July 2009
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Sonia Sotomayor
Smooth Sailing for Sonia Sotomayor?
At least that’s what it’s looking like, according to the New York Times and the Washington Post. Today Justice Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee drew to a close, and no major bombshells were dropped. A Senate vote is expected in early August. Update: Gibson Dunn partner Tom Dupree, who served in the […] -
Career Center
Career Center: Paging Summer Associates
What’s your summer been like? Though the summer of 2009 has seen some exciting events, the summer of 2010 is shaping up to be very different, as summer programs are already under siege. Before the summer slips away, and those lucky few of you getting wined and dined are again on a steady diet of […] - Sponsored
This AI-Powered Document Tool Will Meet You Where You Are
Lexis Create provides simple access to internal and external knowledge — directly within Microsoft Word. -
Non-Sequiturs
Non-Sequiturs: 07.16.09
* I know I’m just a muggle. But the economic strength of the Harry Potter series is simply mind boggling. No offense to J.K. Rowling, but she is living proof that the devil exists, and he is willing to listen to offers. [Halogen Life] * Are women having an easier time finding legal jobs than […]
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Drugs, Law Schools, Marijuana, Native Americans
Law Student of the Day: John Belanger
John Belanger, who appears to be a rising 3L at the University of Connecticut, will likely be deferring his third year of law school. He has some bigger legal issues to deal with. Belanger, 27, was arrested last week for his role in running an international drug ring. From the Watertown Daily Times: Federal authorities […] -
Bad Ideas, Crime, Lawyer of the Day, Rape
Local Prosecutor Decides Pictures (of Alleged Rape) Are Worth A Thousand Words
Pop quiz: You are a local prosecutor, and you’ve obtained pictures of an alleged rape. The pictures show the alleged violation taking place — the victim and the alleged assailant — as well as other teenagers drinking and partying. You should: (a) Use the pictures as evidence when you prosecute the rapist. (b) Put the […] -
Romance and Dating
Ladies, Are You Looking for Love in Boston? Try Suffolk Law
The Boston Globe runs an advice column called Love Letters. It’s no Pls Hndle Thx, but it does get a different kind of questioner than we do here at ATL. This week, the love seeker is a lawyer — and he is understandably quite proud of that fact. Perhaps there are ladies who read Above […] -
SCOTUS, Senate Judiciary Committee, Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court
Checking In With Sotomayor
We are not live blogging the Senate confirmation hearings of Judge Sonia Sotomayor today; we’ve already weighed in on what we’ve learned from this process. But we are keeping an eye on the proceedings just in case somebody says something stupid. Today they are finishing up with the questions from the senators. Then they will […] -
Paris Hilton
Judge Moreno May Have Loved Paris Hilton, But Court Artist Didn't
As we’ve mentioned before, Paris Hilton was in court in Miami last week after being sued for $8 million for refusing to promote the apparently terrible 2006 movie “Pledge This!” We’ve told you about how Chief Judge Federico Moreno (S.D. Fla.) was enchanted by Paris. He was perplexed by her use of “BFF,” so she […] - Sponsored
Profit Powerhouse: Elevating Law Firm Financial Performance
In this CLE-eligible webinar on April 10th, we’ll explore the most common accounting pitfalls and how to avoid them for your firm. -
Associate Advice, B for Beauty, Health Care / Medicine, pls hndle thx
Pls Hndle Thx: Too Sexy for My Law Firm
Ed. note: Have a question for next week? Send it in to advice@abovethelaw.com. ATL, I was wondering whether I should get/admit to getting plastic surgery. My issue is that if I was in L.A., I would have done it already, but Chi-town is different, and I want my co-workers to take me seriously notwithstanding the […] -
Husch Blackwell, Layoffs
Nationwide Layoff Watch: Husch Blackwell
The rate of job loss in the legal sector appears to be slowing, mirroring what’s happening in the economy more generally. But make no mistake about it — unemployment continues to grow, and news of lawyer layoffs continues to roll in (and will probably accelerate once the human shields called summer associates are removed in […] -
Ballard Spahr
A Message of Inspiration From Ballard Spahr
Here at Above the Law, we appreciate and encourage openness from law firms. Law firms don’t have to make quarterly reports to the SEC. But partners, associates, staff, and prospective law students should have as much information as possible about the firms they work for. So we honestly applaud Arthur Makadon, chairman of Ballard Spahr. […] -
Morning Docket
Morning Docket 07.16.09
* A hacker got his hands on hundreds of sensitive internal documents at Twitter, and sent them out to a host of blogs who are selectively publishing them. Latest tweet from the company: Twitter’s lawyering up. [BBC News] * Laid off from your law firm? Still looking for a job? Maybe you should collect unemployment […]
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Anal Sex / Butt Sex, Gay, Gay Marriage, Kenji Yoshino, Law Professors, Law Schools, Li-ann Thio
Dr. Li-ann Thio: Much Ado About Nothing?
Or close to nothing. That’s the likely enrollment in Human Rights Law in Asia, the course that Dr. Li-ann Thio, the visiting professor from Singapore with controversial views on gay rights, is scheduled to teach at NYU Law School this fall. An NYU law student reports: I think there’s a point everyone is missing about […]
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Legal AI: 3 Steps Law Firms Should Take Now
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How Generative AI Will Improve Legal Service Delivery
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Early Adopters Of Legal AI Gaining Competitive Edge In Marketplace
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This AI-Powered Document Tool Will Meet You Where You Are
Lexis Create provides simple access to internal and external knowledge — directly within Microsoft Word.
Sponsored
Profit Powerhouse: Elevating Law Firm Financial Performance
In this CLE-eligible webinar on April 10th, we’ll explore the most common accounting pitfalls and how to avoid them for your firm.
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Non-Sequiturs
Non-Sequiturs: 07.15.09
* Not surprisingly, New York personal injury lawyers have a pretty different take on the litigiousness of New Yorkers. [New York Personal Injury Law Blog] * Don’t be a limp litigator. But you shouldn’t be an a-hole attorney either. [Underdog] * Clients are just hammering lawyers over their fees. Who do they think they are? […] -
Money
New York City, Haven For Litigants
A new Forbes report (hat tip: Overlawyered) has some pretty shocking statistics about how much money New York City spends on lawsuits: New York City spends more money on lawsuits than the next five largest American cities–Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Phoenix and Philadelphia–combined. The city’s $568 million outlay in fiscal year 2008 was more than […] -
Clerkships, Job Searches, UVA Law
To the Lifeboats! Penn and UVA Allow Unlimited Clerkship Applications
As goes Harvard Law School, so goes the rest of the law school world. Last month, HLS pointed its students towards an escape from Biglaw purgatory: clerkships. Now Penn Law is doing the same, revising its clerkship policy to allow students to blanket the country — and cyberspace — with clerkship applications. From Law Clerk […] -
Andrew Cuomo, B for Beauty
Andrew Cuomo's Beauty Crackdown
It’s not often that the worlds of law and fashion intersect. There’s much more overlap between the worlds of law and finance, ably covered by our colleagues at Dealbreaker. But an investigation by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo into the practice known as “astroturfing” offers us this opportunity to give a shout-out to the […] -
Sonia Sotomayor
Two More Senators For Round 1 Questions of Sotomayor
We’re going to finish off this live blog of the Sotomayor confirmation hearings with a bang. The last two Senators to ask questions of Sotomayor will be the very experienced Arlen Specter, and the Senator in his first week on the job, Al Franken. This morning we learned that 70% of Above the Law readers […] -
Judge of the Day
Judge of the Day? Only if you really hate deadbeat dads who aren't dads.
Speaking about whether or not judges should be empathetic, try this one on for size. A homeless man in Georgia has been jailed for over a year for failure to pay child support for a kid. He is not the biological parent and the judge knew he wasn’t the biological parent at the time he […] -
Federal Government, Job Searches, Layoffs, Notes from the Breadline
Notes from the Breadline: Workingman's Blues
Ed. note: Welcome to the latest installment of “Notes from the Breadline,” a column by a laid-off lawyer in New York. Prior columns are collected here. You can reach Roxana St. Thomas by email (at roxanastthomas@gmail.com), follow her on Twitter, or find her on Facebook. Searching for a job is often described as a marathon. […]