Archive for November 2010

Where. Are. THE BONUSES?

By Elie Mystal

This is getting ridiculous. It’s November 17th. Last year, Cravath announced its 2009 bonuses on November 2nd. In 2008, Skadden announced first, on November 19th, which was the Wednesday before Thanksgiving week. So essentially Skadden announced bonuses today, two years ago. In 2007, Cravath announced on October 29th.

You take the point. Where are the bonuses? It’s time, it’s past time. Look at the picture. We picked the new 2010 bonus logo WEEKS ago, but haven’t had occasion to use it. WHY? Is this thing on? Are we missing them (tips@abovethelaw.com or texts to 646-820-TIPS)? Whom do I have to sex around here to get some freaking bonus information?

Did firms think they could just not announce bonuses and have nobody notice? WE NOTICE. Right now, we are in a heightened state of taking notice!

Alright, calm down. They are coming. This is all a good sign. Bonuses are going to go up, but firms are unsure by how much. They are not allowed to collude, and nobody wants to get caught out there like Skadden did two years ago and have Cravath come in and Half-Skadden the situation. There is a reasonable explanation for all of this. REMAIN CALM, ALL IS WELL.

Let me get some oxygen, while we take a look at the best theories from our commenters, make some predictions, and conduct a reader poll….

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Non-Sequiturs: 11.17.10

By David Lat

Meet the Palins.

* The producers of South Park are being sued for copyright infringement. You bastards! [THR, Esq. / Hollywood Reporter]

* “Beware the Male Foreign Associate: He Quotes, He Gropes, He Elopes.” [Last Day at the Office Emails]

* Law prof Ann Althouse comes to the defense of the Palin family. [Althouse]

* Collected commentary on those controversial whole-body imaging systems (aka “naked body scanners”). Does the “SA” in “TSA” stand for “sexual assault”? [Infamy or Praise]

* For those of you who have been following L’Affaire Four Loko, check out the FDA smackdown letter. [Food and Drug Administration]

* Remember Google’s gay gross-up? Barclays is doing it too. Will law firms follow suit? [Bucks / New York Times]

* They like things big in Texas — and that includes law firms. McGuireWoods expands in the Lone Star State. [McGuireWoods]

Meet ATL’s New Ami

By Ami Cholia

Every high-profile law firm seems to be getting involved with the incredibly partisan fight for or against EPA’s new climate regulations; Dutch women work significantly less than their American counterparts, have a big pay gap, but are still happier; and a Google maps camera crew busted a drug deal in Brooklyn last week. Why am I giving you these seemingly unrelated news bits? Because starting next week, I’m going to be writing for ATL about gender issues, green causes, and social media — and where they intersect with law and the legal profession.

Hopefully I’ll be able to expand upon ATL’s tradition of reporting, first to satisfy my inner journalist (I’m a Columbia Journalism School graduate and I worked as a reporter for a newspaper in India for over three years), and second because… well, who doesn’t like forcing comments out of Biglaw firms?

More about me, including a picture, after the jump.

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Quote of the Day: Basically, Zuckerberg’s a Jerk

By David Lat

If I’m applying the First Amendment, I have to apply it to a world where there’s an Internet, and there’s Facebook, and there are movies like … ‘The Social Network,’ which I couldn’t even understand.

– Justice Stephen Breyer, in remarks made yesterday at Vanderbilt Law School (gavel bang: ABA Journal).

The Royal Prenup

By Elie Mystal

Breaking: Scion of fatuous family which contributes absolutely nothing to society chooses a mate.

Sorry, if we were living in Britain, that sentence would have read “Prince William to wed Catherine (Don’t call me Kate) Middleton.”

Thank you, George Washington, for saving me from the horror of actually having to care about the British Royal Family. Obsessing over the Britney Spears is much more respectable. At least she can dance.

But there is an interesting wrinkle to the massive waste of time, money, and ink about to be spent on the royal nuptials. For the first time, U.K. laws would appear to hold pre-nuptial agreements enforceable. Which leads to the obvious questions: should the royal couple sign a prenup?

I think the answer is yes, and not to protect the crown jewels from a spurned future Catherine. See, it turns out that Kate Middleton is a “commoner” only in the insulting, archaic, British sense of the word….

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The Secret To Inflating Employment Rates? Only Survey Law Grads Who Are Employed

By Elie Mystal

The following will shock no one who has been paying attention to how law schools are trying to openly game the U.S. News law school rankings and mislead prospective law students. When it comes time to collect employment data, law schools are selectively surveying their graduates: they’re seeking survey responses from employed graduates, while ignoring graduates who are unemployed. They’ve been playing this game at least since the recession started.

And now we have evidence. A tipster emailed pretty much everybody in the legal blogosphere spilling the dirt on how his law school is trying to inflate employment statistics. He claims that the directive from his law school is not at all subtle. If you are employed, the school hounds you to complete a graduate employment survey. If you are unemployed, the school would like you to ignore it. That way, when the school hears from U.S. News or NALP or the ABA — or Law School Transparency, which just issued another request to law schools for more comprehensive employment data — law school officials can throw up their hands and say, “It’s so hard to get our graduates to fill out a jobs survey.”

Still confused about how law schools massage the facts? Let this tipster explain it to you….

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Thanks to This Week’s Advertisers

By Above the Law

Thanks to this week’s advertisers on Above the Law:

If you’re interested in advertising on Above the Law or any other site in the Breaking Media network, download our media kits, or email advertising@breakingmedia.com. Thanks!

Brit Twit’s Sense of Humor Does Not Appeal

By Kashmir Hill

This morning, the Senate had a TSA oversight hearing to discuss serious issues around secure air travel, notably the use of see-through-your-clothes scanners and aggressive “crotchal area” patdowns. A highlight was the TSA head offering any of the senators that wanted one a sample patdown to experience it for themselves. No happy ending guaranteed.

For the patdowns and scanners, that is. “There must be a way to figure out how to do what’s necessary… and for the privacy concern to be addressed because it’s legitimate,” said Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in her opening remarks.

Frequent flyers are increasingly annoyed with their air travel experiences, whether they’re being scanned, felt up, paying for extra bags, or having their flights delayed or canceled. One U.K. man turned to Twitter in January to vent his frustration when his visit to a lady friend in Ireland was thwarted by a snowstorm. Paul Chambers tweeted, “Robin Hood airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your sh*t together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!!”

The British sense of humor tends to be dry. Chambers’s was too dry for the courts there. He was convicted of being a menace and ordered to pay $4,800 in costs and fines. When his appeal was denied last week, it caused an explosion on Twitter. And those protest tweets will soon be turned over to police…

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The Angel and the Devil

By The People's Therapist

Ed. note: This post is by Will Meyerhofer, a former Sullivan & Cromwell attorney turned psychotherapist. He holds degrees from Harvard, NYU Law, and The Hunter College School of Social Work, and he blogs at The People’s Therapist.

There comes a time as a lawyer when you split in two –- an angel and a devil.

The angel wants to do well — as I never tire of explaining, lawyers are pleasers. You want to make partner, earn a million bucks, and be the best attorney in the world. To the angel, the firm is like your high school football team — go Skadden! Rah rah rah!!

The devil, on the other hand, would burn the place to the ground while he toasted marshmallows and sang campfire songs.

The irony is that it’s the law firm itself that turns little angels into devils — just by telling you that’s who you are.

A junior partner at a big firm told me how they did it to him. Two senior partners marched into his office and announced he was slacking off and taking advantage of the firm. It was a mistake, they told him, to make him partner.

In reality, this guy was a pleaser’s pleaser. He worked his ass off to make partner, and talked in all sincerity about his “gratitude to the firm for that honor.” He was as rah-rah as it got.

Unfortunately, none of that meant anything, because the economy sucked, and he wasn’t bringing in business. According to firm logic, that meant he wasn’t trying, he didn’t care –- he was a bad guy.

By the end of his grilling, all he wanted to do was slack off and go home. They’d done it –- turned an angel into the freeloading devil they told him he was….

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Skadden Partner Accidentally Emails Confidential Evaluations to Entire Department

By David Lat

Those of you who have been in the legal profession long enough remember the tale of Jonas Blank. While working as a summer associate at Skadden, he inadvertently sent an irreverent email, intended for a single friend, to the firm’s entire underwriting group (partners included). Whoops.

But the firm was forgiving of young Jonas. He received a full-time offer at Skadden, and he worked there for several years before moving on to Richards, Kibbe & Orbe, a well-regarded boutique (where he still works).

It makes sense that Skadden forgave Jonas. Partners in glass towers should not throw stones….

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Morning Docket: 11.17.10

By Juggalo Law

* The FDA has made sure no one gets lok’d again. Thanks a ton, Buzz Killington. [New York Times]

* The incoming New York AG is looking for the “best legal talent in the nation.” NBTG: nothing but Touro grads. [DealBook / New York Times]

* If you’re going to file a lawsuit claiming some dude lost his penis, you better be sure that the penis is actually lost. I mean, that’s Penis Torts 101. A skilled penis litigator would never be so sloppy. Penis. [NECN]

* The lawyers behind the Beatles-ITunes marriage. Never forget. [Am Law Daily]

* Old Croaky McBullfrog was found guilty of breaking 11 congressional rules. [Washington Post]

DOJ to Police: Racial Profiling Is Still Wrong and You Still Need to Stop Doing It

By Elie Mystal

It seems like such a simple proposition: if a police officer stops you, he has to have a reason. He doesn’t have to have to be right. He doesn’t even need a particularly good reason. He just needs a legitimate reason.

And the reason can’t be based on the color of a person’s skin.

Why is this simple rule so hard for our law enforcement officers to understand? Why do they resist it? Why do they get defensive when civilians ask them to state their legitimate reasons (if any) for pulling somebody over? Why do police act like the motivations of the police are beyond questioning? Why can’t they answer a direct question about their reasons for pulling people over?

The reason can’t be based on the color of a person’s skin.

Why is it so hard for some police officers and administrators to accept that? Why does the Department of Justice need to send threatening letters to the LAPD, reminding them that they have to actually investigate claims of racial profiling and harassment?

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Non-Sequiturs: 11.16.10

By David Lat

The Nissan Leaf: a vehicle for theft?

* Should gay TSA agents be allowed to give “same-gender pat downs”? Only if they’re cute. [Christian News Wire]

* Is it “stealing” electricity to plug your Nissan Leaf into a parking garage’s electrical outlet? [Instapundit]

* Professor Orin Kerr asks: Have you ever cheated on a law school exam? [Volokh Conspiracy]

* If Ginni Thomas steps down from Liberty Central, can she still keep the foam hat? [WSJ Law Blog]

* Professor Larry Ribstein’s take on the big arbitration / preemption case currently pending before SCOTUS. [Truth on the Market]

* How to succeed in law school without really trying. Okay, you have to try. Here are some tips. [Lawyerist]

* The best kind of marketing (other than advertising on ATL, of course). [What About Clients?]

Quote of the Day: A Supreme Court Beautification Project?

By David Lat

Personally, I would like to see more Midwesterners or Westerners and not as many from the Ivy League schools. But that does not mean any one of them is not fully qualified. It’s a problem that there are only so many seats available….

– Justice John Paul Stevens, in an interview with the Houston Chronicle (gavel bang: ABA Journal).

Lawsuit of the Day: Parents Sued By Man Who Killed Their Son

By Elie Mystal

No helmet could have saved Matthew Kenney.

On occasion, I get accused of “blaming the victim.” I think that’s unfair. Really, I think I just know the difference between “suicide” (which is something you do to yourself) and “homicide” (which is something somebody does to you).

For instance, if you purposefully ride your bike off of a cliff, that’s a suicide. If, on the other hand, you are riding your bike and minding your own business, and somebody plows into you at 83 miles per hour and you die, that’s a homicide. Somebody killed you.

If the person who ended your life later turns around and sues your parents for allowing you to be killed by a motor vehicle traveling 83 miles per hour, that is blaming the victim.

And that is precisely what a convicted manslaughterer, David Weaving, is doing to the parents of Matthew Kenney. He’s filed a $15,000 counterclaim against the Kenneys from the lunacy of his own jail cell…

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Even If You Told Prospective Law Students the Truth, Would They Care?

By Elie Mystal

At some point, even a lemming needs to take care of itself.

We’ve devoted a lot of coverage around here to efforts at forcing law schools to be more transparent about the true employment opportunities for law graduates. We’ve screamed at the ABA, at NALP, and at law school deans themselves. We’ve begged them to just tell the truth about jobs to would-be law students.

Maybe it’s been a colossal waste of breath. Maybe, at the end of the day, prospective law students just don’t care whether or not they’ll ever be able to get a job. Maybe trying to get them to think about their own futures before they leap into law school is as effective as trying to convince a lemming not to follow his brothers off of the cliff. Maybe they just don’t want to learn.

A new study from Kaplan asked students what factors they considered before choosing a law school. Getting a job barely made the list. I say again, getting a job barely made the list of things people consider when choosing a professional school. You simply cannot help people who won’t help themselves….

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Nationwide Layoff Watch: Boies Schiller
(But query whether these were really ‘layoffs.’)

By David Lat

This morning brought more lawyer layoff news. As reported by Peter Lattman over at DealBook, David Boies’s celebrated litigation firm, Boies Schiller, last week laid off three associates.

(The DealBook piece refers to the dismissals as “layoffs,” and we’ve used that terminology in the title of this post and the first paragraph. But whether these terminations should be considered true “layoffs” is open to question — please keep reading.)

As noted in Am Law Daily, the three associates “worked on the firm’s representation of British private equity firm Terra Firma in its unsuccessful civil suit against Citigroup.” Now that the three-week trial is over, presumably the firm felt it could let the women go — and perhaps make them the “fall guys” (or gals) for the adverse result.

Two of three associates used to work in the firm’s former office in Short Hills, New Jersey. After that office was spun off last year into what is now Stone & Magnanini, the two jumped across the Hudson to join the New York office of Boies. So perhaps they didn’t have powerful patrons at BSF – NYC to protect them from the ax.

There’s also a bit of backstory here, which didn’t make it into the reports of DealBook, Am Law Daily, and the ABA Journal….

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(But query whether these were really ‘layoffs.’)“

Above the Law Launches a New Column for In-House Counsel

By Above the Law

Some time ago, we solicited applications for a new position here at Above the Law: a columnist to cover the world of in-house counsel. We received many outstanding applications, and we thank everyone who applied for their interest.

Today we are pleased to announce the launch of the new column, entitled Inside Straight (for the poker aficionados among you). As its name suggests, the column will cover the world of corporate counsel with all of the candor and insight that you’ve come to expect from ATL.

Our columnist — a former law firm partner, current in-house lawyer, and author of a well-received book on legal practice — should be familiar to longtime followers of the world of legal blogging….

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Career Center: Four Litigation Powerhouses

By Above the Law

Clarence Darrow was a pretty good litigator.

Whether you are betting the entire company or see winning as only a matter of pride, here are four firms that clients turn to for the best representation in litigation. Prestige and great work experience aside, working at any of these firms will not be a cake walk. Check out how these litigation behemoths fared in the Career Center Associate Survey in case you don’t want to end up working at a firm with unholy advocates or take an offer from the firm you should refuse.

So let’s look at the fabulous four, shall we?

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Fame Brief: Michael Douglas’ Money Never Sleeps for Ex-Wife

By Marin

Michael and Diandra Douglas

Diandra Douglas‘ $45 million divorce settlement from Michael Douglas in 2000 is one of the most expensive in Hollywood history. But greed is good, and Diandra hauled Michael back into court this summer ten years after their divorce to lay claim to 50% of his earnings from Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleep, released in theatres in September.

Yesterday a New York Supreme Court judge told Diandra that her greed is…misplaced:

Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Matthew Cooper ruled that a New York court was not the proper venue for the suit by Diandra Douglas. He dismissed her complaint on that narrow jurisdictional ground, without ruling on the merits of the case.

Diandra, 52, now has the option of re-launching the action in California, or of appealing Cooper’s decision.

Diandra’s argument  hinged on the meaning of whether Wall Street 2 is a spinoff or a sequel of the original Wall Street…

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