Archive for June 2007

Morning Docket: 06.20.07

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whistleblower.jpg
* DOD releases six Gitmo detainees. [Washington Post]
* Law Profs for Libby. [Slate]
* South Carolina treasurer and Giuliani campaigner indicted on drug charges. [CNN]
* Slate column on the rare disbarment of a prosecutor. [Slate]
* NFL implements whistle-blower rules for concussions. [MSNBC]

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Non-Sequiturs: 06.19.07

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Stella Q is on hiatus from Non-Sequiturs. So we’re going to be doing our own end-of-day linkwraps for the time being, unless one of you would like to help us out (in which case, please email us).
Also, we’re in the process of cleaning out our email inbox. Some of these links are old — things that we meant to write about ages ago, but never got around to. We’re sorry that if upsets some of you, but just deal.
* “A One L for the next generation,” per Jeremy Blachman. [Martha Kimes]
* As if guys wearing bluetooths were not annoying enough on their own. [Newsday]
* Well at least he’s not as bad as this guy. [New Orleans Times-Picayune]
* Which would you rather be: President of the United States, or a Biglaw partner? [Daily Business Review]
* More details about that recent benchslap of Wiley Rein. [The BLT]
* More headaches for that tricky Dickie Scruggs. [Mississippi Sun-Herald]
* More musical chairs within legal academia. [National Law Journal (subscription)]
* More about L’Affaire AutoAdmit. [NPR]
* Speaking of Yale Law School, this is not YLS’s finest hour. [New York Times; Hartford Courant]
* White men can’t jump. But they can get favorable treatment in tax evasion cases, if you believe Wesley Snipes. [TaxProf Blog]

Hell Hath No Fury Like Ex-Bingham McCutchen Associates

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Bingham McCutchen 2 Abovethelaw Above the Law blog.jpgRemember those Bingham McCutchen associates who took buyouts and left the firm? They’re royally p.o.’ed about this article, and they want to set The Record[er] straight about the circumstances surrounding their departures.
Check out their angry letter to The Recorder, plus additional information from an ATL tipster concerning how these buyouts were mishandled, after the jump.

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Still More About Jenner & Block

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Jenner Block LLP logo Abovethelaw Above the Law legal tabloid.JPGYesterday we declared ourselves “all Jenner-ed out.” But based on the comments and emails we’ve received, it seems people are still interested in hearing about Jenner & Block.
We have a little more to offer you. A second source confirms what we previously reported:

Your post about yesterday’s meeting was accurate. [Managing partner Gregory Gallopoulos] went through 3 areas: (1) associate compensation (expect a raise announcement later this week), (2) financial health of the firm (doing great, regardless of the temporary slowdown in litigation), and (3) the partner de-equitizations (no further waves of de-equitizations are expected).

And we’re pleased to report that rumors of an Above the Law shout-out are apparently true:

Greg mentioned that since so many people have sent him links to ATL, he’s become somewhat of an ATL aficionado.

For those of you who are still interested — maybe there are a handful of you — there’s a little more after the jump.

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U.S. Attorney Joe Russoniello? Not So Fast

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Joseph Russoniello Joe Russoniello Cooley Godward Kronish Abovethelaw Above the Law online legal tabloid.jpgYesterday we passed along the rumor that Joseph Russoniello, of Cooley Godward Kronish in San Francisco, would be returning to a post he held years ago: U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California.
We remain fairly confident in this tip. But for the record, there is nothing official to report just yet. Mr. Russoniello kindly got back to us, but only to advise that he has no comment at this time and can neither confirm nor deny that he has been offered the U.S. Attorney position.
Meanwhile, our friends over at Legal Pad picked up on our post. Check out their analysis, in which they refer to Russoniello as “the frontrunner” per “conventional wisdom,” by clicking here.
Russoniello Takes the U.S. Attorney Gig? [Legal Pad / Cal Law]
Earlier: Musical Chairs: A New U.S. Attorney for San Francisco?

Supreme Court Clerks: Where Are They Now?

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Supreme Court hallway Above the Law Above the Law Above the Law.JPGIn our recent New York Times op-ed piece on Supreme Court clerkship bonuses, we argued that “[f]rom a narrowly economic point of view — focusing on the actual work the clerks will perform, and setting aside the law firms’ quest for prestige and bragging rights — it is difficult to understand why firms fight for the right to shower 26-year-olds with cash.”
One of the contentions we thought about offering in support of this claim was that Supreme Court clerks don’t stick around their law firms for very long after getting their huge bonuses. This was our sense of things, based admittedly on “anec-data.” It seemed to us that SCOTUS clerks go to law firms, stay for maybe two years, and then leave to become law professors, or government or public interest lawyers.
But then we decided to go back and look at the data. We thought it would be interesting to see how many Supreme Court clerks from October Term 2002 and October Term 2003 are still in private practice. The OT 2002 and OT 2003 clerk classes were ideal for the purpose of assessing the effect of bonuses because (1) law firms were offering gargantuan bonuses by this point in time, and (2) enough years have passed to allow for meaningful assessment of the clerks’ career paths.
We undertook this research, and it ended up showing that a reasonably high percentage of clerks — about 50 percent — are in private practice, a few years down the road. It’s not an overwhelmingly high percentage (in which case our argument that the firms effectively subsidize other quarters of the profession would be undermined). But it’s also not as low as we expected. We revised our argument accordingly, omitting any suggestion that a majority of clerks “take the money and run.”
Anyway, having done all this research, we felt like we should put it to some use (since it ended up not being reflected in the final version of the op-ed piece). Posting it on ATL seemed worthwhile enough.
Are you curious about what Supreme Court clerks from a few years ago are up to nowadays? Check out the lists, after the jump.
The Supreme Court’s Bonus Babies [New York Times]

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Nationwide Pay Raise Watch: Delaware

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Delaware State Seal Abovethelaw Above the Law online legal tabloid.jpgNow some of you might be saying, “Delaware — WTF???” But if that’s your reaction, you don’t know very much about corporate law.
Delaware is, after all, our nation’s capital of corporate law. Numerous top corporations are chartered in Delaware, and the state’s Chancery Court hears some of the biggest-ticket corporate cases around.
So what do law firm associates in Delaware earn these days? We received some helpful information from a tipster:

“Skadden and Fish & Richardson pay NYC market. At Skadden, at least, that includes an NYC market bonus.”

That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Detailed salary charts for local firms, plus your comments, appear after the jump.

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Please Vote for ATL in the Funniest Law Blog Poll

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birthday cake Abovethelaw Above the Law online legal tabloid.jpgHey, guess what? Today is our birthday!
What’s that you say? You want to get us a gift? Oh really, that’s not necessary!
But if you’d like to do something nice for us, here’s one suggestion. Head over to Niki Black’s Legal Antics blog, and vote for Above the Law as “funniest law blog.”
(Another nice thing you can do: support us in this year’s New York Marathon. It’s for a good cause — cancer research. And it’s tax-deductible.)
P.S. Are we shameless and self-promoting? Sure. But that’s part of our job description, y’know….
P.P.S. We’re going to offline for a little while — taking a long lunch. If anything major happens while we’re gone, please email us, or note it in the comments. Thanks.
Vote for the funniest law blog…..now. [Legal Antics]
Earliest: Something You Can Do For ATL

Breaking: Anna Nicole Smith Clown Judge Resigns!

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Larry Seidlin Judge Lawrence Seidlin Above the Law Anna Nicole Smith.jpgJudge Larry Seidlin is best known for tearfully presiding over the Anna Nicole Smith proceedings in Florida state court. But perhaps it’s the American people who should be shedding tears right now. From the Daily Business Review:

Broward Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin – the weeping probate judge who presided over the recent legal fight for custody of Anna Nicole Smith’s body – announced today that he is leaving the bench at the end of this month.

“It is now time for me to devote more of my daily life to my own young family and to pursue the many opportunities that have been offered to me outside the judicial system,” Seidlin wrote in his resignation letter to Gov. Charlie Crist.

So why should we shed tears over the departure of this fine jurist?

It has been rumored that Seidlin has a television show in the works.

Update: The rumors appear to be true. Seidlin reportedly has reached a deal with CBS.
Judiciary: Judge Seidlin resigns [Daily Business Review]
Anna Nicole Smith Judge Larry Seidlin Cuts Deal With CBS [Fox News]

Benchslap of the Day: Wiley A Little Too Wily?

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Wiley Rein LLP Wiley Rein Fielding Abovethelaw Above the Law online legal tabloid.jpgSo what’s Wiley Rein LLP going to do with its record-setting profits per partner from last year?
One possibility (for a small portion of the haul): Pay off the $1.25 million fine that Judge Alvin Hellerstein (S.D.N.Y.) just slapped them with, for allegedly withholding information about an insurance policy in the World Trade Center insurance coverage litigation.
Judge Fines Firms For Withholding Policy Information [New York Sun]
Earlier: Skaddenfreude: Wiley Rein Dethrones Wachtell Lipton as America’s Most Profitable Biglaw

Skadden Raises to… 190K Food Stamps?

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Skadden Arps Slate Meagher Flom Abovethelaw Above the Law online legal tabloid.jpgA Washington Post article about members of Congress trying to live on $21 a week — the average amount food stamp recipients receive as income supplements — features a source you wouldn’t expect to see quoted in such a piece:

Rick Hindle, executive chef for the Skadden, Arps law firm in Washington, showed recently that you don’t have to spend hours in the kitchen to prepare healthful food for $1 or less per meal….

As part of the launch of a new USDA Web site for food stamp recipients, Hindle cooked colorful quesadillas (60 cents per serving), spinach and meat cakes with brown rice (92 cents) and orange banana frosty (52 cents)….

Hindle, who trained at the Culinary Institute of America, plans to add the quesadillas and some of the other recipes to his regular repertoire.

Guess the Skadden summer program in D.C. doesn’t match up to New York. There’s a big difference between an “orange banana frosty” and a flute brimming over with Cristal.
How Far Can Your Dollar Stretch? [Washington Post]
Earlier: Summer Associate of the Day: ‘Skadden Cristal Boy’

Morning Docket: 06.19.07

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* White House and RNC staff alleged to have tried to circumvent post-Watergate law. [CNN]
* The Roberts-Alito-Kennedy Court. [MSNBC]
* Judge recommends higher BALCO sentence. [ESPN]
* More trouble for Pacman Jones? [SI]
* DA Nifong is out; lax players reach settlement with Duke. [CNN]