Arizona

Morning Docket: 04.25.12

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* Arizona’s immigration law is heading to the Supreme Court today. Meanwhile, former Senator Dennis DeConcini lobbed the worst insult ever against his state. How embarrassing for you, Arizona. [New York Times]

* Will Wal-Mart regret not disclosing its bribery investigation sooner? Not when the delay saved millions in criminal fines. What Wal-Mart will regret is being forced into disclosure by the NYT narcs. [Corporate Counsel]

* Delete all the oil from ocean, and then maybe we’ll care about this. A former BP employee was charged with obstruction of justice for deleting texts having to do with the Deepwater Horizon disaster. [Bloomberg]

* The Tennessee Board of Law Examiners has granted Duncan Law an extension on its bid for ABA accreditation. Woohoo, five more years of allowing students to “negligently enroll.” [Knoxville News Sentinel]

* “Once you cross the six-figure mark, you think, what’s a few thousand dollars more?” You’re doing it wrong: you’re supposed to be bragging about a six-figure salary, not a six-figure debt obligation. [Baltimore Sun]

* New Jersey residents don’t always have the great pleasure of nearly being killed by two high-speed Lamborghinis, but when they do, they prefer that police officers be suspended and sue over it. [ABC News]

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Ex-Lawyers of the Day: Baby, You Did (Many) Bad, Bad Things

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Earlier today, the former top brass at the prosecutor’s office for Arizona’s largest county felt the long arms of the law pick them up, shake them hard, and toss them out the building.

The former Maricopa County attorney and one of his deputies were disbarred for a strikingly long list of ethical violations (a second deputy’s law license was suspended as well). What did they allegedly do? And did they show any remorse to their alleged victims?

Without further ado, let’s learn the scandalous story behind our ex-lawyers of the day….

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Morning Docket: 02.28.12

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From SCOTUS to POTUS?

* Justice Clarence Thomas for president? Hey, it could happen. Lat and Kash’s 2010 proposal is getting a second look. [Daily Beast]

* Speaking of presidents, the Arizona and Michigan primary elections are today. I know folks on the coast often don’t pay too much attention to those middle-of-the-country states, but it will be interesting to see what the Illegal Immigration State and Crippled American Auto State have to say about our ragtag bunch of Republican presidential candidates. [New York Times]

* Emails published yesterday by Wikileaks appear to show that certain Pakistani military intelligence knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding in the months before Seal Team Six raided his garrison and killed him. I hope Wikileaks has juicier material in the pipeline? [Telegraph (U.K.)]

* Congratulations to Tony West, who will become acting associate attorney general, the No. 3 post in the Justice Department. [Chicago Tribune]

* Interesting report on tensions between the White House and the NSA, which has tried to get permission to monitor private web activity, perhaps at the expense of privacy. But Google knows everything you do on your computer, so why shouldn’t the government? [Washington Post]

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Help This University Of Arizona 3L Go to Space — Literally

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To boldly go where no lawyer that I know of has gone before.

Some of you may know (I did not until an hour ago) that this year is the 50th anniversary of the Seattle Space Needle. Pretty exciting, right? I know, not really.

Except for one thing. In honor of the anniversary, the Space Needle is holding a contest to send one lucky person on a trip to space. The 20 contest finalists were recently announced, and among the chosen few is a 3L at the University of Arizona’s James E. Rogers College of Law.

The grand prize winner will be chosen in part based on user votes. Keep reading to learn about this aspiring lawyer-to-be, see why his head is in the clouds, and watch his application video. You can help make his wildest dreams come true…

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Benchslap of the Day: Say My Name, Say My Name

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Judge Carlos Bea

Judge Carlos Bea is one of my favorite members of the Ninth Circuit. He’s refreshingly conservative, on a famously (or infamously) liberal court. He has a fascinating personal history; how many federal judges can claim they were almost deported? He has an ancestral home — some call it a castle — in Spain, which he sometimes makes available to vacationing law clerks. And he tools about town in a vintage Rolls-Royce (which, rumor has it, he received as payment for legal work before he took the bench).

Well, it looks like one assistant U.S. attorney has some expensive tire marks on his back. Check out the epic benchslap that Judge Bea just dished out — not just to the poor prosecutor, but to the United States Department of Justice….

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Arizona Supreme Court Upholds Discrimination Against People Who Can’t Speak English

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English m*****f***** do you speak it?

How much English do you have to be able to speak in order to hold elected office? I don’t know, but apparently justices in Arizona think they know it when they hear it.

Continuing Arizona’s quest to become the most racist state in the Union, the Arizona Supreme Court affirmed a ruling that prevented Alejandrina Cabrera from running for a city council seat because she doesn’t speak English proficiently.

But we can’t just “blame whitey” for this one. Here we’ve got a Southwestern case of Latino-on-Latino crime.

Well, you know what they say: when in ‘Zona, do as the xenophobes do…

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Morning Docket: 02.03.12

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Touchdown Biglaw!

* New York is considering allowing nonlawyer ownership of equity in law firms. If that somehow means we’ll see less Jacoby & Meyers commercials on television, then I’m definitely all for it. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* Football’s labor lockout legal fees: which Biglaw firms scored huge touchdowns thanks to their collective bargaining work? The three top billers included Latham, Dewey & LeBoeuf, and Patton Boggs. [Am Law Daily]

* The sanctions for filing a 9/11 conspiracy claim cost $15K, but forever being remembered as the lawyers who got benchslapped for drafting “a product of cynical delusion and fantasy” is priceless. [Reuters]

* Jared Loughner is still incompetent to stand trial, and he’ll remain in the loony bin for another four months. You know what that means? Time to make this kid swallow some more pills. [Arizona Republic]

* A panel of law professors over at Harvard thinks that while law schools have problems, but they’re certainly not in crisis mode yet. Not yet? You hear that Team Strauss/Anziska? Needs moar lawsuits! [Harvard Crimson]

* Well, that was a short-lived victory. Heather Peters, the former lawyer who beat Honda in small claims court, is preparing to do battle with the car company in Superior Court. [Los Angeles Times]

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How to Succeed in Law School Without Really Trying? Make a College Kid Do Your Work

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Hey 1Ls, is law school getting you down? Are you tired of doing your 1L bitchwork, like briefing cases? Then have we got a deal for you! For the low, low price of a weekly cup of coffee, you can outsource all of your undesirable tasks to an up-and-coming sucker! Because why try your hardest to succeed when you can get someone else to do it for you?

As one tipster puts it, this is exactly what an “unbelievably entrepreneurial 1L” is doing at a top-tier, southwestern law school. Watch out, law schools: you’re not the only ones who can play the game of duping unsuspecting undergraduates.

Does this kid have what it takes to farm out his work to a gunner in training? Let’s find out….

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Morning Docket: 01.17.12

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This ship be sinking.

* How many one percenters do you think are members of the 11%? According to this poll, Congressional approval ratings have hit an all-time low. Looks like it’s time to occupy Congress. [CNN]

* Wikipedia is planning a site-wide blackout this Wednesday to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act. At least they’re giving some advance notice. If you’ve got papers to write, hurry up and finish. [Businessweek]

* Racial profiling ain’t easy. Sheriff Joe Arpaio still wants to detain people based on the suspicion that they might be here illegally, so he’s appealing Judge Snow’s ruling. [Washington Post]

* The part you won’t see in the inevitable movie starring Robert Pattinson: victims of Italy’s Titanic reenactment will probably be unable to sue for damages in U.S. courts. [Reuters]

* Here’s the umpteenth rehashing of the “are law schools cooking their employment statistics?” argument. Better question: without minimum standards for employment, does it matter? [NPR]

* Jesse Dimmick — the kidnapper who sued his victims for breach of contract — won’t get his day in court. The “most ridiculous lawsuit of 2011″ has been dismissed. [Topeka Capital-Journal]

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Morning Docket: 12.27.11

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Paul Clement

* If defending unpopular clients is cool, consider Paul Clement Miles Davis. He’s the lead lawyer in three politically charged cases going up before SCOTUS in the new year. [LA Times]

* Joe Arpaio’s going to have a tough time racially profiling Hispanics in 2012. What’s a man to do without verification powers and the ability to detain people on suspicion alone? [WaPo]

* A summary of the NLJ’s 2011 year in review round-up: all of this was a preview of what’s to come in 2012. And what’s to come? Same sh*t, different docket number. [National Law Journal]

* C&F fail: the California Supreme Court is busy worrying about Stephen Glass, a guy who took his “creative writing” efforts a bit too far. [San Francisco Chronicle]

* The Hollywood actress suing IMDb for revealing her age has to reveal much more thanks to this ruling. She’s got two weeks to amend her complaint to include her name. [The Wrap]

* “Oh my God, the law school has gone crazy.” Don’t blame the messenger, but UVA Law’s headlines on ATL are totally self-inflicted. Here’s Elie’s take on the collar-poppin’ action. [C-VILLE]

* Larry Ribstein, partnership law guru, business law blogger, and Associate Dean for Research at the University of Illinois College Law, RIP. [Truth on the Market]

* Robert Morvillo, New York trial lawyer and white-collar defense pioneer, RIP. [WSJ Law Blog]

* John Lawrence, plaintiff in the landmark LGBT rights case of Lawrence v. Texas, RIP. [NY Times]

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