If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. From our sister site, Going Concern:

[A] judge in Seattle has allowed a revised lawsuit to proceed that lists “Washington Mutual officers and directors, underwriters, and the auditing firm Deloitte & Touche” as defendants.

The revised lawsuit was trimmed down to a “concise” 267 pages from the original 388 that the judge described as “verbose” and “disorganized”.

“Verbose” and “disorganized” would also describe many lawyers we know. On the defense side, though, it’s an all-star cast. From Am Law Litigation Daily:

The lineup for the defendants includes Simpson Thacher & Bartlett attorneys Barry Ostrager and Rob Pfister for former WaMu officers; Ronald Berenstain of Perkins Coie for former WaMu outside directors; Barry Kaplan of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati for former WaMu CEO Kerry Killinger; Peter Wald of Latham & Watkins for Deloitte; and Jonathan Dickey of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher for the underwriters.

Read more about this lawsuit, and comment, over at Going Concern.

Lawsuit Against Deloitte Gets New Life [Going Concern]

The decisions Latham & Watkins has made regarding its associates have been well documented in these pages. Because of the firm’s associate layoffs, some people forget that Latham & Watkins was one of the first firms to freeze associate salaries. Latham froze salaries way back in December of 2008.

It would be somewhat fitting if Latham became one of the first firms to unfreeze associate salaries.

For now, the firm isn’t saying anything. Latham spokespeople did not respond to our multiple requests for comment.

But multiple sources inside Latham are preparing for a thaw. And, if true, Latham could go a long way towards answering one of the most important questions we have about making associate pay raises come back again.

Details from our Latham sources after the jump.

Reed E. Hundt, who served as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission from 1993 to 1997, will be joining Skadden Arps. He most recently served as a senior advisor on information industries to McKinsey & Company, the elite consulting firm. (For a more detailed description of Reed Hundt’s illustrious career — Yale College ‘69, Yale Law School ‘74, partnership at Latham & Watkins, etc. — see the biography on his personal website.)

Hundt made the announcement this morning at the YLS alumni reunion, where he was serving on a panel on the regulatory process. Professor Thomas Merrill, moderator of the panel, introduced Hundt as a senior adviser to McKinsey. Hundt interjected to note that he’s moving to Skadden — and joked that this was a good opportunity to plug his new practice. He didn’t specify which office he’ll be based out of, but we’re assuming D.C.

It doesn’t seem that the move was public before this morning (at least based on Google News, a search of the Skadden website, and a search of Law.com). But it is now.

Congratulations and good luck, Chairman Hundt!

Alumni Weekend - Schedule of Events [Yale Law School]

* Here’s all you need to know about this link: Elizabeth Wurtzel, curtains, no rug, “vaginal hegemony.” [Jezebel]

* Never take sex photos you don’t want everybody to see after you break up with the guy. [True/Slant]

* On-campus interviewers are very interested in your answers to “behavioral questions.” I guess they are trying to figure out if you are a drone or a droid. [Young Lawyers Blog]

* Can law firms use the grapevine to their advantage? [Law and More]

* It appears that Jobless Lawyer (we linked there yesterday) is a former associate at Latham & Watkins. Maybe he’ll be an inspiration to all of the former Latham associates? [Legal Blog Watch]

* Alfred Nobel’s grudge against lawyers. [Legally Drawn]

* Lat is doing a call-in program tomorrow at 2 p.m., moderated by Edward Adams of the ABA Journal, entitled “Why Openness & Transparency at Law Firms Matters.” [Legal Rebels / ABA Journal]

Last week, we wrote about federal judge Stephen Larson’s decision to step down from the bench because of unrequited salary longings. He said his salary of $169,300 was not enough to support his family. We’re skeptical of a six-figure salary not being enough to support a family, but Larson does have seven kids and lives in Los Angeles, so it may not be entirely ridiculous.

Plus, his salary would be much more likely to keep pace with seven future college tuition bills if he were making the big bucks as a Biglaw partner. His resignation led us to ask if judges really are underpaid. We threw the question to you via a poll. ATL readers were torn: 52% of voters said judges are underpaid, while 48% of voters said they’re not underpaid.

Ashby Jones at the WSJ Law Blog weighed in on judicial pay (and recounted a story about how a judge screwed him over when he was a law student interviewing for clerkships). Jones points out:

[I]t’s unreasonable, in all likelihood, to expect that federal judges should make what the average BigLaw partner makes. But it also strikes me as unfortunate that the federal bench should lose Larson, who presided over the recent dispute between Mattel and MGA Entertainment over the rights to the Bratz doll (and, incidentally, a judge I’ve heard to be exceptionally hard-working) over financial issues.

If judges were to make more, how much are we talking? The SCOTUS justices make just over $200,000, with John Roberts raking in $217,400. Should all judges be making that much? It is public service — are the rewards of respect and being called “your honor” enough to make up for the salary shortfall?

We’ve been following the admissions scandal at the University of Illinois College of Law. So have some top Biglaw firms, and it’s time for them to get paid. Am Law Daily and the Chicago Tribune reports on the tab run up by the University of Illinois:

The University of Illinois has spent nearly $500,000 on legal bills for six firms retained in the past two months to help it navigate an admissions scandal, reports the Chicago Tribune.

The bulk of the money went to Latham & Watkins, which advised the university on cooperating with the state commission reviewing the school’s admissions procedures. In a statement released Friday, University of Illinois general counsel Thomas Bearrows said that Latham has been paid $392,120.

That’s a nice get for Latham, Chicago.

But there are other firms, large and small, that have been suckling off of the law school scandal. More firms after the jump.

Let’s finish off the prestigious Vault 20. Here we have some firms on the rise, and some firms that are … not.

Here is the next batch of firms:

16. WilmerHale
17. Latham & Watkins
18. Arnold & Porter
19. Jones Day
20. White & Case

Okay, before we discuss Latham and White & Case, let’s give a good cheer for WilmerHale (up one spot from last year), Arnold & Porter (up two spots from last year), and Jones Day (up four spots from last year).

The Jones Day surge is particularly impressive. You’ll remember that the firm slammed its competitors earlier this month. But it seems like the firm is walking the walk as well as talking the talk.

After the jump, you know what happens next.

Last week, Above the Law was dominated by the Vault rankings. But we still had time to expose scandal and poke a little fun. This week’s top three stories:

1. Vault Rankings:

   The list which all prestige-based conversations will have to reckon with was released this week. Vault is so exciting that we even published an incomplete list earlier in the week to whet people’s appetite.

   

   The big news from the rankings has been that Weil Gotshal surged to #6, while Latham & Watkins fell ten sports to #17.

   We’ve also started our open threads to allows attorneys and law students to discuss the firms on the list. Click here and here for our first two open threads.
   
   



2. Trial Lawyers for Justice:

   Not every lawyer is obsessed with prestige of course. Some are just concerned about family. Really concerned. Check here for a law firm’s strange request that new applicants submit a family photo with their application. Here, the firm’s managing partner defends the request.
   



3. Moritz College of Law Scandal

   This week, Above the Law was able to expose a scandal at the Moritz College of Law at The Ohio State University. It appears that the school’s Student Bar Association President embezzled student funds for private use. Now, he might not be able to get his diploma. Check out our full coverage here.
   
   

Comment of the Week:

One young attorney had some choice words for baby-boomers partners who question the work ethic of today’s “Generation Y” lawyers.

Ok Partner, I will bust my butt for you, I will sacrifice my physical and mental well-being, and I will not complain. And in return, you will mentor me, show me the ropes, introduce me to clients, help develop my business, and reward me with a partnership down the road if I do all you ask of me. You know, the same deal that YOU had when you were an associate. Wait, you won’t do that? You have no interest in mentoring, teaching, or grooming me as a future partner?

Well then, you can suck it. I will continue to care about my “work-life balance,” collect a paycheck for a few years, and then get out of here while I’m still young and marketable.

The official Vault law firm rankings for 2010 are out today. This list will define law firm prestige for the year to come. Many law students, associates, and partners — especially partners involved in the recruiting process — care greatly about these influential rankings.

Here are the top five most prestigious law firms, according to Vault. This year’s top five is substantially similar to last year’s:

Skadden has flipped-flopped with Sullivan & Cromwell. Otherwise the top five remain unchanged from last year.

After the jump, the rest of the brand new Vault top ten, and a note from Vault’s managing editor about what’s new in this year’s rankings.

Working Mother magazine has released its annual review of law firms and named the 50 Best Law Firms for Women. No shame on these firms (unlike the one in our caption contest), at least when it comes to “flex-time, reduced-hour and other family-friendly policies”:

[O]ur winning firms have more lawyers working reduced hours (8 percent versus 5 percent nationwide) and also employ more female equity partners, who share in their firm’s profits (20 percent versus 16 percent nationwide)—and that’s just for starters. We salute these firms for recognizing that making the legal profession work for women is good business for everyone.

As pointed out by the ABA Journal:

A bad economy may be hurting law firms, but it’s opening up more flex-time opportunities for male as well as female lawyers.

Only one firm from the top five most prestigious — as ranked by Vault last year — made the cut.

The Career Center, powered by Lateral Link, saw record numbers of users in July, and a new firm is at the top of the charts in the ATL-LL Top 20. With hiring picking up and on-campus recruiting getting underway, we wanted to remind you about all the useful information that we have compiled over on the Career Center. In each firm snapshot you will find information about compensation, billable hours, facetime and vacation policies, pro bono work, partnership prospects, benefits and the overall associate experience. In addition, in the coming weeks we will be adding new information about the summer program based on our survey of 2009 Summer Associates (you can still add your two cents, by clicking here).

Now on to the ATL-LL Top 20 — the most requested firms from the across the nation for the month of July.

Taking the crown for July is: Davis Polk & Wardwell. No doubt the news of Davis Polks recent (website) facelift boosted your curiosity about the quality of life for all those hard workin’ hotties.

In the number two spot, crowd favorite Skadden Arps — but this month Skadden trails far behind Davis Polk.

Coming in third, DLA Piper, a firm that made headlines in July when it changed up its summer program, pulled out of Duke, and cut over 100 people from its payroll.

Rounding out the top 20 are some regular fan favorites and some new names. Check them out, after the jump.

Earlier this year, Latham & Watkins laid off some 400 employees (190 associates and 250 staff). This caused many to wonder about how tough times were getting at Latham.

Well, don’t shed tears for LW partners just yet. From the New York Times:

If a tourist passing along the Rue du Cloître Notre-Dame just looks up, it is not hard to glimpse, through the open windows above, the rich colors of old master paintings that have been stretched across a ceiling in Linda and Bryant Edwards’s first-floor apartment.

And from the home itself, in an elegant Haussmann building dating to 1905, the family has its own view — of the garden behind Notre Dame Cathedral….

When her husband, 54, presented her with the apartment as a gift for her 40th birthday, Mrs. Edwards envisioned a kind of “Tale of Two Cities” life, split between Paris and what was then the couple’s home in London.

The generous husband in question, Bryant Edwards, is a partner at Latham & Watkins. Last year he moved to Dubai, where he serves as managing partner of the firm’s Middle East office. The Edwardses now use their Paris apartment as a pied-à-terre when they return to the Continent.

So, the question you’re all wondering: How much did this amazing apartment cost?

Is my associate experience better than your associate experience?

One of the cooler features on the Above The Law Career Center, powered by Lateral Link, is the ability to compare firms based on associate experience in a number of areas including firm management, partnership prospects, parental leave policies, vacation policies, billable hours expectations, etc. You can see how your experience stacks up against the experience of associates at other firms by running your own side-by-side comparisons in the firm comparison section.

Thousands of readers have used this feature, and today we wanted to highlight which firms you have most often pitted against one another. We also want to remind all of you summer associates out there to take our short summer associate survey - Click Here for that (of course the survey is completely confidential).

So which firms do our readers compare most frequently?

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP is the firm most often compared to others. Its most frequent "rivals" are Latham & Watkins, Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP, and Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. These firms are compared to Skadden more than 30% of the time a comparison including Skadden is generated.

Other frequent comparisons, after the jump.

* Earlier this week, Leah Ward Sears stepped down as Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court. She penned this piece for CNN about her brother’s suicide, the problems with no-fault divorce, and where she’s going next. [CNN]

* Former Latham & Watkins partner Samuel Fishman sentenced to 15 months in prison for bilking the firm and clients out of several hundred thousands of dollars. [Dow Jones Newswires]

* J.D. Salinger wins his copyright suit. Judge rules that ‘J.D. California’s’ spin on Catcher in the Rye is not transformative enough, and cannot be sold in the U.S. [Associated Press]

* Skadden Arps takes the top-billing throne. [ABA Journal]

* SEC lawyer Genevievette Walker-Lightfoot tried to warn superiors about Bernie Madoff back in 2004. [Washington Post]

* Time for a new edition of the Kama Sutra. Indian court makes gay sex legal. [New York Times]

American Lawyer has released its A-List for 2009. The rankings try to measure the qualities that make an elite law firm:

This list, which we launched in 2003, aims to measure and quantify the qualities that define an elite law firm, making an effort to look beyond profits. We examine four factors: revenue per lawyer, commitment to pro bono, diversity among lawyers, and associate training and satisfaction. Our formula gives more weight to the first two factors; we double a firm’s scores for revenue per lawyer and pro bono, and then add scores for diversity and associate satisfaction.

This year’s A-List? The elite of the elite? The top three firms are:

1. Munger, Tolles & Olson
2. Hughes Hubbard & Reed
3. Latham & Watkins

I’ll pause to give laid off Latham associates an opportunity to finish screaming. Please return after the jump.

On Monday, we offered you a blind item about a major law firm giving “fake work” to its summer associates. Some commenters thought we were criticizing the practice, but if you go back and read our original post, you won’t find any criticism. To the contrary, we enumerated the advantages of this policy (which found defenders in the comments as well).

We now bring you an update, based on a number of interesting emails we received. Here’s one:

My former firm, Day Berry & Howard [now Day Pitney], did this with first years back in the 80s. Several of us found out we were researching the exact same issue having to do with business trusts. I proposed we do a joint memo and that’s what we did. I don’t think they did that again.

And here’s a second:

Fake-work has been happening for years. I have given it to summers at the two firms I’ve been at and have practiced this art since 2005…. [T]his practice will greatly increase this year.

It is very easy, especially in areas like tax, where you can give a summer associate a discrete set of facts year after year (sans client names) and see if the summer can get to the answer you already know is right (or find some of the authorities that are directly on point). I actually think it is a GREAT way to test a summer’s research and writing ability without having to take as fact the lame “I couldn’t find very much on point” excuse. Of course, it is essential that the summer not know you gave him/her fake work until he/she does a spotty job and then you hand them the memo you (or a former summer associate) wrote so that they can see that they should have put a bit more effort in getting the project right before handing it in. In prior years, it was fun to see the sense of dread come across an SA’s face if they did, in fact, half-ass it and you caught them in the act (since the SA would likely get an offer anyway). This summer, pulling something like this would probably bring the SA to tears or worse.

I gave three separate fake work projects to summers back when I was at Locke Lord. The partners absolutely knew I was doing it and liked the comparison potential that the practice fostered. The practice was not widespread when I was doing it.

Additional discussion, plus the name of the firm that was the subject of the original blind item, after the jump.

Members of WMD and the Bad Ass Brass Band (Latham & Watkins LLP / Law Office of Richard Goldberg), rocking out.

If you’re at your computer (and perhaps in the office) at this late hour, you must be very bored.

So check out a slideshow of photos from the sixth annual Battle of the Law Firm Bands, an event previously covered here and here, after the jump.

Lining up outside The Black Cat for the Battle of the Law Firm Bands. The evening was sold out — 1,000 tickets in all.

We just got back from Washington, DC, where we spent a few days attending the 2009 convention of the American Constitution Society (ACS). We may have a post or two about the conference later.

While in the nation’s capital, we also attended this fun event: the sixth annual Battle of the Law Firm Bands. A description:

Lawyers from prominent area law firms will compete in a hotly contested sixth annual Battle of the Law Firm Bands to benefit Gifts for the Homeless, Inc. (GFTH), a non-profit, all-volunteer organization supported by the city’s legal community to help the homeless. The Black Cat, a premier hot-spot in DC’s historic U Street district, has partnered with GFTH to host “Banding Together 2009” on Thursday, June 18, from 7:00 pm to midnight.

At the stroke of midnight, one band will be crowned champion for having raised the most money from the crowd through “Chicago-style” voting (each dollar equals one vote - vote early and often!). GFTH will use 100% of the money donated to purchase thermal underwear, sweatshirts, sweatpants, hats, gloves, underwear, socks, blankets and other essential new clothing items for homeless men, women, and children; the clothing is distributed to more than 30 shelters throughout the metro area. GFTH has already raised over $100,000 in connection with Banding Together 2008.

It doesn’t surprise us that Biglaw denizens would be willing to help the homeless. There but for the grace of God….

Our belated account of the evening — The BLT wrote it up in more timely fashion — after the jump.

This isn’t going to come as a galloping shock to most people, but it turns out that the firms that are making the most profit aren’t feeling the need to defer their incoming first year associates. Am Law Daily reports:

The only top ten firm that is making deferrals mandatory this year is Schulte, Roth & Zabel, which is requiring all new associates to start in 2010.

But the rest of the top ten most profitable partnerships are taking a different path. Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen and Katz; Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges; Boies, Schiller & Flexner; Sullivan & Cromwell; Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison; Kirkland & Ellis; and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton are starting all of their associates next fall as originally scheduled.

Congratulations to the incoming first years lucky enough to be heading one of these firms in the fall.

But it’s time to learn an important lesson about the difference between “revenue” and “profit.”

More after the jump.

Lost in yesterday’s Quinn kerfuffle was the fact that Skadden has officially deferred its class of 2010 associates to 2011. That move will help stem the influx of fresh talent into Skadden,

But what about the all of the talent leaving Skadden? Friday, we learned that David Fox and Daniel Wolf were leaving Skadden for Kirkland & Ellis. Today, the word is that restructuring partner D.J. (Jan) Baker is leaving Skadden for Latham & Watkins. AmLaw reports:

The lateral move comes on the heels of two lateral departures from Skadden’s M&A practice reported on Friday — partners David Fox and Daniel Wolf have joined Kirkland & Ellis.

But Skadden executive partner Eric Friedman sees no connection between Baker’s lateral move and that of Fox and Wolf. When asked whether the three departures allude to any larger issues at Skadden, Friedman simply responds, “none whatsoever.”

Anybody in the mood for some positive spin? Let’s take a look at some after the jump.