EP 204: Deepfakes, Drones and Damages

Episode Notes

Transcript

Alvin Wolff [00:00:00]:
I wake up every day and I get 3 concerned comments from my wife.

Christine Byers [00:00:04]:
Welcome to The Case Doctors.

Alvin Wolff [00:00:06]:
Before I even say hello.

Christine Byers [00:00:08]:
With John Simon and Alvin Wolf.

Alvin Wolff [00:00:10]:
What are my damages? What are your damages? Damas?

John Simon [00:00:12]:
Right, what are your damages? Right.

Alvin Wolff [00:00:14]:
None.

Christine Byers [00:00:15]:
The show where 2 of the greatest legal minds offer you advice on your cases.

Alvin Wolff [00:00:19]:
This guy needs to toughen up, I think.

Christine Byers [00:00:21]:
The Case Doctors will see you now. Welcome to The Case Doctors. I’m your host, Christine Byers of Simon Law, and I’m joined by The Case Doctors, John Simon and Alvin Wolf. Now, between them, they have more than 80 years of experience as plaintiff’s attorneys, so there really isn’t a scenario they haven’t already encountered on a case and figured out how to handle it. Now, they’re offering you the chance to tell them about various problems or issues that are coming up in your cases and hear how they would handle it. But first, Let’s turn to some of the civil cases making headlines and hear what the case doctors have to say about them. All right, gentlemen, our first hot topic takes us to the Paramount-Warner Brothers merger fight. And this is a coalition of 12 states led by California that sued to block Paramount Skydance’s proposed $110 billion acquisition of Warner Brothers on antitrust grounds.

Christine Byers [00:01:22]:
Now, this isn’t your usual company versus government type of story. It’s states defying a federal agency that already cleared the deal. Can states really override federal approval? And what does it mean that a TRO already landed just not too long ago in this case?

Alvin Wolff [00:01:40]:
I watch a lot of television, so I don’t know if this is going to impact me. I’m thinking the merger would be for better entertainment. So I don’t know.

John Simon [00:01:51]:
More expensive entertainment.

Christine Byers [00:01:53]:
True.

Alvin Wolff [00:01:54]:
Well, absolutely. But the way it’s all packaged now, you used to have channels 2, 4, 5, 9, and 11, 30. And now you pay separate for each channel. So they’re just going to keep raising the fees on everything. I don’t see there’s any way to get around it. And there’s got to be something going on inside the states that would want them to block the deal. I don’t know why, but I’m sure they have a good reason.

Christine Byers [00:02:21]:
What gives a coalition of state attorneys general the standing to block a private merger between 2 media companies?

John Simon [00:02:27]:
Damn, these are really hard questions. I thought you were going to give us some easy ones.

Alvin Wolff [00:02:32]:
Probably the same reason that Missouri was able to sue China for $500 billion. These guys are just, in my opinion, grandstanding and trying to grab headlines and try to get reelected, thinking they’re the people’s attorney generals, where in fact, they’re clogging the courts with a lot of frivolous lawsuits.

John Simon [00:02:53]:
That’s a good legal explanation.

Alvin Wolff [00:02:55]:
Very good.

John Simon [00:02:55]:
Of the legal merits of those cases.

Christine Byers [00:02:56]:
Very thorough. What is the actual harm regulators are worried about here? Is it higher prices, less competition, fewer choices? I mean, what do they have to prove?

Alvin Wolff [00:03:07]:
Money. It’s all about money. Do you agree, John?

John Simon [00:03:10]:
I agree. Most things are.

Christine Byers [00:03:14]:
If the states lose, does that set a precedent that makes future mega mergers harder to challenge, in your opinions?

John Simon [00:03:20]:
I think, you know, anybody can file something to challenge anything. And it’s just like Alvin was saying, you know, filing it is not really an indication of the merits, but it does get the publicity. I mean, here we are talking about it. True.

Alvin Wolff [00:03:33]:
Everything’s in a cycle. Like right now, the Republicans are controlling everything, so they want bigger is better. And as soon as they get voted out, the Democrats will come in and they’ll try to break up all these companies.

Christine Byers [00:03:46]:
Okay, we’ll move on to another hot topic, Uber versus New York City. Uber sued New York City to block a new law restricting wrongful deactivations, arguing it would force the company to keep drivers who engage in dangerous behavior. Local Law 52 of 2026 bars large ride-hailing companies, Uber and Lyft, from deactivating drivers unless they can show bona fide economic reason or just cause. It requires 14 days’ notice before most deactivations, and it lets drivers who feel wrongly deactivated sue in court, not just file a complaint with the city’s Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. Winning drivers are entitled to attorney’s fees, which is what makes even small individual cases worth litigating. The law was passed by the city council in a 46 to 5 vote in January, and it’s set to take effect later in July of 2026. Is Uber’s argument really about safety, or is it about control over who gets to work on its platform?

John Simon [00:04:49]:
That’s interesting because we’ve had a case that had to do with the fact that they were sending drivers into dangerous areas. They were sending drivers to pick up people who they had complaints about previously. And if any of the drivers refused to take the ride, as I understood it, you kind of fell down a notch on when you got called next. So if you didn’t take anybody and everybody that the company wanted you to take, you were punished, you know, indirectly punished by it because you just, you didn’t get the calls that, you know, you kind of fell to the end of the list.

Alvin Wolff [00:05:23]:
Gotcha.

John Simon [00:05:23]:
So that may have something to do with it that they want to be able to— it might be more about the drivers being at risk than Uber talking about safety.

Alvin Wolff [00:05:35]:
Well, I think it also— the statute wants to give the driver some due process. So Uber just can’t turn off their access to ridesharing with flipping a switch. And I think there’s probably some room for compromise on both sides. I think 14 days is probably too much, but 3 days may be more than enough to get to the bottom of what may be a dangerous driver and getting them off the road.

Christine Byers [00:06:03]:
How does a company argue that a worker protection law is unconstitutional? What’s the legal theory there?

Alvin Wolff [00:06:12]:
They’re the boss. It’s their company. They should be able to do what they want.

John Simon [00:06:15]:
But again, the workers need to have some protection. And I think that’s probably what they’re trying to do is give them some protection so that they’re not just yanked out of a You know, out of a job in a matter of minutes or while they’re on the road or whatever.

Christine Byers [00:06:29]:
Uber is arguing that public safety is an issue in these cases where they deactivate drivers, that they’re deactivating drivers for public safety issues that they’re finding. So what is the risk to public safety if the city wins? And what is the risk to gig workers if Uber wins this case?

Alvin Wolff [00:06:47]:
Well, let’s say that you have an Uber driver and he rapes A customer. He gets arrested, he goes to jail, he makes bail, and within that 14-day period, he can go back out on the road. If Uber can flip the switch and turn him off, then he’s not driving for Uber.

John Simon [00:07:06]:
Yeah, and I think, you know, we don’t have all the details of what they’re asking, but I’m assuming that there are going to be some, you know, exceptions for something like that. Pretty egregious. If somebody’s in a serious accident, somebody’s hurt or killed, and it looks like it’s the Uber driver’s fault, I think under those circumstances, I would think there’s some accommodation in the law or the proposed legislation to be able to do that. But I think if it’s for something other than— they still need to get some type of— I guess I’d really have to look at what they’re proposing, but I can’t imagine it’s just some broad concept of we can terminate you whenever we want. I mean, don’t you think they have something in place now to—

Alvin Wolff [00:07:49]:
Well, okay, think about it. Let’s say it’s a tractor-trailer accident and the driver crashes into someone and the company decides that’s a chargeable offense. They have the right to terminate that driver right away.

John Simon [00:08:01]:
Well, there’s a difference between terminating the driver and pulling them off the road. And I think one way to do it would be to suspend the driver. If it’s an Uber person and they’ve been in an accident where somebody was killed or You know, maybe they could say, okay, you can’t take any more, you know, you can’t take any more rides until we have some type of hearing to give them some due process.

Alvin Wolff [00:08:24]:
They’re going to say you can’t drive for us, which is the same thing as a tractor-trailer company taking a driver off the road. The tractor-trailer driver can still get behind the wheel of his car and drive. The Uber driver, his car is not getting turned off. He just can’t pick up rideshare.

John Simon [00:08:42]:
Yeah, I think, you know, one size doesn’t fit all. I mean, it’s going to depend on the circumstance.

Christine Byers [00:08:46]:
So time now to turn to our email inbox for the cases our viewers have sent in for the Case Doctors to diagnose. Now, just so everyone knows, we’re not going to reveal where these cases came from. We’re not going to name any names or firms to protect the confidentiality of cases. Instead, the Case Doctors are going to focus on just the issue in each of them. So as they say, the Case Doctors will see you now. First up, we have a LinkedIn libel case. Dear Case Doctors, My client’s former business partner posted what looks like a real video of my client confessing to tanking the company, except it’s an AI deepfake, badly lip-synced, that somehow still got 40,000 views and 3 concerned comments from investors. The ex-partner claims he didn’t make it, just reposted it because it seemed accurate.

Christine Byers [00:09:40]:
So is reposting a deepfake with a caption like, Make of this what you will, defamation, or does it need its own legal category at this point?

John Simon [00:09:51]:
You know, it’s— I guess it’s— is it strict liability or do you need to show, you know, negligence or negligent conduct?

Alvin Wolff [00:09:57]:
Doesn’t it have something to do with, uh, you have to accuse them of being a thief or a venereal disease or something along those lines?

John Simon [00:10:05]:
That means stealing from the business?

Alvin Wolff [00:10:07]:
No, for defamation, don’t you have to have Something that’s untrue.

John Simon [00:10:13]:
I know, I agree with that. It’s got to be untrue.

Alvin Wolff [00:10:15]:
Or a horrendous disease or accuse them of a crime. You know, I just don’t remember everything about it.

John Simon [00:10:23]:
Well, I mean, he’s— he should know. He’s still with the company, right? And he was— was his partner. So it would seem believable if it’s posted by his former partner. But as Alvin said, I think it needs to be true and it needs to be harmful in some way.

Alvin Wolff [00:10:38]:
Yeah. What are the damages?

John Simon [00:10:39]:
What are the damages? That’s what it would come down to. Is it Is it false? I don’t know. Do you, do you need to know that it’s not false when you say it or post it?

Alvin Wolff [00:10:47]:
You know, how much do you read on LinkedIn that is probably not true?

John Simon [00:10:52]:
A lot of it. Let me just put it that way. A lot of it. And well, the flip side is how much do you believe of what you see on LinkedIn? And, you know, very little. I think, number one, it needs to be false. It needs to be untrue. The other part of it is that the person needs to have some damages. And the question is, how was that person damaged? He’s already out of the company, I assume, right? Yes, he’s former.

John Simon [00:11:17]:
So, you know, he’s going to have to show that it somehow affected him in some capacity financially. Financially, right?

Alvin Wolff [00:11:24]:
Yeah. There’s got to be some harm.

Christine Byers [00:11:26]:
The harm that’s discussed or referenced in this, in this short note to us says there’s already 3 concerned comments from investors that have been posted on here.

Alvin Wolff [00:11:35]:
I wake up every day and I get 3 concerned comments from my wife. Every day before I even say hello. What are my damages?

John Simon [00:11:45]:
What are your damages?

Alvin Wolff [00:11:48]:
None. You know, this guy needs to toughen up, I think.

Christine Byers [00:11:52]:
Our next case comes to us. Dear case doctors, my client is convinced his neighbor is flying a drone over the fence line specifically to photograph his prized tomato plants for reconnaissance ahead of the county fair. The neighbor says he’s just into aerial photography and the tomatoes are incidental.

John Simon [00:12:12]:
Where’s Judge Judy when you need her?

Christine Byers [00:12:14]:
Seriously.

Alvin Wolff [00:12:15]:
Judge Wapler.

Christine Byers [00:12:17]:
There’s no HOA, no formal privacy statute that I can find that covers backyard airspace clearly. And my client wants an injunction and emotional distress damages.

John Simon [00:12:29]:
He doesn’t need an injunction. He needs a pellet gun.

Alvin Wolff [00:12:32]:
That’s what I was thinking. Just take a gun and shoot the damn thing out of the air. Get a .22 if you could, you know, wherever he’s at.

John Simon [00:12:38]:
I don’t know if it’s downtown Chicago or something, probably not a good idea. But I think, you know, I think a .22 rifle might do the trick.

Christine Byers [00:12:46]:
It might.

Alvin Wolff [00:12:46]:
Yeah.

John Simon [00:12:46]:
I’m talking about the drone, not the neighbor. Yes.

Christine Byers [00:12:49]:
Yes, of course. Important distinction. Is there any real legal ground here or am I about to become the tomato lawyer of my county?

John Simon [00:12:58]:
You know, I just get back to the same thing with— I mean, is it protected airspace over your house? Do you own the air over your house?

Alvin Wolff [00:13:07]:
Yeah, but what are the damages?

John Simon [00:13:08]:
What are the damages?

Alvin Wolff [00:13:09]:
What are the damages? We always have to return to the damages.

John Simon [00:13:13]:
And so is he going to— let’s say he sees his neighbor’s tomatoes and he figures out that his tomatoes aren’t good enough and his neighbor has better tomatoes and he’s going to win at the fair. What does he do about it? Like, would he put more fertilizer on his tomatoes? And he wasn’t going to do that anyway. Or I just, I just don’t see what the, what the damages are.

Christine Byers [00:13:36]:
Okay, gentlemen, that will do it for this episode of The Case Doctors. If you have a case that you would like the Case Doctors to dissect, send us an email at [email protected]. Once again, we will be keeping all names and cases confidential. Thank you for joining us, and we will see you next time on The Case Doctors.

Alvin Wolff [00:13:55]:
Thank you.