Where the LSAT Can Lead: My Story of Suing UPS in Small Claims
The LSAT can lead to a lucrative career in law, or a Supreme Court clerkship. Some lawyers fight for the rights of Guantanamo Bay detainees; others practice space law.
In my case, it led to Brooklyn small claims court. A year after leaving Yale Law School and passing the New York Bar, I found myself in downtown Brooklyn with a pile of tabbed evidence (exhibits A-H) in my lap, seething at the petite woman in pink flats seated across from me, the owner of my local UPS store just north of Prospect Park, as she crossed her arms and yelled, “YOU SHOULD HAVE BOUGHT INSURANCE!”
She was right. I should have, and I didn’t. But I had just sued her on behalf of myself.
It began, the way too many things do, with an overpriced pair of shoes. They were worse than overpriced; they were exorbitantly expensive, the most expensive pair of … the most expensive anything fashion-related I’d ever purchased by eight hundred percent. (For you fellow math-challenged, that means if the most I’d ever spent on a pair of shoes had been twenty dollars, they’d be $160 … and that’s not it.)
Thing is, I was working at a “big law firm” when I bought them and, in my abject misery, constantly seeking out means of instant gratification and temporary solace: McDonalds french fries for lunch (large, naturally); a fourth cup of coffee; that dress in the window I don’t even like that much but maybe it’ll look almost good with a belt.
During my lunch break, which wasn’t so much a “break” as fifteen minutes I could sneak away as a bottom-level associate, I walked over to Madison Avenue and bought the $hoes to feel better. And I did for about ten minutes.
When I quit my law job two months later to write (and actually began to feel better), I could not only no longer afford such extravagances, I could no longer afford to live with the previous ones, including the $hoes (although I had never actually been able to bring myself to wear them, anyway). I cashed out part of my IRA, moved to Brooklyn and put the the $hoes on eBay, where they sold quickly. I dropped them off at my local UPS store and, a week later, received an email in all caps from Yvonne, the buyer, in San Diego: WHERE R SHOES EVENT IS 2NITE!!!!!
A dozen calls and emails to the UPS branch, and I still didn’t have any answers. I googled the branch and found similar complaints of “lost,” high-value items that were never recovered. I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau (where the store, for the record, had an F rating). The store responded in a terse letter that it was my fault for not buying additional insurance. It didn’t mention anything about where the shoes might be now.
When I called the national UPS customer service line, the CS representative I spoke to told me she couldn’t help.
“You’ll need to take it up with your local branch,” she said.
I was done: done with working things the soft way, and done with saying “branch.” Full of rage and self-righteousness, and $300 poorer after eBay made me pay back Yvonne, I googled “Brooklyn small claims” and found my way to Turbocourt, the judicial twin of Turbotax, which, as you can infer, files your lawsuits for a fee. Instantly, I got my trial date: September 18th, 2012.
I had to teach a class that night.
I called the court.
“I have to work the night of my hearing,” I told the clerk, “so could we move up the date?” She told me that I’d have to send a letter to the judge, who would open it on my court date, in my absence, and decide whether or not to give me an extension. Best case scenario, the new date would be several months later.
No. This was a matter of justice, and as I’d heard too many times in law school, “Justice delayed is justice denied.” I would find a substitute teacher, and on September 18th, I would be there, guns blazing.
Over the next four months, I spent around twenty hours preparing for my hearing, at which I assumed UPS would not show. I hoped to get a winning judgment by default (which can happen when a defendant just doesn’t show up). I rehearsed my arguments, printed and sorted evidence at Kinkos while the clock charged my Visa, and invited a friend along for moral support, who brought her microphone to record (how could we not document such an exciting event?). By the time I arrived at small claims, I had spent or foregone (having gotten a sub for my class) well over the original value of the shoes–not even the resale price. Theoriginal price.
Small claims court is the little league of court. Few people have lawyers. You can only sue for $5,000 or less.
After an hour in a tense and crowded room, my case is finally called–case 87 of the 95 on the calendar that night.
“Mary Adkins!”
“Here.”
“UPS!”
“Here,” a voice chimes from the back. I turn to spot a small, angry-looking woman in a hot pink shirt and dark, creased jeans standing in the corner, staring right back at me.
Our case is sent to room 509, several flights up, and we end up in the same elevator. After nearly half a year of cultivating anger at UPS, the abstract merchant who won’t return my calls, it’s strange now to face this woman who (a) actually came, and (b) doesn’t look evil or abstract, at all. She just looks annoyed.
When we arrive on the fifth floor, I introduce myself. Her name is Camille. She’s owned the store with her brother for seven years.
Ultimately, we end up in front of an arbitrator. We each tell our version of the story. Hers is defensive, and I find myself believing it: she wasn’t there the day I shipped the shoes, and she trusts her employees. When the arbitrator raises her eyebrows in a way that signals, to both of us I think, that the store is nonetheless responsible for the shoes, Camille caves. She offers to pay me $316–the sale price, plus what I’d paid for shipping. I accept her offer because it feels like this is where this ends, and because it seems, now that I’ve heard her version, fair or at least fair-ish … never mind that what I’m agreeing to is less than what I have spent or forfeited just working on the case, alone.
As the arbitrator drafts the agreement, Camille and I chat. She is talkative about the challenges of running a small shipping franchise. People are always claiming that expensive items have been lost when she has no way of verifying whether or not what they’re saying is true. She’s sick of it, and this case has been the tipping point.
Because of me, she tells me–not kindly–she’s had to institute a new policy to track packages from the moment they are dropped off through each stage of handling. Her employees, and the employees of the companies she works with, are irritated by the new policy; they have to record and tick off every phase of transfer, and it substantially slows down the process. But she doesn’t care. The policy’s purpose is to spare her from having to spend evenings like this and cutting checks to people like me.
As we shake hands and part ways, I realize something. If Camille had just paid up but walked away without having said anything more, I’m pretty sure I would have wound up with the same empty feeling I’d had after the fleeting pleasure of buying the shoes had passed: the understanding that nothing was different. The delight at having “won” or prevailed eventually would have left me in the same place I was before the whole thing ever took place; instant gratification dissipates rapidly into The Default, As Usual.
But that isn’t what happened. Because something lasting came out of this–a policy change–I left small claims feeling better than I did coming in, and that feeling has endured; it’s with me months later.
Small claims is no space law. But my local UPS is a more reliable institution now. Begrudgingly, and via collective hostility, it operates in what I believe is a superior way. And that feels good.
In my case, the LSAT didn’t lead to a headline-worthy legal career. But it did lead to one headline that makes me a little proud, small as that may be.