Texas

Non-Sequiturs: 01.17.13

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* A Charleston School of Law student leader was arrested for stalking. I’m not sure how else Charleston Law students are supposed to get jobs. [Fitsnews]

* I think this is a very poor reading of the history of the Second Amendment that is making the rounds. Sure, having weapons really helped slaveholders, but that’s not “the reason” the Second Amendment was ratified. The founders had better reasons… reasons that have nothing at all to do with the time we live in, but that’s a different story. [Truthout]

* By the way, you saw that Obama nominated a black lawyer for something, right? Since the Republicans in Congress are so concerned about Obama’s record on diverse appointments, I’m sure Todd Jones will be confirmed super quickly. [Daily Beast]

* Should pet owners be allowed to recover for “sentimental value”? A Texas case might answer that question. I’m looking forward to the companion case in Arkansas where pet owners try to recover from loss of consortium. [Adjunct Law Prof Blog]

* I’d be shocked if this Manti Te’o thing doesn’t end up with somebody suing someone for something. [New York Daily News]

* There’s going to be a law and robots conference at Stanford in April. Because we all know how much robots love law. [The Volokh Conspiracy]

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Lance Armstrong: Straight From The Horse’s Mouth

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Lance Armstrong

Bicycle bicycle bicycle
I want to ride my bicycle bicycle bicycle
I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride my bike
I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride it where I like

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Not for Lance. His hemoglobin unnaturally oxygenated, Lance was going to hop on his banana seat and literally ride off into the sunset. He was just going to take his ball and go home. And other jokes about his chosen profession and/or lack of testicles, plural.

Tomorrow, Lance Armstrong appears before our nation’s high priestess of contrition to blubber and wail. Lance Armstrong cheated in a sport that very few people in this country care about. I’ve written about this before. And before that. I have great difficulty ginning up the proper amount of outrage, schadenfreude, or whatever it is you’re supposed to feel when a world class athlete and jerk gets nailed like this.

It’s for this reason that the home stretch of this column will be written by a guest columnist. This writer was well-known for thriving in a sport that, like cycling, was similarly plagued by drug abuse and scandal.

I’m talking, of course, about….

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Dean’s Ouster Inspires Outrage From Trustees, Joy From Students

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There has been a lot of law school dean news these past few days. On Friday, a tipster asked us to help with the NYU Law dean search (we were happy to oblige). Earlier today, we talked about the ridiculous salaries some law deans earn. Now we get to talk about a dean who has been pushed out of his law school. The law school dean carousel is just as interesting as the NFL coaching carousel… only the NFL has the Rooney Rule to ensure that a diverse group of people get an opportunity to interview for the jobs.

Usually, law deans gracefully exit as respected (and wealthy) members of the legal academy. But apparently that’s not how they do things in Texas. A year ago Christmas, the University of Texas unceremoniously ousted its law school dean. This holiday season, it appears that Texas’s number-two law school (more on that below) was busy throwing its dean under the bus.

And some students couldn’t be happier….

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Morning Docket: 01.14.13

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DaNae Couch

* “I’m a New Yorker, and I jaywalk with the best of them.” Don’t be fooled by the rocks job that she’s got — she’s still, she’s still Jenny Sonia from the block. The Supreme Court’s very own wise Latina, author of a new memoir (affiliate link), is proud of her city. [New York Times; 60 Minutes]

* If you’re looking for an M&A adviser, you’d be wise to seek out counsel from Skadden Arps. The firm swept three separate rankings lists based on the total value of its clients’ 2012 M&A transactions. [Am Law Daily]

* Only in the world of legal education could the dean of a law school that isn’t even numerically ranked by U.S. News have the highest salary of all law deans nationwide. (We’ll likely have more on this later.) [Boston Globe]

* Arizona schools will allow 3Ls to take the bar exam, but New York schools may soon do away with 3L year altogether. Of course, the ABA will find a way to muck it up, but still, hooray for progress! [National Law Journal]

* Remember “Made in Jersey,” the show about a stereotypical Jersey girl who made the jump to Biglaw? Yeah, neither does anyone else. Hopefully “Staten Island Law” won’t face the same fate. [New York Daily News]

* “Sexiness is all about being a woman of character.” Our congratulations go out to DaNae Couch, the Texas Tech law student who advanced to the Top 10 of the Miss America competition. You go girl! [Lubbock Online]

* Aaron Swartz — Reddit co-founder, friend of Larry Lessig, felony hacking defendant — RIP. [New York Times]

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Non-Sequiturs: 01.11.13

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Housewife: best job ever?

* Go to BuzzFeed to see pictures of cute animals, or go to BuzzFeed to see some quality journalism — like Chris Geidner’s profile of Edith Windsor, plaintiff in one of the landmark gay-marriage cases before the Supreme Court. [BuzzFeed]

* “A python is fairly dangerous. There’s definitely a turn-on about hunting something carnivorous that could, in theory, eat you,” says the NYU law student heading to Florida to hunt pythons for prize money. [Bloomberg]

* Looking for work? It’s time to head south, before everyone else does. Word is starting to get out about Texas, which boasts a low cost of living, no state income tax, and jobs — yes, actual freaking jobs. [Instapundit]

* But there’s no shortage of jobs in the housewife sector. If that’s what you want to do, then be fruitful, multiply, and remove your résumé from consideration at the jobs you’ve unwillingly applied to. [The Careerist]

* Although a reference from this century would’ve been appreciated, both Lat and Elie agree that I’m pretty damn great at “mak[ing] everything be okay.” Where’s a cute hat to toss when you need one? [Law and More]

* Lat sometimes dabbles in Biglaw predictions (despite the risks of being wrong). If you’re interested in seeing more, watch him in this interview with Lee Pacchia of Bloomberg Law….

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The $160K-Plus Club Welcomes A New Member

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A few months ago, we wrote a story about the $160K-Plus Club: those law firms that pay their first-year associates more than $160,000 a year, the going rate within Biglaw. Earlier this week, we covered which cities give young lawyers the biggest bang for their buck — i.e., cities where the buying power of the median salary for that city is the greatest.

Let’s mash up these two stories. Today we bring you news of a law firm that (1) pays a starting salary of more than $160,000 and (2) is based in a city that’s in the top ten for buying power. Associates at this firm are — by our calculations, based on the NALP Buying Power Index — living as well as someone earning $414,000 in New York City. That’s a staggering sum for a first-year associate.

So which firm are we talking about? And are they hiring?

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Which Cities Give Young Lawyers the Biggest Bang for Their Buck?

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Back in 2011, the National Association for Law Placement (NALP) produced an extremely useful chart for people trying to figure out where to start their Biglaw careers. The chart, which tracks buying power based on starting salaries for associates, is a great way to find out where you’ll get the most bang for your buck if you land a lucrative Biglaw gig.

NALP’s Buying Power Index continues to use New York City ($160,000) as the baseline. It takes the median starting salary for the class of 2011 and the cost of living index for NYC and sets that figure at 1.00. Cities with a better purchasing power than NYC have a value greater than 1.00. In all, 76 cities have been ranked.

When we first wrote about this, associates in New York City were crestfallen when they found out that their city was number 42 on the list — they realized they were essentially throwing their money down the drain. This year, NYC has tumbled even further down the list.

How badly are they getting screwed, and where can you go if you want greater purchasing power?

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Above the Law’s 2012 Lawyer of the Year Competition: The Finalists!

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The year is quickly drawing to a close, but we have unfinished business to conduct here at Above the Law. Come on, people, we still have to crown our Lawyer of the Year for 2012.

Thank you to everyone who responded to our call for nominations, in the comments or via email. We’ve narrowed down the nominees to a field of nine (although you’ll see only eight options in the poll because one is a joint nomination). As in past years, the contenders run the gamut from distinguished to despicable.

And the nominees are….

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Morning Docket: 12.20.12

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* “As a lawyer, this is very sad for me.” Al Togut, the prominent attorney pulling all of the strings behind the curtain of the Dewey & LeBoeuf bankruptcy filings, wishes that there was some way that the firm could’ve been saved. [Am Law Daily]

* Guys at my law school used to break into the registrar’s office to steal transcript paper all the time; it was no big deal. No really, as far as sentencing goes, apparently doing such a thing isn’t that big of a deal in Virginia. [Daily Progress]

* That’s some nice lipstick you’ve got there, pig: Lincoln Memorial University’s Duncan School of Law is still trying to get ABA accreditation by changing everything it can, including its lax admissions standards. [Knoxville News Sentinel]

* Even though Peter Madoff’s supporters showered the court with with letters filled with compliments ahead of his sentencing, the Ponzi victims aren’t exactly showing him the same kind of love. [WSJ Law Blog (sub. req.)]

* This law firm in Texas is trying to make getting divorced a more pleasurable experience, so they invented something called the “Divorce Resort” — because there’s nothing like a four-star train wreck. [Huffington Post]

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Morning Docket: 12.06.12

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Overworked and underpaid.

* “Why drag us into it?” Constitutional or not, it seems that not even the D.C. Circuit wants to deal with the political hot mess that’s been caused by President Barack Obama’s recess appointments. [National Law Journal]

* There’s something (allegedly) rotten in the state of Texas: Bickel & Brewer was booted from a multi-million dollar lawsuit due to accusations that the firm paid top dollar for insider information. [Dallas Morning News (sub. req.)]

* There are many more women in the legal profession these days than there were 40 years ago, but — surprise, surprise, here’s a shocker — they’re still getting paid less than their male counterparts. [WSJ Law Blog (sub. req.)]

* And here’s today’s opportunity to beat the horse that just won’t die. This law professor says he pities those who buy into the media’s law school scam narrative, while in reality, most would pity the many unemployed graduates of his law school. [Huffington Post]

* Here’s a protip for the February bar: don’t fake a disability to get extra time. Even if you end up passing, the bar examiners will find out and pretty much ruin your life. Just ask this UC Hastings Law grad. [Am Law Daily]

* “Also, you probably shouldn’t bring pot with you to the federal courthouse (or any other federal property).” Umm, come on, were the Washington police officers who created this marijuana guidebook high? [CNN]

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