Goodwin Procter

* Fresh off a five-month stint in prison for defrauding clients, Todd Malacuso, a lawyer who once represented Casey Anthony, has been arrested and accused of conspiring to smuggle almost two tons of cocaine into the United States from Central America on his own plane. He’s being held without bail as he’s been deemed a flight risk. [Daily Mail]

* “Taking a fee when you’ve got people literally still paying off their credit cards is a lot different than when it’s essentially found money for the plaintiffs.” In a wide-ranging interview, Jason Forge, a partner at Robbins Geller, explains why plaintiffs’ lawyers in the Trump University fraud case decided to forgo attorneys’ fees. [WSJ Law Blog]

* SCOTUS justices seem poised to block Texas from executing a man due to the fact that an outdated definition of intellectual disability is being used in its capital punishment regime. Justice Stephen Breyer said that the Texas standard to determine impairment “would free some, while subjecting others to the death penalty.” [USA Today]

* “We are refusing to comment on speculation around partners being in discussion with other firms.” Biglaw firms are circling King & Wood Mallesons like vultures, hoping to pick off partners as its EUME operations struggle. Goodwin Procter and Chadbourne & Parke are reportedly in talks to extend offers to KWM partners. [Big Law Business]

* According to the Committee on Capital Markets Regulation, President-elect Donald Trump and a Republican-led Congress may be able to tweak some elements of Dodd-Frank without completely dismantling or rewriting the law. After all, “federal agencies have wide latitude to undo reforms” and “there is room to change things.” [Reuters]

* Who recently made partner at Kirkland & Ellis, Covington & Burling, Goodwin Procter, and Curtis Mallet-Prevost? Here’s a nice round-up that highlights the names of the 112 associates who were promoted at these four firms. Don’t be too shocked by that high number; the vast majority of partner promotions were made at Kirkland, where 81 attorneys were welcomed into the ranks of the firm’s non-equity partnership. [Big Law Business]

* In what’s hailed as a victory for gay rights, Massachusetts expanded the legal definition of the word “parent” to be read “in a gender-neutral manner, to apply where a child is ‘born to [two people], is received into their joint home, and is held out by both as their own child.'” The state’s high court also allowed parentage laws to be construed to apply to members of same-sex couples without biological ties to the children. [WSJ Law Blog]

* Today, SCOTUS will hear arguments in a case challenging “judge-made law,” that is, what is and isn’t considered insider trading. If you trade on information received from a third party who received it from an insider, is that insider trading? Even Mark Cuban wants to know, writing in an amicus brief that “no one should be prosecuted for conduct that Congress is either unwilling or unable to define.” [DealBook / New York Times]

* The Oklahoma Supreme Court struck down a law that forced abortion providers to save fetal tissue samples from patients younger than 14 years old, on top of other broad restrictions. The court unanimously ruled that the law violated the state constitution’s “one subject” rule. In a separate concurrence, four judges would’ve struck down the law as an unconstitutional burden on a woman’s right to have an abortion. [Reuters]

* Much like America, the Supreme Court seems to have a problem with race this Term. The high court will be hearing three divisive cases having to do with racial slurs, racial rhetoric, and racial epithets, and the Court may very well be divided along ideological lines, resulting in 4-4 deadlocks thanks to the seat left vacant by the late Justice Antonin Scalia and the Senate’s refusal to give Judge Merrick Garland a hearing. [CNN]

* Alecia Schmuhl, the lawyer accused of teaming up with her husband and plotting to kill the managing partner of the law firm she was fired from, has taken a deal in her case and could serve anywhere from 10 to 45 years in prison under the terms of her plea agreement. She’ll be sentenced by the middle of January 2017. [Washington Post]

* Two heads are better than one, especially when it comes to taking over a Biglaw titan’s position as chairman at K&L Gates. Longtime chairman Peter Kalis will step down at the end of February, and come March, James Segerdahl will serve as the firm’s global managing partner, while Michael Caccese will serve as chairman of the firm’s management committee. We’ll have more on this later today. [Big Law Business]

* A big old welcome back to Biglaw: Brackett Denniston III, who has served as general counsel at GE for more than two decades, is throwing in the in-house towel to get back to the daily grind of law firm life. He recently rejoined Goodwin Procter — a firm where he previously worked for about 15 years — as senior counsel, and while there, he hopes to work on “hard cases” and mentor some of the firm’s younger lawyers. [WSJ Law Blog]

* What do the Redskins and the Slants have in common, aside from names that some may consider offensive? As it turns out, the football team and the rock band are fighting the same fight before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. They both claim the First Amendment bars the USPTO from refusing to register their “disparaging” marks, and the Supreme Court may soon grant cert on either one of their cases. [Associated Press]

* If you’re planning to apply to law school during this admissions cycle despite the state of the job market for entry-level attorneys, then you may want to follow this 10-week timeline for submitting your applications. Don’t forget that the goal here is to get ahead of the game, take advantage of rolling admissions, and submit all of your materials before those pesky December LSAT test-takers. [U.S. News & World Report]