A lesson that Matt Couloute Jr. is learning.
It’s a sad fact, but almost everyone has had the opportunity to partake in a bad romance or two. And although it may sound elegant when Lady Gaga sings about it, in real life, it can be devastating. That’s why websites like LiarsCheatersRUs were created — so that jilted lovers could have a place to unleash their angst about failed relationships caused by a lover’s supposed infidelity.
But what happens when you’re a lawyer and a scorned ex-girlfriend lets loose on the internet about your infidelities? That is apparently what happened in the case of Matthew Couloute Jr., a former prosecutor and Court TV analyst, after he allegedly cheated on Amanda Ryncarz.
Now he’s suing Ryncarz and another ex-flame, roller-derby diva Stacey Blitsch, both represented by feminazi lawyer to the wannabe stars, Gloria Allred. Thus far, we’ve kept our coverage of the drama to Morning Docket entries (here, here, and here), but now, Matt Couloute has spoken out about the situation on television.
Check out Couloute’s on-air coverage, and see pictures of the women in question, after the jump….
Continue reading “Lawyer Suing Hot Exes Over Scathing Relationship Reviews Speaks Out”
Downward dog... kind of.
* Protip for Mark Hansen, AT&T’s lawyer: when you want a judge to save your merger plans, it’s probably not a good idea to demand that she make a ruling by a certain date. [Businessweek]
* What’s going on in Cooley Law’s defamation suit against Rockstar05 (other than discussion of whether the school’s attorney understands the tort’s defenses)? An appeal. [Lansing State Journal]
* Getting a prep school education in New York isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Ask Philip Culhane, Simpson Thacher partner and name plaintiff in the Poly Prep sex abuse suit. [New York Times]
* America, f**k yeah! The Texas division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans is suing the DMV over free speech rights they might not have had if they seceded from the union. [Fox News]
* Yoga guru Bikram Choudhury tried to sue his disciples for infringement of his moves, but he ended up getting it downward doggy style from the Copyright Office instead. [Bloomberg]
* “If you want a good grade, you need to have sex with me.” At the height of finals season, many law students wish this were an option, but apparently it only happens in college. [New York Post]
Our law student readers are well aware that finals season is underway. People have already started camping out at the library as they meticulously prepare and organize their outlines and note cards. They’re double- and triple-checking their professors’ slides to make sure they haven’t missed any important information. And for the average law student, poring over pages and pages of text can get mind-numbingly boring very quickly.
Apparently one controversial professor at a D.C. law school figured that out, and decided to add a bit of excitement to his lecture slides. Because nude pictures are great study aids….
Continue reading “Nude Pictures: The Best Way to Help Students Study for Finals”
* Facebook settled with the FTC over its privacy violations. Mark Zuckerberg will be adding a “dislike” button to the site so he has an appropriate way to deal with this. [National Law Journal]
* The lawsuit seeking to overturn gay marriage in New York will proceed. Eric Schneiderman just got disinvited from more holiday parties than he can even count. [New York Times]
* On appeal, Dechert will get to walk away from the Dreier drama without losing a single dime, but not if Marc Kasowitz has anything to do with it. [New York Law Journal]
* Herman Cain’s defamation lawyer, Lin Wood, is apparently living on a very nice planet where “guilt by accusation” isn’t already the norm in the realm of politics. [Washington Post]
* What’s with all of the child predator attorneys flocking to New Jersey? Solo practitioner Tobin Nilsen got 12 years for trying to have sex with a 7-year-old girl. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
What do Proskauer Rose and Ropes & Gray have in common (besides the seven shared letters in their firm names)?
- They are both leading law firms.
- They both have major presences, their two biggest offices, in New York and Boston.
- They both have blue and gray in their logos.
- And they are both involved in litigation with former employees claiming employment discrimination.
Let’s take a look at the latest news — a fresh lawsuit filed against Proskauer, and updates in a lawsuit against Ropes that we’ve previously covered….
Continue reading “Biglaw Discrimination Lawsuit Potpourri: Proskauer Rose and Ropes & Gray”
* While med school grads can stop a person from bleeding out, law school grads could probably treat a papercut (but that’s a bit of an overstatement). Who will be there to stop our bleeding? [Am Law Daily]
* Annie Le’s family is suing Yale over her death, saying the school failed to protect women. Yale says the suit has no basis, but when someone has died, that just makes them sound like tremendous d-bags. [CNN]
* The unhappiest workers in professional fields are unmarried, middle-aged, female lawyers. Figures. Maybe we need to arrange some Geriatric Courtship Connections for these gals. [ABA Journal]
* China’s new marriage law interpretation has set women’s rights back a few decades. Next thing you know, women will be back in the kitchen, with bound feet and pregnant. [New York Times]
* Is it defamatory to say someone is a millionaire, not a billionaire? Don’t mess with the Donald’s money. Apparently he has enough of it to appeal even the dumbest of lawsuits. [Wall Street Journal]
* A noise complaint against Madonna will go to trial. Her neighbor was borderline, but the Material Girl’s not sorry. It’s human nature. And I’m all out of applicable lyrics. [New York Daily News]
Accepted in Utah.
* Prop 8 made an appearance today at the California Supreme Court before newly seated Justice Goodwin Liu. As suspected, the liberal Liu immediately made the proponents have sex with each other as he cackled “I hate families.” [Poliglot / Metro Weekly]
* Next time a TSA agent sticks her hand down your pants and cops a feel, try not to call it “rape” on your blog. Instead, maybe just admit that you were asking for it by showing up to the airport dressed in all them clothes. [Techdirt]
* After Labor Day, consider that “every day should be a day to care about working people.” And don’t forget that even though judges live in impenetrable fortresses of justice, they are people, too. [Underdog]
* Here’s a good one for the 1Ls. If you’re a grieving mother and your boss forces you to remove pictures of your dead daughter from your cubicle as if she never existed, is he intentionally inflicting emotional distress upon you? Nope, but he sure is a douchebag. [Courthouse News Service]
* “In my day, we used to walk 70 miles to school…” Next time grandpa forces you to hike the Grand Canyon and starts with this old codger rhetoric, give your mom a call. That’s not legal. [CBS News]
Grandpa's idea of fun.
* If you have time to read real books, maybe you should check some of these out from the library. Do those even exist anymore? Ugh, just download them to your Kindle. [Constitutional Daily]
* One is the loneliest number, especially if you’re supposed to be in a partnership. Professor Larry Ribstein has some ideas on what ought to happen post-breakup. [Truth on the Market]
* Ahoy, me matey. This law blogarrrr wants ya t’ know that if ya want t’ trade for booty usin’ yer gold doubloons, steer yer ship toward th’ land o’ many wives. [Adjunct Law Prof Blog]
Last night we wrote about a high-profile lawsuit: 3M v. Lanny Davis. Yes, that’s right: the maker of Post-its and Scotch tape is going after Lanny J. Davis, the noted D.C. lawyer and lobbyist, along with his client, Porton Capital (a group of private investors).
It’s a strange lawsuit, but the allegations in it aren’t new. Similar suits were filed by 3M in June and July, in New York state court. (And one of them is still pending, despite the filing of an action in D.C. federal court.)
The primary parties, 3M and the Porton Group, have crossed swords before. In fact, they’re litigating against each other right now in merry olde England, before the High Court in London. In the U.K. litigation, 3M is being sued by Porton Capital and by the British government (in the form of Ploughshare Innovations, an entity owned by the U.K.’s Ministry of Defence).
According to the Wall Street Journal, Porton and Ploughshare allege that 3M failed to diligently develop the BacLite testing technology, “a product already proved and used in Europe as a cheap and quick way of detecting methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, commonly known as MRSA, a hospital infection.” The reason this is so upsetting to Porton and Ploughshare is that they were contractually entitled to receive royalties from 3M’s sales of BacLite. The plaintiffs in the U.K. case claim that 3M abandoned BacLite less than a year after buying it — after botching the BacLite trials, and declaring the testing technology non-viable — “in order to protect a 3M-developed detection product known as Fastman from the less expensive rival posed by BacLite.”
Got that? Okay. Now, some updates to our prior coverage….
UPDATE (9/2/11, 9:30 AM): An update to our updates: a statement from William A. Brewer III, counsel to 3M, has been added below.
Continue reading “3M v. Lanny Davis: For the Record”
Lanny Davis
Physician, heal thyself? D.C. power broker Lanny Davis, a guru of crisis management, now has a crisis of his own to manage.
Davis has been hit with a federal lawsuit by, oddly enough, one of America’s largest corporations: 3M, the Fortune 100 company and Dow Jones Industrial Average component that’s famous for such products as Post-it Notes and Scotch tape. It’s surprising to see a mega-corporation like 3M going after a high-profile lawyer like Davis.
When you see a large corporation suing a prominent attorney like Davis — who, before launching his own firm last year, was a partner at such firms as McDermott Will & Emery, Orrick, and Patton Boggs — you might expect a malpractice claim. But that’s not the case here….
UPDATE (10:50 AM): Comments from Lanny Davis and his client, the Porton Group, have been added below. They point out that this is 3M’s third bite at the apple — the company previously filed two similar cases in New York state court. (The first suit was withdrawn, while the second still appears to be pending — rather strange, given the D.C. federal court filing.)
UPDATE (5:50 PM): Here is more information about 3M v. Lanny Davis.
Continue reading “Lawsuit of the Day: 3M v. Lanny Davis”
Don't 'defamate' me because I'm beautiful.
* With four states sounding their emergency alarms, will this weekend’s hurricane be the next natural disaster to rain on the legal world’s parade? [Los Angeles Times]
* Should we deregulate the practice of law? Do you want someone like me to be an actual lawyer? Easiest debate ever. I should’ve been on moot court. [WSJ Law Blog]
* Even if Justice David Prosser needed to choke a bitch, he’s not going to face criminal charges over it. That’s one way to address workplace safety. [Bloomberg]
* Want a Biglaw job? There’s an app for that! Don’t say Skadden never gave you anything for free (sorry, but the pizza doesn’t count). [DealBook / New York Times]
* Man, it must be nice to have so much money that you can talk bribe kids into skipping out on college. Are all Stanford Law grads so generous? [Reuters]
* Rapper Pitbull was shocked when he found out that Lindsay Lohan was suing him. See that suit and tie? He’s an upstanding gentleman. He’d never “defamate” a soul. [Houston Chronicle]
July shaped up to be a pretty good month for going after lower-ranked law schools. It isn’t even mid-August, but this month might end up even better.
Early in July, we reported that Kurzon Strauss, a small law firm based in New York, was trolling Craigslist for plaintiffs to sue Thomas M. Cooley Law School over its employment reporting practices. Cooley Law decided to strike first, suing the firm for defamation. And at about the same time, New York Law School and its dean, Richard Matasar, got ripped a new one in the New York Times.
And now, both law schools are getting sued for fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and deceptive business practices — à la Alaburda v. TJSL, the lawsuit filed back in May against Thomas Jefferson School of Law by an unhappy alumna.
Karmic revenge sure is sweet….
Continue reading “Cooley Law and NYLS Hit With Class Action Lawsuits”
Chris Christie
* Some bloggers stand up to dubious defamation lawsuits. [Techdirt]
* And some settle: St. Thomas Law (or its insurer) is paying $5,000 to Joseph Rakofsky. [Simple Justice]
* Another day, another lawyer accused of trying to kill someone — but not succeeding. (We might have more to say about this case next week; send us tips about Jason Smiekel.) [Chicago Tribune]
* My former boss, Governor Chris Christie, defends his appointment of Judge Sohail Mohammed, standing up to some of the Sharia-obsessed crazies on the right. Alas, some of these crazies could create problems for him in 2016. (Where are all the nice, moderate, socially liberal Republicans hiding? Establishment types, please take the GOP back from these icky populists.) [Arab American Institute]
* My co-author, Zach Shemtob, takes to the airwaves in defense of our New York Times op-ed, which has been controversial in some quarters. [AM 560 WIND]
Richard Matasar
* Dean Richard Matasar, outgoing dean of New York Law School, denies that law schools are all about the benjamins; rather, NYLS and other independent law schools “exist only for the benefit of their students.” [Bloomberg Law / YouTube]
* A woman is videotaped saying that she will claim sexual assault, when no such assault happened. (Staci’s take: “Pissed off women do strange things.”) [Houston Press]
* Google’s chief legal officer, David Drummond, accuses its competitors of being evil. [Corporate Counsel]
* Being a tenured professor can be a pretty sweet gig. Being an adjunct prof? Not so much. [Adjunct Law Prof Blog]
* If you’re looking for something to do on Monday night in New York, check out this fundraising event, sponsored by Weil Pays It Forward (and featuring Survivor hottie and former Weil lawyer Charlie Herschel). [Celebration of Survival]
You see what happens, Cooley? You see what happens when you sue anonymous commenters on the internet?
We’re only on day two of Cooley’s reputation defense lawsuits, and it’s already obvious that the lawsuits have made it possible for more people to be more critical of the education offered by the school.
So far, the most damning statement about Cooley’s education has come from Cooley itself. Cooley president Don LeDuc said that the school filed these suits “to protect Cooley’s reputation and stand up for our students and more than 15,000 graduates.”
And yet, of those 15,000 graduates, when it came time to defend Cooley’s reputation, the school went with lawyers who were not educated at Cooley.
Not only did the school not use its own graduates for this work, one of the anonymous commenters the school is suing appears to be a recent Cooley graduate former Cooley Law student. I mean, with friends like these, right?
CORRECTION (7/16/11): It appears that this commenter did not graduate from Cooley, but instead studied there for a time before transferring out.
In any event, that defendant has decided to respond to the Cooley lawsuit…
Continue reading “Cooley Lawsuit Update: One Of The ‘Cooley Four’ Responds To The Law School’s Complaint”
Cooley President Don LeDuc
Earlier this month, we reported that somebody was looking to Craigslist for potential plaintiffs to sue Thomas M. Cooley Law School over the school’s published post-graduate employment statistics. As many of you know, Thomas Jefferson School of Law has already been hit with such a lawsuit.
Well, apparently Cooley isn’t going to sit around and wait for somebody to sue them. Instead, the school is going to sue first.
A message from Cooley president Don LeDuc informed students that Cooley is suing a New York law firm and four anonymous “John Doe” commentators on the internet. We haven’t seen the lawsuit, so we don’t know exactly who the school is suing. According to LeDuc, Cooley is not trying to “police the internet.” Instead he says the school is trying to defend its reputation and the value of a Cooley Law degree.
You can read his full letter to students below….
Continue reading “Thomas Cooley Sues A Law Firm And Four ‘John Does’ On the Internet”
It has been said that one has truly arrived as a small-firm superstar when he appears in this column. Who said that? Someone, I am sure. While I simply cannot confer that honor to all small-firm attorneys, there is a second place honor: a feature in the New York Times. Martin Singer — the “guard dog” to Hollywood royalty, and founder of the small firm Lavely & Singer — is one of these superstars.
Singer’s client list includes some major starpower: Charlie Sheen, Jeremy Piven (remember when Ari Gold had mercury poisoning?), Arnold Schwarzenegger, Senator Harry Reid, Quentin Tarantino, and (gasp) Sylvester Stallone. Through these relationships, Singer has developed a niche that anyone would want to scratch: “shielding stars and their adjuncts from annoyance.”
While Singer’s firm specializes in all things entertainment, “[n]othing gets Mr. Singer going like a whiff of defamation.” And when he gets going, he does what has made him famous: “kill, or at least maim, unflattering stories that have yet to surface.” Some attorneys do not believe the hype about Singer’s ability to kill said stories (e.g., noted First Amendment lawyer Martin Garbus, who described Singer as a “blowhard”). But Hollywood publicists are convinced that Singer is the man to call when a story breaks about their clients’ love child or sex tape.
Do not be fooled by the glitz and glamour associated with representing celebrities. After the jump, see how Lavely & Singer is like many other successful small firms….
Continue reading “Size Matters: Hollywood Pit Bull Is Just Like Us”
Andrew Shirvell (far right) and Chris Armstrong
Here’s a quick update on a past Lawsuit of the Day. Last month, Chris Armstrong, the openly gay ex-president of the University of Michigan student body, sued Andrew Shirvell, the former Michigan assistant attorney general and outspoken opponent of homosexuality. As you may recall, Shirvell criticized Armstrong in a blog called Chris Armstrong Watch, making allegations that according to Armstrong were false, and Shirvell also followed Armstrong around Ann Arbor. So Armstrong sued Shirvell for stalking, invasion of privacy, and defamation (among other claims).
Now Andrew Shirvell is firing back. Last week, Shirvell, proceeding pro se [FN1], moved to dismiss Chris Armstrong’s lawsuit.
Not surprisingly, Shirvell claimed in his motion to be a victim: “Plaintiff’s course of conduct was politically motivated and intended to make an example out of Defendant in order to deter others from criticizing Plaintiff’s homosexual activist agenda.” More specifically, Shirvell argued that certain counts of the Armstrong complaint fail to state claims upon which relief can be granted, that Shirvell’s criticism of Armstrong was protected by the First Amendment, and that Shirvell never had direct contact with Armstrong (e.g., by email or by phone).
In addition, Shirvell lodged some counterclaims against Armstrong. What is the basis for Shirvell suing Armstrong?
Continue reading “Shirvell Won’t Shrivel: Former Michigan Prosecutor Turns It Around on Chris Armstrong”
Toronto partner David Cowling, exonerated booty dancer
Back in January 2009, a moot court after-party hosted by Mathews, Dinsdale & Clarke got wild enough to spark allegations of sexual harassment. Canadians do know how to party, eh? The “night of debauchery” has haunted David Cowling ever since; he was one of the partners accused of getting overly friendly with female associates and law students, while gettin’ jiggy.
He says that an internal law firm investigation cleared him of charges of inappropriate dance floor behavior, but that the firm refused to make that public, leading to rumors continuing to swirl in his work and social communities in Toronto. Oh, and have we mentioned that David Cowling specializes in labor and employment law? “If I were a personal injury lawyer, sexual harassment rumors would not be such a bad mark on my professional reputation,” says Cowling.
So he filed a libel suit against Adrian Jakibchuk and Sarah Diebel, the two associates who accused him of doing the really funky chicken on the dance floor. Apparently, they don’t study the Barbara Streisand effect in Canadian law schools. That got the allegations splashed across Canadian newspapers and here at ATL.
But now he’s got his name cleared, with a public statement from his prior firm, along with a seven-figurish settlement. He started a new firm and dropped his lawsuit against his accusers, and has a few things to say about his side of the story.
So say you’re the law student who supposedly got felt up by a partner on the dance floor, and his lawyer calls you up in the middle of exam week to talk about it. Yeah, that’s awkward. And Cowling sent along the transcript…
Continue reading “Booty-Dancing Toronto Partner: ‘I Was Falsely Accused’”
Our buddy, the Honorable Alex Kozinski, is on a roll. On Monday, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit benchslapped a pair of wealthy, persistently annoying and mildly famous identical twins.
The same day, he gave a lecture at San Francisco’s Golden Gate University School of Law, where he declared the Internet has killed the First Amendment, or at least made it an anachronism. Heavy stuff.
More on what the judge said about the web’s effect on unsuppressable free speech, journalism and scumbag bloggers, after the jump.
Continue reading “Did Blogging Kill the First Amendment?”
Remember Lawrence Connell, the professor at Widener Law School who got in trouble for coming up with teaching hypotheticals in which he killed Dean Linda Ammons? Well, perhaps Professor Connell wishes the dean’s death was more than hypothetical.
Apparently Professor Connell wants to slay Dean Ammons — in a court of law. He has sued the dean for defamation.
Suing your current boss or employer — as opposed to suing after you’re gone, a la Matthew Kluger v. Fried Frank — can be awkward. Just ask JoEllen Lyons Dillon of Reed Smith or Raymond Carey of Foley & Lardner, two partners who have sued the law firms where they still work.
But they don’t have tenure, unlike Larry Connell. Let’s see what the good professor is suing over….
Continue reading “Lawsuit of the Day: Widener Law Professor Sues Dean for Defamation”
