This is AWESOME. But can we please have PICTURES of this Shanetta???

What's with all the typos?

that woman is obviously mentally ill and should be fired, stripped, beaten, ground into sausage and fed to school children throughout the D.C. metro area.

Is Shanetta Cutlar single? I think I'm in love...

This Shanetta monster should be fired and prosecuted for her abusive behavior. We pay this person with our tax money??? She is a deranged and vicious individual who clearly has never been challenged for her evilness and mistreatment of other humans. Shame on her and shame on her superiors for not acting on the complaints of those who have the misfortune to work under her authority.

Shanetta is married with two boys. Pity the poor souls!

Fired? Cutlar is African-American, female, and a civil servant. Good luck with that.

(Also, there are two sides to every story - and we haven't heard Cutlar's yet.)

Maybe it was her evil twin, Shanetta Cultar.

SYC is the only DOJ supervisor that managed to fire three attorneys in a 12 month period, now that has to be some sort of record. No one ever gets fired in the Federal government. Why doesn't somebody post how many attorneys have left on their own since SYC became chief?

Her name is misspelled "Cultar" in the memo. Perhaps it's deliberate, meant to get people thinking of some evil cult.

I wonder what kind of issues would cause someone to behave so outrageously to a SUMMER INTERN?

I mean, flying into a rage cause she didn't say hi to you in the hall?

My first day of work, I was told that the number one rule of working in Special Lit was . . . ALWAYS say "Hi" to Shanetta!

Note to Self: Withdraw Special Lit application.

and would they be bitching if Shanetta was an old white guy? Clearly the chief did not strike the fear of god into this intern. Whoever heard of a lowly intern sending a letter of complaint to higher ups. Suck it up and take your "law student ass" back to school. When you pass the bar you can think about having rights intern.

"Who are these babies" writes:

>

Please pay more attention, WATB. The document was submitted in October 2006, after the summer job had ended and the student was no longer emplyed at DOJ. In other words, the student's "ass" was already bacl at school.

Sincerely yours,
PMA

Even more reason for her to chill the fuck out, rather than create a reputation for herself before her career begins. Get your head out of your ass PMA and pay attention to the big picture.
Insincerely yours and no fan of crybabies

Create a reputation as what, exactly? Someone who was crapped on by an insecure, neurotic boss?

Also, she did NOT report what had happened to management. All she did was type up a memorandum memorializing what had happened to her. No one in management saw it until Ty submitted it with his letter.

what a bitch.

What does this woman's race and sex have to do with ANYTHING. And why SHOULD a law student, paralegal, or anyone allow themselves to be bullied or terrorized by a superior?

It's relevant because white males can act like total pricks and get away with it. But when a black woman does, she's called a "bitch."

The same is true of Anna Wintour. If a male magazine editor acted like that, he'd be respected and feared. But she gets turned into the subject of a nasty roman a clef and movie.

well, what about Harvey Weinstein and Scott Rudin? They are infamous powerful MALE WHITE assholes, right?

What reputation you ask? .....a reputation as a lilylivered crybaby who would not survive 10 seconds in my firm. It's quite nasty in the real world of law my friend, esp. big law where you find the most righteous assholes. Try memorializing how much your feelings are hurt and see how quickly you are blackballed into oblivion. oops did I say blackballed.

whether shanetta's treatment of subordinates is acceptable behavior and whether our society is racist are separate questions (the answers, by the way, are no and yes, respectively). mean white guys in private firms are assholes too, but that doesn't make shanetta less of one. patting ourselves on the back about how tough we are is a way to avoid the harder question of whether it has to be like this. it doesn't (and it shouldn't). this is why people with souls don't like being lawyers.

Someone asked the question -how many people have left Special Litigation on their own accord? In say a little over 2 years more than 40 people have left (someone better in the know correct me - this is a guesstimation). Now that is some turn over for your *Bleep. Its more than her just being bitchy- its about impacting hardworking people's careers based on petty personal and non-performance based issues - the tip of the iceberg that is what you all are getting here, and that my friends shows what's done in the dark does eventually come light or is that litigation? Hmmm

"It's quite nasty in the real world of law my friend."

You know, this is something I don't understand. If a partner at my old firm was going into the supply cabinet when angry and lighting the office supplies on fire, or screaming at clients, they would be reprimanded. Why? -- cause it hurts the bottom line?

But screaming at staff/junior lawyers hurts the bottom line, too, cause of the expense when they leave prematurely. Also, in an environment where people act like assholes, only the people with no place better to go [read: mediocre lawyers] will stay.

Everyone knows people who quietly leave practice groups, law firms, departments because they can't stand working with a raging lunatic.

Why do other partners eat the costs externalized by douchebags?

Let's point out that it's been 49 employees that's left.. Deputies, Managers and attorneys.. not support staff. Professionals with years of experience with DOJ have been demoted, and loss SES status.

I'm an outsider so I have a few questions: 1) One of the posts said that several people were hired in the last year and at least one attorney has left. (It seems like this Section is always hiring). Who is doing the recent hiring for this Section, the Bush-appointed front office or the Section Chief and her deputies? 2) Are the recent hires all conservative Bush types? 3) Is the in-fighting that is going on caused at all by philosophical differences between the old regime (including Ms. Cutlar) and the new Bush-appointees who may differ on how civil rights should be enforced for the population serviced by this Section, and 4) has the focus of the caseload in this Section changed in the last few years or are they still enforcing civil rights. Rumor has it that they have many Civil Rights Division lawyers working on immigration cases to out people out of the country.

I suspect that there is truth in some of this, but there could be many contributing factors to why lawyers are leaving in droves. There is no excuse for rude behavior, but I sense that Ms. Cutlar's hands may be tied with some of this.

Ms. Cutlar's race is pertinent because minority women in positions of power must take out their own self-doubt on their subordinates.

Many of the appellate immigration briefs being filed for the government in the circuits are being written by non-immigration lawyers, including civil rights, but also including numerous tax attorneys. They do equally poor jobs. The tax attorneys might have been able to stomach it a bit better than the civil rights attorneys, though.

Almost all of the Team Bush hires are gone out of SPL and believe me it wasn't because of philosophical differences, anyone who came from a half way normal job gets a load of the sidewalk act going on there and bails. It’s not a healthy environment -- note: cowering under your desk is not good. A few of the most recent hire batch personally selected by her Majesty have bailed out or are about to . . . its only the old timers who remember the good 'ole days that are hanging on, because as many career DOJers know, bosses come and bosses go, but civil service is forever . . . or is it? I mean, who had time for a philosophical debate when you're worried about exact spacing, god forbid typos, keeping track of your expert contract expenditures (I know that's why I went to law school!) and taking good notes because you never know when SYC was going to order you to type them up and leave them in her box for perusal?

Because of Ashcroft ordering the BIA to get rid of its nearly six thousand case backlog, the federal courts are flooded with immigration petitions for review. The REAL ID Act provided that those are handled by only the Circuit courts. Every civil attorney at DOJ, including those in the USAOs, are writing oppositions. Its mostly petitions from the 9th & 2nd Circuit. Seems SDNY called uncle and asked for help after many years of not allowing OIL to do any cases in their district. Suck it up Civil Rights Divisioners, you are not alonea and your country needs you! I know its actual law, but it will come back to ya!

1:01 and 2:07

I am not sure how the topic of immigration briefs came about, but I practice immi law, with a heavy concentration of federal appeals (petitions for review). 2:07 is right in cases fron 2d Cir are now filed with OIL, who in turn take some of them, and send the rest to DOJ offices all over the country. I have gone up against AUSAs from OK, AL, FL, etc.

As for 1:01 re quality of briefs, the briefs filed by petitioners are typically abysmal, and often seriously hurt petitioners. Example 1: one attorney had 2 different asylum cases (one from China and Indonesia), with two different asylum claims. She just switched the names of petitioners and filed 2 identical briefs to the 3d Cir.

poor Little Debbie...she should have told Shaneta where to shove it

What a bitch (quite frankly)

I mean...any corroboration of this lady's attitude at all??? Unfortunately, jerks in the legal environment are nothing new but I would like to hear the experience of others before putting her in the open like this.

"What's with all the typos?"

Maybe she was feeling stressed out when she wrote the memo. Most people would probably feel that way if they had to deal with an unstable, abusive supervisor.

Also it wasn't appropriate to refer to her as "Little Debbie". This is apparently part of Lat's diva shtick or routine, but it doesn't seem appropriate.