Legal Ethics

Congratulations, ladies, because today you've got something to celebrate.

* Rhonda Crawford, the Illinois law clerk who allegedly posed as a judge and was running unopposed for her own judgeship, was indicted for her judicial impersonation. Crawford does not intend to drop out of the race for a seat on the bench, despite the state bar ethics commission seeking to suspend her license to practice. [Chicago Tribune]

* London firms CMS and Olswang are merging with international firm Nabarro for a three-way combination that’s set to close in May 2017 and operate under the name CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang, but rumor has it an American firm wants to get in on the action. Will Hunton & Williams join in for four-way fun? [The Lawyer]

* “[M]aybe Republicans can stop with the 60-something repeal votes they’ve taken … and just work with the next president to smooth out the kinks.” President Obama hopes that maybe when his second term in the White House is over, his signature healthcare law can be fixed. He doesn’t even care if they change its name to “Reagancare.” [Reuters]

* “The panic is starting to set in. Those who have a lot of interests at stake need to do work now.” Lawyers across the pond are poised for a profitable 2017 thanks to people scrambling for legal advice following Brexit, but those billables won’t last forever; after all, lawyers aren’t “immune to a broader economic slowdown.” [Big Law Business]

* More law schools are partially or completely covering bar exam preparation costs for their students, but with pass rates plummeting across the nation, you must be curious if this trend has had any positive effect. It worked for Loyola New Orleans and Southern University, whose pass rates for first-timers increased quite a bit. [ABA Journal]

Lawyer might have bit off more than he could chew....

Advice for lawyers who are new to the top in-house job.

Attorney-client confidences breached because of pretty handwriting.

Biglaw is coming to the little screen.

How much prison time is he facing?

* “The ballot-selfie prohibition is like ‘burn[ing down] the house to roast the pig.'” Just in time for Election 2016, the First Circuit has struck down New Hampshire’s ballot selfie ban as unconstitutional, citing the fact that it curtailed voters’ free speech, and on top of that, the state was unable to identify any complaints of vote buying or intimidation. [POLITICO]

* Suspended Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, who instructed probate judges to adhere to the state’s ban on same-sex marriage, even after the Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling, says the ethics charges he faces are “ridiculous” since he never “encourage[d] anyone to defy a federal court or state court order.” [WSJ Law Blog]

* Wiley Rein lost two practice group leaders to DLA Piper this week. The firm, known for its media, telecom, government contracts, and IP practices, no longer has partners in charge of its telecom group or its wireless group, but it claims these departures were anticipated, and the practice groups were merged ahead of time. [Big Law Business]

* Cha-ching! The Caesars bankruptcy is ending, which means the “fee frenzy” for lawyers who were working on the case is about to dry up as well. Nine law firms have been involved in the case since the company first filed for bankruptcy in January 2015, and hundreds of millions of dollars of legal fees have already been assessed. [Am Law Daily]

* Many jurisdictions adopted the Uniform Bar Exam for the July 2016 administration of the bar exam, and it seems like it may have had the opposite effect on test-takers than what was intended. Graduates of this law school saw their bar exam passage rate drop by 13 percent since last year. We’ll have more on this later today. [Albequerque Journal]

Lawyers aren't special snowflakes; we must follow the same rules as other players in the digital economy.

The latest salvo in the Biglaw drama/lawsuit.

* Interesting attorney ethics complaint filled with allegations of racial slurs and anti-Semitic language. [Legal Profession Blog]

* Attention associates: This is who you should thank for your raises. (Hint: you’re welcome.) [3 Geeks and a Law Blog]

* The justices on the Supreme Court sure do have a lot in common. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* This lawyer is blowing up what you expect from a general counsel. [Big Law Business]

* Does the Supreme Court lag behind the other two branches of the federal government when it comes to reporting potential conflicts of interest? [Fix the Court]

* Watch out for your cases being deemed frivolous lawsuits by Judge Clay Land. [Law and More]

Referral fees taint relationships between attorneys -- and collecting such fees isn't as simple as it seems.

Always pay your referral fees. Always.

* Roger Ailes hires Hulk Hogan and Melania Trump lawyer Charles Harder for a possible suit against NY Mag. [Huffington Post]

* As expected, Haynes & Boone has merged with Curtis Davis Garrard [Texas Lawyer]

* Berkeley’s Sujit Choudhry still coming to work amid sexual harassment claims. [ABC 7]

* An update on the revenge porn law that’s seen over 200 prosecuted in England and Wales. [CNET]

* Avvo defends its fixed-fee legal services after a South Carolina ethics ruling dinged the practice. [Corporate Counsel]

* Sullivan & Cromwell tapped to make one lucky French fan base learn what it’s like to have Frank McCourt as an owner. [The Am Law Daily]

* Second Circuit throws procedural roadblocks in front of workers seeking back wages. Happy Labor Day! [Law360]

This former Biglaw attorney just got fired for his alleged ties to a neo-Nazi group.

"Indeed, if the Court were forced to sanction anyone, the Court would sanction.... [the sanction seeker]."

Sorry, but there's no such thing as playing judicial dress-up.

* A Brazilian judge ordered that Olympic swimmers Ryan Lochte and Jimmy Feigen surrender their passports and remain in Rio until investigators can determine whether they filed a false police report of being robbed at gunpoint. There’s one problem: Lochte is back in America. Jeah! [USA Today]

* As we mentioned yesterday, according to NALP, law school graduates in the class of 2015 landed fewer jobs in private practice than any other class in the past 20 years. There is a bright side, though: Biglaw firms are hiring in droves and the median starting salary for new lawyers has risen to $100,000, which is 5 percent higher than it was for the class of 2014. [DealBook / New York Times]

* Graduates who sued Widener Law in 2012 over the school’s allegedly deceptive employment statistics lost a federal appeal to overturn a denial of class certification. A three-judge panel of the Third Circuit — one which included Donald Trump’s sister, Judge Maryanne Trump Barry — rejected a class-wide theory of damages. [Law.com]

* Legal ethics professor Ronald Rotunda of Chapman Law wrote an op-ed striking out against the ABA’s adoption of a new professional misconduct rule which seeks to combat discrimination and bias in the law. He refers to the new rule as a misguided “foray into political correctness,” and thinks the ABA overstepped its bounds. [WSJ Law Blog]

* “At best he was doing something profundity stupid with the hopes of meeting someone he will never get to meet in his lifetime.” A lawyer for Stephen Rogata, the teen who scaled Trump Tower, says her client should receive psychiatric treatment instead of jail time. He’s being held on $10,000 bail bond or $5,000 cash. [New York Daily News]

Sympathies to students who may have to (read: will almost certainly have to) retake the exam.

States that have legalized medical or recreational cannabis should allow their lawyers to advise and assist companies trying to comply with state and local laws.