May 2015

According to columnist Tamara Tabo, Josh Duggar himself might have benefited if his parents had handled the first reports of sexual abuse as the law required.

* Out-of-state mistress had insufficient contacts with the state for wife’s alienation of affection tort. Hos in different area codes: it’s not a saying, it’s a legal doctrine. [Legal Profession Blog]

* The Orange County D.A.’s office took withholding evidence to a whole new level. Actually, probably more frightening, this behavior probably isn’t all that uncommon. [Slate]

* Lawyer making six figures lectures law school grads about how they need to take public service jobs. [The Legal Watchdog]

* Prince Harry’s ex has left Allen & Overy. What’s the next career move for Chelsy Davy? DJ. Rich people make the best life decisions. [Legal Cheek]

* All the ways that FIFA allegedly hid bribes. When it comes to hiding, I thought soccer would never top an NBCSN contract. [Screamer / Deadspin]

* The Dersh talks about becoming a great litigator and discusses where his current legal battle stands. [In the Benches]

* Why fight in court if the courts are so unfair? [Katz Justice]

* On Tuesday, the Intelligence Squared debate series will tackle marriage equality, debating whether the Equal Protection clause requires states to issue same-sex marriage licenses. There are still tickets available if you wish to attend. [Intelligence Squared]

* What will life look like after Earth’s next mass extinction event? And will they need lawyers? [What About Clients?]

What role should firm culture play in your lateral move?

Because job numbers.

Thirty years ago this month, the Topps Company released Garbage Pail Kids, a series of trading cards/stickers designed to parody Cabbage Patch Kids dolls. Both induced mania in the 1980s, made their companies millions, then almost in tandem, lost their mass appeal. But before the madness stopped, the Kids met in court, where a judge determined whether the Garbage Pail Kids infringed Cabbage Patch Kids intellectual property.

What drove him into this situation, and what will happen to him next?

Practice pointer: do not appear as a client's defense attorney at trial when there is an outstanding warrant for your arrest.

The ATL Law School Rankings are out. Here's what's wrong with them.

Putting the "free" in "free market."

If you see Megan Fox walking around your law school, don't be too surprised.

Q: What do I need to do to succeed as a summer associate? Are there differences between what I need to do as a summer and a first-year associate?

Use regularly submitted invoices as a way to impress and reassure clients and create an opportunity to address their concerns, columnist John Balestriere advises.

When the roads are full of self-driving cars, vehicular manslaughter is going to get real interesting.

Diversity does not happen by accident, as columnist Renwei Chung argues.

Sweet, sweet irony.

* It may have taken two years, but Lindsay Lohan finally completed her community service for her reckless driving conviction. In other news, for the first time in almost eight years, the Hollywood has-been is off probation. Yay! [Los Angeles Times]

* A former staff attorney at Drinker Biddle was suspended from practice after overbilling his time doing doc review work by just a tad — 418.5 hours, to be exact. He owes the firm $12,500 to be paid in monthly installments of $100. [Legal Intelligencer]

* An ex-assistant dean and a professor at Cleveland-Marshall Law filed suit against Dean Craig Boise, claiming he retaliated against them after they assisted the faculty in unionizing. This, after they were offered raises of $0 or $666. [Northeast Ohio Media]

* Someone’s allegedly been a very bad boy: Ex-House Speaker Dennis Hastert was indicted by a federal grand jury for lying to the FBI in an attempt to conceal payoffs to a third party to cover up his “prior bad acts.” We wonder what those “bad acts” were… [BuzzFeed News]

* We bet you didn’t know that if you get convicted for sex on the beach you’d have to serve jail time and register as a sex offender. Protip: Don’t let 3-year-olds catch you doing the dirty in public. You’ll regret it for life (or until you win an appeal). [Bradenton Herald]

Reader poll: Who is the real prick here?

* Nebraska banned the death penalty. Does this signal a new conservative opposition to the practice? Well, is there a way this can make private prison lobbyists more money? Because then, yes. [FiveThirtyEight]

* The best way to sway a Supreme Court justice? Represent clients that the justices have financial stakes in. [Fix the Court]

* Pharmaceutical companies are peeved that lawyers are using Facebook to identify class action plaintiffs. Why aren’t people content to suffer grievous injury for the sake of profits anymore? [Bloomberg Business]

* Now you can know for sure if your job will be replaced by a robot. Good news, lawyers! Unfortunately, I don’t think this thing’s taking into account document reviewers. [Postgrad Problems]

* Jawbone is accusing Fitbit of poaching workers to steal its technology. Ten points to the tipster for the line: “Think this will all work out?” [Slate]

* Two Biglaw partners from rival firms have joined forces on a new challenge Native American adoption rules. It helps that they’re married to each other. [National Law Journal]

* An interesting perspective: “innovation” is more than technology, and it starts with debt relief. [Rawr]

* A former state senate candidate charged with witness tampering. At least he’s got experience with the system — his dad’s political career ended in a hail of guilty pleas too. [Nashoba Publishing]

* Brace yourselves for a shocker, but Biglaw is failing women. [The American Lawyer]

* David Gans on the upcoming “one person, one vote” claim. The proposition at issue, that representation is based on “voters” not “persons,” is so laughably unconstitutional the Court is clearly just trolling us at this point. I mean, putting aside the horrible racism, isn’t the 3/5ths compromise pretty compelling evidence that the Founders meant to count people who didn’t vote? [Constitutional Accountability Center]

Highlights of the year that was in law schools.

Elie and Joe talk with Brian Dalton, Research Director at Above the Law, about the 2015 law school rankings published by Above the Law.