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  • Non-Sequiturs: 01.23.17
    Non-Sequiturs

    Non-Sequiturs: 01.23.17

    * Powerful essay from a Cornell Law professor on the need for empathy in the criminal justice system. [Verdict]

    * It’s Apple v. Qualcomm, with $1 billion on the line. [Fortune]

    * An inspiring story of a graduate of a lower-ranked law school who has found success. [Breaking into Biglaw]

    * What’s the future of ethics? [Law and More]

    * An analysis of the decisions of Trump’s shortlisters. [Empirical SCOTUS]

    * On the legal consequences of the lack of supervision at work. [Guile is Good]

    * The Chinese Business Lawyers Association is hosting a free CLE in New York tomorrow night at Fordham Law School. You can RSVP here. [CBLA Law]

  • Morning Docket: 12.22.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 12.22.16

    * The antitrust battle between Apple and Nokia has heated up. Apple filed a new lawsuit against nonpracticing entities, Acacia Research Corp. and Conversant Intellectual Property Management Inc., alleging an abusive anti-competitive scheme. [Law.com]

    * Gibson Dunn partner Debra Wong Yang may be in line to lead the SEC under President Trump. [CNN]

    * North Carolina failed to repeal their controversial law regulating the use of public bathroom by transgender people. [Washington Post]

    * New York City’s plan to destroy data collected in connection with its IDNYC card program is on hold pending a hearing in a Staten Island courtroom. [New York Times]

    * 2016 was a record breaking year for the SEC’s Whistleblower program. [National Law Journal]

  • Non-Sequiturs: 10.14.16
    Non-Sequiturs

    Non-Sequiturs: 10.14.16

    * A useful new resource for journalists, media lawyers, and anyone else interested in libel law -- from Charles Glasser, another lawyer who successfully called Donald Trump's bluff (as the New York Times just did). [LexisNexis] * Relatedly, Marc Randazza discusses the phenomenon of the libel-proof plaintiff. [Popehat] * The Florida Supreme Court just declared the death penalty unconstitutional. So that's a thing. [NPR] * The duty to warn in the Marvel Universe -- does Luke Cage need to tell his attackers that they're about to break their hands punching him? [The Legal Geeks] * Interesting... law schools have really cut back on the AALS Faculty Recruitment Conference. Almost 60 fewer schools in attendance. [PrawfsBlawg] * Using algorithms for sentencing? Just in case you wanted to introduce flash crashes to criminal justice. [Medium] * Meticulous deep dive into the Apple v. Samsung oral argument. If Samsung paid this much attention to detail they probably may not have exploding phones. [Empirical SCOTUS] * Mike Papantonio's got a new show coming to RT next month: America's Lawyer. [RT]
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  • Morning Docket: 10.12.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 10.12.16

    * From a SCOTUS mention to what seems like a final exam hypo: Kim Kardashian filed a defamation suit against celeb gossip site Media Takeout for reporting she’d faked her robbery and filed a fraudulent insurance claim. In her complaint, she alleges that the site victimized her again by “referring to her as a liar and thief.” [Reuters]

    * A legal recruiter claims that she received a series of death threats after she made political donations to Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president. Because she “fear[ed] for her life and safety,” the disturbing calls were reported to the police, and the matter is still under investigation. We may have more on this later. [Big Law Business]

    * “It seems to me that the design is applied to the exterior case of the phone. [T]here shouldn’t be profits awarded based on the entire price of the phone.” Thanks to SCOTUS, will Samsung get another bite at the apple when it comes to not giving up all of its profits as damages in its design patent dispute with Apple? [DealBook / New York Times]

    * The results of the July 2016 administration of the bar exam are out, and with a 91.96 percent pass rate for first-time takers, Duquesne Law boasted the second-best passage rate for first-timers out of all 10 Pennsylvania-area law schools, with only Penn Law coming out ahead. But which school did the worst? [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review]

    * “Katie is the woman in the middle doing everything. It’s all because of Katie, man.” Katherine Magbanua, the woman who is alleged to have facilitated the successful murder-for-hire plot against Florida State law professor Dan Markel, has been denied bond. She will remain in prison behind bars until her trial. [Tallahassee Democrat]

  • Morning Docket: 10.11.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 10.11.16

    * As we previously mentioned, London-based firms CMS and Olswang and international firm Nabarro were considering entering into a merger. Partners at all three firms have officially voted in favor of the merger, which will close in May 2017. The new firm will operate under the CMS name. We’ll have more on this later. [Legal Week]

    * “The infringement has been affirmed, now it’s whether this huge judgment should be affirmed.” In the Supreme Court’s first design patent case in more than 120 years, Samsung will face off against Apple today, where the smartphone companies will duke it out over how much Samsung should have had to pay for copying the iPhone. [Reuters]

    * “Justice [Ruth Bader] Ginsburg no longer needs to worry about whether she seems threatening to the Court. She is the Court.” A new linguistics research study tells us what we can learn from Justice Ginsburg’s accent as a lawyer versus her accent as a Supreme Court justice, and how all lawyers make accommodations in their speech. [TIME]

    * By edict of a federal court — and over Governor Rick Scott’s objections — Florida’s voter registration deadline has been extended to 5 p.m. Wednesday thanks to Hurricane Matthew’s interference with last-minute sign-ups. Florida’s Democratic Party alleged many voters would be “severely burdened” by the hurricane’s effects. [CNN]

    * Sorry, social justice warriors: Harvard Law 1Ls wanted to feed the university’s striking dining services workers at their sections’ social committee events, but Dean Marcia Sells shut down their plans, saying it “does not seem to make sense for us to encourage … students to bring in food to feed workers who are on strike.” [The Concourse / Deadspin]

  • Non-Sequiturs: 09.01.16
    Non-Sequiturs

    Non-Sequiturs: 09.01.16

    * It’s official: a judge has ruled Beyoncé’s landmark visual album, Lemonade, did not infringe on a white dude’s indie film. [Hollywood Reporter]

    * Tim Cook is pissed off about his Irish tax bill. [Huffington Post]

    * Will writing these things on legal documents get you fired? [Defenestration Magazine]

    * The chances of lawyers landing on their feet when they’ve been fired at 61. [Law and More]

    * Does the length of a jury’s deliberation have a correlation to the verdict returned? [Versus Texas]

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  • Morning Docket: 04.13.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 04.13.16

    * You may think that your law school graduation speaker is cool, but you should think again, because your law school graduation speaker probably isn’t Vice President Joe Biden. This spring, the Veep will be delivering the commencement address at Syracuse Law, his alma mater. [Syracuse.com]

    * Bill Mateja, one of Polsinell’s finest white-collar criminal defense attorneys, will be representing Texas AG Ken Paxton in his latest foray into the wrong side of the justice system. How do we know Bill Mateja is good at getting his clients off? “Unlike many attorneys, Bill Mateja does not expect repeat business.” [Big Law Business]

    * The Supreme Court may be behind the times when it comes to technology (cellphones are typically banned inside the courtroom’s walls), but the justices will allow a group of about a dozen deaf and hard-of-hearing lawyers to use them to see a live transcript during their swearing-in ceremony next week. Congratulations to all! [ABC News]

    * FBI Director James Comey acknowledges similarities between arguments made in the gun-control debate and Apple’s quest to maintain privacy through encryption, but says “[w]e can’t resolve these really important issues that affect our values — technology, innovation, safety and all kinds of other things — in litigation.” [WSJ Law Blog]

    * “There’s a plaintiff who’s sure, his tunes could’ve made gold, and he’s buying a lawsuit in C.D. Cal.” Ever seen a cause of action for the falsification of rock n’ roll history? It’s taken about 40 years to happen, but now Led Zeppelin is going to trial over a copyright claim to its hit song “Stairway to Heaven.” [THR, Esq. / The Hollywood Reporter]


    Staci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

  • Morning Docket: 03.29.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 03.29.16

    * Legal showdown averted (for now): the feds were able to access the data on the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone without any help from Apple. [Washington Post]

    * A Harvard Law School grad stands accused of a $95 million fraud scheme — yikes. We’ll have more on this later. [ABA Journal]

    * Does a sentencing delay violate the Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial? Some on SCOTUS seem skeptical. [How Appealing]

    * Georgia Governor Nathan Deal announces his intention to veto the Free Exercise Protection Act, which critics claimed would have protected discrimination as a form of religious liberty. [New York Times]

    * Hillary Clinton takes Republicans to task for their handling of the current Supreme Court vacancy. [Wisconsin State Journal via How Appealing]

    * Some thoughts from Professor Noah Feldman on the recent Seventh Circuit ruling about the use of form contracts on the internet (which nobody reads). [Bloomberg View]

    * Save money (on taxes), live better: a federal judge strikes down a tax levied by Puerto Rico on mega-retailer Wal-Mart. [Reuters]

    * The Bracewell law firm, now sans Giuliani, elects Gregory Bopp as its new managing partner. [Texas Lawyer]

  • Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 03.22.16

    * WHATCHA GONNA DO, BROTHER, WHEN THIS JURY’S PUNITIVE DAMAGES AWARD RUNS WILD ON YOU?!? Gawker was hit with an additional $25M in punitive damages yesterday in Hulk Hogan’s sex-tape lawsuit, on top of the $115M award the jury had already slapped the media company with last week. That loud typing sound you hear is the appeals being furiously written. [Reuters]

    * They were gonna grant you leave to file, but then they got high? The Supreme Court has puff, puff, passed on the opportunity to hear a challenge posed by Nebraska and Oklahoma to Colorado’s legalization of marijuana. Justices Thomas and Alito dissented, contending that the case fell within the Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction. [NPR]

    * This took longer than the iOS 9 download: Hot on the heels of the announcement of new Apple products, we got the news that the tech giant and its rival, Samsung, will face off next term before SCOTUS in a patent case that’s been going on since the iPhone 4 was still considered the latest and greatest in smartphone technology. [WSJ Law Blog]

    * “Once you start seeing leading law firms offering this, it’s going to become more prevalent and pretty rapidly, because it’s going to be required to compete.” Lawyers with law school debt will probably jump at the chance for their firms to pitch in to repay their loans, but don’t forget, all of that assistance will be taxable as income. [U.S. News]

    * “My job is to enforce the law, and starting today, DraftKings and FanDuel will abide by it.” In a settlement reached with New York AG Eric Schneiderman, the sports betting daily fantasy sites will cease operations in the state, and in exchange, the AG will hold off on additional litigation that could force them to pay restitution to their losers. [ESPN]

  • Morning Docket: 03.11.16
    Morning Docket

    Morning Docket: 03.11.16

    * Hooray, this study says it’s a great time to be a lawyer! According to career website Glassdoor, lawyers are the second-highest paid professionals in the country, with a median base salary of $144,500. See, everybody, you’ll be able to pay off your six-figure law school debt in no time! You’re probably rich! [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

    * John Oliver of “Last Week Tonight” trademarked the word “Drumpf” ahead of the humorous segment on his show, and he turned to Kenyon & Kenyon to get the job done. The comedian was apparently trying to keep it in the “Daily Show” family with his choice of legal representation — as we’ve noted before, Kenyon’s managing partner is Stephen Colbert’s older brother. [Am Law Daily]

    * Here’s a ranking that’ll be useful for prospective law students and legal professionals who love being boastful: Which law schools have the highest percentage of graduates who pass the bar exam on the first try? You may legitimately be surprised by the placement of some of the law schools on this list. We’ll have more on this later. [AL.com]

    * “The tone of the brief reads like an indictment.” The Justice Department filed a pretty feisty response to Apple in its legal battle over the encryption of an iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters. Apple’s GC says the DOJ lawyers are now “so desperate” to get what they want that they’ve “thrown all decorum to the wind.” [CNBC]

    * U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara of the Southern District of New York will have to face a lawsuit filed by David Ganek of Level Global Investors, once a $4 billion hedge fund, over allegations that the federal prosecutor’s office filed a misleading affidavit and fabricated evidence as part of an insider trading probe that resulted in the fund failing. [Newsday]