As we roll through the next segment of the 2010 Vault rankings, we get into some firms that have been caught testing the stealth layoff waters. To refresh your memory, here is the next list of firms:
Check out the big move by Munger. It’s up 11 spots on this year’s list. And let’s not forget about the firm’s #1 A-List ranking by Am Law earlier this year. Munger’s managed to do all of this without laying off a massive number of associates. Hopefully other Biglaw firms (and current 2Ls) will take note.
We know people have strong opinions about some of the firms on this list. Let’s get into them after the jump.
* Don’t look for Chief Illiniwek on University of Illinois sidelines this fall. [My Law Life]
* Maybe becoming a law professor is just the tonic for the recession blues. [Tax Prof Blog]
* I had to duck out of the office this afternoon to continue the fight for a student loan bailout. I inadvertently slammed SEC lawyers in the process (sorry guys). There’s plenty of room left on this student loan bandwagon. [Fox Business]
* Lower associate salaries are a good thing? I suppose, if by “good” you mean “slightly better than cleaning car windows on the Long Island Expressway.” [TechnoLawyer]
* Companies are now soliciting resumes on Twitter. That knock you hear at the door is the Visigoths. Proceed with caution. [Young Lawyers Blog]
* On the one hand, this has nothing to do with the law. On the other hand … everybody should know that these 39 seconds of video exist. [Dealbreaker]
The well known Atlanta based firm, Morris Manning, will be under new management in 2010. Louise Wells will be taking over the firm, making her the first woman to lead Morris Manning. The firm’s press release is understandably positive about the future of the firm:
The firm’s succession plan is being implemented to ensure that the firm is positioned to capitalize on ever-evolving market conditions for the continued success of its clients and the firm. As a critical component of the plan, the firm created an Executive Committee that will work closely with Wells. The Executive Committee members include litigation partner John P. MacNaughton, corporate partner David M. Calhoun and real estate partner Thomas S. Gryboski.
“I am honored to accept this responsibility,” Wells offered. “As a result of the firm’s unique culture and entrepreneurial spirit, we have been responsive to the challenging market conditions. We have made smart strategic decisions that build upon the firm’s solid platform, better positioning us to succeed and drive forward in the coming months and years,” she added.
Mmm … peaceful transition of power …
The current managing partner, Robert E. Saudek, will step down at the end of the year, but he will still be active with the firm.
A former Cardiff (U.K.) law student sued her school for giving her low grades on two oral exams, and she won. The Times Online reports:
Alice Clarke was given low marks in two assessments for her Bar Vocational Course that all lawyers have to pass to practise as a barrister.
She claimed that the low marks for her oral examinations in advanced criminal law and legal negotiation were because of disagreements with her tutors and asked Cardiff University to reassess them. When it refused, she pursued her claim through the High Court.
Wow, it’s not too late for me to get my Sears Prize. It was unfairly denied me because my graders were too focused on form and substance instead of poorly thought out witty remarks!
Of course, to win a lawsuit and force your law school into court ordered grade inflation you need a couple of things: time and a complete inability to make sound economic decisions with your litigation dollar.
Is your Facebook page ready for your character and fitness exam? If you are applying to the Florida state bar, you might want to update your profile. Over on True/Slant, Kash examines employers who want to use Facebook against you:
[N]ot all legal types respect Facebook privacy. The Florida Bar Examiners, the group that decides who gets to become a lawyer in Florida, is considering forcing some wannabe lawyers to be subjected to a thorough social networking investigation prior to their being knighted esquires.
Florida bar examiners will look for evidence of substance abuse in applicants with a history of those problems, and will of course check to see if you would like to overthrow the government.
Click on the link below for Kash’s picture thoughts.
As super-big law firms suffer through the recession, many midsize and small firms are thriving. Back in June, we discussed these firms as a viable alternative to Biglaw. (A number of smaller firms — e.g., Stone & Magnanini, Silver Golub & Teitell, and McKool Smith — are even hiring, with the help of job postings on Above the Law.)
But are smaller firms all they’re cracked up to be? We try to present both sides of the story. Check out this letter, from the ATL mailbag:
I’m an Ivy League law grad with a couple of years in big law. I got laid off and eventually found a job at a smaller firm. Like, way smaller. Unsurprisingly, I know a couple of people to whom this has happened (and a couple who haven’t found jobs as well, of course).
The commonly held wisdom is that the trade off in big law is money for your time and soul, while smaller firms pay less, but ask less. I’m not finding this to be really true, and neither are my friends.
So what exactly are we talking about, in terms of hours and compensation at small firms?
Many of our Biglaw friends have been biting their nails over hours this year. Lawyers are not worried about making bonuses at the end of the year. They’re worried about keeping their jobs. Last week, we invited you to share your hours’ outlook for 2009 and to see how you compare with fellow anonymous ATL readers.
Has it dawned on anyone that people billing solid hours aren’t taking the time to take ATL surveys?
This survey will be less reliable than my balls.
We’re not sure how reliable that reader’s balls are, but the poll results might shrivel them. The percentage of those looking at less than 1600 hours for the year is staggering. Check out the results after the jump.
As a New Yorker, people often tell me that Austin is “the oasis of Texas.” I think they mean that Austin is a culturally progressive blue city in middle of a red state.
I hope they don’t mean that Austin is a great place to practice law.
On Friday, Fish & Richardson announced plans to close its Austin office. This marks the second major law firm to get out of Austin this summer. Weil Gotshal has already announced plans to close its Austin office.
The Austin Business Journal described the importance of Fish & Richardson to the local legal market:
Fish, which opened its Austin office in 2005, currently has 28 attorneys and a total staff of approximately 68 locally. A spokeswoman in the firm’s Boston headquarters confirmed the firm will close the office on Dec. 31.
According to Austin Business Journal research, Fish & Richardson is the 16th largest law firm operating in the city, ranked by number of attorneys. Fish reported firmwide revenue of $420 million in 2008. Some of the firm’s clients include Microsoft Corp., Google and Freescale Semiconductor Inc.
Are Austinites ready to make the move to “regular Texas”?
Late last week, offer calls went out to those who summered at Cadwalader. We now have the firm wide offer rates. Compared to some other firms, it’s really not so bad.
Here is the information from a firm spokesperson:
Cadwalader made offers to approximately two thirds of our 2009 Summer Associate Class.
Cadwalader went through its layoffs early and often. People who summered at CWT had to know that the firm isn’t one to defer associates. Instead, Cadwalader recently asked some of its laid off associates to comeback … as contract attorneys.
Given all of that history, a 66% offer rate seems pretty good. In fact, even some of the CWT summers that were no offered didn’t sound too angry about the situation. One no offered summer described it this way:
The hiring partner was very nice about it, and offered to serve as a reference when I pursue other jobs, and I was repeatedly told that it was for purely economic reasons … I was upset, but I understand what the economy’s like right now, and I’ll be ok, may just take a while.
Things could be worse. Good luck with 3L recruiting, CWT friends.
[Ed. note: This post is authored by Evan Jowers and Robert Kinney of Kinney Recruiting, sponsor of the Asia Chronicles. Kinney has made more placements of U.S. associates and partners in Asia than any other firm in the past two years. You can reach them by email: asia at kinneyrecruiting dot com.]
Evan here. Although not all US practices in HK / China are currently very busy, many have seen deal flow pick up dramatically in the past couple of months. The outlook is good for most US practices to stay fairly busy through the end of this year and beyond. Some groups are becoming understaffed. The China economy is on a full-fledged rebound, notwithstanding the drop in exports. It is a domestic consumer driven recovery that has taken much of the world by surprise. The Shanghai Index has risen already about 90% this year and had doubled since its November ‘08 low.
This is about the point in this Kinney-sponsored post where you probably expect me to go on and on about all the hiring that is about to happen, to call Kinney and an apartment broker in China, right? But I can’t quite take you on apartment hunting trips to Asia, because the lateral hiring, although it has picked up from the dead period earlier this year (we continue to be put on more attorney searches in Asia, especially in HK / China each week), is just not there for most junior to mid-level US associate candidates. Hiring likely won’t be even close to what we started in 2007 to consider “normal” until at least late ‘09 to early ‘10.
Why? Here are some factors that are coming into play:
- Many US firms are understandably very concerned about their profit per partner numbers for ‘09. It has obviously been a brutal 18 months in the US economy and of course we all know that US biglaw has been very negatively affected. One substantial factor in successful senior partner recruiting and partner retention is of course PEP numbers. Unfortunately, layoffs, de-equitizing partners, and hiring freezes are effective in propping up PEP and in such a climate it is not easy for even very busy US partners in Asia to simply get clearance for all the associate hires they want / need. At some US firms there is a lot of pressure for continued lay offs in the fall, further making new lateral hires overseas a complex issue.
[Ed. note: The following piece was authored by The Legal Tease, of Sweet Hot Justice fame. Check out her other musings from Sweet Hot Justice here.]
I may not be a doctor, but I can spot a good epidemic when I see one. No, I’m not talking swine flu. Or Mad Cow. I’m talking about a bug that’s more contagious, more debilitating. A bug that seems to be tearing through scores of Big Law associates faster than you can say “stealth layoffs.” As much as I’ve tried to find one, there’s just no immunization you can get to ward this one off-and it looks like my fellow Big Law drones haven’t found one, either. The plague in question? Young female associates getting themselves embroiled in ridiculous sexual situations with vile, insane partners. And as far I can tell, a cure is still a long way off.
If you’ve spent any time clicking through the annals of humiliation catalogued on this site, you’ve probably noticed that I’m no stranger to this particular epidemic. The latest episode, though, focuses on my friend, Kirsten, a Big Law mid-level employment litigator trapped in the body of a hot stripper. You may remember Kirsten from her recent and unfortunate dip into married territory-as a visitor, not a local, alas. After that inevitably disastrous affair wrapped itself up, Kirsten did what any heart-bruised, if not quite heart-broken, Big Law associate would do: She planted herself at the office 24-7 and figured, hey, if I can’t get laid, I might as well get hours.
And she did. As luck would have it, she also got the attention of a new lateral employment partner to her firm, Martin. Now, let’s paint a quick picture here: When I say Kirsten is hot, I don’t mean lawyer-hot; I mean fantasy-league, blonde bombshell, silicone-enhanced hot-hot. Martin, on the other hand, could pass for Ben Stiller’s pudgy older cousin-on a good day. Still, when he began stopping by Kirsten’s office every night to chat, some combo of charm, partnership units and daddy issues sparked a crush in her. More than anything, though, after dating a string of unemployed aspiring man-whores, she cherished the attention. And when she found out that Martin had recently been handed divorce papers by his starter wife, she was smitten.
After a couple of weeks, the office pop-ins turned into weekly after-work cocktails. This was more than just flirtation, she told me; this was a real connection. They would have long, soulful talks about everything from firm politics to past relationships to the devastation of rejection. The only problem, though, she said, was that Martin was a supervising partner in her small department, and she felt he was holding back on making a move because he was, well, her boss…and an employment litigator. But when he asked if she wanted to accompany him to a black-tie fundraising event that the firm was co-sponsoring, she knew that they’d reached a turning point. This was his way of testing the waters, of stepping out with her in a formal, open setting. This was big.
Think you already know where this is going? Well, you don’t. Unless “meat” and “blood” are part of your prediction. Grab a napkin and keep reading, after the jump.
* Stanford Financial Group investors have filed a class action against Proskauer Rose and partner Thomas V. Sjoblom, alleging that they helped mastermind a massive investment fraud scheme. [National Law Journal]
* Judge George Wu overturned the Lori Drew conviction in the MySpace cyberbullying case. [Volokh Conspiracy via ABA Journal]
* Two persistent and well-pedigreed ACLU lawyers + FOIA + six years = a $2 million investigation into detainee abuse. [New York Times]
* A prominent 81-year-old Mexican drug suspects’ defense attorney, Americo Delgado, was stabbed to death outside his home this weekend. [Los Angeles Times]
* A former in-house attorney for Toyota says the company withheld evidence about rollover deaths and injuries in a “ruthless conspiracy” to hide its vehicles structural shortcomings. [CBS News]
* Jerry O’Connell explains why he is heading to law school. [Celebrity Baby Blog]
Three years ago yesterday, on August 30, 2006, Above the Law was born. Read the letter from the editor that started it all. (If you find this site occasionally immature, cut us some slack; we’re three years old.)
Reaching the three-year mark is a notable milestone for a blog. According to Jim Beck and Mark Herrmann, over at Drug and Device Law:
Legal blogs are like small businesses: Half of ‘em fail in the first year, and 90 percent of ‘em fail in the next five.
But we’re still here. Our traffic (and revenue) continue to grow, knock on wood. And we have you — our readers, sources, advertisers, and friends — to thank. So, thank you.
If you’d like to send us birthday gifts — a reader sent Roxana a lovely Starbucks card the other day, and the rest of us are jealous — our snail mail address is 262 Mott Street, Suite 102A, New York, NY 10012. The third anniversary — or blogiversary, as the case may be — is the leather anniversary. So you can give Lat a leather business card holder, Kash a leather laptop case (or a leather fringe bikini), and Elie the rest of the cow.
(You can also send us news tips or juicy documents by snail mail. They’d be a nice change of pace from our usual hard-copy mail: handwritten letters from prisoners, alleging they were framed.)
In any event, thank you for joining our ATL community. We deeply appreciate your visits, tips, and continued support.
What is a douche? We know lawyers thrive on precision, but this term resists an exact definition. To paraphrase Justice Stewart, you know a douche when you see a douche. For example, that guy in the photo to the right.
We started the contest with a field of 16 law schools, taken from the top of the latest U.S. News & World report rankings. The first eight match-ups garnered over 7,000 votes each. The field has now been narrowed to the eight douchiest law schools.
Check out the douches, and vote in the next match-ups, after the jump.
Mainly we’re posting this because it’s a Friday afternoon and rainy (at least here in New York). We figure you need some entertainment to launch you into the weekend.
But there is a legal angle to this music video. It might have spawned intellectual property litigation, if Disney — and Miley Cyrus — didn’t have such a good sense of humor. Enjoy!
(If you like, feel free to discuss “fair use” issues in the music video context in the comments.)
LEWW is fascinated by ATL’s Douchiest Law School contest. Official results haven’t been announced yet, but based on our preliminary read, Yale seems to have notched a decisive first-round victory over the University of Texas, and it looks like Harvard has trounced UCLA. Stanford Law School, however, appears to have been decisively out-douched by lowly Georgetown. Conclusion: The relationship between douchiness and prestige is not linear.
This week’s weddings feature two YLS grads and two SLS grads, so these lawyer newlyweds are undeniably prestigious. But are they also representative of their respective institutions’ reputations for d-baggery? We’ll let you make the call.
Thanks to all of the tipsters who are helping us put together numbers on the Baker Botts layoffs. Even though the firm doesn’t want you to know how many people it is letting go, our sources have been relentless in helping us expose the information.
Yesterday we reported that Baker Botts laid off at least twelve associates in Houston. Today we can report that at least seven other associates were laid off in Baker’s Washington office. One tipster has a colorful description of the action in D.C.:
Baker Botts DC canned 7 associates. They handled it so poorly that one found out from a secretary. … They laid off associates who had a lot of hours and were strong performers, so it was even more ridiculous. None of us feel safe now. Apparently, this firm has no loyalties to anyone but the dollar.
According to NALP, there are 65 associates in Baker Botts’s D.C. office. So the cuts represent around 10% of the associates in that office.
After the jump, we learn that the timing of these layoffs couldn’t have been worse for one Baker Botts associate.
Yesterday, we learned that Morgan, Lewis & Bockius came up with only one offer for the 17 second-year law students who summered in the firm’s D.C. office.
At Sidley Austin’s D.C. office, the news is very different. Above the Law has learned that Sidley D.C. is calling some of its incoming associates and asking them to start early. A Sidley-bound tipster reports:
Everybody in the D.C. office who expressed an interest has received a call from the D.C. office to start early — right after the Labor Day. Yay! Yay! Yay!
Sidley offered a voluntary deferral option to its incoming associates. The firm reports that about a third of their incoming class voluntarily decided to start in November 2010. The rest of the class is slated to begin work in November 2009. But a few people in D.C. will have the opportunity to start earning money even earlier. A Sidley spokesperson released this statement to Above the Law:
[A]bout 100 associates will start with the firm on November 16, 2009. Due to the needs of certain practice groups, a handful of fall associates will join the firm before November 16, 2009.
The law firm of Littler Mendelson is embroiled in a pretty nasty lawsuit with a former receptionist. The Washington Business Journal reported on the suit brought by the former Littler Mendelson receptionist, Rebecca Landrith:
According to the July 27 lawsuit the receptionist filed — on her own behalf — against her old firm, Littler provided no back-up or substitute receptionist, and “had no consistent policy or procedure as to when or how Landrith could take a restroom break.”
Apparently, the receptionist was so bereft of bathroom breaks that she — on multiple occasions — pissed herself. Literally:
On two separate occasions, Landrith claims, she had to “wet her pants” at the reception desk because nobody would, well, relieve her.
Eww. Just yuck, man. Was there a physical chain attaching her to her desk? If not, there is simply no excuse. Can you imagine walking into a place of business, and the first person you see — and smell — is a woman covered in her own urine? Did she at least have some hand sanitizer on her desk!!!??? If I wanted to deal with that kind of stuff, I’d take the subway.
So, how much does Landrith want Littler to pay for her own incontinence?
Last recruiting season, Above the Law was the first publication to warn law students to accept their offers for summer employment as soon as possible.
This year that advice is so obvious that even law school career service professionals are telling students to accept offers quickly. William A. Chamberlain, assistant dean for law career strategy and advancement at Northwestern, wrote an article for the National Law Journal this week, strongly urging students to make decisions rapidly:
Our message to students about how to handle offers has been straightforward — accept your offer quickly. The key is to get a job for next summer. Smart students will not rely on NALP’s 45-day guideline but rather accept their offers as soon as humanly possible. [W]e have dealt with all sorts of reactions by firms to the economy and are urging our students to be risk-averse. Any sense of entitlement will be fatal this fall.
Relying on NALP guidelines = fatal?
You know, when the career services dean is directly warning students not to rely upon the NALP rules, I am forced to ask why students should heed the NALP rule limiting the number of offers students can accept.
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.
Dear Lat,
Thank you so much for the back-to-school care package you sent when I started classes at Solo Practice University! I must ask: where did you find the Wonder Twins pencil box? I absolutely adore it, and I love the Trapper Keeper (and the puffy stickers with googly eyes!) you picked out. I am also crazy about the Dukes of Hazzard lunchbox, and the note you included was very thoughtful. (I’m not sure that “Knock ‘em dead!” is appropriate advice for a lawyer, but why split hairs?)
I’ll address, seriatim, the questions you posed in your enclosed letter. Regarding your first question (“What are you going to wear on your first day of class??”), I had a hard time deciding between the plaid skirt, button-down shirt, and penny loafers you helped me pick out when we went back-to-school shopping, and something a little more casual, like the Guns ‘n Roses t-shirt and holey jeans you turned your nose up at when I was modeling outfits. (I believe your exact words were “If you think you’re leaving the house dressed like that, young lady, think again,” and “If I put a 7-11 hot dog and a Slurpee in your hand, you’d look like Britney Spears - on a bad day.”)
But that, my fashion-forward friend, is the beauty of Solo Practice University: I don’t have to leave my house to go to class. Susan Cartier Liebel, the headmistress of Solo Practice University, calls it “carpet commuting,” but since, as you know, I live in true Manhattan-style squalor and thus do not have a carpet, I simply call it “convenient.” In any event (and because I also do not have an air conditioner), I opted for a tank top with a large coffee stain on the front, and shorts. Though I was certain my mother would pop out of the closet, smack me on the back of the head, and remind to “dress for the job you want,” she did not make an appearance. The cats, however, channeling her disapproval, looked at me with disdain.
As for your second question, things here at Solo Practice University, or “SPU,” as we call it on campus, are going well. The classes that SPU has to offer are - at this point - too numerous to list here, but as you know, they are divided four general areas: Substantive Law, Marketing and Management, Technology, and Work/Life Balance. In fact, the course content is so voluminous that I spent a few undignified minutes wringing my hands, uncertain about where to begin. (Again, the beauty of SPU is that no one can observe, firsthand, your minor meltdowns.)
No, Lat: there’s no need to start gathering piles of Zoloft for my next care package (although a little Valium never hurt anyone - let’s talk later). It turns out that my generalized anxieties, and the sense of being overwhelmed by the nuts and bolts of solo practice, were a valuable object lesson. Many people, Susan told me, are derailed by their fear of solo practice. One of her goals, therefore, was simply to “demystify” the reality of lawyering without a net. This led me to a minor, but useful, epiphany about one of my perceived barriers to solo practice: my fear of commitment.
The latest Job of the Week, brought to you by Lateral Link, is for someone who wants to relocate to Atlanta. To those of you living in New York and other expensive cities: just think of that cost of living adjustment!
Position: Employment Attorney
Location: Atlanta, GA
Description: A medium-sized Atlanta-based firm is seeking an employment litigation associate with 3-4 years of employment lit experience, preferably with some ERISA class action experience. The firm offers associates the chance for significant responsibility and lean case staffing and is known for maintaining the flexibility of a smaller firm, while providing a level of sophistication usually associated with much larger firms. The quality of the Firm’s attorneys is evidenced by numerous honors and awards, including recognition as one of Atlanta’s top law firms by the Atlanta Business Chronicle. Big firm experience and excellent academic credentials required. Out-of-state candidates preferred.
For more information about this position, please contact Lateral Link’s Director for the Southeast, Jordan Abshire. Jordan is a graduate of Harvard Law School and a former Troutman Sanders attorney. Current Lateral Link members can also view Position #5207 on Lateral Link. Membership in Lateral Link is free and you can apply at www.laterallink.com.
I thought we were done with salary cuts. It’s almost September! Fashion week is on the horizon, but King & Spalding is coming out with an old style. I mean, it’s been multiple weeks since I used this picture.
As you know, the past year has been a difficult one in all industries. The economic turmoil has led to a reduction in demand for legal services and increased pressure on firms to reduce costs. Although King & Spalding remains strong thanks to the quality of our people and our diverse portfolio of practices, clients, and offices, we are not immune to the broader economic environment. As a result, over the course of the past year, we, like other leading firms, have had to make a number of difficult but important changes to ensure our cost structure remains competitive and we are able to generate the opportunities that keep us all engaged.
Earlier this year, many firms “froze” salaries at 2008 levels or reduced them even lower. After closely monitoring those changes, we have decided to make commensurate adjustments to our salaries. Effective September 1, 2009, the annualized salary for U.S. partner-track associates will be equal to their 2008 salary. Partner-track associates in Atlanta and Charlotte will have an additional market-based reduction equal to $10,000 on an annualized basis. The salary for U.S. counsel, other lawyers, and consultants will be reduced by five percent. These salary changes will only apply going forward and will not be retroactive to the beginning of the year. Our plan is to announce 2010 salaries some time during the first quarter of next year, as some firms already do.
Ugh. Doesn’t K&S know that the cool thing isn’t just to cut salaries? All the popular kids are busy making fun of lockstep compensation. Oh wait, I guess K&S did get that message.
* The U.N. is sovereign territory, so Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi can stay there if they want him to. But Englewood, New Jersey is squarely within the jurisdiction of the United States government. [New York Times]
* Chicago’s local government is apparently doing its part to keep the struggling Chicago legal market afloat. [Am Law Daily]
* Something you learned in Public International Law is actually being used in the real world. Foreign litigants are suing US corporations in US court under the Alien Torts Statute. [Wall Street Journal]
* President Obama has paid Perkins Coie over $1 million in fees to suppress “birther” litigation. Now, how about suppressing the birther movement altogether? [Legal Blog Watch]
* Last week, it was a Special Assistant AG eliminating witnesses. This week, a NY Supreme Court Justice is convicted of soliciting bribes from attorneys appearing before him. It’s a hell of a town. [Law.com]
* Former Gitmo detainee to sue US government for compensation. Surely there’s room here for some Class Action action. [The Times Online]
The cast for the latest season of Survivor, which premieres on September 17, has been announced. This season, the show’s nineteenth, takes place on the tropical island of Samoa.
Four of the 20 contestants, or a fifth of the field, are either lawyers or law students. Is appearing on a reality television show the best way to wait out the recession?
We believe this to be the highest number of law-related contestants in a single season. We reached out to Charlie Herschel — the former Survivor contestant and current Weil Gotshal associate, who has encyclopedic knowledge of the show — and he said that, as far as he knows, four would be a record. Herschel explained:
Lawyers are making a better showing than bartenders for once on Survivor! There was a lawyer on the first Survivor who sued producers for rigging the show. Word was that they avoided casting lawyers after that.
Also, it’s generally difficult for lawyers to drop everything at a moment’s notice for the casting process and also for the show (which is required), so they have trouble casting lawyers. Most of the lawyers on survivor dont practice anymore.
Perhaps you know one of these four. Let’s learn more about them, shall we?
Thursday, August 27, 2009 4:25 PM - By Elie Mystal
Ed. Note: This post has been updated (as reflected in the edited title). Please keep reading.
The offer calls for Morgan, Lewis & Bockius went out today, and associates who summered with the firm’s Washington office are receiving some especially difficult news: zero offers.
Update: Morgan Lewis responded with this statement:
Rumors you reported of zero offers in DC are false. We are giving offers in every large office of the firm. Due to the difficulty of predicting 2011 staffing needs, we have today extended only a limited number of offers. To assist those who have not received offers in seeking other opportunities, we will provide a letter to prospective employers that explains the circumstances surrounding our summer program, in the hopes that as these students enter the legal profession, they will be able to obtain employment opportunities commensurate with their qualifications and performance.
The firm refused to elaborate on just how many offers constitute the “limited number of offers” the firm extended. Above the Law has independently confirmed a report of one (1) offer extended at Morgan Lewis in D.C. Is there anybody else? Feel free to email us.
Multiple tipsters from D.C. are reporting phone calls like this one:
They just called. They’re not giving offers this year. They’re re-evaluating next fall for hiring needs for the following year and writing the summers a letter explaining that they were awesome. … [T]he head recruiter honestly sounded like she had been crying … Apparently they’re going to “stay in touch” over the next year to see what’s going on.
According to NALP, Morgan Lewis expected 17 2L summers and 2 1L summers for their 2009 summer program in D.C.
We are still collecting information about Morgan Lewis’s firm-wide offer rate. More details, plus an update from Philadelphia, after the jump.
Thursday, August 27, 2009 3:47 PM - By Elie Mystal
Way back in 2007, a time so long ago that firms actually made offers to summer associates, we mentioned the story of UConn law professor Robert Birmingham. The professor showed a clip from the movie Really Really Pimpin’ in Da South, and got in a little bit of trouble. The film is (apparently) a “prostitution training film” that contained an interview the professor wanted his students to see. Professor Birmingham was forced to take a leave of absence back then, but he’s back on campus.
Unfortunately for the professor, now his girlfriend is in trouble. Heather Kaufmann — who is not only Professor Birmingham’s girlfriend but also represented Birmingham back in 2007 — has been charged with a litany of crimes. The Hartford Courrant reports:
Heather Kaufmann, 33, surrendered to police Monday and is facing charges of second-degree forgery, third-degree larceny, third-degree identity theft, credit card theft, receiving goods illegally, charging less than $500 on a revoked credit card and five counts of fraudulent use of an ATM….
According to court documents, police said that in the days following the death of her aunt on Dec. 7, 2008, Kaufmann used her aunt’s ATM card and wrote a check on the account that, together, came to more than $3,200.
Birmingham isn’t just tainted by the romantic association with Kaufmann; he allegedly also received some of the misappropriated funds.
Thursday, August 27, 2009 2:45 PM - By Kashmir Hill
Law librarians got miffed at Westlaw this week, after the legal research company sent out the following advertisement via e-mail:
Law librarians across the land were appalled and voiced their displeasure on this list-serv, among other places. From a librarian at a large southern law firm:
[Apparently] the folks at West think that attorneys shouldn’t know their librarians’ names. I’d love to see ATL’s snarky humor sticking it to West (or, Hell, stick it to us law librarians if you think we’re being too sensitive.)
We don’t think you’re being too sensitive. In fact, we have a great appreciation for law librarians.
We know that law librarians are hot. We know that librarianship is a good career alternative. We know that law library staffers save lives, literally. And we think knowing their names is not something to mock.
While the folks at LexisNexis are doing a little happy dance, what does Westlaw have to say for itself?
Thursday, August 27, 2009 2:42 PM - By Above the Law
Do you love your job?
Do you wake up on Monday morning looking forward to the week ahead? Does your current job?
If the answer is “No” to the questions above, then it is probably a sign that you are not in the right job. Working out what to do with your life is not always easy, and many people often find themselves in jobs that are financially rewarding but leave them feeling empty and unfulfilled.
If this sounds like you, then you should speak to us. We help executives all over the world work out what they should do with their lives by teaching them about themselves. Our programs are designed to figure out who you are, what really motivates you and where your real talents and passions lie. Once you have learned everything there is to know about “you” we will help you put a plan together to help move you into a career that has real meaning and purpose.
If you want to find out more, then you can join our FREE Career Change webinar with Paul Lanzarotti, CEO & Co-Founder of The New World Institute.
Details of the FREE webinar are as follows:
Date: Thursday August 27th Time: 7:30pm EST Access: PC or Phone
Space is limited to click here to reserve your spot. As with all our events there is absolutely no obligation to buy and you can choose to participate or just listen in.
If you would like to know more about us and what we do then email us at info@thenewworldinstitute.com or call 347 445 5763 to get more information.
Thursday, August 27, 2009 1:36 PM - By Elie Mystal
Let’s say you leased a $25,000 car with an option to buy it a few months later. But when your option matured, you realized that automobiles previously priced at $50,000 were available for what you would have to pay for your $25,000 car. Wouldn’t you at least go back to the showroom and take a look around?
According to some Dechert summer associates, that is essentially what Dechert is doing to its summer class. As we understand it, Dechert has made offers to half of its summer class. But it told the other half of the class that they’ll have to wait until January 2010 before the firm even decides if it will give them offers. January!
In the meantime, Dechert is one of the few firms we know of that is going full speed ahead with 3L recruiting. So Dechert looks to be interested in hiring some 3Ls for its next class of incoming associates, before it even tells all of its 2009 summer associates where they stand with the firm.
I know, nobody is “entitled” to a job. But is it reasonable for a firm to treat its summers like fungible commodities? To quote the late Charlton Heston: “It’s people! Soylent Green is made out of people.”
Tipsters who summered at Dechert reported that the firm’s reason for delaying their offer decision until January was “purely economic.” But if that is the case, then why is the firm looking to hire additional people for the same incoming class?
Dechert summer associates weigh in after the jump.
Your above-signed writer will be delivering the keynote address at this year’s ABA Law Firm Marketing Strategies Conference, taking place in Philadelphia from November 12-13, 2009. In this tough economy, the subject of how to market your law firm effectively is more important than ever.
To learn more about the conference, click here. To register, click here. Early bird registration closes on August 31, after which rates will increase. So don’t delay — register today!
Thursday, August 27, 2009 12:17 PM - By Elie Mystal
Yesterday, we reported that Baker Botts no offered around 50% of its summer associate class. But while Baker Botts summers were learning whether they had a future with the firm, some Baker Botts associates were told to move out of the way. The Texas Lawyer reports:
This week, Baker Botts laid off lawyers for economic reasons, says firm spokesman Mike Cinelli, although the Houston-based firm will not disclose numbers or further details. The layoffs, Cinelli says, are an attempt by firm management to have “supply meet demand.” The layoffs are the result of market conditions and the lack of attrition this year, Cinelli says. “It was a difficult decision,” Cinelli says about the layoffs.
Above the Law has learned that 12 associates were let go from the Baker Botts Houston office. There are reports of additional casualties firm wide, but as you know Baker Botts doesn’t want you to know how many of its people it is putting out on the street.
For the 12 in Houston, one tipster had this to say:
Associates at Baker Botts have been surprised about some of the layoffs in the Houston office. Several high hours, good work product people are gone along with some who are not big surprises.
Should summers and incoming Baker Botts associates be concerned? Details after the jump.
Thursday, August 27, 2009 11:28 AM - By Elie Mystal
Sources report that Fish & Richardson will cut its entire corporate department as of January 1, 2010.
To be fair, Fish & Richardson is more known for its IP work. Its corporate department is relatively small. But cutting an entire practice group seems like an extreme cost cutting measure. The firm has already cut associate salaries and laid off associates.
There are a few things we don’t know. Although our sources tell us the corporate department will be cut firm-wide, our sources are clustered in only one Fish office. We don’t know if corporate associates will be offered other jobs in the firm as of 1/1/10, and we don’t know if the move is being precipitated by a large group of Fish corporate partners leaving.
That’s because the Fish associates we spoke with were informed of the news in a curious way. Details after the jump.
GQ.com had a charming feature story this week: The Top 25 Douchiest Colleges. This is one of the few times that Kash’s alma mater - Duke (#2) - managed to beat Lat and Elie’s undergrad institution, Harvard (#4). Duke would have taken the top spot on the list but the GQ editors gave Brown that honor, saying:
Duke’s probably number one. But we’d rather not rank Duke number one at anything.
Since we didn’t have a Back-to-School feature planned, we’ve decided to riff off of this one. We’d like to invite you to help us determine the #1 Douchiest law school.
This will not be based solely on our editorial discretion. We’re taking the top 16 law schools from U.S. News & World Report and putting them into brackets, ATL March Madness style. We’ll let you vote on which is douchiest.
Check out the brackets and vote on the first eight match-ups after the jump.
Thursday, August 27, 2009 9:12 AM - By Kashmir Hill
* Former Rehnquist SCOTUS clerk David Hoffman is resigning as inspector general of Chicago in order to run for Obama’s vacated Senate seat. He may be a “political unknown” but we like that he’s part of the Elect and a hottie. [Chicago Sun-Times]
* Meanwhile, there is a move in Massachusetts to skirt state law in order to fill the late Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat ASAP. [Boston Globe]
* Belgium’s Palace of Justice is a royal pain. [New York Times]
* Ex-SCOTUS Justice David Souter has put the lockdown on his personal papers. They won’t be open to the public for 50 years, a longer seal “than any justice has placed on papers in recent memory.” [National Law Journal]
* Chris Brown gets probation and “physical labor” in the Rihanna case, then heads out to the clubs. [ABA Journal]
* Richard Hatch not a “Survivor” when it comes to jail time. “It’s awful. It’s been eight days. He’s tormented,” said his lawyer. [Associated Press]
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 6:27 PM - By Elie Mystal
You can still call yourself prestigious if you work at the firms that make up today’s fall recruiting open thread. But once you are outside of the Vault top 20, people start talking about “firm culture” at least as much as they talk about prestige.
The slide continues for Shearman & Sterling. The firm was ranked #19 last year, and is down two spots this year. Is there any specific reason for the fall?
After the jump, let’s look at the firms rising up through the rankings.
* “To be Irish is to know that, in the end, the world will break your heart.” [What About Clients?]
* Does Vogue have an equivalent for Paul Begala? [Fashionista]
* Lat was on with Brian Cuban yesterday, ranting about Sotomayor, firms and scandals. He dislikes the camera angle, but it’s still better than what Jacob is exposed to. [Cuban Revolution]
* Don’t forget to tell us how your hours are looking in our poll.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 4:48 PM - By Elie Mystal
During on-campus interviewing this year, the power is clearly with the recruiters. There are going to be a lot more law students looking for summer internships than employers looking for fresh talent.
I am walking up the stairs to get to my OCI appointment. I overhear some interviewers from various firms talking to each other as I hold the door for them and their heavy bags of firm-branded crap.
One lady says to another, “Did you get a lot more applicants from UT this year?” Lady 2 says, “No, it was the usual number for us.” Lady 1 replies, “I had 200 applicants from UT alone for the 15 total spots we will fill this year.” Lady 2 says, “I think it’s gonna be a great year for employers!” They all laugh.
Yes, it’s the sweet sweet tears of law students that make employers strong and profitable. What could be funnier than that?
After the jump, our tipster has some advice for OCI season.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 4:06 PM - By Elie Mystal
Offer season (a.k.a. no offer season) is here in full force. The latest news comes from Baker Botts, and it appears that you didn’t have to be involved in a Texas scandal to get no-offered by the firm.
Multiple tipsters independently report that the offer rate at Baker Botts was between 50 to 55 percent firm-wide. The no offerees we spoke to felt the firm should have brought fewer people on for the summer if it was going to throw so many people back into the pool of 3L recruiting:
No offered. Man that sucked. Should have summered at a firm that wasn’t going to waste my time. At least I’m not alone.
But summers that received an offer understandably had a more positive take on the experience:
I got an offer, but I know a lot of people who didn’t. I suppose that is unfair, but I feel like we all knew that it was going to be a competitive summer and not everybody was going to make it.
Make it? Ask the class of 2009 whether getting an offer at the end of the summer bears any relation to actually having a full-time job upon graduation.
While Baker Botts made offers to about half of its summer class overall, the Baker Botts summers in the firm’s New York office were not nearly as lucky. Details after the jump.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 3:18 PM - By Kashmir Hill
The billable hour may be under attack, but for now, it still rules the lives of most lawyers slaving away in Biglaw offices around the country.
An ATL reader recently wrote to us and asked if we would do a survey of the health of associate hours this year. With the work slowdown, we imagine hours for 2009 are on track to be a bit lower than last year.
Most people have had their mid-year reviews. How are your hours looking? Is 1600 the new black? Are you trailing the pack?
Take our survey and obsessively compare your hours discuss after the jump.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 2:33 PM - By Elie Mystal
A month and a half ago, Morgan Lewis announced that it was canceling its 2010 summer program and moving away from lockstep compensation. At the time, some people criticized me for looking at a move away from lockstep compensation as tantamount to a salary cut.
A firm could move away from lockstep to give its associates a larger share of the profits they generate. Is that what Morgan Lewis is thinking?
Morgan Lewis is in the process of holding a series of meetings with associates in various offices. The goal is to let the associates know what the firm is planning to do with salaries starting January 1, 2010.
According to a firm spokesperson, these meetings are preliminary in nature:
As our Chair announced earlier this year, we have decided to move away from lockstep to a performance-based evaluation and compensation model. We are still in the process of developing the new model and are meeting with associates around the firm to solicit their input. We have not yet determined or announced any specific terms of the model, so any reports regarding compensation cuts at this point are pure speculation and false rumor.
Associates who have been in these meetings have a different take on what’s going on.
Now that the New York Times has covered it, it’s official: the recession has hit the legal profession.
Here’s more evidence. Yesterday afternoon, while walking along 53rd Street in Manhattan (between Broadway and Eighth), we came across The Man in a Van. Aaron Heideman, aka The Man in a Van, is traveling around the country, collecting stories of how people have been affected by the recession. Contributors write down their narratives on a giant poster (which, when unfurled, spans 50 yards). Selected stories are written on the van itself.
Here is one person’s story, from a former law clerk — someone who would usually have no trouble landing a job:
Two additional pictures — a larger shot of the banner, plus one of the van — after the jump.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 12:48 PM - By Elie Mystal
My wife and I live four blocks away from my mother. I have a little bit of experience balancing one’s mother and one’s wife and not getting crushed by a domestic pincer attack of disastrous consequences.
As any good husband-son will tell you, the best policy is to stay far, far away from any skirmishes between your wife and your mother. Never underestimate the power of “selective deafness.” My wife and my mother can be having a conversation right in front of me, and if I hear something that could lead to conflict, I can “un-hear” statements before they make it to my hippocampus. All I hear is “First-and-ten on the Dallas 40. Manning drops back … incomplete.”
Later I can agree with my wife’s interpretation and my mother’s interpretation with perfect honesty. What do I know? I wasn’t even there!
Of course, such familial gymnastics might not be possible if my wife were a public person. For instance, my mother-in-law lives thousands of miles away. I like that. On the public forum of this blog, all you’ll ever hear me say is “my mother-in-law is the bestest most awesomest person ever! It only took her a decade to learn how to pronounce my name!”
New York comedian Sunda Croonquist apparently doesn’t have my skill for tact. Her act, which has been featured on Comedy Central, apparently contains a number of jokes made at her mother-in-law’s expense.
Is she hoping to get a sitcom? Probably. But instead she’s earned a defamation lawsuit — filed by her mother-in-law.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 12:10 PM - By David Lat
We’ve written extensively in the past about law students and lawyers taking their clothes off for the camera. For whatever reason, most have been women. For example:
an associate from Thacher Proffitt (& Wood — hehe), who previously posed for Playboy;
a U. Miami law school graduate, who also posed for Playboy;
a UNC law student, who auditioned for Playboy’s pages; and
a Brooklyn law student, who appeared on Playboy TV.
But we are equal opportunity oglers here at Above the Law. We’re more than happy to write about naked male hotties (or clothed male hotties, at Davis Polk).
Meet “Jacob” (surely not his real name). He’s a male law student who has turned to performing in gay pornography to pay his tuition.
NOTE: We’ve included a screencap. It is safe for work, but it does include shots of a shirtless man, which some may find risqué. Accordingly, we’ve posted the image AFTER THE JUMP.
Do NOT click on the “Continue reading” link below unless you are prepared to see some skin. Thanks.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009 10:41 AM - By Elie Mystal
The ABA Journal is kicking off a series on legal rebels. It’s not an oxymoronic phrase; there are innovators and mavericks all throughout our risk averse profession. Here’s what the publication is looking for:
Over the next three months, the Journal will profile 50 of the profession’s leading innovators on www.LegalRebels.com, with at least three profiles added every week. Each profile will include multimedia features like video interviews, audio podcasts, photo slideshows and live chats.
[T]he recession is totally changing the practice of law, and the Legal Rebels project is documenting the individual lawyers who are leading the changes.
But you don’t have to be featured by the ABA Journal to be a legal rebel. Check out the rebel manifesto, after the jump.
Ed. note: We’ve already discussed the passing of Senator Ted Kennedy and the New York Times article about the state of the legal job market.
* Diversity among federal judges: low, but increasing. [Washington Post]
* Speaking of federal judges, the super-stylish Judge Preska just ordered the Federal Reserve to reveal emergency bank loan records. [Bloomberg]
* Chris Brown sentenced to five years probation and 180 days of community labor for assaulting Rihanna; evidence of prior domestic violence incidents emerges. [Los Angeles Times]
* If you show up to a Michigan trial court in a burqa, you may now be forced to remove it. [CNN]
* Some news from Pakistan: lawyers gone wild? [Am Law Daily]
Check out this article, wherein the New York Times tells you what you already knew. We’ve been covering these developments for weeks here at Above the Law.
To all the mainstream media reporters who complain about blogs repackaging their content without adequate attribution, we say: it looks recycling is a two-way street.
In fairness to the NYT, they’re writing for a general audience. Some of their readers might actually find it newsworthy that (1) legal employment is down during this recession, (2) people often have to go into debt to attend law school, and (3) some of these people are having a hard time finding jobs now.
Regular visitors to ATL will find the Times piece more boring than incorrect. But one paragraph was wildly off the mark.
Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) passed away shortly before midnight on Tuesday, while at home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts. He was 77. From CNN:
“We’ve lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever,” a family statement said. “We thank everyone who gave him care and support over this last year, and everyone who stood with him for so many years in his tireless march for progress toward justice.”
Kennedy, nicknamed “Ted,” was the younger brother of slain President John F. Kennedy and New York Sen. Robert Kennedy, who was gunned down while seeking the White House in 1968. However, his own presidential aspirations were hobbled by the controversy around a 1969 auto accident that left a young woman dead, and a 1980 primary challenge to then-President Jimmy Carter that ended in defeat.
Senator Kennedy was a lawyer. He graduated in 1959 from the University of Virginia School of Law (where he won a moot court competition), became a member of the Massachusetts bar, and served as an assistant district attorney in Suffolk County from 1961 to 1962. But he was more known for his long and distinguished political career than for his legal one.
Update: Over at True/Slant, Elie asks: “Could a 30 year old Edward Kennedy get elected to the Senate today? Would he have survived the scandals of his youth to become entrenched in the U.S. Senate?”
Meet Ken Basin. This legal prodigy, just 24 years old, is an associate at Greenberg Glusker, one of the top entertainment law firms in the country. Basin graduated last year from Harvard Law School, magna cum laude and with a Sears Prize, at the tender age of 23.
Basin isn’t just a handsome legal genius; he’s also a trivia ace. Back in 2003, he made it to the semifinals of College Jeopardy (which, incidentally, his girlfriend won back in 2000).
On Sunday, Basin was back in the hot seat. He made it all the way to the million-dollar question on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
So how did things turn out for Ken Basin? Did he join the ranks of lawyers who have won seven-figure sums on television — e.g., Victor and Tammy Jih, of Harvard Law School and the Amazing Race, and Yul Kwon, of Yale Law School and Survivor?
Tuesday, August 25, 2009 4:53 PM - By Kashmir Hill
We mentioned the ‘Skanks in NYC’ case in yesterday’s Morning Docket, and I’ve written about it extensively over at True/Slant.
To summarize: a blogger started a website called ‘Skanks in NYC’ in order to say nasty things about model Liskula Cohen. Cohen discovered the site containing just five posts, in which the blogger called Cohen a skank, a ho, and an old hag, among other nasty things, and posted photos of her.
Cohen decided she wanted to file a defamation suit against the anonymous blogger, so her lawyer subpoenaed Google — which hosted ‘Skanks in NYC’ at Blogger — to obtain the writer’s e-mail and IP address. The blogger’s lawyer fought the subpoena but lost. Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Joan Madden ordered Google to turn over the information. Google sent it along. Cohen filed her defamation suit outing her alleged defamer: Rosemary Port, a 29-year-old Fashion Institute of Technology student who was mad at Cohen for saying nasty things about her to Port’s boyfriend.
The press wrote lots of stories about the case and about Port, whose name the media obtained from court papers. Cohen then dropped her $3 million defamation suit, making it appear that this may have been a Cyberslapp: “a new form of lawsuit… threatening to overturn the promise of anonymous online speech and chill the freedom of expression that is central to the online world.”
Now Port wants to slap Google with a $15 million lawsuit, saying Google violated her First Amendment rights by complying with the court order. Her lawyer went so far as to compare ‘Skanks in NYC’ with the Federalist Papers. From the New York Daily News:
“I’m ready to take this all the way to the Supreme Court,” [Port’s lawyer, Salvatore] Strazzullo said. “Our Founding Fathers wrote ‘The Federalist Papers’ under pseudonyms. Inherent in the First Amendment is the right to speak anonymously. Shouldn’t that right extend to the new public square of the Internet?”
It’s been widely reported, but what are the actual merits of the suit against Google? We spoke with renowned privacy expert and George Washington Law professor Daniel Solove about the case and have an answer for you after the jump. While we had him on the phone, we also discussed how one becomes the foremost U.S. expert on privacy by age 37.
Let’s finish off the prestigious Vault 20. Here we have some firms on the rise, and some firms that are … not.
Here is the next batch of firms:
16. WilmerHale 17. Latham & Watkins 18. Arnold & Porter 19. Jones Day 20. White & Case
Okay, before we discuss Latham and White & Case, let’s give a good cheer for WilmerHale (up one spot from last year), Arnold & Porter (up two spots from last year), and Jones Day (up four spots from last year).
The Jones Day surge is particularly impressive. You’ll remember that the firm slammed its competitors earlier this month. But it seems like the firm is walking the walk as well as talking the talk.
I don’t speak Russian, so I have no idea what this commercial is about.
But it seems like it should be about what associates should do when the “firing partner” is making the rounds:
If a Russian speaker wants to translate for us in the comments, that would be great. But I’ll definitely be implementing some of these design ideas in the ATL office. (Gavel Bang: Justin Bernold)
Before the recession, this would have surprised me. Now, it seems relatively pedestrian. The Joplin Globe reports (via the ABA Journal):
BAXTER SPRINGS, Kan. — Lawyers Chris Meek and Nathan Coleman are taking it on the road. They have turned a 2002 Volkswagen Rialta into a mobile law office.
“It’s a convenience factor for our clients,” Coleman said of the recreational vehicle, sometimes called a Winnebago Rialta.
If an ambulance leaves Manhattan, KS, traveling at 75 mph, and a mobile law office leaves Baxter Springs, KS, traveling at 50 mph, at what point do the two vehicles collide and open a portal to another dimension heralding the apocalypse?
The Connecticut Employment Law Blog reports on the kind of plaintiff that gives other plaintiffs a bad name:
In the middle of trial, a plaintiff (who is claiming his employment was terminated, among other reasons, in retaliation of his exercise of FMLA rights) drops a bombshell:
“[In the prior October], I learned that I had — have stage III prostate cancer with a metastatic brain lesion.”
What kind of client just blurts out “metastatic brain lesion” in open court? What kind of counsel allows that to happen?
Not surprisingly, defense counsel moved for a mistrial. The judge called a hearing, and then the idiot plaintiff had something else to say:
During the hearing, however, there’s another another unexpected development: The medical records show that the employee did not have (and never had) a metastatic brain lesion.
The plaintiff knew he didn’t have a brain lesion — though it seems self evident that something upstairs is not working properly in this guy’s head.
Is this a situation that demands more than a mistrial?
Will the mainstream media ever hold law firms accountable for their roles in the global financial crisis? Probably not. Relatively speaking, only a small sector of society understands that Biglaw firms played a significant role making “toxic assets” lucrative and legal. Without attorneys, bankers wouldn’t know their tranches from their enhancements.
Too few people can get their head around what actually happened to cause the market crisis. But the public — the average American citizen — can wrap its mind around the concept of bonuses. I think it goes something like this:
Bonuses, BAD. Wall Street, BAD. Pitchforks and Torches, GOOD.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009 12:06 PM - By Elie Mystal
Do you want to purchase a discount legal education, but you don’t know where to look? A new list from the National Jurist will point you in the right direction. Tax Prof Blog reproduces the list of which law schools give you the most bang for your buck. Here are the top 15:
How do you come up with a list that ranks N. Carolina Central the best at anything? Check out the methodology after the jump.
The atrium on the 25th floor of Hogan’s offices at 875 Third Ave. will be transformed into Mr. Big’s on-screen office, according to an internal memo that found its way to our in-box. (We have no idea what Mr. Big does for a living, but we know he’s played by the dreamy Chris Noth.)
Lowe, we’re flattered you’ve adopted the royal ATL “we.” We’re not sure what Big does for a living either, but we know he’s not a lawyer, which is perhaps why he has an atrium-sized office.
The Sex and the City crew will be at Hogan’s office on Sept. 2, but an internal memo — which we invite tipsters to send for posting — indicates that friends, family, and random Chris Noth-stalkers shouldn’t try to drop in. We wonder if they would make an exception for Justice Scalia, who may or may not be a SATC fan.
The internal memo says that Hogan employees might get to meet the stars and might get autographs, but it’s not guaranteed. And the memo reminds partners that on the day of the filming, their star wattage will be dimmed:
A few partners will also have to clean up their offices “so your boxes are not in the movie!” the memo says.
We talked to Hogan managing partner Warren Gorrell. He says he works on the 24th floor. “I’m not one of the partners with a messy office,” he told us. Gorrell’s take on Hogan’s Sex and the City 2 star turn, after the jump.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009 10:12 AM - By Elie Mystal
Do you remember the class of 2009? You know, the kids who should be gearing up to start work in a couple of weeks but are instead sitting around, waiting to get out of purgatory? Don’t look now, but a couple of firms have decided to extend the deferral period for these people, and that can’t be a good thing.
Proskauer Rose’s New York office kicked off the round of deferment extensions last week. A tipster from Proskauer in Los Angeles reported the news:
Proskauer just told incoming L.A. associates that [incoming associates] in New York are getting their start dates pushed back again. It’s all the way back to November now. They told us [in L.A.] before they told New York because they didn’t want us to “hear it on Above the Law first.” [Sheesh.]
The letters have now gone out to all the incoming New York associates informing them of the news. The new start date is November 2, 2010.
Proskauer had already pushed back the class of 2009 to March 2010. But Proskauer has also told the class of 2010 that the earliest they will be able to start is “fall” 2010.
So can we assume that rising 2Ls considering interviewing with Proskauer won’t be able to start until late 2012? For that matter, are incoming Proskauer associates confident that they will ever be able to start at the firm? We reached out to Proskauer, but the firm did not respond to our request for comment.
After the jump, Mintz Levin joins the deferment extension party.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009 9:30 AM - By Kashmir Hill
* A disappointing ruling from the 3rd Circuit for sports gamblers in Delaware. [USA Today]
* L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich wants to make hanging out illegal. [Los Angeles Times]
* Judge Jed Rakoff is becoming a media darling. Another article singing the BofA-bench-slapping judge’s praises. [New York Times]
* Foley & Lardner sued for allegedly revealing trade secrets. [National Law Journal]
* Connecticut prosecutor John H. Durham has been chosen to lead the Justice Department’s investigation into CIA torture of detainees. [Talking Points Memo]
Even though we are moving out of the Vault top ten, we are still firmly in the land of law firms that everybody recognizes.
To refresh your memory, here is the next batch of firms on the Vault list:
11. Williams & Connolly 12. Debevoise & Plimpton 13. Paul Weiss 14. Gibson Dunn 15. Sidley Austin
Williams & Connolly was crowned the safest firm by Above the Law readers in March. And so far, the firm has worn its crown with grace and style. No layoffs to report at this small dynamo. It’s something to consider during this recruiting season.
* Is Bernie Madoff about the try the Lockerbie terrorist defense? Does he have friends in oil rich countries that we don’t know about. [Dealbreaker]
* You can’t get rid of the LSAT until you come up with something better to replace it. I nominate tying up prospective law students and throwing them into a body of water of some kind. If they sink, we’ll know they have what it takes to depress the salaries of lawyers already in the system. [Miller-McCune]
* Now I know why the British left their islands to conquer the world. They were just in search of a little bit of sunlight. [Pink Tape via Blawg Review]
Are you a laid-off lawyer who has been spending way too much time on Facebook? Here’s a way to turn that “résumé gap” into job experience:
Director of Social Media
Medium-sized Atlanta law firm seeks candidates interested in a part-time or full-time social media position. The primary responsibility of the Social Media Director will be to actively promote our growing law firm using a variety of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and our existing web-site. Projects include: managing the firm’s Twitter, Facebook and web-site account, research current and relevant legal stories in the news and republish to social networks and firm web-site on a daily basis, communicate through social web-sites about all specific practice groups and their developments, update marketing team on a weekly basis with web-site content.
Managing a professional presence on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites felt like a full-time job to me. But I didn’t know you could draw a salary for it.
So what are the qualifications for this position — and, more importantly, the salary?
When Justice Sonia Sotomayor needs to stock up on her beloved rice, beans and pork, where does she go? One might peg the Supreme Court’s newest member — a liberal, a lawyer, a Greenwich Village resident — as a typical Whole Foods customer.
But perhaps Justice Sotomayor, in a show of support to the president who appointed her to the Supreme Court, is participating in the Whole Foods boycott? Her Honor was spotted shopping for groceries last Thursday at Whole Foods archrival Trader Joe’s, in the Foggy Bottom section of Washington, DC.
The Sotomayor sighting was noted briefly in the Washington Post. But an ATL tipster, who actually met and chatted with Justice Sotomayor at Trader Joe’s, has more details.
Skadden has decided to significantly reduce the size of its summer class for 2010. In a charming move, the firm told the media before informing law schools and prospective summer associates. Am Law Daily reports:
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is cutting the size of its 2010 summer associate class by half and adjusting its recruitment strategy by making all of its offers on a single day in late September, according to a copy of a letter the firm will send to prospective summers.
Skadden hired 225 summer associates this year and expects to hire a little more than 100 next year, though the precise figure will depend on offer acceptance rates, says Howard Ellin, Skadden’s recruiting partner.
Good news from the letter: the firm plans to make offers to 95 percent of its 2009 summer associates. Of course, as we previously reported, they won’t be starting at the firm until 2011.
We’ll let you know when Skadden officially releases the memo to the people who are affected by the decision.
Correction: From a Skadden spokesperson:
The letter was sent last week to career services and deans at the law schools where Skadden is interviewing. Some schools already have circulated it to their students. We absolutely did not talk to the media before notifying schools.
By way of explanation, your ATL editors were thrown off by the wording of the Am Law report, which described the letter as one that “the firm will send to prospective summers” (emphasis added).
Update (4:15): After this post went was published, Thomson Reuters reversed course and reinstated the free printer access to Puerto Rican law schools. Click here for our coverage.
Thomson Reuters owns Westlaw and is one of the two major gatekeepers to legal research in the modern world. Recently, the company made an economic decision that some claim unfairly impacts law students in Puerto Rico. A tipster reports:
It seems Westlaw has decided to cut their free printer service to the four Puerto Rico Law schools for economic reasons, while keeping the service in all US law schools.
Why would Westlaw only discontinue free printer access to Puerto Rican law students? One Westlaw user wrote to Thompson Reuters, asking the company to reconsider its decision. But he also seems to have figured out why Westlaw made this decision.
Is there really blood in the water around the billable hour? Or are we simply hearing an updated version of a familiar refrain? This morning the Wall Street Journal took another look at killing the billable hour (subscription):
People who follow the world of law firms know, among so much else, two things: 1) that billing-by-the-hour has long been the way law firms get paid and 2) companies have over the years had only limited success in getting firms to agree to do it any other way.
That’s changing. In a big way. Companies are starting to ditch the hourly structure — which critics complain offers law firms an incentive to rack up bigger bills — in favor of flat-fee contracts and other types of arrangements.
Of course, we’ve heard all that before. Heralding the death of the billable hour is much like predicting the end of the world: eventually somebody is going to be right.
Has anything fundamentally changed this time around to make the billable hour more susceptible to death? Here’s the best argument.
The Vault survey rankings may have created buzz last week, but we’re going to kick off the buzz this week by unveiling our first annual review of the summer associate experience at the major law firms. With information based on surveys conducted by Lateral Link and tips we’ve gathered at ATL, the summer program snapshots give you an insiders perspective on each firm. So if you are heading into OCI and want the scoop on what 2009 summer associate class felt about their experience, check out the ATL Career Center, powered by Lateral Link.
The Summer Associate Program review is located within each firm snapshot. Surf over there to find out:
Which firm received high marks for being “open and honest” with summer associates “at every juncture of the law firm strategy in this economic climate?” Click here.
Which firm gives summers an $85 dinner budget and does a two day retreat for all summers at Catalina Island? Click here.
Which firm’s summers report that the firm is “fantastic” when it comes to summer salaries and offers “job security” that is hard to find elsewhere? Click here.
Which firm had summer associates go head to head in a “Roc the Guac” guacamole-cooking contest? Click here.
Yolanda Young is back with a vengeance, and an amended complaint against Covington & Burling.
The brief synopsis on Young is that she was a Covington & Burling staff attorney who sued the firm for racial discrimination. Covington has denied the charges at every point. The firm briefly got the suit tossed, but it was reinstated.
Young’s basic allegations remain the same:
Through its pattern and practice, Defendant, Covington & Burling LLP, systematically relegates its black attorneys to its lowest rung of practicing attorneys — the position of staff attorney. Firm policy bans the promotion of staff attorneys to the position of associate and, ultimately, to partner. This prohibition adversely impacts Defendant’s black attorneys by consigning the majority to earning less money, performing less challenging work, and enjoying less opportunity for professional growth than Defendant’s nonblack attorneys.
This time around, Young argues that black staff attorneys at Covington are more qualified than their white colleagues:
Young points out that while Covington uses a combination of law school grades, journal membership, and clerkship experience to determine the assignment of its attorneys, many of their partners — who decide how an attorney should be assigned — lack such credentials, but presumably are able to perform adequately at partner-level.
Young also asserts that black practicing attorneys, as a group, typically graduated from higher ranked law schools than their white colleagues and that, more often than their white counterparts, black staff attorneys attended law schools from which Covington’s partners, counsel, and associates graduated.
I think I know what is going on here. See, this is a revenge fantasy lawsuit. And Covington has been typecast in the role of Major King Kong.
After the jump, Young brings charts to back up her claims, and announces her full intentions exclusively to Above the Law.
[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.]
It seems so good, doesn’t it? According to the lead of a recent AP story, "The unemployment rate fell in 17 states and the District of Columbia last month, a positive sign even as the pain of joblessness remains widespread."
Don’t believe the hype. Even lawyers can subtract when it’s only double-digit numbers. Are we not supposed to notice that that must mean the unemployment rate increased, or at best was flat, in more than 30 states? In fact, it was up in 36 states and territories, more than twice as many as it was down in, but the AP is just drunk on White House Kool-Aid apparently, how else to explain that spin?
Other outlets aren’t so optimistic (or bedazzled, depending on your level of cynicism). Initial jobless claims were actually higher than expected for the week, at 576,000, and the overall unemployment rate was flat at about 9.4% (we touched briefly last week on why that number is particularly misleading right now). That rate is still expected to hit the psychologically-dreadful 10% level by early next year. Still, the S&P 500 had a nice little run for the week, finishing up about 40 points.
Law-firm news wasn’t terrible this week, although the "week without a layoff" streak ended at one. Details after the jump.
* A Michigan attorney has filed an age discrimination lawsuit against the University of Iowa College of Law, claiming that the school wouldn’t put him on faculty because he’s the ripe old age of 56. [Chicago Tribune]
* The Justice Department may prosecute CIA employees for torturing detainees. [New York Times]
* Child molester hatched a bizarre $3 million defamation suit against his victim. And won, but only for one day. [Washington Post]
* As we’ve noted before, prospective law students tell Kaplan the economy is motivating them to head to law school. Obviously, they haven’t done their due diligence here at Above The Law. [Oregon Daily Emerald]
Ed. note: As previously mentioned, LEWW is on vacation this week. Regular weekly posting will resume with a double issue on Friday, August 28.
Today we ask readers to choose the most impressive lawyer newlyweds of the past two months. Early summer traditionally represents the height of the wedding season, and this year’s June and July couples have not disappointed. Below the fold, you’ll find two SCOTUS clerks, a Harvard JD/MD, the GC of a major corporation, a Google millionaire, and two managing editors of the Harvard Law Review, plus the typical amount of prestigious Biglaw employment.
Click on the link below to review our prior write-ups of the Couple of the Week winners and vote for your favorites. (And remember: The two lucky couples who are selected will be eligible for Couple of the Year consideration.)
Last week, Above the Law was dominated by the Vault rankings. But we still had time to expose scandal and poke a little fun. This week’s top three stories:
Vault Rankings:
The list which all prestige-based conversations will have to reckon with was released this week. Vault is so exciting that we even published an incomplete list earlier in the week to whet people’s appetite.
The big news from the rankings has been that Weil Gotshal surged to #6, while Latham & Watkins fell ten sports to #17.
We’ve also started our open threads to allows attorneys and law students to discuss the firms on the list. Click here and here for our first two open threads.
Trial Lawyers for Justice:
Not every lawyer is obsessed with prestige of course. Some are just concerned about family. Really concerned. Check here for a law firm’s strange request that new applicants submit a family photo with their application. Here, the firm’s managing partner defends the request.
Moritz College of Law Scandal
This week, Above the Law was able to expose a scandal at the Moritz College of Law at The Ohio State University. It appears that the school’s Student Bar Association President embezzled student funds for private use. Now, he might not be able to get his diploma. Check out our full coverage here.
Ok Partner, I will bust my butt for you, I will sacrifice my physical and mental well-being, and I will not complain. And in return, you will mentor me, show me the ropes, introduce me to clients, help develop my business, and reward me with a partnership down the road if I do all you ask of me. You know, the same deal that YOU had when you were an associate. Wait, you won’t do that? You have no interest in mentoring, teaching, or grooming me as a future partner?
Well then, you can suck it. I will continue to care about my “work-life balance,” collect a paycheck for a few years, and then get out of here while I’m still young and marketable.
This week, a number of recent summer associates have asked us to take off the rose-colored glasses. On Monday, we reported that Paul Hastings would have a 75% offer rate, leaving a quarter of its summers with no offers.
We’re now getting reports of no offers at other firms. Two examples are after the jump. But tell us what you are hearing in the comments or send it into tips@abovethelaw.com.
We have an update on former Lawyer of the Day and Sonnenschein San Francisco partner Paul Glad. Glad was sued earlier this year by a Girl Scout and her mother after running into them with his Lexus.
According to the San Mateo County Times, [Glad] 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?
* Maybe this dude thought that displaying the mental aptitude of child would make it okay for him to look at pictures of naked children. He was wrong. [Roll On Friday]
* Facebook — good for cheaters and divorce attorneys. [Long Island Press]
* If you want to shoot at beautiful wild animals for “sport,” there’s a lawyer willing to help you. [Legal Blog Watch]
* Maryland’s chief Public Defender might want to get an employment lawyer. [Underdog]
* Are “wimpy local counsels” out for themselves more than their clients? [What About Paris?]
* If you take away the color of her skin, is Sonia Sotomayor still “diverse”? [Blackbook Legal]
Sure, firms can try to dump their bad news on a summer Friday, but Above the Law is open 24/7.
Today, emails started going around to rising 2Ls who were seeking interviews with Loeb & Loeb’s New York office. They were not happy emails:
Thank you for your letter and resume inquiring about the possibility of employment at our firm.
In moving forward with our hiring efforts for the coming season and for the future, we have given a great deal of thought to the needs of the partners and associates in servicing our clients. In reviewing our client base and the matters that we are handling, we have come to the conclusion that in order to provide the level of sophistication and complexity required to service these clients, it will be necessary for us to recruit at a more senior level. We have reexamined our hiring efforts, and, in so doing, have determined to suspend the New York summer associate program for the foreseeable future. We intend to focus our hiring efforts on identifying associates with those levels of experience and practice specialties that will best enable us to meet the challenges of servicing our clients. If at any future time we feel that our needs and those of our clients would best be served by having a summer associate program, we will reinstate the program.
We very much appreciate your interest in Loeb & Loeb LLP and wish you every success in finding a satisfactory position.
Wow. That doesn’t even sound like the firm has decided to temporarily ratchet back recruiting because of the recession. “If at any future time we feel that our needs and those of our clients would best be served by having a summer associate program, we will reinstate the program,” sounds a lot more like the firm’s New York office has decided to totally dispense with the notion of hiring summers, indefinitely.
Is this a small glimpse of the future? The class of 2012 better hope not.
A former University of Louisville student and contract employee was apprehended by University of Louisville Police Friday morning after a law library staff member recognized that he was barred from campus.
According to police, Thomas H. Irwin entered the law library at about 8:30 a.m. with two handguns and ammunition. A library employee called U of L Police, who escorted Irwin from the premises without incident.
According to an email sent to the student body, the former University of Louisville student “had been declared persona non grata by the university in December 2008.”
Way to watch over your library like a hawk, not a cardinal, unknown super-staffer. We gotta get you into the TSA.
There are opportunities in England for those willing to brave the frigid waters of the North Atlantic. This week’s Job of the Week, brought to you by Lateral Link, indicates a bit of recovery in the international markets. Although candidates for this position cannot have been laid off, we are currently working with a number of corporate in-house clients, both domestically and internationally, who are considering applicants who have been deferred or subject to a reduction in force. Email bridgeyear@laterallink.com for more information. Now, to the position…
Position: Mid - Senior Corporate Associate
Location: London, UK
Description: The London office of a top US firm is seeking a mid to senior level UK-qualified corporate associate. Candidates should have 2-6 years’ corporate transactional experience with a top-level US or Magic Circle firm in London and must be currently employed with a top firm or investment bank. Must be UK-qualified. The firm is an international powerhouse, and is busy with high level public and private M&A transactions from the addition of a partner from another well known international firm.
For more information on this position or to apply, please see position 5244 on Lateral Link, or contact Justin Flowers at jflowers@laterallink.com / 646.257.4886. Membership in Lateral Link is free and you can apply at www.laterallink.com.
In a world where there are already too many law degrees flooding the market and allowing firms to handle their associates like fungible assets, the new law school at UC Irvine continues to rake in positive press. We’ve previously noted that the new law school is already one of the most selective in the country. Today, the L.A. Times positively gushes about the new public law school:
In a challenging fundraising climate, the first new public law school in California in more than a generation begins classes Monday at UC Irvine with 61 top-flight students, a highly regarded faculty and the goal of becoming a model for an innovative legal education emphasizing hands-on experience and public service.
It appears prestige isn’t just conferred by a magazine.
Brian Leiter, a University of Chicago law professor and author of an influential blog on legal education, said that, based on the quality of its faculty and the entrance exam scores of its first class, UCI should be ranked among the nation’s top 20 law schools, status that typically takes a new school decades to achieve.
“It’s quite unusual. But this is an unusual situation,” Leiter said. “This is the University of California, after all, which is a big selling point. They’ve recruited the right kind of people from the right kind of places. And the fact that someone of Erwin [Chemerinsky]’s stature is the dean obviously helps.”
The school touts a commitment to public service that you don’t often hear from law schools. It also touts free tuition, which sounds like the Gods are having an orgasm to law students hoping to keep their debts under control.
After the jump we ask if UCI Law can keep it up. And an update on potential future tuition decisions.
One University of San Diego Law School student isn’t worrying about deferrals. He’s worrying about defense strategies. From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
A 30-year-old Marine Corps captain will face a court- martial Feb. 8 on rape and other charges involving three University of San Diego students in April 2007, a judge ruled today.
At the time of the alleged crimes, Capt. Douglas S. Wacker was on unpaid leave from the military to pursue a law degree at the university and on a spring break trip to New Orleans with the three alleged victims.
So not a very fun spring break trip for those San Diego law students.
According to the Union-Tribune, the New Orleans D.A. and a USD administrative board both looked into the allegations and decided not to pursue them, even though — according to one USD student — Wacker’s a “creeper”:
This guy was a 3L last year and was on the moot court board. A lot of people thought he was a real creeper.
Wacker may well be a creeper, but whether he’s a rapist is yet to be determined. The University of San Diego won’t be giving him a degree until that’s sorted out though. The University’s message to students AND an update — analysis from a lawyer and former Marine as to Wacker’s fate — after the jump.
We’ve previously reported on the hiring of Supreme Court law clerks for October Term 2009. Their names appear here (everyone but Justice Sotomayor’s clerks) and here (Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s clerks).
As we mentioned, we weren’t 100 percent certain on the Sotomayor clerks. Happily, as it turns out, our intelligence was correct. Thanks to everyone who shared information with us; we can’t accurately track Supreme Court clerk hiring without your help.
The Public Information Office of the Supreme Court has released the official list of October Term 2009 law clerks, and it matches up with what we’ve reported in these pages. For a copy of the official list, click here to download (as a Word document). (Note that it doesn’t include law school and prior clerkship information, which usually comes in a second, more detailed list.)
Not counting the law clerks’ middle initials, the official list doesn’t contain much information that hasn’t already appeared on ATL — with one exception. We now know that retired Justice David H. Souter’s clerk will be Thomas Pulham, formerly of the D.C. office of Jenner & Block (which has sent a number of its associates into SCOTUS clerkships).
Based on the official list, we’ve made some small tweaks to our list (e.g., changed some maiden names to married names). Check out the final list, a mash-up of the official list with the law school and prior clerkship information that we’ve gathered on our own, after the jump.
I have been invited to a poker party a junior partner’s house. I am very good at poker, and I assume the partner is not as good as I. Should I play to win so I look impressive and intelligent? Or should I throw the game, so I don’t look uppity or risk offending the partner’s ego?
Sir Gaga
Dear Sir Gaga,
A junior partner who invites an associate to poker at his place is the sort of person who lives in a Scarsdale McMansion decorated in fauxTuscany-style, sits around the poker table and yells for his Juicy Couture velour sweatsuit-clad wife to quit yapping on the phone and deliver the goddamn Doritos and Lipton Onion Dip to the guests, chomps on cigars while talking about Per Se, Vegas, and golf, swills Johnny Walker Black from his Wiliams-Sonoma highball glass which was the one item he lobbied hard for on the wedding registry, mentions his humidor, claims his bachelor party was the best one he had ever been to, has a Golden Retriever named Phoenix, says “work hard, play hard” is his personal motto, indiscreetly bangs two associates on the side, once snorted coke off a hooker in Amsterdam, sends purposely nonresponsive emails to a dweeb first year just to be a bully, DVRs SportsCenter, wears French cuffs to partner meetings, plays X-Box and ignores his wife while guzzling Coke from a 7-11 Slurpee cup, farts and doesn’t apologize, wears Prada loafers without socks on the weekend, drives a Jeep Grand Cherokee for alleged “off-roading” that no one has ever seen him do, “lives for the deal” but hates his life, so you should feel free to roll up this partner’s plywood palace with your Full Tilt hoodie, hologram sunglasses and Marlboro Miles visor and take this chump for everything he’s got.
* Terminally ill Lockerbie Bomber was released from a Scottish prison yesterday, on grounds of compassion. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton aren’t feeling it. [CNN]
* Attorneys at the Office of Special Investigations begin to prosecute a new generation of war criminals. [Washington Post]
* I suppose that I should know the answer to this question, but is your school accredited…? [Courthouse News]
* “Obviously, any witnesses you can eliminate is a good thing.” New York Special Assistant Attorney General prosecuted for (ahem) tampering with witnesses. [Bloomberg]
* Are you ready for some football? All my rowdy friends will be at an emergency injunction hearing in Delaware, Monday Night! [The Legal Intelligencer]
Weil’s strong move up the Vault charts — the firm was ranked #9 last year — shows the power of high profile work. The Lehman bankruptcy and the General Motors restructuring were just two of the many recognizable matters Weil has had its hands on in the past 12 months.
But Weil also seems to have timed the Vault rankings quite well. The firm didn’t start deferring incoming first years until March, didn’t start laying off staff until May, and didn’t start laying off associates closing offices until the end of June.
Regardless of whether or not those moves catch up with Weil next year, right now is Weil’s time to shine in the warm recruiting light of sixth place. Congrats.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 5:40 PM - By Above the Law
If you’ll be in New York on Monday, August 24, you might be interested in this event, brought to you by Above the Law and our friends at Applied Discovery:
SPACE IS LIMITED. To request an invitation, please email InviteRequest@breakingmedia.com. Please include your name, employer, and job title in your response. If we can accommodate you, we will send you a confirmation by email.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 5:12 PM - By Elie Mystal
* Would the Mad Men working environment be illegal today? [Miss Trials]
* There are so many ways for the current administration to help students tackle their debt that one of them will eventually catch on. [The Stimulist]
* We’re getting to the point in the recession where tips for laid off lawyers need to include instructions on how to build your own shanty and strategy tips for Madden 2010. [New York Personal Injury Law Blog]
* I think Harriet Miers could do more good on Facebook than arguing in front of the Supreme Court. Look how well it is working out for Sarah Palin. [BLT: The Blog of the Legal Times]
* Maybe email isn’t safe for attorney-client communication. From now on, all client contact should be done in person. Let’s see how important that 4:30 p.m. Friday email is now. [Legal Blog Watch]
We’ve written before about Hal Turner, the infamous internet radio host who has been charged with threatening three federal judges. This week brings new information about him, from Wired:
A notorious New Jersey hate blogger charged in June with threatening to kill judges and lawmakers was secretly an FBI “agent provocateur” paid to disseminate right-wing rhetoric, his attorney said Wednesday.
Hal Turner, the blogger and radio personality, remains jailed pending charges over his recent online rants, which prosecutors claim amounted to an invitation for someone to kill Connecticut lawmakers and Chicago federal appeals court judges.
But behind the scenes the reformed white supremacist was holding clandestine meetings with FBI agents who taught him how to spew hate “without crossing the line,” according to his lawyer, Michael Orozco.
Unfortunately for him, Turner can’t blame the FBI for the comments that got him in trouble with the law. His claimed involvement with the Bureau ended in 2007, and his alleged threats against the Seventh Circuit judges were made in 2009.
More discussion about Turner’s case — plus comment from one of the threatened jurists, Judge Richard Posner — after the jump.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 3:46 PM - By Kashmir Hill
If you side with those who think baby-making is a good option these days, you’ll read this post with special interest. The Bulldogs have named the top ten pup-friendly Biglaw firms.
Here are the best firms for the family-minded according to the Yale Law Women:
Arnold & Porter
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton
Covington & Burling
Jenner & Block
Katten Muchin Rosenman
Mayer Brown
Munger, Tolles & Olson
Patton Boggs
Sidley Austin
WilmerHale
Despite last week’s welcome reprieve from Biglaw layoffs, it looks like some firms didn’t get the memo. Above the Law has learned that Curtis Mallet conducted layoffs early this week. We believe that 10% - 15% of its corporate associates have been let go. Multiple class years were affected, but it appears that first years were spared.
Curtis Mallet would not respond to our multiple requests for comment
Perhaps the firm is embarrassed to be laying off associates on the heels of last year’s strong profit numbers. In February, Am Law Daily reported:
Bucking the trend among New York law firms, Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle reports a 13.5 percent surge in revenue to $125 million. Curtis Mallet has chosen the worst business year in memory to cross the million-dollar profits per equity partner mark, with PPP up 11 percent to $1 million. Revenue per lawyer for the firm’s 225 lawyers, scattered among 14 offices worldwide, nudged up 3.5 percent to $570,000….
Firm chairman George Kahale, who was profiled in The American Lawyer last year, says that Curtis Mallet has the right mix of groups for the current economic climate.
So you see, laid off associates should be proud that they helped the partners make a million dollars before being shown the door.
After the jump, we learn that the work of soon-to-be-former Curtis Mallet associates is not quite done.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 2:11 PM - By Kashmir Hill
A California defense attorney has earned a spot in the ATL Lawyer of the Day hall of fame. Michael Lukehart didn’t let a weak heart stop him from defending his client. From KERO-TV:
Lukehart said he woke up at 5 a.m. on Monday with massive chest pains.
A normal non-ATL-Lawyer-of-the-Day would head to the hospital at that point. But not Lukehart.
Even though he knew something was seriously wrong, he said he was in denial. So instead of going to the hospital, Lukehart said he went to the courthouse to deliver his closing arguments on a case he was on.
Michael Lukehart’s website says he’s “passionately committed to your defense. When you hire Michael Lukehart, you hire a fearless warrior who is passionately committed to you and your case.”
In the case of Lukehart, that’s not hyperbole. Massive chest pains are no obstacle for this legal warrior. So when he finally went to the hospital, what was the diagnosis?
Thursday, August 20, 2009 1:10 PM - By Elie Mystal
Above the Law has learned that officials at Ohio State University’s Moritz College of Law are investigating the actions of the school’s 2008-2009 Student Bar Association President. As we understand it, the investigation remains internal and has not resulted in any law enforcement action; accordingly, we will not be printing the student’s name.
Word around campus is that the former SBA president is being investigated for allegedly misappropriating student funds. A tipster reports the details this way:
[The former SBA President] is now under investigation by the administration for embezzling thousands of dollars from the University. [He] reportedly used this money to fund trips around the country, including a spring break booze-fueled extravaganza — having told the administration that the funds would be used to attend a “conference.”
Our sources report that university investigators have already contacted and questioned members of the Moritz class of 2009 who know the former president. We also understand that his boyfriend, an undergraduate at OSU, has been questioned.
Throughout the year, IPC plans or co-plans a variety of social, professional outreach, and community services events, including professional skills workshops, multi-cultural dinners at area restaurants, and food drives for the Mid-Ohio Food Bank.
We believe that the total amount of money at issue is in the neighborhood of $3,600. As one student put it, the IPC “doesn’t do much for students anyway.”
The law school’s response and more details, after the jump.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 12:08 PM - By Elie Mystal
Can you imagine rolling on your parents in an attempt to get out of a drug conviction? What if your parents were both attorneys? According to the Boston Globe, one kid attempted to throw his cool sounding parents right under the bus:
Two prominent attorneys are under police scrutiny after their son, arrested on charges he was dealing marijuana from home, told investigators his parents knew what he was doing. Police found a small smoking pipe, scale and baggies in their bedroom.
Jonathon Cook, 20, said his stepfather, Suffolk University law professor Timothy Wilton, helped him build a place to grow marijuana in exchange for some of the profits and also smoked it in the house, according to a police report.
He said that his mother, Kathy Jo Cook — the former president of the Women’s Bar Association of Massachusetts — also knew about the drug activity and frequently complained that her husband’s smoking left the house smelling like marijuana, authorities said.
Let me get this straight. Instead of beating you like a red-headed step child your stepdad actually helps you grow weed. Your mom isn’t happy about it but allows it to continue. And you — snot-nosed 20-year-old asshole that you are — rat them out for it? What kind of world are we living in?
His parents deny all of the allegations.
It is of course entirely possible that Jonathon Cook simply made this all up, which makes him a bad son and a terrible liar.
A female associate at a large law firm recently sent us a message along these lines (we’ve tweaked and paraphrased her original email in places):
In these tough economic times, people are (1) having trouble finding jobs as they come out of law school, (2) recently laid-off, or (3) miserable in the jobs they still have, given how low morale is and how many hours they’re expected to work now (given the “be grateful for your job” mentality).
People in such situations are often unable to make a change, given how few jobs there are out there and how much competition there is for them. But they’re scared to just up and quit, because very few employers would actually buy that they had resigned and not been fired.
What’s a girl to do? Make babies. That’s what.
Making the case for making babies, after the jump.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 10:02 AM - By Elie Mystal
Yesterday we told you about the firm Trial Lawyers For Justice asking job applicants to send in some non-standard information. Among other things, the firm asked potential employees to send in a family photograph.
We asked Nick Rowley — who wrote the ad asking for applicants to send in their personal story and political beliefs along with their picture — to explain how these factors affect his decision making process for new hires.
He furnished Above the Law with a full response. We’re publishing it full after the jump. Let Mr. Rowley know if you agree with his reasons in the comments.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 9:10 AM - By Kashmir Hill
* Texas judge Sharon Keller (a.k.a. Sharon ‘Killer’) faces possible removal from office for denying a death sentence appeal because she needed to go home early. She has testified though that she would not do anything differently if faced again with a similar situation. That must have been a life-or-death repair job. [New American]
* Eleven lucky Brown Rudnick first year associates have been un-deferred. [National Law Journal]
* Paris Hilton wins her suit. Judge disses her movie. [Popeater]
* UPS got a special delivery yesterday: a $100 million lawsuit for not paying overtime. [Associated Press]
* Unspam Technologies has filed a lawsuit to find out which banks are vulnerable to hackers. [New York Times]
* Doctors in Oklahoma no longer have to administer an ultrasound before an abortion. [Washington Post]
1. Wachtell 2. Cravath 3. Skadden 4. Sullivan & Cromwell 5. Davis Polk
As we noted yesterday, the only change in the top five is Skadden jumping over S&C. Is that fair? A lot of you opined that Skadden’s prestige score was settled before it starting deferring associates. But surprisingly few of you noted that Skadden paid out bonuses that were double what Cravath, S&C, and DPW paid.
Is twice as much bonus money worth one extra spot in the rankings? Vault’s managing editor, Brian Dalton, suggests that Skadden’s bonus carried some weight:
Skadden had a good year, climbing over Sullivan & Cromwell to take the #3 spot. Among other factors, the notion of ‘half-Skadden’ is a potent one, though not quite enough to carry the firm past Cravath. (Mildly ironic in that Cravath’s bonus decision spawned that meme.)
Truly striking is the reach of the Skadden brand: Third in the Boston regional ranking, second in Chicago, and—taking over from Latham—No. 1 in Northern and Southern California. (Vault’s regional rankings are calculated using only the votes of the survey respondents in the particular region.) By contrast, in its hometown of New York City, Skadden places fifth. (These regional rankings are coming soon to the site.)
After the jump, should any of these firms in the top five move over to make room for somebody else?
Wednesday, August 19, 2009 5:45 PM - By Elie Mystal
* I wonder if Harvard understands that when it does things like open up its own disgustingly preppy clothing line, it makes it far more likely that random strangers will throw unpleasant inanimate objects at me and my friends? [The Faculty Lounge]
* Is Biglaw turning into Bifurcated law? [Ideoblog]
* They’ll be teaching the Bible in public schools in Texas this fall. That sound you just heard was the Devil celebrating another victory over the forces of religious tolerance. [Quiz Law]
Wednesday, August 19, 2009 4:48 PM - By Elie Mystal
When a group of Facebook users sue Facebook for invasion of privacy, it really gives you hope that the legal profession will come out of this recession stronger than ever. The ability of Americans to turn fear and an incomplete understanding of what they signed up for into a full blown lawsuit is like renewable energy to American lawyers.
As Kash explains on True/Slant, it is really quite easy to get some people to join a legal crusade:
Are you vaguely uncomfortable with Facebook? Something doesn’t feel quite right with the way it handles privacy issues, right? You can’t quite put your finger on what bothers you exactly about handing all of your photos, personal information, videos, friends, and status updates to one corporate entity for indefinite storage, but yeah, there’s something messed up about it.
If the above resonates with you, you should try to join one of the latest legal actions against the social networking company.
Of course, if you do sign up, Kash will think you’re kind of dumb. And you don’t want to disappoint Kash do you?
10:14: Who the hell is Benjamin Cardin (D-MD)? So far I’ve learned that he’s an Oriole fan, and Wikipedia tells me he beat now-Republican Chairman Michael Steele for Senate in 2006. I want Tommy Carcetti to be asking these questions!
But his nephew, attorney and Baltimore County state delegate Jon S. Cardin, is a man who knows how to make an impression. The Baltimore Sun reports:
City police are investigating why on-duty marine and helicopter officers helped a Baltimore County state delegate propose to his girlfriend by pretending to raid a boat the couple were aboard, a department spokesman said Monday.
Officers boarded the boat, owned by a friend of Del. Jon S. Cardin, Aug. 7 in the Inner Harbor. As the helicopter Foxtrot hovered overhead, adding to the sense of tension, one report says officers pretended to search the vessel and even had the woman thinking she was about to be handcuffed before the delegate got on one knee and proposed.
Yes, the fear of getting apprehended and incarcerated is really what marriage proposals are all about. But for some reason, Baltimore officials don’t understand that asking a girl to marry you without the imminent threat of state action is so 2007.
It’s time for some good ol’ fashioned ass covering, after the jump.
On Monday, the Supreme Court ordered a federal trial judge to take a closer look at the murder case against Troy Anthony Davis, a Georgia death row inmate. The SCOTUS directed the district judge to “receive testimony and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could have been obtained at the time of trial clearly establishes [Davis’] innocence.”
Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, dissented. Justice Scalia questioned the viability of Davis’s claim of actual innocence, then went one step further. Even if Davis might be “actually” innocent, he’s SOL:
This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is “actually” innocent.
This bold pronouncement caught the attention of Professor Alan Dershowitz, back at Justice Scalia’s alma mater, Harvard Law School. From “Scalia’s Catholic Betrayal,” over at The Daily Beast:
Let us be clear precisely what [Scalia’s dissent] means. If a defendant were convicted, after a constitutionally unflawed trial, of murdering his wife, and then came to the Supreme Court with his very much alive wife at his side, and sought a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (namely that his wife was alive), these two justices would tell him, in effect: “Look, your wife may be alive as a matter of fact, but as a matter of constitutional law, she’s dead, and as for you, Mr. Innocent Defendant, you’re dead, too, since there is no constitutional right not to be executed merely because you’re innocent.”
It would be shocking enough for any justice of the Supreme Court to issue such a truly outrageous opinion, but it is particularly indefensible for Justices Scalia and Thomas, both of whom claim to be practicing Catholics, bound by the teaching of their church, to do moral justice. Justice Scalia has famously written, in the May 2002 issue of the conservative journal First Things, that if the Constitution compelled him to do something that was absolutely prohibited by mandatory Catholic rules, he would have no choice but to resign from the Supreme Court.
So should Justice Scalia resign? The Dersh isn’t saying that — yet.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009 1:58 PM - By Kashmir Hill
This past weekend we spent some time in Charlotte, North Carolina, where the houses are big (compared to Manhattan apartments), the downtown is small, and lawyers make time for inspirational lunches with school children. Or so we read in the Charlotte Observer:
It’s not every day that an eighth-grader gets to sit down to lunch with a lawyer, but it happens once a month for nearly 80 Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools students.
CMS’ “Lunch with a Lawyer” program helps middle schoolers who are interested in law careers learn more about the profession by getting to know a lawyer.
The article offers a refreshing take on why people become lawyers. See your profession through the eyes of 12-year-olds, after the jump.
As we roll through the next segment of the 2010 Vault rankings, we get into some firms that have been caught testing the stealth layoff waters. To refresh your memory, here is the next list of firms: 
Continue reading "Fall Recruiting Open Thread: Vault 31 - 40 (2010)"
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