Third Circuit
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Courts
The Third Circuit Might Just Look A Little More Diverse
The first Muslim nominated to a federal circuit court. -
Courts
The Third Circuit Is About To Get More Diverse
President Biden's Third Circuit pick will be the first Asian American on that court. - Sponsored
Are Small Firms Going Big On Legal Tech?
Please help us benchmark your firm against your peers through this (always) brief and anonymous survey and enter for a chance to win a $250… -
Courts
This Appellate Opinion Is Bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S!
A judge on Trump's SCOTUS shortlist gets punny when it comes to fruit.
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Courts
Third Circuit Strikes Down Partisan Balance Requirement
Things are about to get real in Delaware. -
Government
Senator Bob Casey Really Doesn't Want This Guy To Be A Federal Judge
The Twitter thread tells the real story. -
Courts
More Judicial Nominations From President Trump -- And More Judicial Emergencies
April brought not one but two waves of new nominees from the White House. -
Courts
The Latest And Greatest In President Trump's Judicial Nominations (Part 1)
Here's a rundown of where things stand, including district as well as circuit courts. -
Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 11.03.17
* 41 Cat Pictures That Prove Beyond All Doubt That Being BuzzFeed’s GC Is Freaking Awesome. [Big Law Business]
* Jeffrey Wertkin, the ex-Akin Gump partner accused of trying to sell whistleblower complaints while in disguise, plans to plead guilty later this month. As he said upon arrest, maybe his life really is over… [The Recorder]
* Professor Stephanos Bibas of Penn Law was confirmed to the Third Circuit by the Senate in a 53-43 vote. According to the law school’s dean, Bibas “possesses all the skills to excel on the federal bench.” Congratulations! [Philadelphia Inquirer]
* Justice Joan Larsen of the Michigan Supreme Court was confirmed to the Sixth Circuit by the Senate in a 60-38 vote. If you recall, Larsen was on the original version of President Trump’s Supreme Court shortlist, and was one of his top five finalists for Justice Neil Gorsuch’s position. Congratulations! [Detroit Free Press]
* Cozen O’Connor’s lobbying affiliate, Cozen O’Connor Public Strategies, poached a five-lawyer team of lobbyists from Manatt, and now Manatt no longer has a lobbying practice. [New York Law Journal]
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Early Adopters Of Legal AI Gaining Competitive Edge In Marketplace
How to best leverage generative AI as an early adopter with ethical use. -
Federal Judges, Politics
Federal Judicial Nominations: A Quick Recap
The August recess offers a good opportunity to evaluate the state of play in judicial nominations. -
Federal Judges, Politics
Circuit Court Nominees In The Trump Administration: The Latest News And Rumor (Part 1)
What are the chances of these folks getting confirmed? -
Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 06.21.17
* Everyone in the Trump administration who is in some way related to the Russia probe has now lawyered up with outside counsel, including the attorney general. AG Jeff Sessions is being represented by Chuck Cooper, a longtime champion of conservative causes. If you recall, Cooper also prepped Sessions for his confirmation hearing. [USA Today]
* Let’s not go crazy: Earlier this week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and outside counsel Keker & Van Nest were denied certiorari on the Lenz v. Universal Music case — perhaps better known as the “dancing baby” case. Thanks to the SCOTUS decision, or lack thereof, we’ll not know “whether or not the DMCA includes meaningful protections for online fair uses” anytime soon. [Law.com]
* Judge Gonzalo Curiel will not make a Trump University settlement objector post a $146,888 bond to pursue an appeal. Sherri Simpson, a Florida bankruptcy lawyer, paid $19,000 for Trump U. seminars and mentorship, but now she wants out so she can sue the president over the alleged fraud. [POLITICO]
* Concerned Veterans for America, a political action committee that’s funded by the Koch brothers, is running an ad in support of a Penn Law Professor Stephanos Bibas’s nomination to the Third Circuit. “Generally a candidate would have to be pretty inflammatory or at risk to justify this kind of spending,” said election law attorney Adam Bonin. [Legal Intelligencer via ABA Journal]
* UNC Law’s budget has officially been cut by the state Senate, but it’s not as bad as the $4 million budget buster that was previously proposed. The law school will have to do without $500K in state appropriations if the legislature approves the move. Yes, that’s the sound of your tuition going up. [News & Observer]
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Federal Judges, Politics
The Latest Legal Luminaries Nominated For Federal Judgeships By President Trump
Prominent conservatives are hailing this latest slate as "a fantastic list." -
Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 05.12.17
* What’s the over–under on how long acting FBI director Andrew McCabe will keep his current post? [New York Times]
* And Democratic senators want answers — lots of answers — from deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein. [Washington Post]
* Following up on our list of top law schools with great employment outcomes, here’s a broader look at the latest ABA employment data. [ABA Journal]
* And following up on our recent round-ups of possible judicial nominees in the Trump administration, here’s a name for one of the open Third Circuit seats in Pennsylvania. [CA3 blog via How Appealing]
* A lawsuit claims that a Biglaw behemoth is trying to invalidate the same patents it prosecuted — not a good look. [Daily Business Review]
* Former Biglaw chair J. Stephen Poor ruminates on the riches of this year’s top Am Law 100 firms. [Big Law Business]
* Robert Post looks back over his eight years as dean of Yale Law School. [Law.com]
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Federal Judges, Politics
Circuit Court Nominees In The Trump Administration: A Nationwide Round-Up
Names, names, and more names, for federal judgeships around the country. -
SCOTUS, Supreme Court
An Outspoken Critic Of A Supreme Court Shortlister
A "celebrity" in legal circles comes out against one of the SCOTUS finalists. -
Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 09.27.16
* “Even with a new Republican appointee, [Justice Clarence] Thomas is likely to remain somewhat isolated on the extreme right.” In the case of Justice Thomas, it wouldn’t even matter if Donald Trump won the presidency — he’d still be the most conservative justice in the modern history of the Supreme Court. [New York Times]
* The Supreme Court’s long conference was yesterday, and we’ll likely find out later today (or in the days to come) the cases for which the justices decided to grant certiorari for the 2016-17 term. One of those cases may be NCAA v. O’Bannon, where the question of sports amateurism for the purpose of athletes’ pay is up for debate. [CBS Sports]
* Hot on the heels of the news that Dentons dragged down revenue per lawyer rankings for the entire 2016 Global 100 thanks to its mega-merger with Dacheng, the firm had a more upbeat announcement. Partners Mike McNamara, Jeff Haidet, and Peter Wolfson have ascended to national and global leadership positions. Congrats! [Big Law Business]
* Under a new California law signed by Gov. Jerry Brown, actors may conceal their age and force websites like IMDb to remove their age from bio pages in order to shield themselves from age-based discrimination in casting. Critics of the law are calling this an attack on free speech — and it’s too little, too late for Junie Hoang. [WSJ Law Blog]
* Judge Leonard I. Garth, Third Circuit Court of Appeals jurist, RIP. [Washington Post]
* Daniel O. Bernstine, president of LSAC, RIP. [ABA Journal]
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Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 08.19.16
* “Donald Ducks,” the DNC’s mascot that’s being used to taunt Donald Trump for his undisclosed tax returns, bears a striking resemblance to Disney’s Donald Duck, and people are starting to wonder: “Is Donald Ducks waddling over Disney’s intellectual property rights?” [WSJ Law Blog]
* The Third Circuit declined to re-seal excerpts of depositions in the Bill Cosby case where he admitted to giving women Quaaludes, but included in its opinion an interesting footnote calling out the district court judge’s decision to unseal the records in the first place, saying its “public moralist rational” had “no basis in our jurisprudence,” and that the term itself was “vague and undefined.” [THR, Esq. / Hollywood Reporter]
* This fall, Indiana Tech Law will welcome its largest class ever, with 55 students set to begin their legal studies next week. With only 15 students in its inaugural class, this huge jump in enrollment could possibly be due to the fact that the ABA gave the school a provisional rubber stamp (as it’s wont to do) back in March. [Indiana Lawyer]
* “There is a disconnect between what banks are doing and what consumers want,” and what they want is the ability to sue. More and more big banks — 72 percent of them, in fact — are using mandatory binding arbitration clauses in their contracts to prevent customers from filing suit. Read the find print, people. [DealBook / New York Times]
* “What if somebody gets injured on somebody else’s property? Trip on a rock or get bitten by the neighbor’s dog? There would be a whole host of responsible parties.” A New York firm already filed a class-action suit against the company behind Pokemon Go, but this lawyer thinks there’s a minefield of tort actions available to sue over. [Mlive.com]
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Morning Docket
Morning Docket: 08.18.16
* 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]
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Sports
Appeals Court Dashes New Jersey's Hope For Legal Sports Betting
New Jersey just can't catch a break. -
Non-Sequiturs
Non-Sequiturs: 05.18.16
* Check your spam folders! The Ticketmaster settlement email may be in there. [Slate] * Conservative lawyer Ted Olson is drafting an amicus for companies opposed to North Carolina’s anti-transgender bathroom law, HB2. [Time] * Amanda Knox can now sue Italy for an unfair trial. [New York Post] * Will there be a long-term chilling effect […]