http://www.cnn.com/2009/TRAVEL/12/17/road.trips.maui.highway.tl/index.html

But Lahaina is also a town rich in well-preserved history, a history that juggled the relationship between the whaling industry and the missionaries during their heyday in the mid 1800's.

From a look at the records available in the old prison, Hale Paahao ("stuck-in-irons house"), built by King Kamehameha III to detain unruly sailors who refused to return to their ships by sundown, it's easy to see which group prevailed more often than not.

In 1855 there were 330 convictions for "drunkenness" and 169 for "fornication," as well as 89 for "furious riding."

But apparently life in the prison, which is beautifully preserved, with its well-manicured yard under large monkeypod trees just off the main drag, was not all bad.

Seaman William Mitchell Stetson confided in his diary: "Male and female all had freedom of the prison yard and mingled promiscuously." And if the hardships of jail life ever did become too much of a strain, the wooden cells were barely secure and the coral restraining wall, at just over 10 feet high, was easily scaled once the sailors sobered up.

...so you see, there *is* legal precedent for restraining the prisoners to prevent mass fornication and the resulting lawsuits ;)

(btw Why does your comment posting system require an email address?)

There's no way that a court can make up for this and in the end they are just torturing themselves even more...there are so many ways that this case can end in a non-decision, forcing them to start all over again, with even less hope of success. The city is just showing the plaintiffs that they get paid to drag this out, paid out of their own tax money, and anything they win? They will also pay tax money which will go to pay off most of the players. This is basically nothing more than a long two-fingered salute all around.

I'm just waiting for Ramsey to show up in court and say that he ordered the arrest of the protestors who were disturbing the peace and threatening to interfere with the orderly flow of pedestrians through the park, not everyone there, and that order was simply misunderstood by overzealous subordinates. "Oh, that's all there was to this? Case dismissed".

Liar. She sounds like Rumsfeld - I stand all day at my writing table, so why can't Gitmo prisoners stand all day?

The people who are suing should not settle until they get what they want. If they each want a million dollars, so be it. After their rights were violated by the District, those people have the right to pursue their case for as long as they want [provided, of course, the courts allow them to do so].

If they each want a billion dollars, that's their choice, that's their right. If you don't want to be sued & have to spend years in court before paying $50 or $100 million in damages, then don't violate people's rights.

Maybe if the District has to pay $100 million in damages, the peasants who live here will revolt & throw the bums out - bums like Lanier, Fenty, Nickles, et al. Odds are, though, that nothing will happen - the beaten down poor people & the self-absorbed transient hipsters just don't give a shit.

I like reading about the Perishing Park case. Keep up the good work.

If this case is taken to trial, it would be a massively large number that would come out in the end. Therefore, a total settlement number around 15-20 Million would probably be fair... 40-50K a protester, plus the attorney's fees and costs. I'm pretty sure that the city is balking at that. Perhaps a few million in sanctions fines and a raft of adverse inferences will properly adjust their thinking.