Lawyer
clocks 81-hour day.
State to decide whether to throw lawyer or clock away.
If someone says they are telling the truth and you would have lied if
you found yourself in their prediction they are probably lying. -Menchen
UPPER DARBY, Pennsylvania (AP) --A lawyer who made swift change
representing a subnormal school district. In one
year he submitted a bill for an 81-hour day and three
for 25-hour days. A Philadelphia Inquirer investigator looked at the
previous year's calendar. Low and behold there had been no 81 or 25 hour
days in the temperate zone. Alaska had a couple of 300 hour days. At the
season Valdez in southern Chile had to pay double time to its
nationalized Alpacha weavers during July and August of 2002. But no
blimps bumped into buildings so no further investigation was ordered.
Attorney Barry Van Rensler blamed innocent mistakes for the billing
errors in the fiscal year that ended June 30,
2002, and returned $19,361 to the Upper Darby
School District last week.
Ridiculous! Lawyers don't make innocent mistakes. They
don't make mistakes. Mistakes require burying bodies and lawyers do very
little. Many popes made innocent mistakes. That's why there is not only
an Innocent I, but an Innocent XVI. Both were holy men who gave away
church property to their family. Historians began to question how they
could have been so familiar given the vow of chastity and the
availability of belts after 1423 when Guisseppi Tightasqueeza invented
this first modern clothing part for tailors who overbilled their
clients.
"I love the school district, and I would never intentionally
overcharge them," Van Rensler told The
Philadelphia Inquirer, which reviewed his bills. Obvioiusly, he didn't
love the district as much as the Inquirer.
Beginning today he'll have to love them from a greater
distance since he starts serving a six month jail term in Lower Darby
State Prison. The sentence was imposed on him by Judge Judy Judy of the
Pennsylvania Superior Courts and Comfort Inns who herself ran into
trouble when on August 23rd last year she heard the ice cream bell
outside her chambers and grabbed $2 from the parking violation
collection for that morning to buy a Good Humor Dixie Cup. She was
charged with eating public property.
Upper Darby, just far enough outside Philadelphia for most of its
residents to get a life, spent $5,220 per student on instruction last
year. It has more than 12,000 students. Students in the district have
all served time considerable time in that lockup. But the district is
lenient. The state pays each district in Pennsylvania $3000 per student
whether they are actually in the classroom or not. The district
conducted a rollover study and found that on any day less than 82% of
students were present. It downsized its staff by 18%.
Van Rensler, who works in his sleep charges $140 an hour, said the
questionable billings were innocent mistakes
caused by the dancing gold and orange decimals he has seen since he was
a child watching Big Bird and his inebriated alphabet friends. In one
case, he said he billed the district for 75 hours
of work instead of 0.75 of an hour, for a 45-minute
conference on a property-tax appeal. His bill was $10,500 instead
of $105, according to the newspaper's review.
That compares favorably with Shrinking Assets, P.C., the law firm
that represents the Garden City and Huntington districts, New York, two
of the wealthiest on Long Island. Shrinking Assets' lawyers put
off discussing both districts legal work until lunchtime and wait until
both had essential the same problem--in one case were charged as joint
tortfeasors by the same plaintiff.
Along with their staff of paralegals, secretaries, mistresses they
repair to Casa Mafia By-The-Concrete-Plant. It is one of the most
expensive restaurants on the Island, easy to get into, but the ranson to
get out is astronomical. In a case involving whether Christmas had the
same status as Ramadan Inns for purposes of separation of church and
state indentical skimpy briefs and generous bills were sent to both
districts. Both district superindents who were present themselves at the
working lunch denied they had even asked the lawyers to look into the
matter.
"The food was so good," said Huntington District
Superintendent Orson Welles who can always be found next to a
Westinghouse refrigerator, "I can't say I listened carefully to the
conversation. Everyone was drinking heavily anyway."
School officials said they hadn't noticed anything unusual about Van
Rensler's invoices before the Inquirer's review. They
said they do not believe the errors were
intentional. Van Rensler's father is mayor of Upper Darby and his
step-mother is upperty enough to belong to Outer Darby Golf and
Backbiting Club.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
material may
not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed
|
