What goes up, must come down. Nearly two years ago, Above the Law broke the news of Kilpatrick Stockton raising starting salaries to $145K in Atlanta and North Carolina. At the time, the firm said:
As you know, starting salaries for new associates have recently increased, for the second time this year in some of our markets. Consistent with our philosophy of paying competitive salaries, we are announcing today increases in the starting salaries in some of our offices and markets, to be effective January 1, 2008.
Effective on that date, we will pay a starting salary of $145,000 in Atlanta and North Carolina and $160,000 in Washington, D.C., New York, and IP Patent.
But in an even more shocking sign of the times, that August 2007 memo also noted:
We are studying the market in the capital markets practice to determine if any adjustments are warranted with respect to the existing capital markets scale. We remain committed to paying competitive compensation to our lawyers who practice in that area, but are not currently making any changes to the existing capital markets scale.
But today is not 2007. What do you think the existing capital-markets attorney pay scale is today? A pat on the back and a fish sandwich?
Today, Kilpatrick announced that it was scaling back starting salaries to $130K in Atlanta and North Carolina.
But that is not the full extent of the cuts. More details and a statement from the firm after the jump.
Continue reading “Salary Cut Watch: Kilpatrick Stockton Takes Away Previous Gains”
A couple of days ago, we brought you the story of a Bingham McCutchen secretary who believed that her firm had great “CHARACTER,” despite these tough economic times. She closed her remarks with this:
So, although I am grateful for my job and middle class life, I realize that living daily in fear and conforming to play a Stepford role will not ensure either. Besides, I value and respect too many of the people at Bingham. I’ll stick with good old CHARACTER.
As we — and many others — anticipated, that secretary is no longer employed at Bingham.
The firm would not comment about its internal decision, but multiple sources independently tell us that she has been let go. As we understand it, she was fired on Wednesday.
One of our commenters had this insightful response to the Stepford Secretary’s situation:
I think this and eekboy’s “rant” is a reflection of our times. Everyone thinks their opinion is important and should be heard. While I don’t doubt this secretary has a beef on her mind, I believe she and eekboy have no concept of boundaries. This is part of the facebook/twitter/blog phenomenon where everyone thinks they can say WHATEVER they want, WHENEVER they want, WHEREVER they want.
She should’ve sent that to close friends and peer colleagues. Sending it to the entire firm is just selfish and egotistical.
But it could be that the secretary had more to say.
Details after the jump.
Continue reading “Bingham McCutchen’s ‘Stepford Secretary’ Has Left The Building”
Last week, we brought you information about which firms respect your weekends — and which don’t. This week, we tackle a related topic: vacation. As noted earlier today, it’s an area where firms have been making changes lately.
At which firms are your vacations safe? And at which firms might vacation time be at risk — assuming your firm hasn’t given you a permanent vacation (a la McDermott)?
Most associates at top law firms said that it is uncommon for vacations to be canceled, but it happens sometimes. Firms where vacations appear to be the safest include Akin Gump, Sidley, Weil and Winston, where more than one-third of the associates at each firm report that it is very rare for associates to be expected to cancel vacation.
Honorable mention goes to Dechert, Baker & McKenzie, Milbank, Orrick, Skadden, and Willkie.
At which firms is vacation cancellation more likely? After the jump.
Continue reading “Career Center: How Safe Is Your Vacation Time?”
Remember to wash your hands, New York attorneys. There’s been a swine flu outbreak in the Bronx. Here’s the memo from the Bronx District Attorney’s Office:
Yesterday I was informed that there were three who have contracted the H1N1 virus also known as “swine flu”. Each is home and being treated by their physicians. All of them work in the Criminal Court Bureau. I have been in communication with the Mayor’s Office and the Health Department. I have also informed Administrative Judge Efrain Alvarado. Attached you will find Health Department guidelines dealing with the virus and preventing its spread. In light of these diagnoses our Office will conduct a cleaning in the Criminal Court Bureau to help curtail the virus’ spread.
Please read the attached guidelines. While this is a potentially serious illness, each of the individuals who contracted the virus took the appropriate steps by not coming to work and seeking medical attention. Unless there is an underlying medical condition this virus has been relatively mild. We will continue to monitor our staff and report any additional cases to the appropriate authorities. I want to assure everyone that we as an Office wish to address the concerns of staff as they relate to this issue. We will continue to communicate with you and provide you with information. Further, we will continue follow the recommendations of the health authorities. If there are any questions please feel free to call me.
When this happens at a school, they close the school and bring in a lot of soap. But when it happens at a place of business (as we’ve seen already with the outbreak at Mayer Brown), it seems like the onus is on individual employees to protect themselves.
Still, I’m not too concerned. I’ve got chicken soup, Robitussin, and Sprite, so I should be golden.
Earlier: Breaking: Swine Flu at Mayer Brown (Chicago)
Last Friday, we reported that McDermott Will & Emery had cut the salaries of summer associates. At the time, we said:
Good luck, summers — and good luck MWE junior associates. We hope the writing isn’t on the wall.
Unfortunately, the words of the prophets were written on the subway walls and tenement halls. And we’re not talking about salary cuts.
Above the Law is now able to confirm the the firm has laid off 72 people: 25 associates and 47 staff. The firm wide memo just went out:
I want all of you to know that today we are conducting a reduction in force that will affect 25 attorneys and 47 staff members. This difficult decision results from a careful review of the current and projected needs of our clients. While we are seeing signs of recovery in some practice areas, demand for transactional-related services continues to lag. As we ride out this difficult business cycle, I want to remind you that we remain a strong Firm. Our international asset base of talent and clients and our strong balance sheet will position us well when the economy rebounds.
More details after the jump.
Continue reading “Nationwide Layoff Watch: McDermott Will & Emery Lays Off 72 People”
Recently, we’ve seen a lot of law firms take creative approaches to cutting costs. At Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold, the firm’s new approach to attorney vacations could save a bit of money, especially if the firm decides to go through a round of layoffs.
While discussing the Morrison & Foerster face-time policy, a commenter pointed out:
It is the same way in “firm holidays” and “vacation days”. When you have a minimum billable requirement, it doesn’t matter if the firm gives you unlimited amounts of vacation, because if you miss your expected hours, you will be more than able to take all the vacation you want when you are fired.
It appears that Sedgwick is doing just that. Last month, the firm decided to do away with the traditional concept of “vacation days.” The firm’s new approach allows attorneys to take as much time off as they want/need, provided they schedule it within their group. Here’s how the firm memo explains the new policy:
Sound great? A tipster explains the flip side of the new plan after the jump.
Continue reading “New Vacation Policy At Sedgwick Could be Disingenuous”
Ed. note: Have a question for next week? Send it in to advice@abovethelaw.com.
ATL-
I’m a summer associate in Texas (3,500 sq. ft., wife, etc) and I drive to work where I park my car in the office’s parking lot. My car is a 2005 BMW. Should I be concerned about looking like a jackass?
Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car
Dear Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car,
You should always be concerned about looking like a jackass, whether it’s rolling up to work in a Beemer or wearing a fedora at Sunday brunch. In any other year, normal associates might look forward to the summer class arriving; but this year, the summers are viewed as intruders, freshly arrived to snatch associates’ jobs out from under them. Despite the ludicrous scavenger hunts and game nights concocted in your honor, make no mistake; you’re persona non grata at terra law firma, and your goal this summer should be to be as unobtrusive as possible. Your car should reflect your humility as well as your groundling status at the firm, and a BMW, no matter how ancient, will never do that. You’ll need to lease, but what should you get?
Driving up in a car of the Ferrari/Lamborghini/Lotus ilk is obviously out, since you’re not Richard Gere from Pretty Woman and this is not a “dream date” with Jillian on the The Bachelorette. Jaguars are for eccentric billionaires, Ford Probes are for high school sleazebags and Mercury Sables are for drug dealers. Since you’re in Texas, you may be tempted to trade in your BMW for a pickup truck, but I strenuously advise against this since pickups indicate that spend your free time listening to Toby Keith while patrolling the Mexico border with a rifle and Coonhound named Rusty. Toyota Priuses are for wimps, and minivans are for people who drive carpool or own florist shops. DeLoreans, Pintos, GMs and other cars that are dangerous and/or no longer made are always cool.
When I worked as an intern in Newark, I drove a 1997 teal Toyota Camry with Cobra rims (not kidding). The smooth handling and tape deck made many people very jealous, and when someone stole my front left rim, I learned firsthand the dangers of driving flashy cars. Go with something junky, like a Kia or an Isuzu, but if you don’t feel like shelling out the extra cash, your best bet is a Huffy. Get the one with the basket so you can take your laptop home.
Your friend,
Marin
Elie loses his sh*t while parallel parking, after the jump.
Continue reading “Pls Hndle Thx: Pimp My Ride”
Have you heard the one about the law firm partner, the Girl Scout, and his Lexus? Well, here it is, but we warn that it’s not very funny.
Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal partner Paul Glad is an experienced litigator, but he’s going to need to ramp up his public relations skills in the months ahead. He has been hit with a lawsuit that is the definition of a PR nightmare.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
A 7-year-old Girl Scout and her mother filed a lawsuit today against a litigation attorney who crashed his car into them outside a Burlingame grocery store, forcing doctors to amputate one of the woman’s legs.
The driver, Paul Glad, 59, of San Mateo, was trying to park his Lexus near the entrance to the Mollie Stone’s market on Chapin Avenue on March 8, authorities said.
Glad pulled to within a few feet of where a group of Girls Scouts was selling cookies on the sidewalk at the entrance of the store, the suit said.
Glad had good intentions. According to the San Mateo County Times, he had stopped to pick up some delicious Girl Scout cookies. But in his excitement to get his Samoa and Thin Mint fix, he neglected to shift his car into park. His Lexus then rolled into the cookie table. The car pinned Girl Scout mother, Holly Rogers, to a wall, causing her to lose her leg. Her daughter, then 6, suffered multiple leg fractures.
Did we mention that Glad had parked in a disabled spot? And that he was on prescription painkiller OxyContin on the day of the accident? Yeah… that’s not the way one wants the cookie to crumble.
Glad did not comment to the mainstream media folk, but we got him on the phone last night. His response, after the jump.
Continue reading “Lawyer of the Day: Paul Glad”
* The tales of the Not-So-Honorable Samuel Kent — the first federal judge to be charged with a sex crime — are now being told on the Hill. The House Judiciary Committee task force held his impeachment hearing yesterday. Kent and his lawyer were not in attendance though. They “refuse to be part of the circus.” [CNN]
* Dickinson Wright hit with a $33 million lawsuit for allegedly letting a lacrosse stick patent lapse. [National Law Journal]
* Does what’s underneath their robes matter? The debate over the effect of gender on being a judge is back on. [New York Times]
* SCOTUS nominee Sonia Sotomayor may be feisty during oral arguments, but will her opinions (continue to) be “thorough, long, and unimaginative” with a “slavish attention to precedent and to statutory interpretation”? [BLT]
* Sotomayor’s first job in the New York D.A.’s office shaped her. We hope that she’s kept her toughness, but given up her chain-smoking and Tab diet soda guzzling ways. [Washington Post]
We’ve written before about the tragic, still unsolved murder of Robert Wone, a promising young Asian-American attorney in Washington. At the time of his death, Wone was the general counsel of Radio Free Asia and president-elect of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association in D.C. We never got to meet Wone during the time that we lived in Washington, but we did meet many friends and colleagues of his, mainly through APABA. Wone was universally praised as a talented attorney and an incredibly generous and decent human being.
Almost three years after the fact, Wone’s murder remains unsolved. The circumstances under which he was killed were strange, even bizarre. He was killed in an elegant townhouse in a nice part of northwest Washington (Kash and I lived in the area), supposedly by an intruder (as 911 was initially told). But there were no signs of forced entry, and at the time of the attack, there were other people in the house — three gay men (a D.C. power couple and their housemate), who reportedly live as a polyamorous family.
At first it seemed Wone had been stabbed. But the stab wounds were clean and symmetrical, showing no evidence of struggle, and a postmortem examination found the following: evidence of possible strangulation or suffocation; six premortem needle marks, suggesting Wone may have been injected with drugs prior to his death; and Wone’s own semen around his genitals and in his rectum, suggesting possible sexual assault.
Earlier this week, the Washington Post published a fascinating two-part series about the case. The articles are long, but well worth your time. (You can also read the WSJ Law Blog’s recaps, here and here.)
The Robert Wone story has a number of connections to the Biglaw world. Prior to joining Radio Free Asia, Wone was an associate at Covington & Burling. Former Covington partner Eric Holder, now the U.S. Attorney General, previously represented Wone’s widow, Kathy — who has filed a wrongful death suit against the three housemates. One of the trio, Joseph Price — who along with his housemates now faces obstruction of justice (but not murder) charges — was a partner at Arent Fox, until his recent resignation from the firm (after a lengthy leave of absence). Price was also active in the marriage equality movement, as former general counsel of Equality Virginia.
The Post’s articles are excellent — but reporter Paul Duggan is not the first writer to focus intensely on this case. Over at their superb blog, Who Murdered Robert Wone?, four gay D.C. bloggers — Craig Brownstein, David Greer, Michael Kremin and Doug Johnson — have been scrutinizing the case for months. Their site has played an important role in raising public awareness about the case.
To learn more about the Wone case, which is far too complex to be summarized easily here, check out the links below. To learn more about the Who Murdered Robert Wone site and the four enterprising citizen-journalists behind it, which is an interesting story in and of itself, see The Bilerico Project and Queerty.
Who Murdered Robert Wone? [main site]
The Robert Wone Stabbing: Anatomy of a Murder Case [Washington Post]
The Robert Wone Killing Remains ‘a Head-Scratcher’ [Washington Post]
The Robert Wone Murder: Little to Show Three Years Later [WSJ Law Blog]
The Robert Wone Murder: A Hard Look at the Evidence [WSJ Law Blog]
Who Murdered Robert Wone? [The Bilerico Project]
Robert Wone’s Grisly D.C. Murder Inspires Four Gay Men to Seek Out the Truth [Queerty]
Every once in while, we like to explore career alternatives for attorneys, i.e., things you can do with a law degree that don’t involve Biglaw or contract attorney work. These days, we’ve come to think of the series of open threads as things you might do if you can’t find Biglaw or contract work.
Do you have a passion for Extreme Makeover: Home Edition and HGTV? When you walk into a room, do you immediately judge the color scheme? Do you spend an inordinate amount of time rearranging doc review boxes to maintain the proper feng shui in your office? Maybe you should consider a second career in interior design.
Gordon Chin, a real estate lawyer and American University Law ’99 grad, has always had an interest in design work. Since being laid off by Locke Lord Bissell & Liddell in November, it’s become his full-time gig. To see his ultra-modern style, check out this Washington Examiner piece [PDF] on him (though the article’s a bit cliched, describing his style as “unpretentious yet somehow still sophisticated”).
Chin told us:
I’ve always done design work on the side, but given the slowdown in big-law, I’ve found more time to devote to my passion. I’m currently working with some clients in the DC area — everything from interior design, to staging services….
Projects range in scope and size — some include entire rowhomes/townhomes, others are consulting with paint colors or staging, assisting clients with shopping or selecting decorative pieces.
A Q&A with Chin, and the bright side of being laid off, after the jump.
Continue reading “Career Alternatives for (Laid-Off) Lawyers: Interior Designer”
* Next week, the inventor of Above the Law (David Lat) will be getting together with the inventor of Lolcats (Ben Huh). “Lawlcats” for everyone! [Asian American Writers' Workshop]
* Wait, did you want more news about Eliot Spitzer and his sexual proclivities? Well, why didn’t you say so? [Dealbreaker]
* Kiwi Camera has “taken the bull by the horns.” [p2pnet]
* For the record, at the end of the first Transformers, when they put Megatron at the bottom of the ocean, I loudly proclaimed “that is so not going to work.” I’m just saying, my powers of prediction are pretty awesome. [Courtoons]
* Alan Dershowitz on Facebook’s stance on Holocaust denial. [The Cuban Revolution]
* There’s a sperm-based facial treatment that is available now. Shockingly, you have to pay for it. [Fashionista]
The AP is reporting that the New Hampshire state legislature has passed a gay marriage law that the governor will likely sign:
Gov. John Lynch is expected to sign [the proposed legislation] into law later Wednesday. It would make New Hampshire the sixth state to allow gays to marry. The bill would expand religious protections that Lynch says are needed to win his signature.
Lynch said he would veto gay marriage if the law didn’t clearly spell out that churches and religious groups would not be forced to officiate or provide other services.
So, soon you can add New Hampshire to the list of states that allow gay marriage. The current members are: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Vermont and Iowa.
Is there a warm weather state willing to take the plunge? C’mon Florida. C’mon moderate Governor Charlie Crist. You know you want to.
Update: Okay, so Florida has a constitutional amendment explicitly prohibiting gay marriage. Can anyone nominate a different warm weather state? Somehow I don’t think Mississippi will be leading the charge here.
New Hampshire Legislature advances gay marriage [AP]
On Monday, we warned you that student loan forgiveness programs were under attack. Today, the University of North Carolina School of Law informed students that the school could not afford to make the promised loan repayments to students in low income jobs. Here’s the email from UNC Law Dean Jack Boger:
We are writing to share news about a regrettable delay in our implementation of the new LRAP program at UNC School of Law. Unfortunately, because of the grave economic downturn that has hit the North Carolina state budget, we will not be able to go forward this spring with Loan Repayment Assistance Program funding. As you may know, various statewide freezes and other severe restrictions have been imposed this spring on all state funds, including the UNC law school account that was designated for LRAP purposes. Moreover, the state has made clear that it intends to ‘recapture’ those funds to meet its larger budgetary needs sometime before June 30, the end of this fiscal year. This will leave us without the financial means to make LRAP awards.
While we share your disappointment with this turn of events, we remain committed to the LRAP program – and will keep your application on file. We hope to be able to relaunch this program sometime during the 2009-10 fiscal year.
Thank you for your patience, and for your help in the development of this program. We also thank you for your continued support of Carolina Law.
Sincerely yours,
Jack Boger, Dean, UNC School of Law
UNC Law seems to be developing a pattern of raising people’s hopes, and then dashing them.
A student affected by this decision shares an interesting viewpoint after the jump.
Continue reading “UNC Law Abruptly Ends Loan Repayment Assistance Program”
There are a lot of things you can do in New Orleans that you can’t do anywhere else. But cursing out a judge is apparently not one of them.
Ashton O’Dwyer has made a bit of a name for himself in the post-Katrina universe. A tipster provides some backstory on this former lawyer:
Ashton O’Dwyer has become a bit of a nuisance in Louisiana post Katrina. I am pretty sure that at one point, he actually seceded from the union in an attempt to get financial foreign aid following Katrina. He has been disbarred for abusive language and disrespect of the legal system. He does have several cases where he represents himself pro se.
Recently, Judge Ivan L. R. Lemelle (E.D. La.) held O’Dwyer in contempt of court for saying “screw you” and hanging up, at the conclusion of a status conference.
O’Dwyer fired off a (handwritten) response to the contempt order, defending his conduct:
[A]t the time he told Ivan L. R. Lemelle (as a man, not as a Judge): “screw you,” and hung up the telephone during the referenced status conference by telephone, the business of the Court had already been concluded.
Actually, that is not a terrible argument, if the court’s business was actually concluded before O’Dwyer made his remark.
But O’Dwyer doesn’t leave well enough alone. Did you know that both O’Dwyer and Lemelle are Judge Lemellle is black? That fact becomes important — at least in O’Dwyer’s mind.
More details after the jump.
Continue reading “How To Curse Out A Judge in New Orleans”
Hallelujah! Bring me the finest bagels and muffins from throughout the land! According to the ABA Journal, the ABA is going to take a serious look at the accreditation and review standards for law schools:
For months, the ABA’s law school accrediting body has quietly been working on a comprehensive review of its often controversial standards governing legal education….
The most significant change in the Standards for Approval of Law Schools is likely to be a move away from evaluating law schools on the basis of criteria that measure “input”–such things as faculty size, budget and physical plant. Instead, the Legal Education Section would evaluate law schools more heavily on the basis of “outcome” measures.
Outcomes? As in whether students actually learn anything from law school? Or whether they are able to get a job after law school?
The essential difference is that outcome measures would focus on what students actually take away from their educational experience at a particular law school rather than what the school teaches, and how, explained E. Christopher Johnson Jr. Johnson was one of three members of the Accreditation Standards Review Committee of the ABA’s Legal Education Section, who gave a status report on the committee’s work at a program held in Chicago on Friday during the 35th ABA National Conference on Professional Responsibility….
“It is a sea change to tell law schools you should focus more on outcomes as measures,” said committee member Steven C. Bahls, the president of Augustana College in Rock Island, Ill. He chairs the outcome assessment subcommittee.
Oh my God. Something good. Something good could be happening!
More details after the jump.
Continue reading “ABA is Taking a Look at Law School Accreditation”
We’ve received countless requests for shout-outs from worthy non-profit organizations that are seeking deferred associates and/or associates on leave from their law firms (pursuant to such programs as Skadden’s Sidebar program, Dewey’s DL Pursuits, etc.). Alas, due to the sheer number of these requests, we can’t mention them all on the main ATL homepage (which would be transformed from a blog into a bulletin board if we were to do so).
To treat these requests in a fair and consistent manner, we direct every public interest organization with a need for such help to post in our Community section, where readers can create posts on topics of their choosing (subject to moderation). The Community section is also where you can post information about charitable benefits and other events.
Update / Note: At the current time, only registered users can create Community posts — mere “guests” do not have this capability. So if you’d like to start a Community thread, please register as a site user.
Check out the Community section for yourself, and peruse the non-profit opportunities posted here, by clicking here. Additional opportunities also appear in the Resources section of the Career Center.
If you’d like the greater visibility of appearing on the ATL homepage, please consider advertising. In addition to full-scale banner campaigns and Sponsored Content, we now offer Quicklistings — an eminently affordable option, at $250 each. Thanks!
P.S. If you are a for-profit organization or have commercial goods or services to offer, please do not post in the Community section. Instead, please contact us about advertising on Above the Law. Postings of a commercial nature in the Community section will be removed. Thanks again.
The Marcus Epstein story just keeps getting better and better. We reported that the Tom Tancredo staffer lost his spot at UVA Law school after he slapped a woman in the head after using a racial epithet.
How do you top getting drunk and slapping black women? Talking Points Memo found Epstein’s facebook photo album from his trip to Ethiopia. Facebook has removed the page, but one of the screen caps is preserved over at Gawker.
The Gawker pic has him regarding Ethiopian art. His caption is:
It’s no Sistine Chapel, but you know what Samuel Johnson said about a Dog walking on it’s [sic] hind legs.
We at Above the Law have seen the full photo album, but Facebook is an angry God. We don’t want to get banned from its precincts.
We’ll share more photo captions after the jump.
Continue reading “Marcus Epstein’s Facebook Adventure”
Yesterday, we reported that Dorsey & Whitney laid off 55 staffers. Despite the staff layoffs, we mentioned that Dorsey had generally avoided the worst aspects of the economic recession.
Well, “not so fast my friends.” After our report went up, associates at Dorsey & Whitney flooded the ATL inbox with news of a ten percent associate salary cut. The first tip overestimated my mind reading ability:
You probably already have this by now, but Dorsey implemented a 10% across the board pay cut for associates.
Another tipster reported that full time associates aren’t the only people that will be taking a pay cut:
… also cut all associate salaries by 10% and are asking contract lawyers to agree to a similar cut.
We understand that associates learned of the salary cuts via an internal video available on Dorsey’s intranet. We don’t have the video, but we do have some additional details after the jump.
Continue reading “Salary Cut Watch: Dorsey & Whitney Cuts Salaries by 10%”
