truTV: Not Reality. Actuality.

Frederick Puglisi, 23, was awarded $850,000 by a jury in Ramsey, N.J., in September, for injuries, including a disfigured hand caused by frostbite, suffered when he got drunk at a party, set out on foot, and passed out in a snowbank. The jury determined that his injuries were worth $1 million in damages and that Puglisi was only 15 percent responsible. (Ramsey police and the Bergen county police bore greater fault because they had failed to respond quickly enough to a 911 call about a man passed out in a snowbank.)

In August, cardiologist Dr. Lawrence Poliner won $366 million in damages from a federal court jury in Dallas, Tex., because his practice was virtually shut down through word of mouth for seven months in 1998, a verdict that (after subtracting 25 percent in attorney fees) would reward him with earnings during the shutdown of $39 million per month. The shutdown came after a hospital peer review panel had found errors in 29 of 44 patient-cases of Poliner (but he was reinstated after prominent cardiologists supported him, though the panel did not retract its initial finding).

Leading Economic Indicators: In 1999, recently-widowed Mary Corcoran, who was already set to receive a $1.4 million settlement from Union Pacific Railroad in the death of her husband, met Chicago lawyer Joseph P. Dowd in a bar, and Dowd convinced her that she needed better legal representation. Dowd called a hotshot Chicago law firm, which examined the case, concluded that Corcoran could not expect more than $1.4 million, and thus bowed out without charging Corcoran. Dowd, however, continues to bill Corcoran for the customary "finder's fee" (10 percent, or $140,000) stemming from the single phone call he made to the Chicago law firm. According to an August report in the New York Times, Dowd is back in court, demanding not only the $140,000 but five years' interest.

The Gentle Wind Project of Kittery, Maine, was recently in the news for filing a federal lawsuit against a couple who had allegedly slandered the group with claims of mind control and child neglect, among other charges. According to a Gentle Wind spokesperson, each human lives inside an energy field 8-10 feet high, 4-6 feet wide, which sometimes gets damaged and must be repaired. Its "healing instruments" are just the tools to do that, bringing good health, based on "20 years" of research. For example, its "Puck Puck" (which resembles several tuning forks) is said to bring relief from high blood pressure, arthritis, migraines, ulcers, and chronic fatigue to those who merely hold them, and it has even been known to help people "forgive." On the other hand, wrote the spokesperson, "We're not New Age wackos."

In May, in the latest blooming of the lawyers' class-action money tree, California law firms asked a court to approve $258 million in fees for their handling of a lawsuit against Microsoft Corp., amounting to $3,000 an hour for the lead attorney (who billed for 6,000 hours of his own time, even though three dozen lawyers from more than 30 firms had a piece of the case) and $1,000 an hour for administrative work, all for the following consumer bonanza: Each victim will get a coupon worth $5 to $29 toward the purchase of another Microsoft product (coupons that are often routinely ignored by consumers in these settlements, as not worth the bother).

Not My Fault: James Samuel Steward, then 22, suffered severe brain damage after he took an overdose of methadone that someone had smuggled into jail for him while he was an inmate in Goulburn, Australia. In May 2004, Steward's parents filed a lawsuit on his behalf (because he is now unable to care for himself), claiming that it is the government's fault that their son got tempted, in that it did not smuggle-proof the jail, and the Stewards are asking the equivalent of US$2.7 million.