoid pie. You can't keep it a secret forever. Our local S&TA made his 3,000th in December and nobody knew ... until the April Parachutist came out showing his Double Diamond Wings. He got pied this weekend. By me. Heh, Heh, Heh.

I think your co-workers are messing with your mind because they don't jump. Just say "Screw you guys, I'm going jumpin'."

2 seat ultralights are technically considered aircraft subject to licensing requirements. For all intents and purposes though, they're the same as a 1 seater to a jumper.

Well, I could have not agreed to that and gone forward with the hearing. But my assessment of the judges inclination was that I would have lost anyway. My lawyer basically said that judges don't consider a PFA to be a hardship or adversely affect you so they have a propensity to grant them because it "couldn't hurt". If I had unlimited funds, I'd fight it. But my lawyer fees were getting up there. I had to cut my losses at some point. Smart move. Get out of the system anyway you can.

Dom, First off, let me apologize for the "grow up" comment. It was wrong and has no place in these forums. Your comments are well thought out and have validity. While I don't agree with them, I do respect them. I understand your point completely that this picture does little to win "hearts and minds" and had it been an officer, I would probably agree with you. But I have a problem with enlisted men being dragged through the criminal justice system for sick jokes. As for it giving fuel to the enemy, most of our enemy can't read english, and they're already worked up by Al Jezeera's pictures of maimed babies. This isn't anywhere near the same thing. Since this wasn't on Al Jezeera I highly doubt it has any propoganda value whatsoever. Was this in poor taste? Yes. But should an EM go through the criminal justice process because of this? My opinion is no. Chuck