Correspondence

An ATL Exclusive: Kumari Fulbright Gets Saucy With Us!

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Kumari Fulbright small Facebook Arizona law student beauty queen Above the Law blog.JPGSo what’s going on with everyone’s favorite beauty queen turned law student turned alleged kidnapper, Kumari Fulbright?
First, she’s still suspended from the University of Arizona’s law school. As reported yesterday in the UA student newspaper, The Wildcat (yes, The Wildcat — how apropos):

On Jan. 7, Fulbright and her lawyer, Marc Beginin, met with UA officials and Fulbright was placed on interim suspension by the Dean of Students Office, said Johnny Cruz, a university spokesman.

“There’s no designated end date as to when the status will change,” Cruz said Thursday. “Any student on interim suspension cannot be on campus.”

Beginin pointed out that the suspension is a mandatory part of school policy. “It’s only an administrative suspension that is an automatic function when someone’s involved in an investigation,” he said Thursday. “It wasn’t a decision based on merits of the case.”

Second, on a much more exciting note: Kumari Fulbright has contacted us! Since the scandal broke, she hasn’t been speaking with the media, letting her lawyer to do the talking. So we were thrilled and honored to receive this message from her, via Facebook:

You forgot a quote of mine on your blog…..

“God gave you 2 ears and 1 mouth…. Take the hint”

With all that Ivy League education under your belt that should be reasonably self explanatory… but maybe not.

Well, God also gave us two (2) hands, with which to type up blog posts. Anyway, back to Kumari:

Also, where is your country of origin? In the United States we believe in innocent until proven guilty.

THANKS FOR ALL YOUR SUPPORT!

We usually enjoy being abused by beautiful legal divas, but for some reason we didn’t take kindly to this. Read our response, after the jump.

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Sometimes We Receive Really Odd Email

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chipmunk feeding chipmunk ramp Above the Law blog.jpgIn the wake of this story, which had a happy ending, we received this email:

I read about you helping the woman with cancer who wanted to wear her hat in court.

I’m handicapped, paralyzed with a closed head injury.

I’m in a wheelchair and rarely leave my condo except to see doctors.

I’ve lived in my condo since August 1989. I brought the bird feeder from Mom’s house after she died.

Now Ms. [xxxx], the new Property Manager, has ordered me to get rid of my water and chipmunk ramp.

I’ve been here 18 years. She’s been here less than a year.

My whole outside world is my patio with the bird feeder, and water and chipmunk ramp.

I have appealed to [xxxx] Management in Buffalo Grove, IL, but they won’t help me.

I hope you will.

We’re much better at helping Biglaw associates secure pay raises, or law clerks snag clerkship bonuses. The law governing whether a Chicago condo tenant is entitled to keep a chipmunk ramp on her patio lies outside our expertise. Also, we’re not admitted in Illinois.
But if you’re a landlord / tenant lawyer in Illinois who might be willing to help our correspondent, please email us, and we will put you in touch with her. Thanks.

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How Not To Respond to an Ad for Temporary Paralegal Assistance

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Adolf Hitler paralegal Above the Law blog.jpgA legal staffing agency put up an advertisement soliciting applications for a temporary paralegal position. Cover letters and résumés started rolling in. Like this one:

Hello there,

I am not a paralegal. But, I type 85 WPM and used to be [an] executive assistant and have multiple skillsets, easy to train, that honestly set me $1000 over the salary of a degreed political science bachelors degreed [sic] person. Sadly, she was aggressive and began reading Hitler’s methods and worked her way to stop my success with her deception.

The compliance lawyer finally figured out what she was doing and wound up getting rid of her. She now works in buying and selling electrical components somewhere.

So, I have no way to measure her value or mine within this paralegal field. I’ll let you be the judge.

A cover letter referencing Hitler? + 10 points. We don’t know what “Hitler’s methods” consist of, but then again, we never read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Nazis.
Read the rest of this long, strange, rambling cover letter — does the applicant need a paralegal gig, or a therapist? — after the jump.

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Couple of Clarifications

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We have heard from the subjects of a couple of today’s posts, and would like to post a couple of clarifications based on what they told us.
First, a source from Davis Polk wants to make it very clear that the marriage bonuses are not “bonuses” per se, but are instead gifts from the partnership, which always happen to be in the exact amount of $500.
Second, we stated in the Mayer Brown post that the firm had not commented on the examiner’s report in the Refco case. We made that statement based on the fact that two online sources reporting on the case had reported that Mayer Brown had not commented at that time. The statement was not based on any specific request for comment from ATL. However, we now have received an official statement from Mayer Brown, and it is posted in its entirety after the jump.
Earlier: Does It Pay to Be Married In Biglaw?
Court-Appointed Examiner Blows The Whistle on Mayer Brown In Refco Case

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Blogospheric Identity Theft: The Case of Crescat Sententia

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crescat sententia logo above_the_law.jpg
Here’s the most important part of this post: If you’re a reader of the most excellent Crescat Sententia, please note that IT HAS MOVED.
The new, correct address is http://www.crescatsententia.net/. If you go to the old address, you’ll see what looks exactly like the old blog. But that is NOT the Crescat Sententia blog.
Here’s the backstory, from Will Baude:

In September, without my knowledge or consent, our old domain was purchased by a Search Engine Optimization firm that intends to make money by either reselling the domain for a pretty penny to somebody greedy for its pagerank, or by using that pagerank to sell links to sites eager to trick Google. The webpage up there now is not this blog (it’s an old cache that he will have to take down soon), and this blog is the current and future home of crescat.

Because of the switcheroo, I can’t post a notice over there telling everybody where we’ve gone, so we’re reliant on people updating their blogrolls, and on word of mouth. With your help, hopefully we can minimize the disruption this has already caused.

I thought about taking this as a sign that it was time to turn in and give up, but I think this whole episode was a vindication of some principle like loss aversion. I’m not ready to go yet, and when I am, it will be on other terms.

Please, please, spread the word. WWW.CRESCATSENTENTIA.NET.

When Will Baude emailed the owner of the company that acquired his domain name, he was told to take a hike. The owner expressed a willingness to sell the domain name back to Will — for an exorbitant, extortionate price.
Those of you who blog probably realize what a total nightmare this is. Our sympathies go out to our blogging brethren at Crescat.
There’s some great discussion of this issue over at Concurring Opinions (incl. the comments). See here, by Dan Solove, and here, by Kaimipono Wenger.
Moral of the Story: Website owners and bloggers, remember to renew your domain names — early and often.*
* With Christmas approaching, here’s an ATL holiday shopping tip: Domain names make great gifts. The person you purchase the domain name for may not use it immediately. But it’s nice for them to know that, should they ever want to start up a blog, personal website, or business website, their domain name is reserved for them.
(Yeah, we’re dorks — we bought our parents their domain names for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day this year.)
The Remains of Crescat [CrescatSententia.net]
Quote of the Day [CrescatSententia.net]
Crescat Sententia’s Exploited Domain Name [Concurring Opinions]
Slimy SEO’s invade the Blawgosphere (Part II) [Concurring Opinions]

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