New course offering at Miami area law schools.
Many of you will be outraged by this story, and many more of you will pretend to be outraged by this story if it comes up in front of your wife or girlfriend. And the story is outrageous. It’s sexist and clearly unethical.
But… doesn’t hiring strippers to pose as paralegals and then sending them into jail to “service” your defendants / clients sound like the most natural business strategy in the world? Supply, meet some serious demand.
Hey, rich corporate clients get this treatment all the time. I don’t just mean that figuratively. I’m sure that there have been lawyers who literally brought their clients to a strip club after they closed the deal on their representation. We all know that firms put the prettiest secretaries on the floors clients see, while the floors with associates who share offices are staffed by hagravens. T&A has been used to secure clients probably since we moved out of the state of nature.
Lawyers in the great city of Miami are just taking this natural service and extending to to criminal defendants. What’s so wrong with that?
Continue reading “Arguably The Best Use Of Sexism And Unethical Behavior Ever”
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”
Damn, check out the girls from corporate. Schwing!
It’s almost the middle of summer, and it’s hot as hell outside. Partners are starting to relax a little bit, and collars are getting unbuttoned. You think you might have seen someone sporting a pair of flip-flops at the office, but that one was probably a mirage. All of this can mean only one thing: the moment that you’ve been dreading has finally arrived. The invitation to the firm summer party is coming for you — and it might involve a pool or beach.
But do you really want to wear a bathing suit in front of these people? Maybe while you were busy shredding documents this spring, you got distracted and ditched your ab-shredding routine. Maybe while you were trimming the fat from your briefs, you neglected your cottage cheese thighs. And maybe, just maybe, you were lucky enough to graduate from “law school hot” to “law firm hot,” and you’re worried about your colleagues ogling your grand tetons.
Is there such a thing as bathing suit etiquette for a Biglaw summer bash? Apparently there is, so prepare to be de-sexified (as if you’re not undersexed enough as it is)….
Continue reading “Grin and Bare It: Stripping Out of Your Suit at Firm Events”
Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to be the key witness in a sexual misconduct scandal involving a rich and powerful Frenchman. After you are savaged in the international press, be prepared for the prosecutor handling the case to abandon you.
From the New York Times:
Dominique Strauss-Kahn was released from house arrest on Friday as the sexual assault case against him moved one step closer to dismissal after prosecutors told a Manhattan judge that they had serious problems with the case.
Prosecutors acknowledged that there were significant credibility issues with the hotel housekeeper who accused Mr. Strauss-Kahn of trying to rape her in May. In a brief hearing at State Supreme Court in Manhattan, prosecutors did not oppose his release; the judge then freed Mr. Strauss-Kahn on his own recognizance.
If Strauss-Kahn’s strategy was to attack the credibility of the witness, it worked…
Continue reading “Things Fall Apart: Now Starring Dominique Strauss-Kahn”
Thomas Gooch III strikes me as the kind of man who, upon finding himself in a hole, starts screaming for somebody to throw him down a shovel.
You’ll remember Gooch as the guy who filed a motion objecting to a woman seated at opposing counsel’s table. Well, more specifically, he objected to the breasts of a woman at opposing counsel’s table.
It was a spurious claim from the start; Gooch didn’t know anything about the woman, but because she had large boobs, Gooch felt like he could question her qualifications without any evidence whatsoever. But Gooch was really put in his place when opposing counsel, Dmitry Feofanov, revealed the the allegedly offensive breasts belonged to his wife, Daniella Atencia.
Well, Gooch has dropped his motion. And the judge in the case (remember, there was a real trial going on here before the Gooch started mentally motorboating opposing counsel’s wife) admonished him. And this could all be over with now.
If Gooch would just stop talking….
Continue reading “Lawyer Withdraws His Motion Objecting To Breasts Of Opposing Counsel’s Wife, But This Is Not Over”
I really, really hope that somewhere out there, Thomas W. Gooch III feels like a giant tool. A few days ago, Gooch, of the law firm Gauthier & Gooch, wrote a motion objecting to a “large breasted woman” sitting at opposing counsel’s table. He questioned the woman’s qualifications and accused opposing counsel, Dmitry Feofanov, of planting her there to distract the jury.
We wrote about Feofanov’s response. He said the woman is his paralegal. But that response didn’t satisfy Gooch, who told the Chicago Sun-Times:
“Personally, I like large breasts,” Gooch said. “However, I object to somebody I don’t think is a qualified paralegal sitting at the counsel table — when there’s already two lawyers there — dressed in such a fashion as to call attention to herself.”
Well, it turns out that Gooch has been ogling, scrutinizing, and questioning the qualifications of Feofanov’s wife.
Dude… not cool.
Feofanov has furnished us with a statement, accompanied by a tasteful picture of his allegedly offensively-figured wife…
Continue reading “The Allegedly Distracting Breasts At Counsel Table: Guess Who They Belong To?”
Well, there’s really nothing else to talk about this morning. Jezebel reports that a defense attorney has written a motion objecting to the people seated at the plaintiff’s table. Well, one person in particular — a “large breasted woman” who is seated next to plaintiff’s counsel.
Is there a law against having large-breasted women hang out with you? Of course not; this is America!
But since this motion is one of the most sexist things you are likely to come across, let’s give it a closer look…
Continue reading “Motion of the Day: No Law Against Having Big-Breasted Colleagues”
Every summer when I was in Biglaw, a new crop of summer associates would roll in, and I inevitably would be assigned a female summer to mentor. Presumably the intention was for us to bond over our mutual struggles of being women at a law firm. Every fall the same arrangement would take shape again, this time with a first-year associate. Within a week they would each inevitably ask some variation on the same question: “Have you found that being a woman has made it tougher for you at the firm?”
I always hated this question. I’m not sure if I’m lacking something that normally comes with having two X chromosomes, but it never occurred to me to go into my career asking this question right out of the box. So, my answer was always a simple “No.”
I’m not suggesting that sexism isn’t a real problem in law firms. There are countless horror stories to back this up. Biglaw is still an old boys’ club and doesn’t show any signs of changing any time soon. We all know that going in.
But I don’t think that female lawyers do themselves any favors by starting with an expectation that they will be slighted. I never stopped to question whether things were tougher for me as a woman because I was too busy trying to do a good job to spend time searching for ulterior motives. If you make being a good associate your top priority, you’ll likely be too busy to wonder if you’re getting as many assignments as the guys are.
That said, there will be times when legitimate issues of sexism arise. And when they do, there are good and bad ways of dealing with it….
Continue reading “It’s a Man’s, Man’s, Man’s World”
Ed. note: This is the latest installment of Size Matters, one of Above the Law’s new columns for small-firm lawyers.
After talking to so many happy small-firm lawyers, I have begun looking for my own niche to scratch. It came to me while driving in the suburbs a few weeks ago. There was a radio ad for an awesome night club (“18 to party and 21 to drink”) promoting ladies’ night and a wet t-shirt contest for the ladies until midnight.
As I got off the highway to head to the club, I realized that I had found my niche: ladies’ night is just for the ladies. What about man night? Where is the justice in the world? I should fight for all the men who are discriminated against by paying a cover charge on ladies’ night (well, except for those men who ultimately get preferential treatment from said ladies who enjoyed their free drinks).
Unfortunately for me, Roy Den Hollander took up this worthy cause before my fateful drive to the Boom Boom Room on Highway 12. Let’s learn more about him….
Continue reading “Size Matters: Can A Wet T-Shirt Contest Form The Basis Of A Niche Practice?”
You have to hand it to the University of Michigan Law School. They always keep it interesting in Ann Arbor.
Today’s tale of wacky wolverines arises out of the law school’s “Mr. Wolverine” beauty pageant. Yeah, it sounds like exactly what it is. It’s a nice little event where Michigan men “dress down” for the amusement of their peers, with proceeds going to charity.
You’d like to think that a law school could pull one of these things off without turmoil, but this is Michigan. After the event, the student newspaper, Res Gestae, ran a review of the pageant authored by Chaka Laguerre. Laguerre is a Michigan Law student and a former Miss Jamaica World.
Laguerre’s review was a little bit snarky. And for reasons passing understanding, people got so pissed about it that the paper took the review down, and the Michigan listserv went nuts.
You’ve gotta love Michigan….
Continue reading “Do Michigan Law Men Have Thin, Saggy Skins?”
Jaime Laskis
I’m not trying to compare the claims of Jaime Laskis, a former associate at the prominent Canadian law firm of Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt, with those of Charlene Morisseau (a legendary Lawyer of the Day honoree, from 2007). But we’ve got two stories vaguely related to alleged employee harassment and discrimination in the legal profession, and I wanted to click them both off so I have something to change the subject with when Sweet Hot Justice asks me if she’s a cougar when we meet for drinks tonight.
Let’s start with Jaime Laskis’s story, which is a bit more newsy. Laskis was an associate in the New York office of Toronto-based Osler, who claims she suffered various forms of sexual harassment while she worked there. One partner allegedly said that Harvard University was full of “pretty women pretending to get an education.”
I know, I know, that’s sounds like a man who has never been to a Harvard party. But Laskis makes other allegations….
Continue reading “Aggrieved Women Potpourri: Sexual Harassment Canada-Style, and the Return of Charlene Morisseau”
Today Am Law released an exhaustive report about female equity partners at major law firms — equity partners, not to be confused with non-equity partners (who are really glorified associates that firms slap with the “partner” label in order to look good when folks like BBLP or Jezebel come calling). The numbers aren’t going to surprise any woman who is seriously considering a career in law.
But just because they’re not surprising doesn’t make them any less depressing. From the report:
The data compiled for this first systematic look at the issue is presented below. When we reviewed it, two numbers immediately jumped out. First, women make up only 17 percent of partners at the firms we surveyed, even though they have represented about 51 percent of law school graduates in the last 20 years. Second, of the women partners who work at multi-tier firms, 45 percent have equity status. In comparison, 62 percent of the male partners at these firms have equity.
Retention issue much? At 17 percent, you’re talking about a serious glass ceiling sitting on top of women at major law firms. With spikes pointing downard. And holes so small you can’t possibly fit squeeze through them if you are carrying any extra weight, or a baby….
Continue reading “Hard Stats About Female Equity Partners”
Today’s confirmation of Elena Kagan as the fourth woman ever to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court is a milestone worth celebrating. For ladies in the law, things are looking up.
But female law students and lawyers still have complaints. Check out a recent query submitted to the Dear Prudence advice column over at Slate, by a correspondent calling herself “Livid but Lost Law Student”:
I am a female law student who is employed for the summer (and potentially for the school year) at a small firm that I’m really enjoying. The law office shares a floor of an office building with a bigger law firm, and my cubicle is “on the border.”
All of the attorneys at both firms are male, but at the other firm, the men are far from politically correct. I have two issues….
Let’s explore this law student’s “issues,” shall we?
Continue reading “Do Women in the Law Need to Get Thicker Skins?”
David Cowling, Mathews, Dinsdale & Clarke partner and alleged booty dancer
Sometimes law firm after-hours parties get pretty wild. The Great Recession didn’t put a damper on one Toronto firm’s celebrations last year. In January 2009, Mathews, Dinsdale & Clarke threw a rager in honor of its annual labour law “moot” competition for Canadian law students. (We mentioned this story briefly in yesterday’s Non-Sequiturs.)
After awards were given out at a dinner, the lawyerly crew headed to Toronto night club Cheval, for bottle service and dancing. Things got a little crazy. One senior associate got so hammered that “he left the club without his coat or keys and vomited in the taxi cab as it left the club.” And one partner, David Cowling, allegedly got too friendly with some of the female associates while grinding on the dance floor.
Two associates complained about his behavior to other partners, and now Cowling is suing the two associates (who have since left the firm) for defamation and intentional interference with economic relations.
So what did they allege?
Continue reading “Partner of the Day, Eh: Canadian Lawyer Sues Two of His Former Associates”
It seems the world can’t get enough of Debrahlee Lorenzana, the former Citibank employee who alleges she was fired because she was “too hot.” She’s been making the rounds of the morning talk shows, and people have been absolutely gushing about her figure, which allegedly got her fired.
But could you call her body an attractive nuisance to the men and women who supposedly persecuted her for her beauty? Perhaps, since it now appears that Debrahlee’s boobs were not endowed, but acquired. Dealbreaker reports:
In this clip of her aforementioned knockers surgery, … she says she pumped them up to meet “a professional, well-educated man.”
Dealbreaker has a full clip of Debrahlee’s appearance on Plastic Surgery New York Style. Click here to watch it.
You could say that the video defines the word “busted”….
Continue reading “Debrahlee Lorenzana’s Breasts: An Attractive Nuisance”
You know something is capturing cultural attention when your mother asks, “Did you write about that woman who got fired for being attractive?”
Earlier this week, the Village Voice ran a cover story on a woman who is suing Citibank for wrongful termination. She claims that her bosses found her too hot — and thus distracting to the other people trying to do their jobs.
I know, I know — pictures or it didn’t happen….
Continue reading “Lawsuit of the Day: Woman Claims She Was Fired for Being Too Attractive”
Or make that a cucumber of one. Remember this allegation, from the lawsuit filed by former case manager Hanh Nguyen Allgood against the prominent Richmond law firm of Williams Mullen?
When the [office elevator] doors closed, [partner] Robert Eicher pretended to be sad and depressed. He asked Allgood for a hug. When she complied, he pressed his genital area against Allgood’s left thigh. Allgood felt something hard pressing against her thigh and attempted to pull away from him. Eicher held Allgood tighter to prevent her from pulling away, and pressed his genital area against her thigh even harder. Allgood was horrified. She pushed him away and stepped back. In response, Eicher laughed and pulled a cucumber out of his pants pocket.
We’re sorry to disappoint all you lovers of law firm gossip, but sadly, we won’t be hearing testimony in open court about the cucumber incident….
Continue reading “Williams Mullen Gets Out of a Pickle of a Lawsuit”
It’s funny how being laid off really puts all of your workplace problems into perspective. The Wall Street Journal reports that more and more men are claiming they are victims of sexual harassment:
Since the start of the recession, a growing number of sexual harassment complaints have come from men. Some 16.4% of all sexual harassment claims—or 2,094 claims—were filed by men in fiscal 2009, up from 15.4%, or 1,869 claims, in fiscal 2006, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
While male victims sometimes experience behavior like groping and unwanted sexual advances, employment lawyers say increasingly “locker room” type behavior like vulgar talk and horseplay with sexual connotations have been the subject of claims.
Has there been an outbreak of office grab-ass that I’m not aware of? Not quite. Instead, there has been an outbreak of men losing their jobs …
Continue reading “Sexual Harassment: It’s Not Just For Women Anymore”
Williams Mullen is a prominent Richmond-based law firm that is “100 years strong,” according to its website. For 18 of those years, Vietnam native Hanh Nguyen Allgood, 53, was a case manager for the firm. She left in March 2007.
Apparently, the departure was not “all good” with her. She has filed a $950,000 lawsuit against the firm, alleging discrimination and sexual harassment, according to Style Weekly.
Litigation partner Robert Eicher bears the brunt of Allgood’s sexual harassment allegations. According to her complaint [PDF], he asked when he first met her whether “her vagina was vertical or horizontal,” a reference to “a horrible racial slur bandied about by some American soldiers during the Viet Nam War contending that Vietnamese women had vertical vaginas.”
And then there was the cucumber incident….
UPDATE: A statement from the firm has been added after the jump.
Continue reading “Racial Discrimination and Sexual Harassment — With a Cucumber? — Alleged at Williams Mullen”
We have another episode in the saga of Deidre Dare, one of our favorite laid-off lawyers. She was an attorney in Allen & Overy’s Russia office until she penned typed a salacious online novel about her expat adventures, which featured lots of drinking, sex, drugs, donkeys, and dwarves. After the firm let her go, she sued.
Dare’s still in Moscow, where she writes an often controversial column for the Moscow News called sExpat. The latest reveals that Deidre likes it rough:
Anyone who has spent even five minutes in bed with me knows that I have a strong proclivity for S&M. My experience in the area ranges from the mild (spanking) to the extreme (ball gags, golden showers and the like), according to how much experience my partner has and what he or she likes.
The column goes on to praise Russia’s abusive men. Dare writes: “If you’re hanging out with real men and you’re a little slutty, you’re going to get hit. Period.” Roll On Friday photoshops A&O’s chairman into being a “real man” here.
Ed. note: We at Above The Law do not condone physical violence against women. We do, however, condone violence against the commenter ShaFeef.
In a previous column, Dare said money was tight and suggested that prostitution might be a way out of her money woes. That might have led to more hitting than even Deidre likes. Luckily, she’s come up with a different way to make money. She’s written another book. Its title, fittingly, is SLUT.
Continue reading “Deidre Dare Likes Abusive Men and Getting Paid For Her Writing”
