Securities Law

It pays to tell the truth about your lies.

Compliance issues are a serious problem for hedge fund investors even if the investor can be guaranteed that no activities at the fund will ever rise to the level of fraud.

On this day in legal history, a very important federal agency was created. Which one?

Welcome to Better Know A Practice Area, a new monthly series introducing readers to different practice areas.

* An analysis of Judge Garland’s rulings on the D.C. Circuit — what type of judge he is, who has he been historically, and what he might be like as a Supreme Court justice. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* Ex-Skadden lawyer Charles Bennett, who pled guilty to running a Ponzi scheme, got sentenced to 5 years in prison. [Law360]

* Some of the most damning evidence in the lawsuit against Rolling Stone over its (since retracted) UVA rape story may be a law firm’s involvement. [Gawker]

* Super. One of Donald Trump’s delegates was just indicted on child porn and weapons charges. I’m fascinated to know how that will lead to a bump in Trump’s polling numbers. [Law Newz]

* This criminal defense attorney actually enjoys his job. I thought a lawyer that was fulfilled by their job existed only on TV. Nicely done, sir. [Katz on Justice]

* Securities lawyer is getting two years in jail for tax evasion. You should really know better, dude. [Daily Business Review]

* An attorney faced disciplinary action for letting her deadbeat boyfriend do illegal s**t in her basement. [Legal Profession Blog]

* A cool opportunity in legal journalism: full-time editor of SCOTUSblog. [SCOTUSblog]

Hopefully Regulation Crowdfunding will help companies realize their potential, and offer investors a return on their money to boot.

Looks like Martin is going to need to find a dope rhyme for “securities fraud.”

Mary Jo White is done f@cking around.

* “You’re not getting out of jail today.” Affluenza teen Ethan Couch has been sentenced as an affluenza adult to serve four consecutive 180-day terms for each person who was killed in a fatal drunken-driving car crash he caused in 2013. The judge may reconsider Couch’s sentence in two weeks. [NBC News]

* Who will be the next chair of Baker & McKenzie? Four prominent partners have put their names forward to compete for the title. This would be much more entertaining if it were a Biglaw ladder match where we could watch Paul Rawlinson, Gary Senior, Claudia Prado, and Eric Lasry fight for the shiniest brass ring of them all. [Big Law Business]

* If only law schools had more clinical opportunities for future corporate drones: Law schools have offered students more chances to perform public interest work, but this law professor worries schools are “inculcat[ing] law students with a responsibility of social justice that reflects the morality of the faculty and administration.” [WSJ Law Blog]

* “It doesn’t cry out as a triable case.” Andrew Caspersen, the high-flying Harvard Law grad charged with a $95 million fraud scheme, likely won’t face trial. His lawyer says that he thinks his client’s criminal case will be resolved within the next 60 days. He thinks the case will end in a settlement with the SEC. [DealBook / New York Times]

* Sources say that Donald Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski will not be prosecuted for battery after an incident with former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields following a press conference in March. Apparently the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office has a “higher standard to go forward with a prosecution.” [POLITICO]

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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.

* Howrey doing with all those profit clawbacks for unfinished business? The bankruptcy trustee for this defunct firm filed an appeal with the Ninth Circuit to determine whether his method of collecting cash for the insolvent firm’s estate was legal, and in an amicus brief, the ABA has sided with the law firms being bilked for funds, saying such efforts must be nixed. [ABA Journal]

* The Tenth Circuit dismissed a challenge to Utah’s ban on polygamy that was brought by TLC’s “Sister Wives” family, saying they didn’t have standing to sue as they were no longer subject to a credible threat of prosecution. This will probably add fuel to the rumors that the show is on the verge of cancellation before Season 7. [WSJ Law Blog]

* The SEC has charged Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in connection to a stock scam involving tech company Servergy. Paxton allegedly assisted the company with raising investor funds, but never disclosed his commissions. With three pending criminal indictments and a bar complaint, this guy is batting 1000. [Dallas Morning News]

* Reclaim Harvard Law protestors who have been occupying the school’s student center claim that they found a voice-activated recording device in “Belinda Hall,” and have interpreted this as an “intentional effort to surveil [their] movement.” If your goal was to get people to listen to your message, consider this an achievement unlocked. [Observer]

* If you’re uncertain about your law school decision, you can certainly put down multiple seat deposits, but we’re not sure why you would want to. By all means, start your legal education by putting yourself into debt — you’ll be off to a great start for the six figures of loans you’ll have accumulated by graduation. [Law Admissions Lowdown / U.S. News]

Did John Stumpf fall for the bloody sock routine as well?

Incredibly, Shkreli might be even fuller of sh!t than we thought.

* Now that Rudy Giuliani’s in the news again thanks to his departure from his namesake firm, he’s letting his opinions be known on all sorts of things relevant to lawyers and law students. In fact, he thinks law school should be four years long. Go back into the woodwork, Rudy. [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

* After a decade on SCOTUS, Justice Samuel Alito hasn’t strayed from his conservative roots like some of his colleagues. He “has been every bit as conservative as conservatives could have dreamed — and as liberals would have feared.” [ABA Journal]

* Prior to Martin Shkreli’s arrest, prosecutors obtained a secret order nullifying attorney-client privilege in communications between the pharma bro and his Biglaw attorney. Per records, this case has been ongoing since before he outed himself as a d-bag. [Reuters]

* “Whether I want to marry or not, it should be my right to decide.” China’s first-ever lawsuit challenging its ban on same-sex marriage is expected to be heard in court today. In a country as conservative as China, this could be revolutionary. [New York Times]

* Shake those pom-poms, because the New York Jets have reached a settlement with the team’s cheerleaders in a lawsuit filed over alleged wage theft. The J-E-T-S will pay out $324,000, making it the fourth NFL team to settle such a suit. [New York Daily News]

* Justice Judy? According to a poll conducted by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, about 10 percent of college graduates think that Judith Sheindlin, aka Judge Judy, serves on the bench of the Supreme Court. [CNN]

* If you haven’t heard, Houston-based firm Bracewell & Giuliani lost one of its famous name partners this week. Former New York Mayor and founding New York partner Rudy Giuliani is taking his nouns and verbs about 9/11 and heading to presumably greener pastures at Greenberg Traurig. [DealBook / New York Times]

* Yeehaw! Ride ’em, partners! Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe is the latest Biglaw firm to open an outpost in Houston, Texas, and there’s no better way to staff an office in the Wild Wild West than to poach 20 partners from your competitor firms. [Texas Lawyer]

* Texas Wesleyan Law graduates have officially lost the diploma war they’ve been waging against Texas A&M Law. A judge recently dismissed their case for want of any evidence of wrongdoing whatsoever. [National Law Journal via Courthouse News Service]

* Martin Shkreli is sick and tired of being depicted as nothing more than a “pharma bro” in the press, so he’s decided to get new legal representation in his securities fraud case, as if that’ll somehow solve all of his problems. [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

* Both Kaye Scholer partner Evan Greebel (formerly of Katten Muchin) and Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli pleaded not guilty to securities fraud charges. Now, the world is left to weep because Skhreli’s Wu-Tang album wasn’t seized. [Reuters]

* “You are not an American because you got sworn in on a Koran.” The Hate Crimes Unit of the New York Police Department is investigating a series of threatening calls made to Judge Carolyn Walker-Diallo, Brooklyn’s first Muslim judge. [WSJ Law Blog]

* David Lola, the contract attorney who sued Skadden and Tower Legal for overtime pay with claims he wasn’t practicing law, settled his claims for $75,000. But now we don’t know if doc reviewers are entitled to overtime pay. 🙁 [Big Law Business / Bloomberg]

* Slater & Gordon, the world’s first publicly traded law firm, continues to watch as its stock price tumbles. The firm’s shares are now worth A$0.89 after it decided to pull its earnings guidance, and they’ve lost 90 percent of their value since April. [The Guardian]

* That’s not how you’re supposed to examine briefs: A Maryland court commissioner was charged with visual surveillance with prurient intent and misconduct in office after allegedly using his cellphone to take an upskirt photo of a courthouse employee. [AP]

A Biglaw partner was arrested this morning!

Ed. note: We hope you had a nice Thanksgiving. As we mentioned before Thanksgiving, we’ll be on a reduced publication schedule today.

* Randall Kennedy, one of the African-American Harvard Law School professors whose portraits got marked with black tape, shares HLS alum Elie Mystal’s reaction to the incident: he is unimpressed. [New York Times]

* In other Harvard Law news, an HLS librarian got arrested after police claim he tried to arrange a sexual meet-up with a deputy posing as an underage girl in Colorado (site of a librarians’ conference). [Boston Globe]

* Former Supreme Court clerk Brianne Gorod argues that SCOTUS can and should decide Texas’s challenge to President Obama’s executive action on immigration this Term (i.e., before the 2016 election). [Constitutional Accountability Center via How Appealing]

* Ohio State law student Madison Gesiotto is not happy with how administrators responded when one of her conservative columns prompted a threat from a fellow student. [Washington Times]

* The SEC just dropped its civil insider trading case against former SAC Capital Advisors LP portfolio manager Michael Steinberg. [WSJ Law Blog]

* Let’s rank the top 10 women Supreme Court justices! Oh wait, there are only four…. [National Law Journal]

* Linda Greenhouse offers her reflections on “Sex After 50” (at SCOTUS). [New York Times via How Appealing]

* The father of Paul Walker is suing Porsche for negligence and wrongful death over the 2013 car crash that killed Walker, of “Fast and Furious” fame. [AP via WSJ Law Blog]