Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks. Prior installments appear here; please read them first.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

Katarina grabbed her oversized purse and tossed a long red scarf around her neck. Tyler noticed a copy of Atlas Shrugged peeking out of it. Alignment: Libertarian. And geeky. Only true bookworms manage to slog through all 1000+-pages of Ayn Rand’s magnum opus.

“So what kind of law do you want to practice?” Tyler asked as they walked. He groaned inwardly for asking such a stock question.

“Litigation, probably appellate,” she replied. “I’m especially interested in constitutional questions.”

Tyler sensed a liberal arts background and good grades in law school. “And what was your college major?”

“Archaeology. I have my master’s degree in Near Eastern Art and Archaeology from the University of Chicago.”

Precisely, thought Tyler.

Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks. Prior installments appear here; please read them first.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

The elevator opened again, and a flurry of blue uniforms quickly surrounded ken Thrax’s office and began marking it with yellow tape. Class: Fighter.

Tyler was a thinker, not a fighter. He left quietly, not wanting to get involved, especially if that yellow sticky note was one of Thrax’s last acts….

Tyler went down the hall to Katarina’s office. He spotted her head amongst the piles of books and case printouts. She was so engrossed in a volume of Miller’s Federal Practice and Procedure that she hadn’t even noticed his entry. He smiled.

Tyler rapped lightly on the doorframe. Katarina jumped. “Sorry,” he said, suppressing a chuckle. “Want to get dinner?”

Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks. Prior installments appear here; please read them first.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

Back at the office, Tyler reached for his case file. A yellow Post-It note on top read “Drinks at 5 p.m. Solstice. K.”

Tyler instantly e-mailed Katarina one word: Yes.

Then he noticed an e-mail from the managing partner announcing cuts in the recruiting budget. No reimbursements for associate lunches with summers. The firm has, however, negotiated a deal with Solstice such that all recruiting meals eaten there and paid for by corporate credit card are still fully reimbursable up to $7.00 per person. Tyler groaned audibly. Having to eat well-presented-yet-unflavored food every day was his personal hell.

An e-mail from Katarina appeared! His heart pounded as he read her reply: “?” He read it again and mentally administered severe self-flagellation for a divination attempt gone badly awry! Tyler wished vainly for a time reversal spell to recall that e-mail. Seeing none, he instead replied, “What is the answer to which the question is ‘dinner tonight?’” He crossed his fingers.

Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique firm, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks. Prior installments appear here; please read them first.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

The waiter’s arrival with their food gave him a few moments reprieve. Mark and Alex had cheeseburgers with dill havarti and fries served in a tall silver cone with a trio of condiments: ketchup, barbeque, and honey mustard. Katarina had a chicken caesar, but with the chicken strips stacked like Lincoln Logs. What nonsense, thought Tyler. Then his pepperoni pizza arrived — in five small round pizzettes stacked vertically at one-inch intervals on a braced skewer.

“Leaning Tower of Pizza, get it?” the waiter asked. Katarina laughed. Tyler was not amused, however, as he now had to eat this edible architectural marvel politely in front of his co-workers.

As Tyler mentally debated the question of hands v. utensils, Spencer walked up with his own lunch entourage. Class: New Partner. Intelligence: High. Top of his class at University of Virginia. Charisma: average. Alignment: Hard work. Spencer had no time for alignments. He was too busy billing. Experience Points: ~3500? Spencer had been a rising star since the day he set foot in the firm as a summer associate, and no one was surprised when he made partner the first year he was up.

Spencer skipped the usual round of introductions and went straight to Mark. “Veronica’s suing the firm,” he said grimly.

Veronica, Tyler knew, was an associate who had recently lateraled to another firm after learning she was unlikely to make partner. Standards were higher in this economy. Class: 7. Experience points: 2200/yr, but low Intelligence. Charisma: Above average. She wasn’t Tyler’s type, but he knew her reputation among the firm’s bachelors.

“What, she didn’t make partner because she’s a woman?” asked Mark.

“No, she’d never make that shtick. Sexual harassment. By Dick Schlosh.” said Spencer.

Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique firm, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks. The first chapter appears here; please read it first.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

Tyler headed down to the firm lobby to meet Mark and the 2L summer associates: Katarina from Harvard and Alex from University of Chicago. He knew Mark would want to go to Solstice, the trendy new restaurant in the basement of their building. Mark was efficient like that. Experience Points: about 2700/yr, very respectable.

Tyler hated Solstice. Overpriced, overpresented, and underflavored. But the name, he thought, was fitting. Every day in this building was the longest day of the year.

The elevator reached its destination with a bit of a thud. Mark, Katarina, and Alex were already waiting for him. Mark waved him over. “We were just thinking of going to Solstice,” he said. “Sure,” said Tyler, suppressing an eye roll.

He had met Alex before. Class: Summer Associate. Level: 1. High Intelligence, moderate Charisma. Experience Points: perhaps 50? Alignment: Lawful good. He had quickly developed a reputation as an incredibly nice guy.

And then there was Katarina. Class: Sorceress! Level: 1. Clad in the standard 2L-clone-just-bought-lightweight-wool-dark-suit uniform. But summer associates were well advised to stand out for their work quality rather than their appearance, so her choice probably indicated decent judgment. Something about her, however, exuded a certain geekiness.

“This is Tyler. He also went to Harvard, and then he clerked for Judge Pyrrha on the Fifteenth Circuit.” Mark broke in helpfully.

“Oh, I heard her speak at Harvard last year on the original understanding of the Ninth Amendment. She was amazing,” Katarina replied.

Alignment: Libertarian.

Ed. note: Welcome to ATL’s first foray into serial fiction. “My Job Is Murder,” a mystery set in a D.C. appellate boutique firm, will appear one chapter at a time, M-W-F, over the next few weeks.

Susanna Dokupil can be reached by email at sdokupil@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook.

Tyler got onto the elevator and pressed the button marked 13. As the doors closed, he looked down at the golden manacles that signified his position as an associate. He must survive the tower another day, he thought. Only 657 more days until he paid off his student loans — that is, if he stuck to his budget. Until then, Tyler must serve out his apprenticeship as a squire to the knights of the realm, ensuring that the knights had the proper weapons for jousting with opposing counsel.

He reached his sparsely furnished cell in the law offices of MakoProphet, a D.C. appellate boutique, and turned on his +6 vorpal laptop. Tyler had a tendency to let his imagination wander. He scored high on Intelligence and Dexterity, but less so on Strength and Charisma. Tyler had spent — or rather misspent — the better portion of his youth immersed in fantasy fiction, various strategy games, SimWhatever, or some combination of the above. He tended to view the world in game terms. It helped him break down the complexities of real-life interactions into understandable bits to compensate for his obvious lack of social skills.

Tyler’s voicemail light was blinking. It was a message from his secretary, Jill. The firm’s travel office wanted him to fly from D.C. to New York through Cleveland in order to use some preferred airline. He imagined Jill talking to Patty and Selma from The Simpsons. Class: Bureaucrat. Level: Five. Hit Points: About a million. Bureaucrats were generally impossible to kill and not worth the effort. Better to work around them. He had his secretary research alternatives.

Stephen Snyder is a Maryland trial attorney who has been called “one of the nation’s top litigators.” When you surf into Snyder’s website (www.snyderwins.com), it contains a warning:

Please note: This website may, at first blush, strike you as a bit over-the-top. But it’s not designed to give you pause, or scare you away. It’s simply a reflection of Stephen L. Snyder, the man. His unique personality, creative imagination, and willingness to take risks, has resulted in multiple $100 million-plus recoveries for his clients.

If creating an animated movie featuring yourself as a legal superhero might be considered “a bit over-the-top,” then yes, “Snyderman” is guilty as charged.

“Stephen Snyder, Litigator for Hire,” Website

Yesterday the news broke that Steven Molo, of Shearman & Sterling, and Jeffrey Lamken, of Baker Botts, were leaving their respective firms to start a new litigation boutique. It will be called MoloLamken and start out with offices in New York and D.C. Am Law Daily reports that the firm represents the new recession model for business generation:

If there is a firm model built for the dawning post-recession era, it’s probably a litigation boutique with low overhead and a flexible billing structure….

The firm will start with four partners and two associates, and will work on both plaintiffs and defense cases. Within five years, Molo says he hopes to have around 50 lawyers. “Over time, clients have become far more sophisticated in hiring firms,” he said. “They understand how a firm like this can be small but every bit as efficient or even more so than a larger firm.”

But are they hiring? Details after the jump.

You see partners spinning off from bigger firms to start their own shops all the time. We’ve covered some of these high-profile partners that are still taking the risk during the recession, like the Skadden partners who formed BuckleySandler, or the Boies, Schiller partners who formed Stone & Magnanini.

But starting your own firm isn’t the exclusive domain of partners. Associates start their own shops all the time, even in this market. Last week, we learned that two Quinn Emanuel associates were taking the plunge and forming their own firm, Colt Wallerstein LLP:

Colt Wallerstein is founded by Doug Colt and Tom Wallerstein, two former Quinn Emanuel attorneys. Claude Stern, the managing partner of Quinn’s Silicon Valley office, said of the pair: “For years, I have worked closely with both Doug and Tom. I have trusted them with my clients’ most sensitive information and they have excelled in managing complex, sophisticated, and difficult commercial litigation. Doug and Tom are terrific, client-focused lawyers with a keen sense of the practical.”

These two attorneys weren’t laid off from Quinn. They say they were on partnership track at a firm where profits per partner march ever upwards. So you have to ask, “Why the hell would you leave a stable, well-paying job in the middle of a recession? Do you also enjoy looking gift horses in the mouth?”

After the jump, Wallerstein answers some of our questions.

Today’s job of the week, brought to you by Lateral Link, is at a prominent New York boutique. In addition to covering major international law firms, Lateral Link also works with smaller regional firms. If you are a legal employer seeking to hire a well-credentialed experienced attorney, please contact us.

Position: Senior Litigation Associate

Location: New York, NY

Description: A prominent general practice firm is seeking a senior associate for its litigation group. The work done by the litigation group focuses on general commercial litigation, specifically, corporate and securities matters, contests for corporate control and shareholder disputes and broker-dealer disputes. The department also handles contract, employment, intellectual property, bankruptcy, and real estate litigation, as well as health care regulation, administrative and white collar criminal matters. Position requires 5 to 7 years of litigation experience at a top firm, courtroom/deposition experience, and New York state bar admission.

For more information on this position or to apply, please see position #5234 on Lateral Link, or contact Ryan Belville at rbelville@laterallink.com. Membership in Lateral Link is free and you can apply at www.laterallink.com.

Earlier: Prior Job of the Week listings

If you’re looking for opportunities outside the usual suspects — New York, D.C., Chicago, L.A., San Francisco — then this latest Job of the Week may interest you. As usual, it’s brought to you by Lateral Link.

Position(s): Junior litigation associates (2006 - 2008 grads)

Location: North Carolina

Description: This boutique was formed in 2000 as a select cadre of lawyers providing sophisticated legal services to blue-chip clients. With a strong emphasis on customer service, the ten founding lawyers set out to offer premier legal services efficiently, but with the intense involvement of the firm’s most senior partners. Today, the firm’s 27 lawyers provide legal services to more than 30 members of the Fortune 500. The firm continues to attract the finest attorneys with significant trial, appellate, and transactional experience.

For more information on this position, please contact Jordan Abshire, Director, at either jordan.abshire@laterallink.com or 704.899.5549. Jordan is a Director for the Southeast Region, with a focus on Washington, D.C., Charlotte, and Atlanta. Jordan spent three years in private practice in the energy group at Troutman Sanders LLP, after graduating from Harvard Law School and receiving a B.S. in Psychology, summa cum laude, and a B.A. in Political Science, summa cum laude, from Louisiana State University.

Perhaps Breaking Back Into Big Law is going to get a little easier, now that some of the AmLaw 100 are starting to hire lateral associates again. The Job of the Week is one of several new openings, primarily in litigation and intellectual property, that you can find out about over at Lateral Link. Also, just a reminder: if your firm is offering a paid deferral, please contact your Lateral Link search consultant, since Lateral Link has dozens of in-house positions for deferred attorneys. Lateral Link members click here for more details.

Position: Junior Litigation Associate

Location: New York, NY

Description: An AmLaw 100 law firm is seeking a junior commercial litigation associate. The attorney must have outstanding academic credentials and previous major law firm experience.

For more information on this position or to apply, please see Position #10580 on Lateral Link. Membership in Lateral Link is free and you can apply at www.laterallink.com.

Before you head off for the Memorial Day weekend, check out the latest Job of the Week, coming out of Texas. As always, the Job of the Week is brought to you by Lateral Link. Lateral Link has successfully placed dozens of attorneys at regional law firms. If you are a regional firm looking to hire a top attorney, please email Michael Allen at mallen@laterallink.com.

Position: Litigation Associate

Location: Dallas, TX

Description: Local boutique firm seeks an ‘05 or ‘06 associate for its litigation practice. Excellent academic credentials required. Candidates should be licensed in Texas or be willing to take the first available bar exam. This well-respected law firm is comprised of approximately 40 attorneys, many of whom are refugees from larger firms who tired of the big firm lifestyle.

For more information about this position or to apply, please see Position #10559 on Lateral Link. Current members can also contact their personal search consultant directly to discuss this position. Membership in Lateral Link is free and you can apply at www.laterallink.com.

P.S. The Harvard Law School Alumni Association is looking for at least four graduating students who are deferred by law firms and seeking interim positions in the non-profit field as part of their deferral. For more information, check out the Resources section of the Career Center.

Earlier: Prior Job of the Week listings

You don’t see this everyday. Two D.C.-based partners of Skadden Arps partners are leaving the firm. And it’s not even to work for the government.

The two Skadden D.C. litigators are Andrew Sandler and Benjamin Klubes. Associates were told in group meetings late yesterday afternoon. Skadden furnished Above the Law with the following statement:

Andrew Sandler and Benjamin Klubes are forming their own law firm to be named BuckleySandler, which will also include all of the 36 attorneys from the firm Buckley Kolar, a DC-based boutique that focuses on regulatory issues affecting the financial services industry. In addition, Andrew Sandler will become the CEO of Corporate Risk Advisors, a multi-disciplinary consulting firm providing services to the financial services industry.

Our sources weigh in after the jump.

We’ve been hearing talk of interesting developments at Boies, Schiller & Flexner, the litigation powerhouse founded by the legendary David Boies, which seems to be doing well despite the downturn (see their bonuses). If you have info to share, please feel free to email us.

Here is some news that we can confirm. The BSF office in New Jersey — located in the upscale community of Short Hills, home to the fabulous, high-end shopping mall — is breaking off from the mother ship. Partners David Stone and Robert Magnanini are hanging up their own shingle, at Stone & Magnanini. (The official press release is available here.)

As one might expect of Boies Schiller partners, Stone and Magnanini are highly experienced and impressively credentialed. David Stone (above right) — a graduate of Harvard Law School, where he worked with such heavyweights as Alan Dershowitz and Laurence Tribe — has developed a robust practice in complex civil and criminal litigation. He has been particularly successful in handling False Claims Act cases, where he has scored some major victories (including a $163 million settlement in the Medco case).

Bob Magnanini (at right), a graduate of Columbia Law School, has similarly extensive experience in complex civil and criminal cases, especially False Claims Act matters. He’s also a Lieutenant Colonel in the New York Army National Guard, serving as the senior division staff officer from the 42nd Infantry Division at the World Trade Center for the two weeks following the 9/11 attacks

They’ll be joined by Eric Jaso, as counsel. Jaso, a graduate of the University of Chicago Law School, is a former Justice Department official and federal prosecutor, who also worked at Latham & Watkins and Cravath. (Disclosure: Jaso is a friend and former colleague of your above-signed scribe, from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey.)

We chatted on the phone with David Stone — no relation to Eli — about the new firm. Read more, after the jump.

Update (4/7/09): As of now, the firm is hiring. Details here.

* Investigators looking in to Bernard Madoff’s ponzi scheme “found evidence he ran an unregistered money-management business alongside his firm’s brokerage and investment-advisory subsidiaries.” [Bloomberg]

* A little insight into how Marc Dreier cheated even the best businessmen. [New York Times]

* Regardless of whether Gov. Rod Blagojevich resigns today, Democrats will have to decide whether to appoint or elect Barack Obama’s replacement. [Washington Post]

* … Meanwhile Illinois lawmakers try to pick up the pieces. [Chicago Tribune]

* Another merger fell apart this weekend. Apollo Inc. will not be acquiring Huntsman corp. Litigators will still be kept busy because Huntsman plans to continue its law suit against Credit Suisse. [Reuters]

* New Zealand’s anti-trust regulator says airlines are acting like a cartel. [The Financial Times]

Back in August, we reported that a magazine for female litigators was in the works. They were in the naming phase at the time, and we tried to help them out by surveying you about the worst of their proposed names, including such gems as “Chill,” “Woman Litigator,” and “Spirit, The Magazine for Women in e-Discovery.” Almost half of the voters chose “Trial Mama” as the worst of the worst.

Well, in that post, we asked you all to suggest better titles. And it seems the magazine mavens were listening. They have embraced the suggestion proffered by commentator #33 on that thread, and named the magazine “Sue, For Women In Litigation.”

Kudos to us for calling them out on terrible title ideas and kudos to you, anonymous ATL reader, for naming a new magazine. It launches January 2009, and will be published bimonthly. The magazine promises “stories of remarkable individuals along with expert advice, cutting-edge data and emerging trends to help readers gain more recognition, more equity and opportunity in the legal workplace.”

The mission of “Sue” after the jump.

The makers of KNOW: The Magazine for Paralegals have another legal publication in the works. A tipster forwarded us an e-mail about a “new magazine for women professionals in litigation.”

Imagining the love child of Glamour and the American Lawyer, we expected to see planned articles on hot courtroom studs and legal fashion faux pas. But it sounds like this publication will be more strait-laced. The email announcement claims the magazine will “be chock full of work style and life style balance articles; address women’s issues in the law firm and in-house legal environment and offer informative pieces on current topics in technology, litigation and e-discovery.”

They’re in the naming phase, and are considering the following. Which two are not like the others?

* Women in Litigation
* Chill
* Woman Litigator
* Trial Mama
* American Litigator
* Spirit, The Magazine for Women in e-Discovery
* Equality, The Magazine for Women Litigators
* Legal Women, A Workstyle & Life Balance Magazine

We’re not excited by the bland “Women in Litigation” options, or anything with “e-Discovery” in the title. But “Chill” and “Trial Mama” are truly ridonculous. ATL Idol Exley’s “Clitigator”, or Lat’s beloved “Litigatrix”, would blow all the other entries away. We welcome better title suggestions in the comments.

Among the options offered, we can’t decide which is the worst. What do you think?

That’s the title of our latest column for the New York Observer, which reflects upon recent television and film portrayals of women litigators.

It touches upon some of the same themes highlighted in Amy Kolz’s excellent American Lawyer article from last year, but it’s more focused on fictional female litigators, as opposed to real-life ones. Here’s how it starts:

Whatever happened to Ally McBeal? If recent movies and television shows are any guide, the life of a female lawyer has gotten a lot less pleasant since the carefree, charmingly neurotic days of dancing babies and bathroom kisses. But today’s portrayals may be more accurate, and certainly more critically acclaimed.

Last January, Glenn Close won a Golden Globe for her compelling performance as Patty Hewes, a fearsome and wildly successful plaintiff’s lawyer, on the addictive TV show Damages. The following month, Tilda Swinton snagged an Oscar for stepping into the pumps of Karen Crowder, a hard-charging in-house litigator, in Michael Clayton.

In March, Julianna Margulies (of ER) returned to television as aggressive defense lawyer Elizabeth Canterbury, the title character of Canterbury’s Law. Even Katey Sagal, who embodied the famously vulgar Peggy Bundy on Married With Children, reincarnated herself this year as Marci Klein, the sleek, powerful, and ruthless founding partner of the law firm on Eli Stone.

You can read the full column over here.

Farewell, Ally McBeal; Enter the Litigatrix [New York Observer]

Congratulations to our old friend James Ho. The good news first surfaced on Sophistic Miltonian Serbonian Blog:

A quiet trickle of a rumor last week was that James C. Ho, currently of counsel with Gibson Dunn and a former law clerk to Justice Thomas at SCOTUS, has been tapped to serve as the next Solicitor General of Texas. If this is true, Texas will be in very capable hands as Jim Ho is certainly one of the best appellate lawyers in the state (and the country for that matter), and has demonstrated great and valuable political savvy on the national stage as well.

Moreover, it is interesting to note that, now, three of the four solicitors general have clerked for SCOTUS (Greg Coleman-Justice Thomas; Ted Cruz-the late Chief Rehnquist; and Jim Ho-Justice Thomas). A SCOTUS clerkship now appears to be a prerequisite to the post, which makes eminent sense because one of the OSG’s main functions is to represent the State before SCOTUS-a job we have noted current General Cruz has done extremely well.

That preliminary report appeared on Tuesday; the news is now confirmed. Here are press releases from the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, and the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association, both praising Ho for his past achievements, and wishing him well in his latest endeavor.

Read more, after the jump.