Over the weekend, the California state bar website was down. It’s a pretty big system glitch to have on the weekend before the bar exam, as this tipster explains:
Considering past exams and answers, as well as testing center information is on there, I’m sure lots of people are freaking out. Clear sign of incompetence on the Bar’s part here in not addressing the problem at all.
The site was still inactive when we woke up this morning on the east coast. But now, as most of California is getting into gear, the site is back up.
Cram away, left coasters. The bar will be over soon, and you’ll be able to go back to surfing and eating seaweed or whatever.
The State Bar of California [California.gov]
Earlier: Last Weekend Before the Bar Exam: Open Thread
If you’re a minority female, you’ll likely say ba-bye to your firm within five years, says a study from Catalyst, a non-profit focused on women and business issues.
The organization recently released a report titled, “Women of Color in U.S. Law Firms:”
According to Catalyst’s Women of Color in U.S. Law Firms, women of color face complex barriers compared to other groups that may significantly decrease job satisfaction and increase the intent to leave their current firm–factors that affect a firm’s bottom line. The study is the fourth and final in Catalyst’s Women of Color in Professional Services Series examining how the “intersectionality,” or combined identities of gender and race/ethnicity, puts women of color at a unique disadvantage in the workplace. Despite widespread existence of systems created to develop and advance women of color, research has shown that more than 75 percent of these women will leave their employer within five years, costing an amount potentially greater than each person’s total salary and benefits.
The organization surveyed 1,242 lawyers and conducted focus groups with women of color–including Asian women, black women, and Latinas– and then produced a 72-page report [pdf]. Here’s the short version from the Chicago Sun-Times:
75% bail within 5 years due to barriers.
Female lawyers of color being flaky is maybe not exactly the message that Catalyst wanted to send.
We skimmed the report, and must say it’s a bit dry. We’ve extracted the juicier bits — mainly the individual stories — after the jump.
Continue reading “Don’t Count on Minority Female Attorneys to Stick Around?”
Last week, we reported that Troutman Sanders instituted a 10% associate pay cut based on performance. Those salary cuts were supposed to be temporary. The pay cuts apply from August through December — though we don’t know if that pay will automatically bumped up on January 1, 2010.
Notwithstanding the definition of “temporary,” it now appears that the Troutman cuts are retroactive. A tipster explains it this way:
What they’ve neglected to say is that the cuts are retroactive to January 1, 2009. They will be taking the entire ten percent (or in some cases higher percentages) out of the remaining paychecks for the rest of the year. So if Troutman Sanders cuts a first year associate’s salary by 10%, they will not be taking 10% off of each individual pay check, but rather taking out the entire $14,500 in just the last ten pay periods. This is the first firm I’ve heard of to do retroactive cuts like this, and it just seems very disingenuous to present these cuts as only 10%.
We can’t know for sure if Troutman is the first firm that has done its salary cuts this way. But we are sure that this is the first time that associates have squealed about this kind of retroactive pay cut.
Which is not to say that other firms haven’t been trying to creatively get at the same problem. More details after the jump.
This information has been updated and corrected. Please click here for continuing coverage.
Continue reading “Troutman Sanders ‘Temporary’ Salary Cut is Retroactive“
* Crocs have no teeth when it comes to fighting legal battles. The footwear company has settled five design defect lawsuits filed by parents whose children suffered escalator injuries. [On Point News]
* Yolanda Young’s suit against Covington & Burling is back on. [BLT]
* The ATL editors are not the only legal groupies in New York. [New York Times via Gothamist]
* Blago’s judge is prepared for theatrics in the court. [Associated Press]
* Looks like Rihanna and Chris Brown may be violating the judge’s “two-way” stay-away order. [New York Post]
* The latest abortion legislation. [Slate]
* Senators Orrin Hatch and John Cornyn will vote against Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court. [Associated Press]
* Law school students interning in the Brooklyn DA’s office lack salaries and chairs. [New York Times]
* Is the ABA a club that’s not cool anymore? [National Law Journal]
We realize that we make our fair share of typographical errors here at ATL. But this is just a blog, not a document being sent to a client or filed with a court, and we’re more focused on substance than style, due to the speed of the news cycle and our desire to be… FIRST! So please cut us some slack.
(But do continue to point out typos to us, either in the comments or by email. Readers are our unofficial copy editors, and we frequently fix typos after they’ve been brought to our attention.)
In any event, at least our typos don’t cost anyone millions. From the New York Times:
The Rushmore, a new 41-story glass and stone condominium tower on Riverside Boulevard at the Hudson River, seemed serene on a recent visit. The flowers in the interior courtyard were in full bloom; the ground-level pool had been filled. Sixteen buyers had already moved in.
And yet an error of a single digit in an arcane document — the densely worded 732-page offering plan — could upset that happy picture, and cost the sponsors, the Extell Development Company and the Carlyle Group, tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue, lawyers say.
Of course, this isn’t the first example of an expensive typo (assuming it’s a typo; this is open to debate). Remember the $900,000 comma, or the $40,000 missing “L”?
But, if given effect, the glitch in the Rushmore offering plan will certainly be one of the more expensive ones. Find out the nature of the mistake — and the law firm responsible — after the jump.
Continue reading “A Very Expensive Typo?”
Here’s a final collection of links from the recent Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, an event we were privileged to attend and to speak at last week. We thank the Ninth Circuit for the generous hospitality and warm welcome.
* We shared the stage with Nina Totenberg, Linda Greenhouse, and an esteemed federal judge (Judge Robert Lasnik (W.D. Wash.)). Somebody pinch us; was that a dream? [Legal Pad]
* What to expect from Solicitor General Elena Kagan. Also: she supports cameras in the courtroom at One First Street. [San Francisco Chronicle]
* If you’re planning a trip to Monterey or Santa Cruz, here are some good travel tips. [dagblog]
Mega-fraudster Marc Dreier, who recently traded a magnificent penthouse for a cell at the MCC (look him up in the handy Inmate Locator), isn’t the only New York lawyer with new digs.
The iconic CBS Building (aka “Black Rock”), longtime home of Wachtell Lipton, has another prestigious legal tenant. From the New York Observer:
Law firm Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe was expected Thursday to sign a lease for approximately 220,000 square feet at CBS’ 38-story granite slab known as Black Rock, at 51 West 52nd Street, according to industry sources.
As part of the deal, Orrick is taking the space being vacated by UBS and Cushman & Wakefield, which will consolidate its midtown offices at 1290 Avenue of the Americas. Sources say that UBS paid more than $32 million to terminate its lease early, money which CBS applied to the Orrick deal to absorb the costs of Orrick’s build-out of the noncontiguous space to the tune of $150 a square foot, and which will reduce the firm’s rent in the building.
It’s a great building, with handsome, elegant architecture (courtesy of Eero Saarinen). Because the footprint is relatively small, it doesn’t have the impersonal, warehouse-like feel of many other New York office buildings. The midtown location is super-convenient, and the higher floors offer amazing views. (We know Black Rock well, having spent several thousand hours in it while working at Wachtell.)
An Orrick spokesperson confirmed to ATL that the deal, described by the Observer as “expected,” has closed. Congratulations to Orrick on the fabulous new digs!
Links and press release, after the jump.
Continue reading “Lawyerly Lairs: Orrick Shacks Up With Wachtell”
[Ed. note: Above the Law has teamed up with Law Shucks. Law Shucks has done excellent work translating all of the layoff news into user-friendly charts and graphs: the Layoff Tracker.]
We may not have seen the worst yet, the last few weeks’ progress in the American economy has turned slightly for the worse this week.
Applications rose by 30,000 to 554,000 in the week ended July 18, in line with forecasts, figures from the Labor Department showed today in Washington. Claims had fallen by 93,000 over the previous two weeks. The number of people collecting unemployment insurance decreased to the lowest level in three months, also reflecting seasonal issues surrounding closures at carmakers.
To add insult to injury, first-time filers’ checks are being held up by an overburdened system, and the coffers are running dry.
Could be worse – Spain’s unemployment rate is just shy of 18%.
The constant layoffs without any expectation of hiring have had a continuing negative effect on consumer confidence. If we’re getting out of this recession, it won’t be consumer-spending driven. And it looks like there’s still some pain to come.
The economy has lost 6.5 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007 [the Law Shucks Law Firm Layoff Tracker counts lawyer layoffs from January 2008]. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg predict the unemployment rate may reach 10 percent by year-end from 9.5 percent in June, the highest level since 1983.
Slower layoff rate, more yet to come? Sounds just like the law-firm industry.
Continue reading “This Week in Layoffs: 07.25.09″
So. There’s this thing called the bar exam taking place next week. (Exact dates vary by jurisdiction.)
As bar exam candidates enter the home stretch, they exhibit a wide range of emotions. Some are cool as cucumbers, so confident of passage that they spend bar review classes making origami creatures. Others are panicky, hot messes (literally — like the folks who had to sprint down smoke-filled stairwells during the NYU library fire earlier this week).
Does anyone sitting for the bar have last-minute requests for advice? Do any veterans have wisdom to impart? What’s the most effective way to study — or relax — over the next 72 hours or so?
Comments are open. You know what to do.
Earlier: Ahhhhhhhh. The Bar Exam! And a Fire!
Prior ATL coverage of the bar exam (scroll down)
* Isn’t lugging around casebooks one of the only ways for law students to get any exercise? If you digitize them and put them on the Kindle, law students will lose bone density like astronauts do when they are in space. [Ideoblog]
* Harvard Law School is threatening a student over her role on a legal defense team for Joel Tenenbaum. Not surprisingly, Charlie Nesson is right in the middle of this. [Copyrights & Campaigns]
* Unleash your demons! It might help you get a job. [Law and More]
* If I tried to steal something from you, failed, got away, and later came back to apologize, would you have me arrested? [Quiz Law]
* Dr. Phil intentionally inflicts emotional distress every time he opens his mouth. [Lawtini]
* Professor Brad DeLong on the “huh?” moments from Lat’s panel at the Ninth Circuit conference. [Brad DeLong]
* A Harry Potter star used the “escapium from incarcerationus” spell. [Popsquire]
Above the Law’s commitment to bring you all of the latest details about the crazy saga of Dr. Li-ann Thio is unmatched. On Wednesday night, we broke the news that Dr. Thio decided against teaching at NYU Law School this fall.
Now we have Dr. Thio’s official statement explaining her decision to withdraw as a visiting professor. According to the resignation letter she sent to NYU Law Dean Richard Revesz, a lack of tolerance changed Dr. Thio’s mind about NYU Law:
As an Asian woman whose legal training has spanned the finest institutions in both East and West, I believe I would have something of value to offer your students. However, the conditions no longer exist to proceed with the visit, given the animus fuelled by irresponsible misrepresentation/distortions and/or concerted invective from certain parties. Friends and colleagues have also expressed serious concerns about my safety and well-being.
I am convinced that a primary condition for learning and teaching, especially in my chosen fields (which are rife with contested concepts) – human rights and constitutional law – is a tolerant, serene environment where different viewpoints emanating from a variety of worldviews are heard with mutual respect and carefully evaluated, in a civilised fashion. I have always striven to ensure my classroom would exemplify such conditions and had planned to bring this practice to my NYU classroom.
Dr. Thio Li-ann appears to be arguing that NYU Law students should respect her beliefs. But some of her beliefs sound pretty disrespectful to gays and lesbians in the NYU Law community. Unless “shoving a straw up your nose to drink” counts as a respectful way of discussing sexual practices.
Of course, since we are dealing with Dr. Thio, the letter goes on. Brevity is not her strong suit. Read more after the jump.
Continue reading “New From ‘Thio-Breaker’: Dr. Thio’s Resignation Letter to Dean Revesz”
What should a female Solicitor General wear to the U.S. Supreme Court? It’s a hot-button issue. For some excellent analysis, see Dahlia Lithwick.
The topic of SCOTUS-appropriate attire for a Solicitrix General keeps coming up. It popped up yesterday in Solicitor General Elena Kagan’s interview with Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, at the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference in Monterey.
From an attendee (who stayed at the conference longer than we did; we left the day after our panel):
In case you are not here, David: the solicitor general was just asked what she will wear at the Court, and she declined to say. But Judge Kozinski followed up to ask — expressly on your behalf [David Lat fka Article III Groupie] — whether she would be wearing Jimmy Choos. She said “no,” because the heels are too high to stand in while she argues.
Thought you’d want to know this breaking fashion news!
Shoe groupies: a little bit more, after the jump.
Continue reading “At the Ninth Circuit Conference: Elena Kagan Likes Sensible Shoes”
Obviously, things are not well in Pennsylvania. Ballard Spahr has canceled its 2010 Summer Program. Dechert is laying people off. Drinker Biddle is changing the nature of the Biglaw experience. WolfBlock … does not exist.
So it’s not surprising that people are becoming concerned about another titan of the Philadelphia market, Blank Rome. The firm has cut associate salaries, and it did lay off 79 people back in March.
On Wednesday, multiple rising 2Ls at Penn Law received information that led them to believe that Blank Rome was pulling out of on-campus interviewing at Penn. That made others speculate that Blank Rome’s entire 2010 summer program was in jeopardy.
But sources at the firm — including some partners — contend that the firm is going full steam ahead with its 2010 Summer Program, which will include recruiting at Penn. A firm spokesperson furnished Above the Law with this response:
I can confirm that we are currently scheduled to recruit at Penn and that we will be continuing our summer program.
How did so many Penn students get spooked about the Blank Rome recruiting situation? We investigate after the jump.
Continue reading “Step Away From The Ledge: Blank Rome is Coming to Penn”
A partner at a top New York law firm — we have more partner readers (and tipsters) than you might think — sent us an email with this subject line: “Stimulus Money for Law Firms?” The email directed us to two links on Recovery.gov, the disturbingly expensive website devoted to tracking where the federal economic stimulus money is going.
Almost $900,000 in stimulus money — i.e., your taxpayer dollars hard at work — is going to two top law firms: Debevoise & Plimpton and Paul Weiss. Debevoise is getting $432,680 and Paul Weiss is getting $462,528, both from the U.S. Department of Energy. Links are here and here.
Needless to say, this got us hugely excited. Have things gotten so bad that law firms — even firms as prestigious and profitable as Debevoise & Paul Weiss — need government funds?
Economists sometimes talk about the hypothetical stimulus of the government paying people to dig ditches and then refill them. Is the federal government now trying to jump start the legal economy, by paying law firms to draft merger agreements or summary judgment motions, then send them through the shredder? Has the phenomenon of fake work spread beyond the summer associate class, into the ranks of associates and partners, to be paid for by U.S. taxpayer dollars?
Not quite (although that would have been a juicier story). Find out the somewhat boring reality, after the jump.
Continue reading “Economic Stimulus Money for… Wait for It… Debevoise and Paul Weiss?”
Elie here. On Wednesday, I took a closer look at the woman who called the Cambridge police on Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. I wondered if she could be held liable under a good Samaritan statute, and asked if we should hold good Samaritans to a higher standard.
Most readers felt that the woman was beyond reproach. She saw “two black males with backpacks” attempting to enter a house, and most people — including Professor Gates and President Obama — felt she acted appropriately when she called the police.
Legal Blog Watch has published a great analysis suggesting that Gates’s arrest was unwarranted. Even if you take the police officer’s word about what happened inside the house, it was unlikely that a prosecution against Gates for disorderly conduct could have survived (at least based on the evidence we have now; there are rumors of tapes).
I understand that I am hanging far out on a thin limb, but I remain far from convinced that the woman acted appropriately. I do think, hypothetically, that there is a cognizable legal claim Professor Gates could have against the woman who turned him in. Here is the applicable Massachusetts “good Samaritan” statute:
Chapter 258C: Section 13. “Good Samaritans”; liability
Section 13. No person who, in good faith, provides or obtains, or attempts to provide or obtain, assistance for a victim of a crime as defined in section one, shall be liable in a civil suit for damages as a result of any acts or omissions in providing or obtaining, or attempting to provide or obtain, such assistance unless such acts or omissions constitute willful, wanton or reckless conduct.
On Wednesday, I suggested that the standard for liability was reasonableness, as opposed to “willful, wanton or reckless conduct.” Obviously, a recklessness standard is much more difficult to prove.
But after the jump, I make my case. And then Mr. David Lat slaps me upside the head makes his case … that I need to be Rule 11-ed right back to Tolerance 101.
Continue reading “Gatesgate: A Legal Hypothetical”
It looks like our little legal meltdown is spreading fear and decreased job prospects to our neighbors up north. A tipster reports that rising 2Ls at McGill Law School are having the same problems as schools in the states:
[A]t McGill this year, only 4 firms are participating in OCIs (Paul Weiss; Ropes; MoFo; Chadbourne Parke) … 2 years ago, there were 24 or 25 (and last year had about 19). I guess the firms don’t want to be paying the extra money for visas, etc. for Canadian students.
I know things have been tough for lots of top American law schools, but imagine only have four firms to interview with. That’s not competition, its a deathmatch between you and every other student.
Good luck, Canucks. You might not get legal jobs in America, but apparently you’ll always have a health care system that works better than ours.
Earlier: More Trauma For Duke Law School Students
OCI Update: Guess Who’s Not Coming to Dinner At George Washington
We are living in a bizzaro world. Check out this fact pattern:
There’s a partner at Morgan Lewis with 18 years of experience. Morgan Lewis cancels its entire 2010 Summer Program. Partner leaves Morgan Lewis. For a more lucrative gig? No. He leaves to be the new head of career services at UVA Law School.
UVA Law has just hired Kevin Donovan, a former litigation partner at Morgan Lewis.
First of all, who leaves a partnership for a career services gig?
Secondly, the irony of a partner at a firm that just refused to hire rising 2Ls being in charge of finding jobs for rising 2Ls is rich. Is this some kind of twisted Marshal Plan? First you bomb it, then you build it?
After the jump, let’s take a look at Mr. Donovan’s qualifications and vision for UVA law students.
Continue reading “News From Upside Down World”
* Making law is hard to do: health care reform probably won’t pass before the August recess. [Washington Post]
* Why is New Jersey so ethically challenged? [WSJ Law Blog]
* The investigation into Michael Jackson’s death may be evolving into a manslaughter probe. [AP]
* Gatesgate update: The Cambridge police chief comes to the defense of the arresting sergeant (but Commissioner Haas also promises a review of the Gates case). Some officers want an apology from President Obama for his remarks. [Boston Globe]
* Justice Souter isn’t heading off into Salinger-esque New Hampshire seclusion just yet. First he will address the ABA at its annual meeting in Chicago next month. [The BLT]
* Speaking of Salinger, an appeal is being taken by Fredrik Colting, the Swedish author whose book based on “The Catcher in the Rye” has been blocked from publication here in the U.S. (Colting is represented by Edward Rosenthal and Frankfurt Kurnit — who also, by the way, sometimes represent your friends here at Breaking Media). [Am Law Daily]
* Bad news for laid-off lawyers (current and future): the recession is placing the unemployment benefits system under great strain, and some states are in violation of standards set by federal law for timely processing of claims. [New York Times]
Kirk Herbstreit, ESPN commentator and former quarterback of The Ohio State University football team, let the fire department burn down his house. As fans from Michigan know, this is classic Buckeye behavior.
