Bar Exams

Congratulations to Emily Pataki!

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Emily Pataki Emily Pataki Emily Pataki Above the Law Legal Blog.JPGWe realize we’re rather late in writing about this. But considering our extensive coverage of her past exploits, we really must share this information with you, however tardy.
Here’s the big news:

EMILY PATAKI HAS PASSED THE BAR EXAM!!

Guess the second time’s a charm. Congratulations, Emily!
P.S. If you’re wondering why we’re bothering to write about this event, please read this post. Or click here, and scroll down through our Emily Pataki archives.
P.P.S. Some words of advice to first-year associates not-yet-admitted legal interns working at large law firms (e.g., White & Case, Stroock & Stroock & Lavan): If you’re ever seized by the desire to send a firm-wide email, JUST SAY NO. Otherwise you’ll regret it in the morning. We promise.
But if you decide to go ahead with that blast email to hundreds of your beloved colleagues, please cc your friends at ATL. We love nothing better than to receive (and post) career-destroying, or at least highly embarrassing, office-wide emails. Thank you.
Former Gov. Pataki’s eldest daughter passes bar exam [Associated Press]
Passing Candidates from February 2007 (O-R) [New York State Board of Bar Examiners]
Earlier: Political Kids and the Bar Exam: What Gives?
Additional ATL coverage of Emily Pataki (scroll down)

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Dateline Hickman: Bungling in the Bluegrass State

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birdcage.jpg
An inmate charged with beating an elderly man was mistakenly released from the Kentucky Correctional & Psychiatric Center in La Grange after a fake order was faxed to officials at the facility. The mistake went undetected for nearly two weeks.
In hindsight, it might not have required bloodhound-like detective skills to smell something fishy about that “order”:

It contained grammatical errors, was not typed on letterhead and was faxed from a local grocery store. The fax falsely claimed that the Kentucky Supreme Court “demanded” Rouse be released.

In the facility’s defense, its director noted that “misspellings on orders are common.” Hmmm.
Speaking of Kentucky, does the Kentucky Bar still require applicants to sit for the bar exam in court attire? We know from hard experience that Virginia does; we’re still having nightmares about sitting there in that freezing Roanoke Civic Center in our chic suit and rubber-soled shoes. When will this tradition die?

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Morning Docket: 04.23.07

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* Sports agent busted for smuggling Cuban baseball players. [ESPN]
* Is your bar licence up to date? [Law.com]
* So a lawyer, an “oilman,” and a donkey named Buddy walk into a courtroom… [MSNBC]
* Ohio strippers have to learn new dance steps. [AP via Dispatch]
* UNC’s soccer coach uses some really rough language, as does the 4th Circuit. [ABA Journal e-report]

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More from the Virginia Law Libel Show: The BarBri Video

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The dominant company in the bar exam test prep market, Bar/Bri, has been sued for alleged violations of federal antitrust laws. That class action lawsuit may be settling — and you might be a class member entitled to settlement proceeds. Click here for more info.
Are Bar/Bri’s legal woes over? Not necessarily. Given how painful it can be to sit through some of their classes, it’s only a matter of time before BarBri gets sued again. We’re sure some enterprising plaintiffs’ lawyer can come up with a tort theory for suing Bar/Bri, on behalf of all students who have had to suffer through their courses.
If you think such a lawsuit would be frivolous, then watch this video from the 2005 Virginia Law Libel Show (the same folks who brought you that Beastie Boys parody). The idiocy has been exaggerated for comic effect — but not by much. Enjoy.

Barbri Video — The Virginia Law Libel Show [YouTube]
Earlier: Who Says White Men Can’t Rap?

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Non-Sequiturs: 03.21.07

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* May we recommend that the IRS get a myspace page? [TaxProf Blog]
* Quirkiness belies dysfunction: Woody Harrelson’s father, convicted of murdering a federal judge, dies in prison. [AP via MSN]
* You may think people who buy hardbacks on an Oprah endorsement deserve their fate as victims of the great James Frey Swindle, but I have a heart. Losers, get your money back! [Gawker]
* I’m the kind of person who hates being hugged by non-friends without my permission, but this does seem a little inappropriate. [New York Daily News]
* News flash! No one remembers anything from the bar anyway. [PrawfsBlawg; Conglomerate]

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Morning Docket: 02.22.07

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BarBri bar bri bar exam review course prep course Above the Law Above the Law ATL.jpg* Bad faith in a Chapter 7 filing forfeits the right to convert to Chapter 13. [U.S. Supreme Court (PDF)]
* Statute of limitations for a Section 1983 action based on false arrest begins to run when claimant is detained pursuant to legal process. [U.S. Supreme Court (PDF)]
* South Dakota abortion ban bill fails in state Senate committee. [Jurist]
* 300,000 lawyers can’t agree on anything. [WSJ Law Blog]

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Breaking: You Are Probably $125 Richer Right Now

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BarBri bar bri bar exam review course prep course Above the Law Above the Law ATL.jpgThis news isn’t as exciting as a holiday bonus or a pay raise. But it does mean that if you took the Bar/Bri bar review course between 1997 and 2006 — hey, that includes us! — you can buy a round of $12 martinis for you and a few friends.
According to a tipster:

According to the Los Angeles Daily Journal, the Bar/Bri antitrust class action settled for $49 million, to be paid out to 290,000 clients. Each client will get $125.

Bar/Bri also agreed to terminate a “co-marketing” venture with Kaplan as part of the deal. Neither defendant (Bar/Bri or Kaplan) admitted wrongdoing.

The plaintiff class is represented by McGuire Woods.

The full article, as reprinted in the National Law Journal, can be accessed here.
Update (12:30 PM): Information about how to claim your share of the settlement will appear here. Here at ATL, we’re all about news you can use!
BAR/BRI monolopy class action settled for $49M [National Law Journal]
BAR/BRI Class Action Website [official site]

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Impersonating a Document Drone Junior Associate: Not As Hard As You Might Think

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Brian Valery Brian T Valery Bryan Valery Bryan T Valery Brian Valerie.JPGToday’s New York Times has an interesting article on Brian Valery, the bestest paralegal ever. The article may actually say less about Valery and more about the general uselessness of junior associates. Consider this:

Steven Maass, who hired Mr. Valery’s former law firm, Anderson Kill & Olick, after Mr. Maass’s electronic trading business was destroyed in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, thought Mr. Valery unimpressive but chalked it up to inexperience.

“All first- and second-year attorneys are pretty terrible,” Mr. Maass wrote in a recent exchange of e-mail messages.

True enough — even though you’re paying several hundred dollars an hour for that awfulness. In Valery’s case, he was billed out at $300 per hour. Anderson Kill is in the process of negotiating financial settlements with about 50 former “clients” of Valery.
What should be frightening to defenders of the monopoly that bar-admitted lawyers have upon the provision of legal services is that Valery, despite never having attended law school or taken the bar, didn’t do that badly for himself. Maass found him to be no more useless than the typical junior associate. And Anderson Kill has not yet had any clients come forward to claim that Valery screwed up their cases. (Of course, given how little responsibility junior associates are given, perhaps that’s not surprising.)
Some food for thought:

Connecticut authorities debated what Mr. Dubois called the “metaphysical question” of whether they could even disbar someone who was never a lawyer and had only temporary privileges to practice in the state. They decided they could, and should, to keep other states from issuing privileges based on the faulty Connecticut credentials.

Anderson Kill’s chairman, Jeffrey L. Glatzer, euphemistically refers to the Valery episode as “the unfortunate incident.” Not bad. But if it were up to us, we would have gone with “The Late Unpleasantness,” “That Not-So-Fresh Feeling in the Legal Briefs,” or “The Smell of Napalm in the Document Room.”
Case of the Paralegal Who Played a Lawyer Raises Many Questions [New York Times]
Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of Brian Valery (scroll down)

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He’s Not A Lawyer, He Just Plays One in Real Life

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Brian Valery Brian T Valery Bryan Valery Bryan T Valery Brian Valerie.JPGBack in November, we named Brian Valery an ATL Lawyer Paralegal of the Day. The enterprising and ingenious Mr. Valery, who had neither attended law school nor taken the bar exam, successfully posed as a lawyer for two years. He “practiced” at Anderson Kill in New York.
Here’s the latest news about Brian Valery:

A man who prosecutors said had been representing clients of a prominent New York law firm for two years was arrested here on Wednesday and charged with impersonating a lawyer, state prosecutors said.

The man, Brian T. Valery, 32, of Massapequa Park, N.Y., surrendered to the authorities and was charged with perjury, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison, and practicing law without being a lawyer, a misdemeanor with a maximum penalty of two months, according to David I. Cohen, the state’s attorney for the judicial district.

Some people say that bar admission is just a racket designed to keep the number of practicing lawyers down (and the salaries of those lawyers up). If so, then admitted lawyers should take comfort in the fact that this racket is supported by criminal sanctions. Have fun in prison, Brian!
(A jailhouse grooming tip: You have a boyish face, Brian, so keep that beard. Then maybe you won’t be picked as someone’s bitch.)
Law Firm Employee Is Accused of Posing as Lawyer in Court [New York Times via WSJ Law Blog]
Earlier: Lawyer Paralegal of the Day: Brian T. Valery

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Morning Docket: 12.20.06

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* Maryland becomes the latest state to temporarily halt lethal injection executions, this time because of procedural issues with the way the lethal injection protocol was adopted. [Washington Post via How Appealing]
* Church burners expected to plead in Alabama [CNN]
* No good deed goes unpunished in Libya. [Jurist]
* First the minimum was too much, and now 10 years is not enough. Why doesn’t the appellate court just go ahead and sentence the child-renter?. [CNN]
* And in more bad parenting news…. [CNN ]

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