October 2007

Legal Eagle Wedding Watch: Couple of the Month for September

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Legal%20Eagle%20Wedding%20Watch%20NYT%20wedding%20announcements%20Above%20the%20Law.jpgWe’re long overdue to crown an ATL Legal Eagle Couple of the Month for September. Before the poll, we should mention that for once, our collective readership seemed to agree with us — last week’s Couple of the Week contest (we put the weekly pick to a vote, in a break from our normal practice) was a very, very close call. The aristocratic Team Boyd-Lockhart squeaked by the competition with 35.5 percent, but Team Schonmuller-Williams and Team Leung-Lin made strong showings with 33.9 percent and 30.6 percent, respectively. Congratulations to the winners, and thanks to all three couples for being so freaking awesome.
Now, on to September’s contest, which is basically Stanford versus Douglas Ginsburg. You can read all about the nominees, and cast your ballot, after the jump.

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Morning Docket: 10.18.07

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Michael Vick middle finger Abovethelaw Above the Law blog.jpg* So how did Michael Mukasey do yesterday? Here’s a collection of some coverage. [How Appealing (linkwrap)]
* He totally should have mailed it to himself before faxing it to the Ravens. Also, not a joke, just a fact: the caption is over half of this 37-page opinion. [U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (PDF) via How Appealing]
* How many businesses was Vick opening? Yet another bank sues him over a business loan. [Fulton County Daily Report]
* Speaking of Vick getting sued, he got sued by a South Carolina inmate again, and it’s not Jonathan Lee Riches. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
* Can’t we all just agree that a little less process is due in this case? [CNN]
* SCOTUS stays Virginia execution. [CNN]

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America’s Next Top Model: A University of Miami 1L?

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We just finished watching America’s Next Top Model. So it’s quite appropriate for us to pass along this modeling montage video, which is amusingly bizarre. From a tipster:

I hate to pile it on, but you have to check out this YouTube clip of a University of Miami 1L. It’s a seven-minute clip of various glamour shots, set to the soothing sounds of flamenco guitar. I think my favorite photos involve her posing with a samurai sword.

We agree; nothing beats a samurai sword paired with fishnets. But the pics of her in a midriff-baring schoolgirl outfit, replete with pigtails, are also pretty great. As is the photo of her humping a white banister, which kicks off the whole thing.
You don’t need to watch the entire video, since the shots start to repeat after a while, but stick around at least until “Hotel California.” Enjoy!
Update (12:15 AM): Sigh. If you click on the video below, you’ll see that it has been pulled. We seem to have the anti-Midas touch when it comes to law school videos: everything we link to gets yanked. See, e.g., here (Harvard) and here (Columbia).

A little bit more, after the jump.

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Non-Sequiturs: 10.17.07

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toilet bowl pink toilet Above the Law blog.jpg* It’s hard to believe this car was parked in Brooklyn, of all places. [Althouse]
* The law school hiring process privileges glibness — and is that a bad thing? Law professors are hired (1) to train lawyers, of all people, and (2) to write articles that sound like they’re saying a lot, even when they’re not. Glibness would seem to be a BFOQ. [PrawfsBlawg]
* Once our Surgeon General starts getting on our case about drinking, it’s time to leave the country. But don’t move to the U.K. [Charon QC: The Blawg]
* Speaking of emigration, Tonga says: “Give us your tired, your poor, your disgraced and disbarred lawyers, yearning to breathe free.” [Blogonaut]
* Good news, Pennsylvanians. According to Professor Orin Kerr, “you can scream at your overflowing john all you want without violating the state’s disorderly conduct offense.” [Volokh Conspiracy]
* Martindale-Hubbell ratings: Pay to play? We find them less useful than they might otherwise be because so many lawyers aren’t rated. Will charging a fee for inclusion exacerbate the problem? [Real Lawyers Have Blogs; HireTrade Blog]
* Thoughts on the Eighth Circuit fantasy baseball ruling (mentioned in Morning Docket), from Professor Neil Richards. [Concurring Opinions]
* Dionne Warwick is a tax deadbeat? Say it ain’t so! [TaxProf Blog]
* Have a favorite New York blawg / blawger? Vote for them here. [Sui Generis]

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Nationwide Layoff Watch: Are the K&E ‘Layoffs’ in the Eye of the Beholder?

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Kirkland Ellis LLP logo layoff laid off Abovethelaw Above the Law blog.JPGThere seems to be a lot of hostility towards our coverage of layoff rumors. That’s fine — go ahead, shoot the messenger. But don’t say that we didn’t warn you. It would be irresponsible to write about “NY to 190″ rumors while ignoring similarly reliable (or unreliable) layoff rumors.
Also, rumors — even when untrue — can be revealing. The very existence of a rumor reflects the state of the market and sheds light on the psyches of the participants. The fact that pay raise gossip has been supplanted by layoff gossip is telling.
We received many interesting responses to our recent post about layoff rumors at Kirkland & Ellis. Like this one, from someone at K&E (and not one of The Departed, so without an ax to grind):

Surprised it took you so long to pick up the layoff rumors, though I guess K&E has done a reasonably good job of keeping them quiet, even to its own associates.

(1) Associate reviews were just completed.

(2) 6-8 mid-level associates [in Chicago] have recently and abruptly left the firm. Rumor is that they were canned. I know two of them personally, and neither of them had ever indicated a desire to leave.

(3) As for causes, I initially heard that extraordinarily low hours were to blame. Other sources suggest that performance was an issue.

(4) At least one of the layoffs really has people baffled: good hard worker who appeared to put in reasonable hours…. [T]he response in the Chicago office appears to be a bit bewildered, especially with respect to the one associate who seemed to be very well-regarded.

More information, compiled from multiple Kirkland sources in different offices, appears after the jump.

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Renaming Boalt Hall: Please Cast Your Vote

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Boalt Hall UC Berkeley Law School Above the Law blog.jpgAs we mentioned last week, U.C. Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law hired a brand consulting firm to come up with a new name for the school. The effort ended somewhat anticlimactically. Boalt paid $25,000 to Marshall Strategy Inc., which came up with this brilliant new moniker: “UC Berkeley School of Law.”
Oh well. But since we already took the time to read through hundreds of suggested new names for Boalt Hall, we’re going to conduct this reader poll anyway.
Cast your vote, after the jump.

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Nationwide Layoff Watch: Latham & Watkins

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Latham Watkins LLP Above the Law blog.JPGEarlier this month, rumors about possible layoffs at Latham & Watkins were making the rounds. We alluded to them briefly here (also noting the firm’s denial).
We continue to get asked about this gossip, though, so we’ve done a little poking around. Sources at LW report that layoff rumors have been circulating, but that they aren’t true — at least not yet. From one source:

The LW layoff rumors are untrue as far as I know. Nobody I know has been laid off. [But] things are very slow, and they have 50+ summers still to come [on board as permanent associates]. I think this is confined to New York, though; the rest of the offices seem plenty busy.

That’s consistent with what we’ve been hearing: no layoffs, but lots of slowness. Another LW source reports that the firm’s Washington office is “on pace” for everyone to hit 1900 hours, that Los Angeles is at about 95 percent, and that New York is “sucking wind” at 90 percent.
Internally, here’s how the firm has been dealing with the gossip:

We got a few days of nervous jokes about how layoffs weren’t imminent: “We’ll wait until Christmas…” Then we got an unequivocal denial at Latham’s First Year Academy this past weekend.

More discussion, including a guess as to the genesis of this gossip, after the jump.

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An S&C Bonsai Beauty Pageant!

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small bonsai 2 bonsai tree plant Sullivan Cromwell S&C Above the Law blog.jpgAfter the jump, you’ll see six photographs of Sullivan & Cromwell bonsai trees. Some of these pics have been previously featured in these pages, and some are new. Based on subtle differences between the plants, it appears that S&C may be using different florists around the country to disseminate these gifts to its offerees.
We will now hold a bonsai beauty contest, allowing you to vote for your favorite example of S&C bonsai porn. The differences in the photos are interesting. Just like real pornography, some bonsai porn aims to titillate, some aspires to art, and some just looks fuzzy and low-budget.
Check out the bonsai pics, and cast your vote, after the jump.

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Lawyer of the Day: D. Marvin Jones

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Several commenters to our recent post about the University of Miami law student who got benchslapped on the People’s Court pointed out another news development involving the law school: the recent arrest and arraignment of a popular professor, D. Marvin Jones, on a misdemeanor charge of soliciting a prostitute. See here:

Donald Marvin Jones arrest record Professor D Marvin Jones Above the Law blog.jpg

Donald Marvin Jones Professor D Marvin Jones Above the Law blog.jpgCheck out his bio (which rather pretentiously describes Professor Jones as a “public intellectual”). He teaches Criminal Procedure, of all things. If there’s any technical defect in his arrest, we’re sure the good professor will be able to get himself off.

Professor Jones: If you’re looking to score some ass, why not stick to the U. Miami student body? At least they won’t charge.

Alas, we don’t have the dirty details of this incident. If you know more, please email us. Thanks.

D. Marvin Jones bio [University of Miami School of Law]

Earlier: Wherein Judge Milian Dispels the Stereotype of the Feisty Latina

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Law & Order Comes to Kirkland & Ellis

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Kirkland Ellis LLP logo Abovethelaw Above the Law blog.JPGAnd no, we’re not talking about their tough new standards for associate reviews, which have resulted in what might be called “soft layoffs” (and which we’ll be writing more about soon — we’ve received lots of great info after yesterday’s post).
We’re speaking more literally about Law & Order at Kirkland & Ellis. Check out this email from about an hour ago, which went out to the entire New York office:

From: Carolyn Marino
Sent: 10/17/2007 09:47 AM EDT
To: #NY All Personnel
Subject: Law & Order Filming Today

If you are on the 39th or 43rd floor today, you will notice that parts of the office are being used for filming. The television show Law & Order is using the office to film several scenes. This morning, they are working in the northeast corner of the 39th floor, and this afternoon they will film in Conference Room 43A.

I think of the show as the home-town TV show, since they film almost every day at locations everywhere in the city. So it’s exciting that now they are here. We don’t know when the episode will air that is filmed
here, but we will be sure to let everybody know when the show is scheduled.

Thanks,
Carolyn

Is this as sexy as Cameron Diaz at Cadwalader? Maybe not. But at least K&E doesn’t have bed bugs.
P.S. It seems that law firms are doing very well in the celebrity sightings department these days. See also Michael Jackson at Venable.
Earlier: Nationwide Layoff Watch: Kirkland & Ellis (Chicago)
Breaking: Cameron Diaz at Cadwalader!

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