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posted by Fnord666 on Monday June 18 2018, @04:43AM   Printer-friendly
from the never-give-out-your-passwords dept.

Musician Wins $260,000 In Lawsuit Against Ex-Girlfriend Who Sabotaged Career

In the spring of 2014, Eric Abramovitz got the opportunity of a lifetime. He just didn't know it. Abramovitz was the victim of a deception that a Canadian judge called "despicable," as he granted Abramovitz $350,000 Canadian dollars (more than $260,000 U.S.) in damages.

Abramovitz is a gifted Canadian clarinetist who received national attention when he was still in his teens. As a student at McGill University, he applied for a spot — and a scholarship — at the prestigious Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles, where he would study under the famed clarinet teacher Yehuda Gilad.

Only two spots open up per year, and they're seen as launching pads for elite careers. Competition is fierce. Abramovitz made it to the audition phase. But in March 2014, he saw an email in his inbox telling him he had been rejected.

It was heartbreaking. He went through "some really dark, sad, angry days," he told BuzzFeed. His girlfriend at the time, Jennifer Lee, another musician at McGill, consoled him.

But Abramovitz's despair was born out of a lie — and Lee's comforting words were, in retrospect, "really sick," he told the site. He had actually made it into the Colburn Conservatory. He never saw his acceptance email, however, because Lee got to it first — and sabotaged him. Apparently, a Canadian judge concluded, she didn't want him to move from Montreal to California.


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  • (Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Monday June 18 2018, @05:23AM (4 children)

    by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 18 2018, @05:23AM (#694430) Journal

    I do like a story with an outcome where the right person wins. But I also wonder how much of this money he will ever see. Given the rather limited scope of information about his girlfriend here (the sort of person who lies in an email to keep him from his dreams) I hardly picture her as diving into vaults of cash Scrooge McDuck style.

    Are these court cases actually going to turn over results? Would the state garnish some portion of her income or impose a higher tax bracket until it is repaid? Would she be made to sell any/all assets? I am thoroughly more curious about what happens right after the verdict is read out - aside from the expected appeal on the GF's side of course.

    • (Score: 2) by krishnoid on Monday June 18 2018, @06:28AM

      by krishnoid (1156) on Monday June 18 2018, @06:28AM (#694437)

      Given the rather limited scope of information about his girlfriend here ... I hardly picture her as diving into vaults of cash Scrooge McDuck style.
      ...
      Jennifer Lee, another musician at McGill

      Yeah, not sure how much he'll be able to collect, and over what period of time.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Monday June 18 2018, @03:07PM (1 child)

      When someone wins a judgement against you you're not actually required to pay.

      But the plaintiff can haul you into court once a year for an examination of your assets. If the judge determines that you have the ability to pay then he forces you to do so.

      In the amusing case of a judgement against a retail store, you can ask the Sheriff to send a Deputy around for a "till tap". That fine member of our nation's law enforcement community will stand right next to the cash register - doutblessly howling with laughter - then seize all the cash that goes into it until the plaintiff's award is made good.

      Among other ways to collect is to put a lien on the defendant's real property. That's why your house needs to be rented to you by a numbered corporation in the Cayman Islands. There are lots of books and websites that explain all about Asset Protect.

      HOWEVER:

      The defendant can also declare bankrupcy. Quite likely that's what the girlfriend will do, leaving the poor guy with nothing.

      At least he'll get into music school. I'm a musician too; for someone that really cares about music, that's what really matters more than any amount of money.

      --
      Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
      • (Score: 3, Funny) by krishnoid on Tuesday June 19 2018, @02:45AM

        by krishnoid (1156) on Tuesday June 19 2018, @02:45AM (#694799)

        The defendant can also declare bankrupcy. Quite likely that's what the girlfriend will do, leaving the poor guy with nothing.

        I bet the courts will see through this, and demand she provide her last remaining asset to him, and demand that she remain his girlfriend ... hey, wait a second ...

    • (Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Monday June 18 2018, @03:55PM

      by nitehawk214 (1304) on Monday June 18 2018, @03:55PM (#694555)

      This is why you see judgments at such high dollar values. Because the court system knows a defendant (and, more importantly, their lawyers) will only ever see a fraction of the money.

      --
      "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @06:48AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @06:48AM (#694440)

    secure your login session. Contributory negligence.

    As Sheldons mailman puts it, people be crazy.

  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by maxwell demon on Monday June 18 2018, @06:49AM (2 children)

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday June 18 2018, @06:49AM (#694441) Journal

    And now imagine that cryptographic signing of emails was widely understood and employed.

    The conservatory would have routinely signed their mail. And if his then-girlfriend had tried to manipulate the mail anyway, his mail program would have raised a big warning about an invalid signature. Give the importance of this to him, he certainly would have immediately contacted the conservatory, and would have learned that he indeed had been accepted, not rejected.

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @07:30AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @07:30AM (#694445)

      The easiest way to fake an e-mail signature is to not add one. The recipient is unlikely to notice.

      • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @12:42PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @12:42PM (#694497)

        In that hypothetical dream world, unsigned emails would cause a warning, too.

  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @08:21AM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @08:21AM (#694450)

    His girlfriend was racially awake. The name of the (artificially) "famed" clarinet teacher is yehud gilad, which is a suspiciously jewish-sounding name. She didn't want her future husband to be schooled by a jew, destroying his natural talents and gifts. The jew would have taken him to an onoccupied room, attacked him and consumed his soul completely, leaving only a shell behind.

    He should thank his ex-girlfriend for trying to save his life.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @09:03AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @09:03AM (#694452)

      /pol/ meets /x/

    • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @09:51AM (4 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @09:51AM (#694459)

      The name of the (artificially) "famed" clarinet teacher is yehud gilad, which is a suspiciously jewish-sounding name.

      And Abramovitz doesn't?

      • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @02:16PM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @02:16PM (#694515)

        And that is another question: Would Abramovitz have been accepted, had he not been Jewish.

        • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Thexalon on Monday June 18 2018, @03:21PM (2 children)

          by Thexalon (636) on Monday June 18 2018, @03:21PM (#694536)

          And that is another question: Would Abramovitz have been accepted, had he not been Jewish.

          The main reason Jewish kids are more likely to go to top-quality colleges has a lot to do with Jewish kids having, on average, better test scores [discovermagazine.com], and presumably the GPAs to go with it, than most other religious groups. This largely comes from the fact that their parents are much more likely to have higher education, which in turn comes from the efforts of earlier generations really making a point of taking advantage of every educational opportunity they could come by (e.g. my Jewish grandfather got his start working his way through City College of New York, which had no tuition).

          Not a single college admissions officer or conservative faculty member I've ever talked to or worked with expressed any kind of preference for Jewish students.

          --
          The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @06:25PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @06:25PM (#694623)

            Many Jews learn at least two languages from a young age as well ($NATIVE_LANG & Hebrew), and learning multiple languages is well-correlated with academic success.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @07:15PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @07:15PM (#694655)

            I don't know if that article quite so much proves your point, as the average result range isn't too wide, and Asian Jews are listed at the bottom of the list of SAT scores.

            According to Wikipedia, there are 5.7m Jews in the US compared to a total population of about 325m. That makes them less than 2% by population, yet they are overrepresented in academia. Your grandfather may have pulled himself up by his bootstraps, more so than his contemporaries were willing to do. But today, Jewish kids from wealthy families probably go to good high schools with many kids from non-Jewish families who also value education.

            But this case is more akin to graduate study, and the advisor is committing to spending an awful lot of time and effort on his student. It helps if you have some common ground. It doesn't have to be an open preference: Academic competition is so fierce that acquaintances of student and professor can make the connection. No idea why Mr. Abramovitz didn't bother to call up Professor Gilad to thank him for his consideration, it would have saved him a lot of pain. I also had no idea that something as formal as admission to grad school was being done by email now either.

    • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @02:22PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 18 2018, @02:22PM (#694517)

      Naah, I think incel hysteria fits here better. His girlfriend did it to him because he's an incel. She must have been coerced by the filthy incel into the relationship, so we also know that she is a victim of sex slavery. He had it coming to him.

      Death to incels! Police be upon them!

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