On Friday, Ropes & Gray and Latham announced spring bonuses. This morning we heard from Kirkland & Ellis. Firms are finally getting the message: spring bonuses are what big firms are doing this year.
So let’s keep the good times rolling. Earlier today, Proskauer Rose announced that it would be joining the spring bonus mania. And like many of the recent spring bonus firms, Proskauer is spreading the love beyond New York: L.A., D.C., and Chicago are all getting in on the spring bonuses.
(You hear that, Gibson Dunn?)
Let’s learn more about the Proskauer spring bounty, and see the memo….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Proskauer Rose Will Pay Spring Bonuses”
Ed. note: This is the latest installment of Small Firms, Big Lawyers, one of Above the Law’s new columns for small-firm lawyers.
As with love affairs, all lawyer-client relationships must eventually end. If you’re lucky, they won’t end until retirement or death (not the untimely kind; that would be unlucky). More often though, they will end with one of you — usually the client — finding someone new or simply no longer needing the other. The goal, then, is to try to stave off this end for as long as possible. But it will come eventually. And while no one likes to lose a client, it’s not the end of the world.
But there’s one situation where losing a client is a much more serious problem:
When it’s an uberclient.
Let me explain. When I got the offer at my first law firm, I met with one of the partners one last time before accepting. I felt like I was supposed to ask him important questions about the four-lawyer firm, to help me decide whether to accept. The first question I asked was whether the firm had any debt. Someone told me that this was a good question to ask. He said they didn’t, and that seemed like a good answer. Then I had a brain flash, and asked a much better question:
“Is there any one thing that could put the firm out of business?”
This is what he told me.…
Continue reading “Small Firms, Big Lawyers: Beware the Uberclient”
It’s nice when law firms listen. Last week we highlighted a few firms that had been slow to pull the spring bonus trigger. It would seem that these firms have received the message that their own people were paying attention to spring bonuses at peer firms.
On Friday, Latham & Watkins announced that it would be paying spring bonuses. Later in the day, Ropes & Gray followed suit.
Today, Kirkland & Ellis announced that it also will be making spring bonus payments. Welcome, K&E associates; there is pie and punch in the corner.
We’ll let you know if Quinn Emanuel comes to the party, but let’s first check out what Kirkland is rolling in with…
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Kirkland & Ellis Announces Spring Bonuses!”
Recent news about Cahill Gordon has been very positive. In December, the firm announced year-end bonuses that made Cravth’s widely-adopted year-end bonus scale look paltry by comparison. Cahill can afford to be generous: last month, Am Law reported that the firm enjoyed record profits and revenue in 2010, with profits per partner last year of $3.23 million.
(This has caused some to wonder whether Cahill will be paying spring bonuses, like Cravath and many other firms. In light of the spring bonus phenomenon, how does Cahill compensation compare to Cravath et al.? One Cahill source suggests Cahill is still ahead, but we’d love to see the numbers run by someone who knows the full Cahill scale. Feel free to send us an email, or comment on this post.)
The most recent news out of Cahill, though, is strange rather than glowing. Last week, a prominent partner was escorted out of the building by security and removed from the Cahill website. A firm-wide email then went out informing all staff that he was no longer a member of the partnership. (We haven’t seen this email, but feel free to send our way.)
So who’s the Cahill Gordon partner in question?
Continue reading “Musical Chairs: A Cahill Gordon Partner’s Mysterious Departure”
Bret Michaels
* It would probably be good if I had heard of more than a handful of the 34 most influential lawyers in the United States. Now this is going to turn into a Pokémon-esque game for me. [National Law Journal]
* Instead of fighting over App Stores, BigLaw, and SmallLaw, shouldn’t tech innovators be innovating instead? Because seriously, who fights over generic trademarks? That’s so SmallLaw. [New York Times]
* Bret Michaels suffered the horrors of the STD-laden Rock of Love Bus without injury, yet Broadway gave him a brain hemorrhage. Go figure. I guess every rose really does have its thorn. [Reuters]
* Speaking of buses, lawsuits seeking a total of $220 million have been filed in the wake of the World Wide Tours crash. On the bright side, the odds here will likely be better than playing the Mohegan Sun slots. [Sify News]
* A severely disabled mother was granted visitation time with her kids. If Terri Schiavo was alive today, she would have blinked with happiness after learning about this precedential decision. [Huffington Post]
* Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun. Oops! McDonald’s, you forgot the public masturbation — but I guess that’s the special sauce. [Orlando Sentinel]
* Some “real housewives” of New Jersey are suing Campbell’s over salty soup. Let’s get real here: New Jersey housewives don’t know how to cook. Using the microwave doesn’t count. [Star-Ledger]
Bow down before the most popular.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen a seemingly endless stream of law school rankings. For example:
If you thought that rankings fatigue would set in at some point, think again. Every new set of law school rankings, no matter how arbitrary or methodologically suspect, generates buzz and massive web traffic. The message that readers are sending to publishers: MOAR LAW SCHOOL RANKINGS.
Publishers are hearing it, loud and clear. U.S. News, the kings of the rankings game, just released a new rank-ordered list: the 10 most popular law schools.
How do they define “most popular law school”? And is your law school or alma mater one of them? Some of the schools on the list might surprise you….
Continue reading “More Law School Rankings: The Top Ten Most Popular Schools”
Happy Friday! And happy is right — the spring bonus news continues to roll in.
The latest firm to share the wealth with its associates is Ropes & Gray. The spring bonus news is much cheerier than the Ropes news from earlier today (although note the updates appended to that post, highlighting comments skeptical of plaintiff Patricia Martone’s claims).
So, yes, the Ropes springtime bonuses. The scale being used has the Cravath numbers on it, but there are some caveats and qualifiers.
In terms of overall bonus compensation, some R&G associates will do better than their Cravath counterparts, and some will do worse….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Ropes & Gray Announces Spring Bonuses!”
* Who are the top plaintiffs firms in securities class-action litigation, ranked by 2010 total settlement value? [RiskMetrics / SCAS via WSJ Law Blog]
* Protip: if you go to a meeting at Deutsche Bank’s New York offices, avoid the men’s room. [Dealbreaker]
* This lawyer has an assistant with an unusual name. [Abuse of Discretion]
* We were impressed by the University of Chicago Law School’s new loan repayment assistance program (LRAP) — and we’re not alone. [The Belly of the Beast]
* Dov Charney’s latest accuser, Kimbra Lo, has an interesting past. Yes, there are pics. [Fashionista]
* You know the whole “anti-bullying” trend has gone too far when plaintiffs’ firms are setting up practice areas for it. [Constitutional Daily]
* Career alternatives for attorneys: meet Akila McConnell, traveler and writer. [Thrillable Hours / Legal Nomads]
* Is the “mommy track” a form of gender bias? [Lawyerist]
* Are prosecutors working on commission in one Colorado district? [ABA Journal]
Even witches must pay full price for BAR/BRI.
Law school is expensive. We get it. Preparing for the bar exam is expensive too. We know.
What’s a law student to do? Taking out more loans is the obvious answer, but at a certain point, one cries out, “!No más!”
Some have turned to, for lack of a better word, begging — like this aspiring UNC law student, and this 3L at Arizona State. But their efforts were not well-received. In these troubled times, we all have our own financial burdens to bear.
Alas, one student at Temple Law School didn’t get the “no begging” memo. She sent out a Facebook invitation to almost 800 people, requesting their attendance at an event entitled “HELP [REDACTED] RAISE MONEY FOR THE BAR EXAM IN JULY!!!!”
Yes, she’s asking her law school classmates — some of whom are probably just as cash-strapped and debt-burdened as she is — to just give her money.
Or pay her for one of her magic spells. Because she’s a witch, you see….
Continue reading “Law Student Witch Sells Spells for Bar Exam Prep Course Money
(And begs her classmates for cash, too.)“
What is up with state prosecutors in the Midwest? Over the past year or so, they’ve been making huge fools of themselves. See, e.g., Wisconsin’s Ken Kratz (of “I am the prize” fame); Michigan’s Andrew Shirvell (of “homophobic nut job” fame); and Indiana’s Jeff Cox (of “Use Live Ammo” fame).
Our latest Midwestern prosecutor to win Lawyer of the Day honors, Carlos Lam, also hails from Indiana. Let’s take a look at what this loser Hoosier did….
Continue reading “Lawyer of the Day: Another Midwestern Prosecutor”
On Tuesday night, we gently tweaked a number of leading law firms, including Latham & Watkins, about their conspicuous silence on spring bonuses. This morning, in a post about Latham’s new Boston office, we reiterated the spring bonus tweaking.
Well, it seems that Latham got the message. The firm just announced spring bonuses, on the top-of-the-line Cravath scale.
What else do we know about the Latham spring bonuses? And which dominoes might fall next after Latham?
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Latham Announces Spring Bonuses!”
One morning last week, I walked past dozens of loyal Apple customers lined up to buy the new iPad 2. I scoffed as I walked by, my old, beat-up iPod nano playing in my ears. I also had the misfortune of walking past the same store later in the evening.
A sign in the doorway said something like, “Sorry, you’re too late. We’re sold out, na na na na.” Of course sample iPads were spread across the tables for gullible saps like me to play with, and I couldn’t resist. I really wanted to be able to legitimately say the gadget is silly and excessive, but — curse you, Steve Jobs — that thing is really cool.
It’s been, obviously, an exciting week for the company, but coincidentally (or not?) the Apple legal team has probably been working overtime too. Apple is no stranger to litigation, and we’ve covered Apple’s legal wrangling before.
Details about Apple’s hyperactive legal week — why Steve Jobs got deposed, who owns the phrase “App Store,” and a company that claims Apple stole intellectual property — after the jump.
Continue reading “Apple News That Only Kind of Relates to the New iPad”
It’s about time. We’ve been writing about the new Boston office of Latham & Watkins for weeks now (here and here), revealing a number of their top lateral hires.
On Wednesday, Latham made its official announcement — and confirmed the accuracy of our prior reporting. All of the partners we previously named as Latham-bound, taken from such top firms as WilmerHale, Proskauer Rose, and Bingham McCutchen, are mentioned.
Let’s take a closer look at the L&W crew, and also learn about additional attorneys who are joining up (including associates)….
Continue reading “Latham Officially Launches Its Boston Office”
* In the Barry Bonds trial, an expert on steroids described how the government injected a bunch of baboons with the drug Bonds is accused of using. I, for one, welcome our new baboon overlords. [ESPN]
* Some Amish in Kentucky are fighting a regulation that requires reflective safety triangles on their buggies. Say they’d rather get Munsoned out in the middle of nowhere than use those things. [Louisville Courier-Journal]
* Fresh off his Bushwick Bill impersonation, Allen Stanford has withdrawn his lawsuit against the federal government. [WSJ Law Blog]
* A lawyer in Illinois faces possible jail time for letting her detained client use her cell phone. At least she’ll get bars now. HIYOOOO! [ABA Journal]
* The FBI has instructed agents to to hold off on Miranda warnings when interrogating “operational terrorists” about immediate threats. These threats include suitcase bombs, sex bombs, nude bombs, and La Bamba. The Los Lobos version. [New York Times]
* Law firms are whetting wetting their collective beak on drug deals. But drugs is a dirty business. It makes, it doesn’t make any difference to me what a man does for a living, understand. But your business is, uh, a little dangerous. [Am Law Daily]
On Tuesday, Ropes & Gray was sued in Manhattan federal court by a former partner, Patricia A. Martone. Martone’s lawsuit claims age discrimination, sex discrimination, retaliation, and interference with protected retirement benefits in violation of ERISA (the basis for federal jurisdiction in the S.D.N.Y.).
As you might expect from an ex-Ropes partner, Martone has some high-powered counsel: Anne Vladeck, one of New York’s top labor and employment lawyers, widely regarded as the queen of employment discrimination law. Vladeck famously (and successfully) represented Anucha Browne Sanders in her sexual harassment lawsuit against Isiah Thomas and the Knicks.
Patricia Martone is a veteran intellectual-property litigatrix, a specialist in patent litigation, with almost 40 years of practice under her belt. She made partner at Fish & Neave, the well-known patent law firm, in 1983, and then became a Ropes partner in 2005, when Ropes absorbed Fish. She’s now a partner at Morrison & Foerster, which she joined in October 2010.
Why did she leave Ropes? Let’s have a look at Patricia Martone, and her lawsuit….
Continue reading “Ropes & Gray Sued for Age and Sex Discrimination By Former Partner”
* Still more benchslappery, this time from the Second Circuit. Professor Nita Farahany wonders whether Judge Gary Sharpe “may have missed a few important days of his genetics class in high school or in college.” [Law and Biosciences Digest]
* In other federal judicial news: I’ve never bought into the silly claim that Clarence Thomas is the jurisprudential puppet of Antonin Scalia — and Linda Greenhouse’s analysis of the Term thus far confirms CT’s independence from AS. [Opinionator/ New York Times]
* The ability of judges to be funny: AFFIRMED. [Supreme Court of Washington Blog]
* Remember the crazy deposition dispute over the definition of “photocopying” (which we previously linked to)? Here’s some additional background. [Lowering the Bar]
* Lawyers who rap are a dime a dozen; lesbian lawyers who rap are more rare (and more interesting). Meet GW Law alum Amanda Carter, aka “330.” [DCist]
* In other D.C. news, congratulations to the four bloggers behind Who Murdered Robert Wone?, whose sleuthing efforts have just been honored. [Washington City Paper]
* The estate of the defunct Heller Ehrman firm is getting $20 million, courtesy of Bank of America and Citibank. That’s nice. [Am Law Daily]
Ed. note: This is the latest installment of Size Matters, one of Above the Law’s new columns for small-firm lawyers.
I suppose that I should interview John Quinn (or john quinn?) on what it takes to start a successful small law firm. I mean, yeah, Quinn Emanuel was once small and now is sort of successful, but the reason for this interview would be because so many Quinn attorneys leave to start their own practices.
I did not interview Quinn, though. Instead, I spoke to former Quinn attorneys turned small-firm superstars: Ryan Baker and Jaime Marquart, principals of Baker Marquart LLP.
Baker and Marquart have been doing the small firm thing for nearly five years now, so they know of what they speak. And they both went to HLS and worked at Quinn for many years, so they are smarter than most of us.
Here is what they had to say….
Continue reading “Size Matters: Small Firm With Big Shoes To Fill”
You know an email has gone viral when we get unsolicited emails asking us to not post something we just received from a bunch of people all at the same time. Let’s hope Wake Forest School of Law is ready for its closeup.
Someone — claiming to be a Wake Forest law student, and calling himself or herself “Wes Law” — apparently woke up this morning with a bug up the ass. The object of pain was apparently the law librarians at Wake Law. And so the supposed student asked a rhetorical question: “Is there someone who can please explain why do we even have librarians at this law school anymore, and to what purpose they serve?”
What followed was a tirade against the services provided by the librarians, naming names in a flurry of accusations and insults. The entire campus is talking about it, with a few people even trying to answer the question.
I’ve never been to Wake Forest, so I’ll have to answer his question with my own rhetorical question: U mad, bro?
Continue reading “Purported Wake Forest Law Student Slams Wake Forest Law Librarians”
There must be no more of this childish abuse…. No more or there will be sanctions. In more than 29 years as a judge, I have never encountered such bickering, quarrelsome lawyers. You are wasting my time and your clients’ money.
– Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit, sitting by designation as a district judge (N.D. Ill.), ruling on motions in limine in Chamberlain Group, Inc. v. Lear Corp. (PDF).
(The context of this quotation, which contains additional benchslappery, appears below.)
Continue reading “Quote of the Day: Judge Posner Is Not a Kindergarten Teacher”
