Kids

Morning Docket: 07.17.12

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* “Many organizations have people who do dumb things.” Members of the Secret Service aren’t the only suits getting secretly serviced. Apparently Treasury Department officials like hookers, too. [New York Daily News]

* The cool cats at WilmerHale arrived for their first day of work yesterday at their hip new downtown location. Their library has a Wii, but who are they kidding, it’s probably just for show. [Am Law Daily (sub. req.)]

* On the other side of the fence, we’ve got some signs of the impending lawpocalypse. Soon Biglaw veterans will be forced to say goodbye to the corner office and hello to the glass-walled cubicle. [WSJ Law Blog]

* George Zimmerman: alleged murderer, and now an alleged child toucher (though he was still a child himself). Witness 9 claims Zimmerman abused her for a decade while they were both underage. [CNN]

* “We want to have a bar pass standard that really works. And it’s clear it doesn’t work now.” Oh boy, would you look at that. The ABA is trying to make it look like it’s doing something to improve law schools! [ABA Journal]

* Emory Law received a record donation, and more than half will fund minority student scholarships. Little do these kids know that they’ll soon be condescendingly told to move to Nebraska. [National Law Journal]

* But then again, maybe Nebraska isn’t so bad, considering three law schools are shipping students to neighboring Iowa. The towns are tiny, and the surroundings are rural, but come on, the state’s got jobs. [NPR]

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Judge of the Day: You Won’t Like Me When I’m Angry

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It has been a bad week for those poor naïve souls who imagine judges as wizened, white-haired, grandfatherly figures. At least at the state level, we are learning about judges with tempers more along the lines of grumpy pitbulls than anything else.

This week, we heard about a judge in Washington who has been charged by a state judicial board with violating codes of conduct. The Washington State Commission on Judicial Conduct accused Judge John Wulle of failing to “to maintain order and decorum in proceedings” and engaging “in a pattern of discourteous, impatient and undignified behavior.”

So, how exactly did Judge Wulle allegedly misbehave? Let’s take a read, and, even better, we’ve got video….

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Quote of the Day: Sorry, But No One Feels Bad For You

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Jerry Sandusky

I’m dealing with this, but if I have to sit around in this cell for a few more days, I am going to go nutty.

– Jerry Sandusky, via his lawyer, Karl Rominger, commenting on his time in an isolation cell while on suicide watch after his conviction for child sex abuse on Friday.

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Inside Straight: What Happened To The Careers?

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As regular readers of this column know, my son, Jeremy, took a pass on law school: “I really love you, Dad. But basically you help big companies that did it get off the hook.”

Now, if I mention to physician-friends that my son’s in medical school, those friends often react the same way: “God love him; I hope he enjoys it. But I’d never go to medical school these days. Between the insurance companies, the hospital administrators, and the government, there’s no longer any joy in practicing medicine. It’s hard to treat your patients, and it’s hard to make a living. I suspect that things will only get worse over time. I loved being a doctor, but I sure wouldn’t want to be coming out of medical school today.”

I guess that means that today’s college graduates should think hard before deciding to go to medical school. Cross medicine off the list of desirable career choices.

And everyone in the legal profession knows the story about law . . .

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A Law Firm Partner and His Boalt Hall Wife Stand Accused of Planting Drugs on an Elementary School Volunteer

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Parenting can be an extremely difficult task, but an even more difficult task is proper helicopter parenting. It’s got to be an intense job to keep an eye on your child’s every move, day and night, wherever he may roam. In fact, some people have started to call these people lawnmower parents — after all, why choose to hover overhead when you can destructively mow down all obstacles that you perceive to be in your child’s way on the road to success?

Today, we’ve got a story about an attractive California couple who stand accused of being textbook examples of the worst kind of lawnmower parents, and they just so happen to both be lawyers. Daddy is (or was) a securities litigation partner at a midsize firm, and Mommy is a graduate of top law school. Trust us when we say that you do not want to mess with their kid, because you may wind up facing drug charges….

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Buying In: Thoughts From A Biglaw Dad

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Ed. note: This is the second column by our newest writer, Anonymous Partner. In case you missed his first post, check it out here.

If “Partner” is your only or most important title, quite frankly you are missing out. For me, it’s “Dad,” as my little man likes to say, or simply “Daddy,” to my little princess. Before you freak out about how not everyone wants children and the world is overpopulated — relax. Father’s Day just went by, and it just simply is not the time for anything other than celebrating fatherhood.

None of us would be here without a father, and I submit that each of us has been shaped by our father, whether he was a model dad, an absent one, or simply some squiggly molecules in a petri dish. For those blessed to have had an engaged father, the goal is to emulate and if possible surpass his example, while those who went without should work that much harder to make sure that their own children have something other than the pain of absence to carry with them. Biglaw partners are acutely aware of the value of time, and most that I have met wish they had more of it to give to their children.

Of course, being a dad in Biglaw means sacrifice — the financial and professional rewards come at a cost….

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Potential Lawsuit of the Day: Octomom Refuses to Ride the Pole at Florida Strip Club

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Nadya Suleman aka Octomom

When it comes to Nadya Suleman, aka Octomom, we’ve only mentioned her in passing, and that’s probably because no one actually cares about the woes of a mother of 14 children (holy crap) — come on now, she doesn’t even have her own reality TV show. But it’s hard to feed so many mouths, so back in April, Suleman claimed that she would consider taking any job, as long as the price was right.

Unfortunately for Octomom, dignity was too costly an option. Instead, she’ll be starring in her own [link is quasi-NSFW] masturbation film — set for online release on June 20, and sadly not entitled “Octopussy.” And she’ll be stripping at a Florida venue the second week of July.

Well, she was supposed to show off her sexy C-section scars in mid-July, but she apparently decided to pull out of her contract. If only she hadn’t undergone in vitro fertilization, this would have been great joke fodder.

Now Suleman may be facing an epic lawsuit, but to be honest, we’re surprised that it took this long for someone to threaten to sue her….

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‘Dingo Ate My Baby’ Defense Actually Works!

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Is, is... is that a baby?

Now this is an Innocence Project.

An Australian coroner has ruled that a dingo really did eat Lindy Chamberlain-Creighton’s baby, over 30 years ago.

To put this in context, the line “a dingo ate my baby” comes from this case! This case was the basis for the movie A Cry in the Dark with Meryl Streep (though IMDB claims that the famous line was never actually spoken in this movie).

So Lindy Chamberlain-Creighton, the “dingo ate my baby” lady, has been vindicated! What a world. Next thing you know, dogs will actually start eating homework, and O.J. will find his ex-wife’s real killers.

How did we come to this?

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Friendly Biglaw Partner Accused Of Helping Minors Get Drunk — Like That’s A Bad Thing

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UPDATE (1/10/2013): Please note the update at the end of this post concerning the dismissal of the charge in this case.

This is going to go down as one of those “partners behaving badly” stories, but I don’t think it should. Underage drinking is a problem because kids don’t know how to handle alcohol and they drink too much and die. Or they drink too much and then do something stupid and die. Dead teenagers are not a good thing.

Many people think the solution is to somehow “ban” teenage drinking. Note that currently people under 21 aren’t allowed to buy alcohol. Note also that teens almost always still find a way to drink.

Instead of only focusing on ways to prevent teens from drinking, can’t we also at least think about ways to allow teens to drink in a safe environment? I think every high school should have at least one “cool” parent. One parent whose house you can go over to and have a couple of beers without everybody freaking out. Then, if you get too drunk or stupid or whatever, the “cool” parent can drive you home, or keep an eye on you, or tell the attending physician exactly how much you had to drink before you lapsed into a pansy-boy “alcohol poisoning” coma.

So yeah, to the rest of society, this Biglaw partner has been accused of something really bad. To me, he’s just been accused of providing a vital public service….

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Lawyer on Maternity Leave Brings Baby to Court When Trial Delay Is Denied

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Imagine that you’re a lawyer on maternity leave, and you find out on a Friday — somewhat short notice, but you have the weekend to sort things out — that your request for a trial delay has been denied. You have to go to court on Monday. What would you do in that kind of a situation?

While some would simply ask a family member to watch the baby, others would hit the babysitter’s number on speed dial in a heart beat. Others would farm the case out to a competent colleague. And others still would dump the baby off at the local daycare center that specialized in newborns. Each of these options seems reasonably workable.

But Amber Vazquez Bode, the lawyer this actually happened to, wasn’t having it. Interrupt my maternity leave? Screw you, judge, I’m bringing my baby to court….

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