Hopefully the next edition of What Can You Do With a Law Degree? has not gone to press yet, because there is a thriving new category of jobs a JD gets you these days: reality show contestant. See, Elie? Law school is good for something.
Joining James Weir, Erica Rose, Stephenie Park, and the entire pantheon of lawyer-turned-reality luminaries is John Cochran, a 24-year-old Harvard Law School student who appears as a member of the “Savaii” tribe on this season’s Survivor: South Pacific. Not much is discoverable about red-headed John online because his name is so common, but he lives (somewhat improbably) in DC, drinks Fanta, and loves The Beatles. Pretty standard stuff.
But what’s not standard is the way in which our wan, nerdy hero made it onto the show:
I was in this class in Harvard Law School called American Jury and for the final paper we got to write about whatever we wanted. And being a huge “Survivor” fanatic, I decided to write about “Survivor.” In the paper I compared the current American jury system with the jury system in “Survivor,” especially the final Tribal Council. There are certain lessons we can learn from “Survivor” juries in that the jurors get to ask questions to the defendants…who’d be the final two and final three. And they’re also kind of the witnesses to the “crime.” And my professor, who’s a pretty famous professor, loved it. It turns out he’s a huge “Survivor” fan and he gave me the Dean’s Scholar prize for the best paper in the class out of about 100 students.
So basically while you were busy writing onto Law Review, John Cochran was DVRing a reality show and writing papers about it for a fanboy professor. Perfect….
Continue reading “Fame Brief: Survivor of the Fittest at Harvard Law School”
I know that the movie Idiocracy stars Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph. But if you are at all concerned with the future of humanity, you really need to watch it. The premise of the movie is that smart people have fewer kids than dumb people. And so, over time, humanity gets dumber.
THIS IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING.
And, sorry to say, but the women of Biglaw are partially to blame. WE NEED YOUR SMART BABIES. I know that’s a double standard. I know it’s fundamentally unfair that women have to pass a bowling ball through their vagina while men have to, worst case scenario, jerk off into a cup. But I didn’t make the rules.
And dumb women, all across the world, are pumping out impoverished spawn as if there was an invisible being that lives in the sky who outlaws birth control.
Smart ladies aren’t holding up their end of the bargain. I have proof!
Well, the Wall Street Journal has proof….
Continue reading “The Doom Of Our Species: Intelligent Women Refuse To Spawn”
'At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought.'
It’s not every day that attorneys repeatedly file “unintelligible” complaints that are “riddled with errors.” (Okay, maybe it is every day.)
But it’s really not every day that Drew Peterson’s attorney — yes, that Drew Peterson — attempts to file the same complaint three times, appeals to the Seventh Circuit only to get smacked down, and is then ordered to show cause as to why his federal license to practice shouldn’t be tossed out.
Let’s take a look at what Walter Maksym attempted to file, and why he faced the wrath of the Seventh Circuit earlier this week….
Continue reading “Benchslap of the Day: A Billy Madison Style Rambling, Incoherent Complaint”
Here is Cornell University trying to convince its own graduate students to come back to school and get yet another degree.
Yeah, I know, they are being that bold. It’s like saying, “Okay, OKAY, I know that car we sold you blew up in your face and you lost your hands. But you have got to check out our brand new prosthetic hands.”
Arguably, this is just Cornell’s aggressive new ad campaign for its business school, but they should at least be more discreet. The JD candidates in the class of 2014 don’t even know they’re being bamboozled yet….
Continue reading “Cornell Indirectly Acknowledges the Uselessness of Its Law Degree”
* Hey, Preet Bharara, even Lady Gaga can read your poker face when you’re going all in on an allegation of Full Tilt Ponzi. Maybe Lederer and Ferguson will finally fold. [Wall Street Journal]
* You know what this country really needs? More doctors who don’t believe in science. Another stem cell research case is going up to the D.C. Circuit. [Bloomberg]
* The last 9/11 wrongful death suit has been settled. Lessons learned: airport screeners might not know what Mace is, but they sure can lift and separate your balls. [New York Times]
* Cooley Law held a groundbreaking ceremony for its new campus. We’re good at surviving natural disasters, but a tsunami of unemployed lawyers might break this profession. [Miami Herald]
* A group of drag queens in Florida got busted for thieving the essentials — bras, boas, and butt pads. As RuPaul would say, you better work. Or steal. You know, whatever. [New York Daily News]
* Guys in my high school middle school used to have the ACLU file lawsuits over breathalyzer tests all the time. It was no big deal. [MSNBC]
Last week, when we first wrote about Bruce Reilly — the Tulane 1L who committed a murder nearly 20 years ago — we noted that when he outed himself on his website, he posted a t-shirt that read, “F**k Google, ask me.”
It appears that many students at Tulane Law School did just that.
We’ve already heard from the Tulane law students who don’t know Bruce. We’ve heard their concerns and opinions.
Now let’s hear from some of Bruce Reilly’s new friends on campus….
Continue reading “Tulane Students Speak Out About 1L Ex-Con Bruce Reilly”
Congrats to Mike Sacks on his new gig!
* I’m not alone in arguing for apprenticeships in the world of legal education. On the other side of the pond, Chris Ashford likes the idea too. [The Lawyer]
* Speaking of legal education, “Some Things Are Funny in Law School.” [Only in Law School]
* Congratulations to Mike Sacks — founder of First One @ One First, and a past contributor to these pages — on his exciting new job! [ABA Journal; First One @ One First]
* What should rejected applicants to the shrinking DOJ Honors Program do? Let them eat… muffins! Cake can’t hold a candle to $16 muffins. [Constitutional Daily]
* Given my own uneasiness about guns, I’m not so enthusiastic about the right to print arms. [Associate's Mind]
* Professor Glenn Reynolds asks: “Can Lack of Sleep Ruin Your Marriage?” Just ask the divorced denizens of Biglaw. [Instapundit]
Jason Smiekel
Last month, federal law enforcement officials accused an Illinois attorney, Jason W. Smiekel, of trying to put a hit out on a former client — who also happened to be the ex-husband of Smiekel’s fiancée. That’s quite an allegation, isn’t it?
And that’s not the end of the story. Some sources blamed this fiancée — a very beautiful woman, described to us by a tipster as a “hot hot hot blonde” (“HHHB”) — for the downfall of Jason Smiekel, ruining his marriage and taking him from a successful career in law to a life outside it. But others came to her defense, describing HHHB and Smiekel as “very much in love, and good people.”
Alas, if they are in love, their love may have to wait, thanks to the latest bad news for Jason Smiekel….
Continue reading “Bad News for a Chicago-Area Lawyer Accused of Murder for Hire”
It is crunch time for 2Ls and 3Ls. You’re awash in information — some of it concrete — but much of it ambiguous, amorphous, and second-hand, at best. The dissonance of hearsay collides with the harmony of recruiting. This year, perhaps more than any in the past ten years, Lateral Link’s Frank Kimball, an expert recruiter and former Biglaw hiring partner, has heard stories of “negative” recruiting.
A lawyer with Jones and Brown disparages Johnson & Smith. While any professional recruiter worth his or her grain of salt would never condone such a tactic, several attorneys consider it an effective manner of recruiting. Word to the wise, if the best feature of the firm is the interviewer disparaging other firms, run away!
Negative recruiting takes many forms, but usually appears in one of the following forms….
Continue reading “Career Center: Negative Selling – A Dangerous, Misleading Tactic”
Last week, I thought my life had ended. No, it was not the announcement that All My Children is ending this week. That tragedy I learned to live with once I found out that online episodes will start airing this winter. It was because my iPhone broke, or at least I thought it had.
I panicked. I, like those fax machine loving small-firm attorneys, am not tech savvy. So, I went straight to the Apple website and set up an appointment at the Genius Bar. As I was waiting for my appointment, I emailed a friend to ask her if she had any idea on how to fix my phone. She responded, “Did you Google it?” No, I had not. And, within thirty seconds of web-searching, I had found the solution to my problem.
I realized from our email exchange that there are two types of people in this world: people who are helpless, and those who help themselves. Since learning that I had yet another issue to work on, I set out to find a small-firm lawyer who practices self-help.
Meet Jessica Fairchild of Fairchild Law Offices, LLC. Fairchild, a University of Chicago graduate and former Sidley Austin attorney, started her own firm in May 2010. Fairchild’s path to solo success was the result of this lady making things happen. While I would unlikely be able to follow suit unless there is a way to use the Genius Bar to find small firm success (niche alert!), you can try for yourself by following these steps….
Continue reading “Size Matters: Sport-Minded Solo Success Story”
Susette Kelo's home
Had I known all of what you just told us, I would have voted differently. I’m sorry.
– Justice Richard Palmer (the deciding vote in the groundbreaking Kelo v. New London case) of the Connecticut Supreme Court apologizing to Susette Kelo and keynote address speaker Jeff Benedict at a dinner honoring the Court. Benedict’s novel, “Little Pink House,” documents Kelo’s personal story.
Last week, we saw just how powerful everyday citizens can be when they work together. In a highway accident in Utah, motorcyclist Brandon Wright was dragged under a burning vehicle and trapped. Wright could have been killed, but in a triumph for the human spirit, a group of bystanders lifted the car and pulled Wright to safety. The rescue was captured on YouTube.
Well, we should correct that account: almost everyone in the group of bystanders helped to lift the car so Wright could be pulled to safety. One guy, a man who shall forever be known as the “Guy in the Suit,” was standing around and watching. Actually, the Guy in the Suit took a break from standing around to LEAN ON THE CAR that a man was trapped under. Is this guy the worst human being on the planet, or what?
It figures that someone claiming to be a personal injury lawyer came forward as the Guy in the Suit….
Continue reading “Hey Everybody, Don’t Call the ‘Guy in the Suit’ a Lawyer!”
There has been a sweet apartment deal available on Craigslist for about a week, but we haven’t been able to tell you about it because it took us a while to figure out exactly where the apartment was.
Oh, we knew the city (Boston). And we know there is an intense demand for $40,000/year plus, three-year rentals in the greater Boston area.
But we weren’t quite sure where all the pretty pictures of the unit came from.
Now we know. You’re not going to believe this, but the building and the price correspond to an area law school….
Continue reading “Need A Rental? I Know A Sweet Apartment Going For Only $42,540.”
Maybe it was the hypnotic effect Pippa Middleton’s ass had on Prince Harry? Or perhaps it was simply that Chelsy Davy didn’t want to marry into the crazy old royal family? Either way, shortly after William and Kate tied the knot in April, Harry and Chelsy split up.
And what did the Zimbabwean blonde bombshell do next? She became a lawyer. Yes, last week the ex-girlfriend of Princess Diana’s youngest son started life as a trainee with top London law firm Allen & Overy.
“Let’s watch Chelsy,” the Sun newspaper crowed on Wednesday, after snapping suit-clad Davy making her way through London’s financial district to the Magic Circle giant’s office. The article, fascinatingly, went on to note that Davy “really was legally blonde.” And that was it. End of story. In fact, according to an A&O press officer I spoke with the other day, Davy starting work at the firm is “no story at all.”
But I beg to differ….
Continue reading “Letter from London: Chelsy Davy Joins Biglaw”
* “The road to this day has been long”… and hard. That’s what he said. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell has finally been put to bed, and the next logical step would be to ditch DOMA. [PostPartisan / Washington Post]
* “Citizens United has been good for gay rights.” Well, at least it’s been good for something. Are we allowed to like the ruling in this case now? Bueller? Bueller? No? Okay, just checking. [New York Times]
* And another one gone, another judge bites the dust. $43K wasn’t enough to keep Justice Joseph Covello on the bench. How many more will it take to get a decent raise? [New York Law Journal]
* The First Circuit turned it around on Joel Tenenbaum, reinstating a $675K judgment against him. Charles Nesson couldn’t comment on the decision because he was crying. [Boston Globe]
* Ten-year sentence edition: Samuel Logan’s dad wishes he was still a judge on the Tenth Circuit so he could benchslap the sh*t out of his son for trying to seduce a 14-year-old. [Kansas City Star]
* John Banzhaf continues to fight for coeds’ right to party at Catholic University, but it’s not looking good because it’s hard to immaculately conceive when boys live in the same dorm. [WSJ Law Blog]
Two weeks ago, we asked our readers to submit possible captions for this photo:
Last week, you voted on the finalists, earlier today, Fordham made it harder for homeless people to eat, and now we have finally crowned a winner….
Continue reading “Caption Contest Winner: What Can You Do With a Fordham Law Degree?”
* Really me lawyer mateys. All this pirate talk is highly fictional. Real pirates were just sea-criminals. [National Geographic]
* Behold Dancing with the Stars after sunset. Nancy Grace be performing, you’ll recognize her as the Kraken taking screen time from Hope Solo. [ABC]
* Unless The ABA makes Illinois Law walk the plank, I don’t really care about what the school is doing to turn its statistics into honest labour. [Constitutional Daily]
* Avast, it’s texts from last night for law students. [You know you're in law school]
* Disaster on the high seas happens during a quest for treasure and plunder. Disaster in the air happens to people might as well be auditioning for a Red Bull commercial. [Litigation and Trial]
* Netflix should hire Kash as a first mate. [Not So Private Parts]
Every couple of years, people need to be reminded not to have private conversations in public spaces. Who could forget Acela Bob, the Pillsbury partner who talked about firing people on a crowded train?
University of Virginia law students, that’s who. Yes, we have another installment of: when popping your collar goes real wrong. On the way back to Charlottesville from New York City, a group of UVA Law students were waiting for their flight out of LaGuardia. They started talking about how their callback interviews went. They started talking loudly.
And others were listening….
Continue reading “Students Making Fun of Biglaw Interviewer Overheard By MOST OF THE AIRPORT”
It’s that time of year again: bar exam results season. While some will be on the edges of their seats until November, others are already breathing sighs of relief.
Thus far, we’ve heard bar exam results news from the following states: Nebraska, North Carolina (and you can thank Hurricane Irene if you received your mailed scores a tad late), and Utah (whose results we unofficially released ourselves last week).
As of today, we have news that Florida has released its July 2011 bar exam results….
Continue reading “Recent Bar Exam Results: Open Thread
Nebraska, North Carolina, Utah, Florida — any others?“
