Pursuit of the Pants Suit

The American justice system ran its course today when a DC Superior Court judge rewarded Roy Pearson absolutely nothing after he sued Custom Dry Cleaners, a small mom and pop shop in his neighborhood, for $54 million.

Judge Bartnoff's straightforward ruling temporarily marks the end of a bizarre odyssey in which a dispute over a pair of pants had ruptured relations between a Korean-owned drycleaners and a long-term customer, administrative law judge Roy Pearson, who has left an extensive paper trail in other courts around the area.

Pearson claims that in May 2005 he brought in a pair of expensive red and blue pinstriped trousers to Custom Dry Cleaners to be altered. The owners temporarily misplaced the pair of pants, and asked for Pearson to come back the next day. Eventually the owners located the pants, but Pearson says they instead returned a pair of cuffed gray slacks, the likes of which he had never seen before. The owner, Soo Chung, insists these were the pair Pearson initially brought in due to the matching inseam measurements. Pearson asked the drycleaners to reimburse him the cost of the entire suit, $1,150, which Soo Chung testified in court was unheard of for a $10.50 alteration, especially considering those pants were definitely the ones he brought in. So Pearson pressed on, eventually delivering a letter to the store announcing his intention to sue for $50,000. From there things just took a turn for the worse, with Pearson escalating his demands, and the Chungs raising their settlement offer from $3,000 to $4,000 to eventually $12,000 just to rid of the man and get on with their lives.

But by then Pearson was dogged in his pursuits, eventually bringing a lawsuit of $65 million against the Chungs. It was only a week before the case went to trial that he changed his claim to reflect the fact that the owners failed to live up to their promise of "Satisfaction Guaranteed", according to a sign they posted inside their store and amended the figure to $54 million.

These gray pants, which were admitted into evidence in court, have been everywhere these past couple weeks--from the defense attorney's office, to the DC Superior Courtroom to its final resting place for now, draped across a wire hanger at an afternoon press conference outside the drycleaners today. Maybe they should be auctioned off somewhere, they've become so closely associated with this ridiculous trial. Maybe the funds can be donated to the Chungs' legal defense fund.

I rode a cab back from today's press conference with a freelance reporter from Sweden. That has how far this story has spread.

Although Pearson has been ordered to pay all court costs associated with the trial--filing fees and small things like that--the court has yet to decide whether Pearson would be required to pay all of the Chungs' legal fees, which falls somewhere in the $100,000 range.

Even the defense attorneys expressed doubt that the Chungs would recoup all their costs in this scenario, only because of Pearson's shaky financial status and lack of assets to his name. It's terrible the Chungs may never collect their rightful amount from this debacle, though Pearson does not deserve to be reappointed to the bench, a job which once paid him over $100,000 a year. A panel review to renew his term to another 10 years has currently been suspended.