WASHINGTON, D.C. — Roy Pearson lost his job as a District administrative law judge last week, only months after losing his $54 million lawsuit against Custom Cleaners over an allegedly lost pair of pants.
Pearson was asked to vacate his office last Tuesday after a six-person review panel voted against his appointment to a 10-year term. The panel said Pearson hadn’t demonstrated “appropriate judgment and judicial temperament” and was often “combative” with coworkers during his initial two-year term.
While the panel didn’t cite Pearson v. Chung in its review, tort-reform advocates cheered the decision. “In that we were the first to question Mr. Pearson’s judicial temperament, we’re quite pleased to see that the D.C. government has finally got around to kicking him off the bench,” says Darren McKinney, spokesman for the American Tort Reform Association (ATRA).
“Now if we can only convince the mayor and city council to reform D.C.’s well-intentioned but easily manipulated consumer-protection law, we can protect other small businesses from similarly outrageous lawsuits.”
Pearson continues to pursue his vendetta against Custom Cleaners operators So Jin and Soo Chung, however, by appealing the verdict issued against him in June. The appeal will likely come to trial early next year.
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