Earlier this morning, former IRS tax attorney and Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann held a press conference to announce that she’d be dropping out of the race. Although she won the Iowa straw poll in August, with a percentage of votes in the single digits, she placed sixth during last night’s caucuses. In her concession speech, Bachmann stated that “[l]ast night the people of Iowa spoke with a very clear voice.” They sure did: they told her to STFU. Not even her high-powered lawyers from Patton Boggs could save her.
Let’s face it, she did the honorable thing. Unlike Rick Perry, who announced that he’d be going back to Texas to cry “reassess his campaign,” Bachmann grew a pair and decided end her embarrassment — but she has “no regrets, none whatsoever.”
It really is a shame that she decided to call it quits, because people love Michele Bachmann. Although she looks like a semi-retarded deer caught in headlights in her Newsweek cover, she’s usually one of the more attractive women in American politics.
She’s like Sarah Palin, but dumber, and with an inept stylist. With that said, we present you with a recap of Bachmann’s finest moments on the campaign trail….
Continue reading “Michele Bachmann: Out of the Race, But Still in Our Hearts”
When a tipster sent us an e-mail with the subject, “Court awards $700,000+ in sanctions for destruction of FB page,” I thought it sounded like it might be interesting. Because hey, that’s a lot of money.
I didn’t realize it would also be one of the most depressing legal news stories I’ve read since this tragic murder-suicide.
The three-quarters-of-a-million-dollar sanction award was levied against the widower of a woman killed in a car accident and the widower’s lawyer. The ruling was an abrupt table-turn for Isaiah Lester, who had previously won a $10 million wrongful death suit against the driver whose truck overturned and killed his wife.
Keep reading for the depressing details….
Continue reading “Facebook Spoliation Costs Widower and His Attorney $700K in Sanctions”
If you want to run for president in this country, you best have quality legal counsel.
It doesn’t matter which party you are from. It doesn’t matter what your political platform is. It doesn’t matter if you believe Obamacare is exactly like your own health care plan or if you think marriage is a sacred vow shared by a man, a woman, and millions of viewers on The Bachelor. It turns out you still need competent legal counsel.
Biglaw legal counsel, as it happens. Check out the law firms that are advising the 2012 presidential candidates…
Continue reading “Candidates For President And The Law Firms That Love Them”
* The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday in a lawsuit asking courts to force major companies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Sotomayor spent the entire oral argument asking attorneys how she could fit more Miami Sound Machine on her Zune. [New York Times]
* Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who can be seen every Thursday night on 30 Rock playing Kenneth the Page, shares none of Jan Brewer’s qualms about a “birther bill.” [Politico]
* The Ecuadorean Slapfight (also the name of my ska band in high school) between Patton Boggs, Gibson Dunn, and Chevron was squashed by a judge yesterday. [Reuters]
* Baker Hostetler is balling out of control on L’Affaire Madoff. [WSJ Law Blog]
Judge Vaughn Walker
* Tiger Blogger Vivia Chen wants white guys to be hunted like animals. [The Careerist]
* A copyright troll has found a way to exact a toll without actually owning any copyrights. No word yet on whether anyone has gained entrance into the boy’s hole. [Wired via ABA Journal]
* Alleged Wikileaker Bradley Manning is being transferred to another prison. Julian Assange celebrated the news by going dancing. [Fox News]
* Sponsors of Proposition 8 are mad that retired judge Vaughn Walker, who presided over Prop 8′s defeat in court, is giving lectures around the country that feature a three-minute clip of the trial. They say the video should remain in the closet. Or a desk drawer of some sort. [Los Angeles Times]
In a follow-up to Kash’s post on Monday regarding the newly formed Big Law Society, I volunteered to check out their first happy hour Tuesday night at the BlackFinn American Saloon in D.C. At first I thought it would be amusing to see the type of people who would attend such a gathering. But by 8 p.m. on Tuesday, I was tired and doubted whether I should go at all.
Moreover, I had reason to be suspicious, considering what the group posted about itself on its About page:
Big Law Society organizes social networking events for a very select group of legal professionals, with the aim of creating a community of talented, dynamic individuals. Memberships and invites to the Big Law Society events are limited to individuals with a unique professional background; however, qualified members are welcome to bring guests.
Seriously, I almost felt like I was crashing a middle school party for the “popular” kids, except with less interesting people….
Continue reading “A Report From the First Meeting of the ‘Big Law Society’”
With fall recruiting gearing up, and the lateral market warming up, we continue our annual series of open threads about the law firms featured in the Vault prestige rankings. These threads provide ATL readers with a forum to discuss the different firms and their various strengths and weaknesses.
The end of the Vault 100 is in sight. We’re covering the firms in batches of 20 now. Here are the firms ranked #61 to #80, which will provide today’s discussion fodder:
61. Greenberg Traurig, LLP
62. Holland & Knight LLP
63. Fish & Richardson P.C.
64. Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal LLP
65. Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP
66. Foley & Lardner LLP
67. Perkins Coie LLP
68. Nixon Peabody LLP
69. Patton Boggs LLP
70. Kaye Scholer LLP
71. Hunton & Williams LLP
72. Reed Smith LLP
73. Steptoe & Johnson LLP
74. Chadbourne & Parke LLP
75. Howrey LLP
76. Bryan Cave LLP
77. Lovells (US) [now part of Hogan Lovells]
78. Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP
79. Crowell & Moring LLP
80. Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP
This is a very eclectic group, including a few New York-centric firms, some D.C.-dominated places, and a bunch of national and even international giants.
Let’s take a closer look at some of these shops….
Continue reading “Fall Recruiting Open Threads: Vault 61 – 80 (2011)”
Earlier this year, in one of its many format changes, Facebook forced users to make their profile info more public via Community Pages. Facebook created pages based on users’ lists of interests, jobs, and favorite things to help people find others “who share similar interests and experiences.”
So if you, for example, listed “document review” as something you like, you’d be a member of this page. And maybe this page too.
One issue discussed in some circles was the potential trademark violation in Facebook’s automatically creating and populating Community pages for businesses and brands. Another issue picked up by the National Law Journal was that some of the Community Pages created aren’t very flattering to law firms.
If you listed your employment as “Slave” at Skadden Arps, for example, you’re responsible for this page:
What are some of the other interesting law firm-affiliated Community Pages on Facebook?
Continue reading “Law Firm Facebook Pages Reveal How Associates Really Feel”
There are a number of firms that aren’t up to speed with this whole “social media thing.” But they should be, because their clients are.
American Lawyer Media, Zeughauser Group and communications firm Greentarget surveyed 164 in-house counsel about their social media habits. Lo and behold, they are making use of blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to get their legal information… and, perhaps more interestingly, to judge law firms.
In-house counsel still primarily rely on “referrals from trusted sources and credentialing activity (i.e., demonstrations of thought leadership)” to choose outside lawyers, but they are increasingly taking brilliant tweets and blog posts into consideration…
Continue reading “Many In-House Counsel Are Social Media Savvy. But Biglaw Firms? Not So Much.“
[Brett Favre] decided to play the game at his age and all that goes with it, and the effect he had on Minnesota and on that team and a lot of sports fans was enormous. I think the excitement and the challenge is something that is very alluring, and if I can play a small part in paying the taxpayer back…then I will look back at this time and say, for all the knockdowns that I will inevitably have, it would have been worth the experience and the knowledge that I was helpful.
– Thomas Russo, 66, former chief legal officer at Lehman Brothers, discussing his departure from Patton Boggs to become the new general counsel for American International Group Inc.
Yesterday we reported that Patton Boggs was having an all associates meeting and wanted its people to be there in person.
With everybody gathered around, Patton Boggs unleashed a torrent of news. First things first. Here’s the bonus announcement, from a statement the firm released to Above the Law about the meeting:
As usual, we are rewarding associates who exceed their billable hour goal with our annual bonus program. Bonuses will range from $5,000-$45,000 depending on class year and the number of hours by which an individual target was exceeded.
In addition, the firm plans to offer merit bonuses in January as part of the associate evaluation process.
Well, the New York market starts at $7,500, so the low end of the Patton Boggs scale is below the bottom of the NYC scale. But at the top end, Patton Boggs is paying more than the Cravath scale.
It is worth noting, of course, that Cravath and other top New York firms pay bonuses to everybody, not just those who “exceed their billable hour goal.” In this market, is anybody actually billing anything like 2400 hours? It could be that Patton Boggs’s big top number is a payout only a couple of people will actually receive.
And the bonus news was the good news to come out of the meeting. The other news is after the jump.
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Patton Boggs and the D.C. Market”
What is going on, D.C.? As you know, Above the Law will be inside the Beltway tomorrow. And we know a lot of D.C. associates are wondering whether their bonuses will be on the level that Cravath has set for the New York market.
We could be getting our first piece of solid information on that front later today. Tipsters report that there is big meeting scheduled at D.C.-based Patton Boggs today:
Firm-Wide Associate Meeting Today at Patton Boggs
About 2010 salaries and the automatic hours bonuses. 2:30.
The Firm usually lets associates call in but said that if they wanted to attend or comment they had to be in the conference rooms in person. Kind of unusual.
So Patton Boggs wants to make sure everybody is there in person to discuss salaries and bonuses. Maybe it’s bringing all the associates together to announce a raise and a market-busting bonus? The glass is half-full — at least it looks that way through my rose-colored glasses.
We reached out to Patton Boggs spokespersons, but they were not able to provide us with an immediate comment.
We’ll keep you posted here if new information comes to light later today.
Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of associate bonuses
We continue our slog push through the nation’s 100 top law firms, as ranked by our friends over at Vault. Here are the next ten firms, to be discussed in the comments to this post:
71. Reed Smith
72. Bryan Cave
73. Perkins Coie
74. Hunton & Williams
75. Patton Boggs
76. Arent Fox
77. Schulte Roth & Zabel
78. Howrey
79. Chadbourne & Parke
80. Crowell & Moring
Assorted observations about these firms, after the jump.
Continue reading “Fall Recruiting Open Thread: Vault 71 – 80 (2010)”
Can you imagine having to pay your firm money over the next couple of months because the firm overcompensated you at the beginning of 2009? That is the situation facing a number of Patton Boggs associates over the next couple of weeks.
Patton Boggs has a three tiered associate compensation system. A firm spokesperson explained the details to Above the Law:
Patton Boggs has three base billable hour tiers for associates: 1650, 1800, and 1900. Associates on one of the lower tiers who reach a billable hour total of a higher tier are automatically paid the salary differential in the early part of the next year.
Associates who don’t make their hours are bumped down to one of the lower tiers. But the whole decision making process is done as part of the firm’s annual performance reviews, many of which haven’t taken place yet. A tipster explains the consternation among many Patton associates:
If an associate is bumped down, their salary will be bumped down accordingly in an amount to be determined by the firm (i.e. not the full published drop between the 2008 rate for [1900] and the 2008 rate for 1800 – as in some instances that could amount to up to 65K). So some don’t know if they will be bumped or, better yet, how much their salary will be for 2009. In general, people were pleased just to bump down as opposed to getting laid off or some other alternative.
But:
But here is the kicker – associates [won't know if] they are being paid at the [1900] rate until after their review, if at that time they are bumped down to 1800, they have to PAY THE FIRM BACK the difference in pay for the first 2 months of 2009. The “overpayments” will be spread out over 4 paychecks.
After the jump, the firm explains that this is nothing new at Patton.
Continue reading “Tiered Payscale at Patton Boggs Leads to Associates Giving Back Money”
The Vault 100 march continues! In this series of open threads, we list the firms, and you all discuss their upsides and downsides. We’ll be wrapping this puppy up this week.
Here are the next ten (with prestige scores in parentheses):
71. Nixon Peabody LLP (5.218)
72. Hunton & Williams LLP (5.208)
73. Perkins Coie LLP (5.119)
74. Reed Smith LLP (5.057)
75. Patton Boggs LLP (5.050)
76. Chadbourne & Parke LLP (4.997)
77. Bryan Cave LLP (4.969)
78. Thacher Proffitt & Wood LLP (4.967)
79. Howrey LLP (4.926)
80. Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP (4.910)
Usually, we have fun with the “notable perks” chosen by Vault. But as we move down the list, the perks are becoming distinctly less notable — e.g., gym membership discounts, free parking, and “good views.” Oh well.
You know what to do! Have at it in the comments.
Earlier: Vault 100 Open Threads – 2009
Andrew Bruck takes a question at Wednesday’s press conference.
Every now and then, we leave our apartment. We did so on Wednesday, to attend the press conference of Law Students Building a Better Legal Profession, where the organization unveiled its law firm diversity rankings (accessible here; Los Angles Times article here).
It was quite informative. For those of you who might be interested — and we’re guessing there are a number of you, judging from the robust commentary on our earlier post — read more, after the jump.
Continue reading “ATL Field Trip: The Building a Better Legal Profession Press Conference”
Despite the unseasonably warm temperatures we’ll be seeing here in D.C. later this week, summer is over. But that doesn’t mean our inbox is closed to stories of summer associate scandal.
Check out this great pair of controversies, from the summer program of Washington powerhouse Patton Boggs:
There have been rumors flying around Patton Boggs about major drama in this year’s summer associate class that I thought I’d pass along. Some of the summers got upset because:
(1) At the summer associate golf outing, one of the associates wore a Confederate flag hat while playing 18 holes with the summers. The hat apparently went unnoticed by everyone except the summer associates, who (rightfully) felt uncomfortable telling a lawyer at the firm that his hat may be in poor taste. Best part: apparently he shared a golf cart with one of the black summers!
(2) Apparently a very high-level partner at Patton Boggs was disappointed to learn that a beauty queen winner/current law student was not offered a position as a summer associate. When he learned that the firm had instead hired a (gasp!) gay summer associate, he allegedly said, in front of others at the firm, “You know the recruiting department is screwed up when they’re rejecting beauty queens but hiring homosexuals.”
We contacted Patton Boggs for comment. A firm spokesperson provided this statement:
“The firm takes these types of matters seriously. When we hear of things of this nature, we investigate and take appropriate action as necessary.”
If you’re at Patton Boggs and can enlighten us further about these events — or if you’re at another firm, and have summer associate stories you’re now at liberty to share with us, given the passage of time — please email us. Thanks.
We received this information from a tipster last night, and a firm spokesperson confirmed it for us this morning. Here it is:
Patton Boggs just raised starting salaries to 160,000 for first years for 1950 billable hours. This is a 50 hour bump and a $15,000 bump. They also introduced a new 1800 billable track that is full-time, but paid on a lower scale (obviously).
No memo yet. The full scale closely approximates the Hogan & Hartson scale and caps out at $280,000. Still a 100 hour/year pro bono requirement.
So does anyone know what the DC List of Shame now looks like? Feel free to post it in the comments.
Also, are you aware of any recent pay raise news that we haven’t covered in these pages? If so, please email us. Thanks.
This farewell email was sent out last month by a librarian who left Patton Boggs, the prominent D.C. law firm.
It pretty much speaks for itself. We would just note that Patton Boggs, as one of the biggest lobbying shops in Washington, is chock-full of both lawyers and ex-politicians.
From: [redacted]
Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2007 5:35 PM
To: *Everyone (DC); *Everyone 2445 M Street
Subject: Good-Bye Patton Boggs
After 8.5 years, today was my last day at Patton Boggs LLP.
Everyone knows what I think about the Law(yers) and politic(ian)s, so I won’t dwell onit [sic].
Farewell to everyone as I doubt we’ll meet again in this life or the next.
Good-bye Patton Boggs.
Our tipster reported her fear that the embittered ex-exployee might go postal: “I came to work the following day using the side entrance because, well, I didn’t want to take any chances….”
The NYT has served up a relatively weak batch of candidates this week. That’s okay with us; we needed to be brought down to earth after the heights of last week’s eminence-fest.
Still, a warning: There’s not an Ivy League degree to be found in this column, so those of you who are nauseated by the couplings of mere Duke-UVA grads may want to avert your eyes and ponder what a cesspool the Times has become.
Here are the finalists:
1. Jill Isaacs and Kurt Perhach
2. Jennifer DeLeonardo and Adam Frey
3. Liza Burnett and Stephen Fefferman
Read more about these couples, after the jump.
Continue reading “Legal Eagle Wedding Watch 7.1.07: Lawyers, Literally”
