Real Lawyer Reacts to Reynolds v. Reynolds (Cereal Defense) It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

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Although he watched the other bird law episode and gave it his first F.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 138 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/SwingingSalmon πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

[removed]

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 92 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/[deleted] πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

Did he just upload the whole episode?

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 11 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/Senryoku πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 22 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

Every time I introduce IASIP to someone, I show them this episode.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 60 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/rainier73 πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

The face Charlie makes every time the church bell sound goes off lmaooo

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 9 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/SordidSwordDidSwore πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

Happy to see John Krasinski has found other work since The Office ended.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 35 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/haahaahaa πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

Seasons 4 to like 8 of this show is some of the greatest television of all time.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 26 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/4d3d3d3__Engaged πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

Easily one of my favorite episodes of it's always sunny.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 7 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/flint158 πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 21 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies

I can't tell if the dude has a microphone taped to his face, or if he just cut himself shaving

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 3 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/Srirachachacha πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ Nov 22 2018 πŸ—«︎ replies
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- How did we get on evolution? This is not about about evolution. - Yes, exactly. You shouldn't be talking about this at all. - When you attacked Mac's character! - Yeah, like they did in the OJ trial to that hero cop Mark Fuhrman. - (chuckles) No, not touching that one. (upbeat music) Hey, Legal Eagles, it's time to think like a lawyer. Today we are covering another episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. This time, it is Reynolds Versus Reynolds: The Cereal Defense. As always, be sure to comment in the form of an objection if you disagree with me, and while you're there, let me know what show or movie I should do next. And of course, stick around until the end of the video where I give this episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia a grade for legal realism. So, without further ado, let's dig in to Reynolds Versus Reynolds. [Charlie on Tape] You should pass three-- - This is stuck, Charlie, I need you here, this tape isn't working! - [Announcer] This is KPFN, public radio. - [Woman] Today on Do It Yourself Gardening-- - Ooh, more distracted driving, with a bowl of cereal. Distracted driving is a big problem, never drive while distracted. Always a bad idea. - Oh, Sandra, you dumb (bleep). (car crashes) Guys, so I'm sitting at a red light, at a dead stop, and Frank rams into me, outta nowhere, and now he's saying he's not gonna pay for the damages. I mean, did you know that the man cannot see? - I can see, I got glasses, I just need new lenses. - The lenses are what make the glasses work, Frank. - If you are driving around without the use of sight, then that is completely irresponsible and you need to pay for the damages. - Oh, man, this is actually incredible, because this debate hearkens back to one of the seminal cases in law school, specifically the case of Hadley versus Baxendale, where someone was supposed to deliver a crankshaft to a mill and the mill owner sued the delivery person not just for the exact damages that occurred, but for the loss of income that occurred for the days afterwards for failing to receive the crankshaft which was necessary for the mill. The Court of Exchequer in England, which is equivalent to the Supreme Court in the United States, held that the delivery person couldn't be held responsible for the consequential damages that occurred as a result of failing to meet their delivery deadline. And what they held is that you're only responsible for the damages that are reasonably foreseeable as a result of your negligence. So I think what's going to happen throughout this entire episode is it's going to be a question about whether it was reasonably foreseeable for Frank to have caused these damages to the interior of Dennis's car, and it's not an easy question. It's hilarious to me that they set this up basically as a hypothetical that you would have to deal with as a first-year law student. And it's also funny considering how bad the last legal episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia was. - Objection, she's not a cat, Your Honor. (Maureen hisses) - This is, I think, gonna get a much higher grade. - He was eating a bowl of cereal when I hit him, and it spilled all over the interior, and those are the only damages to the car. - You were eating a bowl of cereal? - Yes. - While you were driving? - Yes, it's not that crazy, that's not what this is about. - So the only damages were interior. - You know what, I don't have to justify myself to you, you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna take you to court! - Fine. - No, no, hold on a second, nobody needs to go to court here, there's no reason we can't settle this ourselves like civilized adults. - No, no, we can't, Dee, so I'm gonna take him to court, I'm gonna sue him, and I'm gonna win. - Dennis, you don't wanna go anywhere near a court, how many bench warrants for sexual misconduct do you have? - Would there be bench warrants for sexual misconduct? I don't think that's a thing. - First off, who is the defendant in this matter? - That's not a statement. - Alright, well, irregardless, I would like to know, as Frank's lawyer, who I am persecuting or who I am defending. - Yeah, prosecuting. - Okay, let me just nip this whole thing in the bud right now, stop treating this like it's a trial and like this is a courtroom. - Yeah, but the tables. - Yeah, but I was against that too. Okay, let's just present the facts to each other, and then let's decide as a majority who's in the right. That being said, Frank would be the defendant. - I'm not the defendant. No, that implies that I am guilty. - He's right, if anyone's ever accused of anything, I automatically assume they're guilty. - [Charlie] You do, right? - I do. - Yeah, you do. - It's unfortunate that a lotta people feel that way, if someone is accused of something, that they have a presumption of guilt. That should not be the case, it's the prosecutor or the plaintiff that bears the burden. That being said, here, clearly, Frank would be the defendant, he's the one that was driving, he's the one that caused the things that are potentially damages here. There's no debate here, Frank would be the defendant. - I'm finished. - Where have you been for the last three hours? - I have been making this. - What the hell is that? - It's the Trial Meter. It shows how we each feel throughout the trial. Yeah, I made little gavels with our names on it, and we can move them accordingly, and at the end, whoever has the most gavels on their side wins. - It took you three hours to make that? - Yeah. - Mac, let me tell you something, nobody is gonna wanna use that, because it's so stupid. We are dealing with a serious issue here. - As ridiculous as this sort of cartoon interpretation of which way all the different people are leaning is, it's actually not a bad way of deciding who, in this sort of quasi-arbitration, is going to win here. Obviously the parties are gonna vote for themselves, but ironically, in an arbitration, which this sort of is, you would often have a three-judge panel. Sometimes you would have only one judge, or arbitrator, but often, you would have a three-arbitrator panel that's made up of former judges. And guess what, the majority wins, so if you're able to convince two out of the three arbitrators, then you would win your case in arbitration. So it's kind of a funny version of what happens in real life. - Uh, I would like a five with my client please. - Are you gonna want a five, Counselor? - I'd like to take a five, yes. - Alright, I'll allow it. - Stop talking like this is a (bleep) courtroom, please. - Oh, I'm the judge. - No, you're not. - Can I be the bailiff? - You are not anything! - I'll allow it. - [Dennis] No one is anything! - Yeah, he's an arbitrator. - I will smash everybody's eyes out of their sockets! - And that is one of the reasons why you never want to represent yourself, you have too much skin in the game, it's too hard to be objective, and it is too easy to have an outburst like that. Dennis should not be representing himself in this matter, he should really be relying on his punitive counselor Dee. - I would like to add into evidence article one. Mac, will you please read this document? - Mm-hmm. "By the power of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, "Reed Mental Institution hereby decrees Frank Reynolds "to not have donkey brains." (intense music) - What? - What? - That is an official document that says donkey brain on it? - What is that? - Alright, so there's a lotta stuff going on here. Interestingly, Charlie is not doing a terrible, terrible job of laying the proper foundation that he needs to enter this thing into evidence. And in fact, like few legal shows, he actually says that he wants to enter this particular document into evidence. You actually don't see that all that often. He missed a few steps. Number one, this document is hearsay, regardless of where it came from, because he's trying to use it for the truth the matter asserted, that Frank, in fact, does not have donkey brains. So he has hearsay problems to deal with, he has to establish that there is some hearsay exception, but he has gone part of the way towards there. He has established that Frank received this document at some point, and he has some basis to say what this document is. He still needs to show that it was a business record of the mental institution, and the only way to do that is to get a custodian of the mental institution. So he certainly hasn't laid all of the foundation, but he is part of the way there, which is more than I can say for a lot of legal TV shows, that's pretty funny. - Frank, would you like to clear this up for everybody? - Well, all the kids in the neighborhood knew I got sent upstate, so they started calling me Frankie Donkey Brains, and it was very traumatic, so I got my mommy to drive me back up to the loony bin, where they signed this official certificate exonerating me of all donkey brains. - Yeah, great, what does this have to do with anything? - Yeah, that is a good objection. What Charlie is trying to do here is to enter character evidence on behalf of Frank. He's trying to say that Frank has a character for lack of donkey brains, which is a ridiculous sentence for me to have to say right now, but anyway, that's what he's trying to do. And what he's trying to show is that on the day in question, of the accident, he's saying that Frank was not acting with (chuckles) donkey brains, and therefore could not have been negligent in driving his car. So at base, this is a really good example of why character evidence should not be allowed. Just because Frank might have had a character for lack of donkey brains when he was a child doesn't mean he didn't act negligently when he ran into Dennis in this particular instance. - Do you have any such certificate? - What? (scoffs) - Well, we don't want a donkey on the road eating cereal. We know Frank's not a donkey, how do we know you're not a donkey-brained man? - Yep, a good example of why character evidence is a bad idea. You're trying to prove a negative here, to show that you weren't a donkey brain when you were the victim of this accident. The fact that Frank has the certificate means nothing, and this is a speciesist argument that Charlie is using here, it shouldn't hold any water. - Why would I have a certificate? - You don't have a certificate? - Oh, no, no, no, no, the burden of proof is not on me. - The defendant will answer the question. - The defendant? I'm not the defendant! - Just answer the question. - Those are two contradictory statements. He's not the defendant, that's accurate, but he does have the burden of proof here. He has to prove that it is more likely than not that Frank was negligent and that the damages that he suffered are attributable to that negligence. (upbeat music) - Frank, would you like a glass of wine? - Yeah, alright. - Huh, why not have a glass of wine? I mean, after all... Oh. (chuckles) - Hey, hey, hey, you can't do that! - Oh, I'm so sorry. Whoopsie, whoopsie, see, I bashed into Frank while he was at a dead stop, that's completely my fault, Frank. I will pay for all the damages to your shirt. Case closed! - Oh, well, when you put it like that, you got me. You know what, I'm on Dennis's side now, he just convinced me. - Alright, I think Charlie's being facetious here, but Dennis's argument here really goes to the heart of the matter. He is trying to establish that the damages that he suffered, the liquid coming out of his cereal bowl and ruining the interior of his car, are analogous to running into Frank and spilling the red wine onto his shirt. This is what lawyers do all the time, we take case law, we make analogies to prior cases that involve a similar set of facts, and we say that the facts at issue are similar to the facts that have gone before. And here, he is trying to make an analogy between the liquid, the milk, in a cereal bowl to the liquid, the wine, that was in the wine glass. So really good job by Dennis making an argument that goes to the heart of the matter here, whether it was reasonably foreseeable for Frank to have caused the damages to the inside of Dennis's car. - It occurs to me that Frank assumed responsibility for a potential spill the second he took the wine. - Yeah, he's right, I knew the risk. - So in this circumstance, it would appear that Frank is at fault, and therefore in the car, Dennis is at fault, I am on Frank's side, case closed! - That's another good argument. There is a doctrine called Assumption of Risk in negligence law. Sometimes, if you do an inherently-dangerous act as the victim, and you are damaged as a result of both someone's negligence and your own actions, the law imputes an assumption of risk, and it is an affirmative defense to a claim of negligence. It's a doctrine that comes into play when a victim knowingly and voluntarily takes on the risks associated with a certain activity. So, for example, if you were trespassing and you saw a sign that said "Enter at Your Own Risk, Dangerous Condition" or "Caution: Guard Dog", you might be subject to the affirmative defense of assumption of risk because you knowingly took on the risks associated with that particular behavior. So this is a great argument for Mac to make, this is a defense that gets used in courts all the time. I don't think it applies in this particular situation, but let's see what the other arguments are and see how it comes out. - I'm gonna ask you one more time, do you or do you not believe that you can create a superhuman race of strongmen through genetic mutation and evolution? (intense music) - Uh, no. (chuckles) That's ridiculous, Dee, what are you talking about? - What are you talking about? You were just... You were just telling Charlie this morning all about the, "Oh, have you seen X-Men?" and "my seed", and-- - No, I was joking with Charlie. (chuckles) That could never happen in the real world, Dee, that's like a comic book thing. - He's credible. - Yeah, he's credible. Alright, we won this case. - I win this case. It's an open-shut case. - [Dee] Shit, Dennis, that was... - No, no, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait a minute. Mac, why don't you believe that? - Huh? - Well, I'm just wondering why don't you believe that you could pass down a gene that would eventually evolve into a race of supermen? Why? - I like where Dennis is going here. This is one of the reasons why you should never lie in court. It's because a good lawyer will be able to suss out your lies and show that you are not a credible person. When you're on the stand, often, credibility is important, not in the sense that they're showing here, but in the sense that they are trying to show that this witness is not credible because they have lied, and usually your character for truthfulness is usually at issue, which is separate from your general character and certainly separate from whether you had a character to engage in some sort of negligence on the day in question. So, whether they take you down the logical route of all the things that come as a result of your lie or whether they show you something that contradicts your prior testimony, so whether it's a deposition or perhaps an email that you wrote that contradicts what you're saying on the stand, a good lawyer will be able to tell when you're lying, and they will ram it down your throat and show everyone that you are no longer credible as a witness, which I think is about to happen right here. - That's a silly question, (chuckles) because evolution doesn't exist, of course. (upbeat music) - [Dennis] I'm sorry? - Oh, could you repeat that again, for the room? - Because evolution is (bleep), it's not real. - God (bleep), recess! - Yeah, or they'll just catch you in some other absurdity and ruin your credibility that way, that can happen too. Okay, I know at this point a lot of people are going to say this is completely unrealistic, this is ridiculous, they're having a fake trial in a bar, so let's talk about what's generally happening here, and let's talk specifically about legal arbitrations. Let's think like a lawyer. (upbeat music) Now, an arbitration is like a court and a trial that happens in a court, except it's all done by private contract. So, two parties get into a dispute, and rather then take their dispute to court, they either decide, at that time, to do an arbitration or they have a prior contract that requires them to go to arbitration. Arbitration can have some advantages, it can be much, much faster than a court, which a court trial can often take years to happen, but it does have the disadvantage of requiring the parties themselves to pay the arbitrator, or arbitrators, plural, if there's more than one, so it can often be more expensive than a courtroom proceeding. If you wanna know more about arbitrations, I actually did a whole video about the arbitration provision in the Discord and Better Health terms of service, I'll put a link to that down below. Believe it or not, when you go to arbitration, all of the rules are set by you and your opponent, you have to agree. Arbitration is a creature of contract, and a contract requires mutual agreement. So if you agree to arbitration, you and the other party have to agree to the terms by which that arbitration will proceed. So here, the parties, Dennis and Frank, have basically agreed to arbitrate their case and avoid going to court, even though this is sort of the classic thing that get litigated in court, negligence in a car accident, and they have sort of agreed to be bound by the outcome of what their three friends think about this particular case. So, believe it or not, this is not that dissimilar from an actual arbitration. It's a little bit crazier, but you could agree to sort of forego the rules of evidence if you wanted to so that all of the testimony that's coming in would come in in arbitration too, and you could agree to be bound by what your three friends think about the particular case. - These were all the smartest scientists on the planet, only problem is, they kept being wrong, sometimes. (intense music) (Devin chuckles) - This is insane, you fool! - This is getting dangerously close to the Chewbacca defense. - Why would a Wookie, an eight-foot tall Wookie, want to live on Endor with a bunch of two-foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense! But more important, you have to ask yourself, what does this have to do with this case? Nothing. - Which, ironically, since that came out in South Park, is a term that lawyers use. When we talk about arguments that are completely ridiculous and that have no bearing on the particular case, except for some speciesist reasoning, we actually do refer to things as the Chewbacca defense. - Have you seen these fossil records? (intense music) - Have I... Huh? - Have you pored through the data yourself, the numbers? - Oh, this thing is getting outta hand. - So let me get this straight, Mr. Reynolds, you get your information from a book written by men you've never met, and you take their words as truth based on a willingness to believe, a desire to accept, a leap of, oof, dare I say it, (scoffs) faith? - I think the writers of the show had a lot of fun coming up with as many logical fallacies as they possibly could cram into 22 minutes. None of this testimony is relevant, we've gone far afield, I hope we get back to the actual trial at hand, 'cause there are some really interesting legal issues to discuss here: reasonability, foreseeability, negligence, this is fun stuff. Or at least it was. - Come on, look, I mean, don't even know how I'm supposed to respond to that, like... Ah, come on. That's a false equivalency. - Just answer the question, Mr. Reynolds. - (chuckles) False equivalency. - Sure, yeah, okay. - I rest my case. - Wow! (upbeat music) Well, that got me. Frank, you want me to... - Put me over too. - Yeah, alright. - What? - Well, we're going on the fence, I mean, that's a shadow of a doubt. - You actually don't believe - (chuckles) Shadow of doubt. - in evolution anymore? - I don't know, he created a reasonable doubt, he makes you sound like a stupid, uh, science bitch. - So Charlie here is getting the standard wrong, even though none of this is relevant to the case at hand, he's talking about the criminal law standard, which is beyond a reasonable doubt. You cannot have any reasonable doubts in order to find someone guilty in criminal court. It is the highest burden in all of law. Whereas when you're talking about a civil lawsuit, you're only talking about a preponderance of the evidence, something that is more likely than not. In other words, if 50% is exactly the same on either side, all you have to be is 51% sure, then the plaintiff has met their burden, just 51% more likely than not that the defendant committed the acts accused of and that that forms the basis of the liability at issue. - Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, what, what are we even talking about? How did we get on evolution? This is not about evolution. - Yes, exactly, you shouldn't be talking about this at all. - When you attacked Mac's character! - Yeah, like they did in the OJ trial to that hero cop Mark Fuhrman. - (chuckles) No, not touching that one. - Okay, let's just get back on track here, I would like to make my closing arguments. - No, no, no, no, no, no, this has gone on long enough. And by the way, Dee, why the hell do you give a (bleep) about any of this anyway? - You don't know? You can't think of why I might like to set a precedent of responsibility for when someone's car gets destroyed? - No. - So, ironically, arbitrations don't really set legal precedent. When you take a case to court and that's adjudicated by either the jury or the judge, it really doesn't have any precedential effect until one of the parties takes that case up on appeal. So, Dee won't get any precedent out of this arbitration because it's not taking place in court and has not taken place in front of the Court of Appeals. (upbeat music) - Okay, here's the deal, Dennis, if you can drive to your apartment and back without spilling a single drop, Dee, your precedent is set, and Frank, you pay for everything. - Fine. - Good. - Okay, and Frank, if you could drive to our place and back without getting in an accident, with me giving you directions, you can continue to drive as long as I'm in the car with you. - Deal. - Alright. - On your mark, get set, go! - I got it. - This is amazing, this is a great way to resolve this particular dispute, the parties are agreeing to the facts. They're basically creating an objective test to determine whether Frank was negligent in the first instance based on his lack of correct lenses in his glasses, and they're all agreeing to these terms, so they're setting a metric by which everyone can agree. This is amazing, I can't believe this is coming as a result of this stupid show. - [Frank] Alright, here we go. - We're gonna make a left up there. - Make a what? - Uh-huh. - Go left. - Make a left? - Right. - Right? - Oh no, I think I know where this is going. (yelling and arguing) - You make up your mind! Deandra, shut up! - (chuckles) Oh no. (car crashes) (Mac groans) No! There's no resolution! - That is insane, how do you hit me again? - It was Deandra's fault! She gave me the wrong directions. - Guys, it's actually pretty cut and dry, - This way, that way, up. - it was Dee's fault, I was trying to give directions and she interrupted and-- - What are you talking about? - And she's butting in, she's butting in. - I was reiterate... Charlie was giving directions and I was-- - So this is your fault? - And this is why the law is hard, sometimes there are just gray areas that won't be resolved. - It was Dee's fault, she'll pay for the damages. - Don't you dare. - Yeah, absolutely, she should. - That's it. - Don't you dare, no. Okay, you know, I have an idea, should we have a trial, me and Charlie? - That's too many trials, that's too many trials. - (chuckles) Oh no. - We can't have a trial for every person. - Let's just have her pay for it and be done with this. - Alright, that's it. - I'm tired of this. - Let's go. - No, no, no, no. - I'm going back to the bar. - No, because Charlie was giving the... I was only... You sons of... God dammit! (Devin chuckles) - Is that a just outcome? I'll have to think about that. But it's a good lesson that sometimes the law is just what everyone agrees that the law is, it's just a construct based on society, and sometimes you get screwed because everyone else is in the majority. Sorry, Dee. (upbeat music) Alright, now it's time to give this episode a grade for legal realism. (gavel bangs) This was a real treat, it started with one of the classic hypotheticals in law school that you have to debate, and there are reasonable people on either side as to whether you're responsible for consequential damages, then it goes straight into something that is a reasonable facsimile of arbitration between private parties, and despite all the hijinks about nonsensical issues with character, and credibility, and evolution, they actually have a lot of good arguments, ending with an objective test to determine who is reasonably at fault. This was an enormous treat for me as a practicing lawyer and someone who really enjoyed all those philosophical debates in law school. I am so happy that this episode of It's Always Sunny was way better than the last one, so I'm gonna give this episode of It's Always Sunny a solid B. Nice job, you're really improving in this class. Do you agree? Leave your objections down below, and check out my other reactions where I will see you in court.
Info
Channel: LegalEagle
Views: 2,951,064
Rating: 4.8424382 out of 5
Keywords: Legaleagle, legal eagle, legal analysis, big law, lsat, personal injury lawyer, supreme court, law firm, law school, law and order, lawyers, lawyer reacts, ace attorney, phoenix wright, lawyer, attorney, trial, court, fair use, reaction, law, legal, judge, suits, objection, Cereal defense, bird law, it’s always sunny in philadelphia, charlie kelly, charlie day, rob mcelhenney, glenn howerton, dennis reynolds, it’s always sunny, frank reynolds, sunny tv, iasip, always sunny, fxx
Id: gX0xVhbDzKs
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 23min 36sec (1416 seconds)
Published: Fri Nov 16 2018
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