When the Insurance Company Owns Your Case
Buried in nearly every insurance policy is language similar to this: “The insurer, on making any payment or assuming liability therefor is subrogated to all rights of recovery of the insured against any person, and may bring action in the name of the insured to...
Back to the Beach
In the majority of states a landowner’s property line ends at the mean high water mark. In these states the intertidal zone is owned by the state, which holds the land in trust for its citizens. But in Massachusetts and Maine, by virtue of an ancient colonial...
The New Normal in DMR Suspensions
Everyone knows that the Maine Department of Marine Resources can suspend a fisherman’s license for a violating a fisheries law. But until recently, nearly all DMR license suspensions were for a court-adjudicated criminal or civil violation. You got a trial before a...
Private Lending
From time to time I’m asked to prepare the documentation for a loan from an individual to a fisherman. Sometimes the proposed loan is from a friend or family member, and sometimes it’s a straight business transaction, uncomplicated by friendship. Either way, it can...
The End of the Consent Decree
On July 21, 2014, Judge Hornby, of the United States District Court for Maine, issued an order terminating the 56 year old consent judgment entered into between the Maine Lobstermen’s Association and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). It was a historic day. In...
Charters and Chartering
A charter, of course, is an agreement whereby in exchange for payment a ship’s owner agrees to allow another person to use his or her ship. But first some terminology. The two parties to a charter are the owner and the charterer. The charter agreement is often called...
The Right to Wharf Out
If your land abuts navigable waters, whether fresh or tidal, your property ends at the water’s edge. The state owns the submerged lands. At common law – that’s the law judges make when ruling in court cases, as opposed to the statutes made by Congress or state...
The Other Jones Act
Confusingly, there are two federal laws which sailors know generically as the “Jones Act.” One is the statutory creation of a remedy for sailors injured through the negligence of the ship. There are actually three separate remedies for injured sailors, only one of...
Arresting a Ship
A few times a year I get a call from an out of state lawyer representing a yacht yard, crewing company or other supplier. The lawyer tells me a certain yacht is cruising Maine waters, and can I arrest it? If the facts are right, I can have the ship arrested, and the...
They Grabbed My Boat!
Soon after I started my law practice a transplanted Texan hired me for a trap molestation case. He had a recreational lobster license and fished five traps outside Portland harbor. The locals resented his traps, and time and again he checked his traps and decided...