Talk:Barratry (common law)

Internal Links
I have added internal links Legal advertising and Ambulance chaser, as part of the project to define or merge all terms on WP:AR1. Bearian 00:03, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Jack Thompson
Hello everyone. I find it amusing, and truthful even, to put "Jack Thompson" under the See Also. However, it's prooooobably not appropriate.....~ Prysorra 22:54, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Different meanings of the term
I recently added a paragraph here on the other definitions of Barratry in law. This was reverted with the edit history "A revised hatnote is a better idea". If barratry's other meaning were unrelated (placenames, or suchlike) then I'd agree, a hatnote linking to a dab page would be sufficient. But the lead sentence says "Barratry is a legal term with several meanings", then proceeds to discuss just one of them. And "repeated legal actions for the purpose of harassment" isn't even the main meaning in common law; This defines it as bringing about repeated lawsuits for profit, while this includes the crime of judges influenced by bribery. Also, the first says this use of the term is rare, so having it as the primary topic is debatable. I suggest the article should offer some explanation of the various meanings of the term, or the current article be moved to Barratry (common law), or somesuch title, and the title Barratry be used to outline all definitions. Any thoughts? Moonraker12 (talk) 11:57, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Hmm, the idea of moving is perhaps a good one. There is, perhaps, not a primary topic for this term which is pretty obscure anyway. I would rather gets some info on the etymology of the word before making Barratry any more than a disambiguation page, though. D O N D E groovily   Talk to me  02:46, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, so; if there are no objections I'll move these in the next day or so. Moonraker12 (talk) 12:26, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
 * It seems reasonable to make it a disambiguation page, if Ambulance chasing and Barratry (common law) aren't just the same basic offense in different forms. It seems that the two meanings could be interpreted as two forms of the same behavior, and Ambulance chasing is pretty short and could be merged if it were closely related.  The article doesn't seem to discuss whether the two were related at some point.  Does anyone have more information on the history of this term in relation to lawyers? --Closeapple (talk) 19:32, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Ambulance chasing and common law definitions are definitely not the same. Common law barratry means repeatedly suing someone mainly to harass them, and rarely appears in modern law books - a modern counterpart is Strategic lawsuit against public participation. Ambulance chasing refers to seeking new clients at a disaster site (thus the name) and is explicitly prohibited in many modern legal codes. D O N D E groovily   Talk to me  20:20, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Closeapple: From what I can gather, Barratry (in common law) covers a whole range of offenses committed by lawyers. The dictionaries I linked (above) list “bringing repeated lawsuits for profit”, “litigation for the purpose of harassment” and (in Scots law at least) the crime of judges influenced by bribery. As such Ambulance chasing is an aspect of bringing lawsuits solely for profit, but it isn’t the whole story. And in some jurisdictions it is merely a disagreeable practice, not an actual offense. So it seems reasonable enough to have a separate page on Ambulance chasing, as with all the items listed in the "See also" section here. Moonraker12 (talk) 13:19, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

The German wiki article, linked to this site is explaining the admirality law instead. Unfortunately, I don't know how to change those links. As far as I know, there is no German article about the common law barratry. 5.56.190.217 (talk) 16:20, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Added a link to the disambiguation page and removed the "Admiralty Law" category which does not apply to this page. Idrach (talk) 13:21, 3 July 2017 (UTC)