* It sounds like very few protesters greeted John Yoo at Berkeley Law School. Only four were tenacious enough to get arrested. [Associated Press]

* Fen-phen lawyers sentenced to 20 and 25 years, respectively. The judge wants their sentences to deter other lawyers tempted to steal from settlement funds. [Bloomberg]

* Proskauer Rose probably likes this headline. [New York Daily News]

* Nino leads one to believe that empathy is not an important quality in a judge. [New York Times via Daily Beast]

* The 5th Circuit agrees with a Texas school district that has banned “shirts with words.” Are shirts with numbers okay? [Courthouse News Service]

* Michael Jackson’s children have lawyered up. [CNN]

* Nationwide salary cut watch: LA County judges. [Los Angeles Times]

* Why has there been no litigation surge in the recession? [National Law Journal]

This year’s batch of summer associates are roughing it at Biglaw summer camp, with fewer meals out on the firm and less lavish events. To make matters worse, some summers are being told now that their future job will be deferred. Summer associates at Skadden and Ropes & Gray have been informed that they can’t come back to the camping ground until 2011. Tents can’t be repitched at Orrick until 2012.

This seems like a good time to focus on the light side of the summer associate experience. For the past month, we’ve been soliciting entries for our Summer Associate Event Contest of 2009. They came trickling in slowly, whether because there aren’t many events to brag about or because summer associates are too busy (or too scared) to email us. One SA was so fearful of “tipping” us that the announcement about the firm’s event was sent anonymously via snail mail. [FN1]

One ATL reader from a small firm had this to say about the environment at firms this summer:

Our firm does a lot of corporate bankruptcy work, so we’re faring better in this economic storm than most, but we had to scale back our summer associate program a bit. We do not have as many summer associates as we used to, and we are not having as many major, expensive events. No more big-ticket concerts; no more dinner theater on a river boat; no more renting out an entire movie theater for a pre-release movie showing….

Certainly, the difficulties of this economy are showing in the makeup of our summer class: because we have a summer program at all (unlike many law firms), we’re getting students from higher ranked schools. Most of them are from Top 20 law schools, all of them from Top 75 law schools, none of them from the fourth-tier local law school that usually supplies some of our summer class. And our summer associates are noticeably more stressed about the experience and their prospects than I’ve seen in the past 10 summers.

Despite the foregoing, we have a nice selection of events for the contest. We ask you to vote on the best one, plus offer a few honorable mentions (for events involving public urination and broken bones), after the jump.

Legendary entertainer Michael Jackson, aka the King of Pop, wasn’t a lawyer. But he certainly generated lots of work for them, thanks to his child molestation charges and financial woes. Not every pop culture icon has their own ATL category tag.

(Sure, MJ didn’t always pay his legal bills on time. But it’s the thought that counts.)

Michael Jackson was 50 at the time of his death. May he rest in peace.

Update: Read Marin’s thoughts on the Gloved One over at True/Slant (here and here).

Michael Jackson Has Beat It [True/Slant]
Michael Jackson Dies [TMZ.com]
Pop icon Michael Jackson is dead [Los Angeles Times]

* Michael Jackson “beat it” without paying his legal bill. [The Daily Breeze]

* Former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain testified for 2.5 hours yesterday in New York in Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s office, but wouldn’t say which employees got some of the $3.6 billion bonus pie before the merger with B of A. How are we supposed to know which men to date when we get laid off? Kidding….[Bloomberg]

* More than 100 clients of a man who pretended to be an immigration lawyer got free advice from Lawyers at the New York City Bar Association. [The New York Times]

* SCOTUS had a big day yesterday, ruling on a Utah union case and a case involvingIndian reservations, and hearing arguments on environmental cleanups. Ruth Bader Ginsburg was the first to ask questions. [ABA Journal]

* In Houston, a Republican on the congressional judiciary has called for the impeachment of U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent, aka the groper we’ve been writing about, who is still hoping to get retirement funds from the state. [The Houston Chronicle]

* Show me the money. Lawyers, bankers, and accountants stand to make $1.2 billion in fees from GM’s bankruptcy. [Bloomberg.com]

* An MSM shout-out for ATL’s very own Hope Winters. [CNN]

* Mickey Rourke’s beloved chihuahua, Loki, crossed over the Rainbow Bridge this past Monday. Here’s to hoping that Mickey’s covered. [Wall Street Journal (subscription)]

* The Tax Workshop for Strippers & Sex Workers will be “speci​fical​ly helpful to those​ who work as indep​enden​t contr​actor​s,​ wheth​er in a club or doing​ priva​te work.​” Nice try federal investigators, but they’ve already pulled this stunt on To Catch a Predator. [The Faculty Lounge via TaxProf Blog]

* If Michael Jackson songs are prohibited on American Idol, I strongly recommend canceling the show. [Popsquire]

* When I first heard the term “waterboarding,” I thought it sounded like a delightful sport. [Brad DeLong: Notes]

* Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep,
And if I die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my toys to break.
So none of the other kids can use ‘em…
Amen. [Overlawyered]

* This celebrity lawsuit round-up has Billie Jean suing Michael Jackson. She says she was his lover, and that his kid is her son. [Popsquire Beat]

* Looking to apply for the federal bail-out? This application is “so simple and easy to use that even Skadden Arps should bill no more than $2.7 million to review it.” [Vanity Fair]

* Law school selling naming rights to everything but the bathroom. [TaxProf Blog]

* U.N.says don’t hate on other people’s religions. [Reuters]

* Laid off? Look at the upside. This associate is celebrating: “Unemployment is awesome. I read books all day, lay out in the sun, watch TV, visit friends (you know, all the stuff you can never do when working for a NY law firm).” [Greedy Associates]

* We love those Alaskan family values. The grandmother of Bristol Palin’s unborn child has been arrested on drug charges. [Politico]

* Biglaw bonuses may be less, but at least they’re in cash. How would you like a “”partner asset facility” in your stocking? (Ed. note: We’re pleased to see the term “half-Skadden” adopted by the WSJ.) [WSJ Law Blog]

Following in the footsteps of Sullivan & Cromwell partner Eric Krautheimer, today’s Non-Top-Tier Law School Graduate of the Day also has a law degree from a Tier 4 law school, supplemented by an LLM from NYU. And just like Eric Krautheimer, his tremendously successful career provides support for the proposition that it’s not where you got your legal education, but what you do with it, that counts.

Name: Benjamin Brafman

Law School: Ohio Northern University, J.D., with distinction, 1974

Current Position: Partner, Brafman & Associates, P.C.

Why He’s Our Winner: Brafman is one of New York’s top criminal defense attorneys, with a long list of celebrity clients (including, for a time, Michael Jackson). Our tipster sums it up nicely: “He represented Diddy! He probably met J.Lo! How can you beat that?”

Brafman & Associates, P.C. [Lawyers.com]
Benjamin Brafman [Wikipedia]
Little Big Man [New York Magazine]

What’s up with Venable? Strange things seem to be afoot over there. From last Friday’s Washington Post:

He’s back!!! Or is it possible Michael Jackson has been quietly lurking in our region ever since his early-a.m. Smithsonian tour last week?

The sometimes-reclusive, sometimes-exhibitionist performer was spotted Wednesday evening in the downtown law offices of Venable LLP. One spy said he looked exactly like — well, himself: black sunglasses, black jacket, white shirt, black pants, white socks, black loafers, a pair of oversize bodyguards.

For those lucky enough to glimpse Jackson, his appearance explained a memo the firm had just put out, warning staffers not to gawk at clients.

We’d love to see that memo (which we hear was actually just an email). As for what Venable is doing for the King of Pop, we think they represent him in some IP matters. Maybe he’ll sue our uncle for unlicensed use of “Thriller”?

Update: Roger Friedman of Fox News reports that “Jackson was in the law offices of Venable LLP to give a deposition in the $30 million lawsuit brought by his former manager, Dieter Wiesner.”

More Venable eccentricity, after the jump.

The past few days have been full of law-related news about celebrities. E.g., Lindsay Lohan, Wesley Snipes, and Madonna. And no menagerie of stars would be complete without the King of Pop himself: Michael Jackson.

Things are getting majorly “meta” for Michael. He’s retained new lawyers to sue his former lawyers, against whom he makes some pretty wacky interesting allegations:

Michael Jackson is accusing his former attorneys of conspiring to put him into involuntary bankruptcy. In papers filed on Aug. 29 in Tarzana, Calif., but unseen until now, Jackson accuses former attorneys Ayscough & Marar of “approaching other lawyers” who represented Jackson “in an effort to get such lawyers to join [with them] in forcing Jackson into involuntary bankruptcy …”

We tend to doubt Jackson’s precarious financial condition is the fault of his lawyers. Unless they happen to be prepubescent boys demanding millions in hush money.

Jacko: Former Lawyers in Conspiracy [Fox News]