Earlier this month, former Bush White House attorney John Michael Farren allegedly attacked his wife, after she told him she wanted a divorce. Farren pleaded not guilty to attempted murder, first-degree strangulation, and assault last week.

The alleged attack — with a flashlight — was a brutal one. Mary Margaret Farren, who is also a lawyer, was hospitalized with a broken jaw, fractures to the face, and lacerations to the back of her head. She’s counsel in the energy regulation and litigation practice group in Skadden’s D.C. office, but claims that she has not been able to work since the attack.

An experienced litigator, she’s decided to sue. The Danbury News Times reports that she filed a $30 million lawsuit in Connecticut last week.

On Monday, we wrote about a shooting in Philadelphia involving a law student, as the accused shooter, and the son of a law firm partner, as the apparent victim. We now have some updates on the situation. Alas, we still have more questions than answers.

Gerald Ung (pictured), 28, is in his final year at Temple University’s Beasley School of Law. (Small correction to our last post: he’s a fourth-year student in the night program, not a 3L.) Ung is accused of shooting Edward DiDonato Jr., 23, a recent college graduate and the son of a partner at Fox Rothschild.

First, some (relatively) good news. Edward DiDonato, who was in critical condition immediately after being shot, is hanging in there and making progress (although he’s still critical). According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, he underwent a fourth operation yesterday. A Facebook group created to express support for Eddie DiDonato has over 1,800 members.

Second, some of Ung’s friends believe he has been treated unfairly in coverage. What are their concerns?

Many law students these days are angry and frustrated. If the allegations are true, one has resorted to gun violence (and not just against his casebooks). From Philadelphia’s Fox 29:

A Virginia man is in custody after a weekend shooting in front of Fox 29’s studio in Philadelphia that was caught on camera. Temple University grad student Gerald Ung allegedly shot Villanova graduate Ed DiDonato at 4th and Market Streets early Sunday morning.

According to WPVI, the suspected shooter, Gerald Ung (pictured), is a third-year fourth-year law student at Temple’s Beasley School of Law.

UPDATE (1 PM): Temple has confirmed that Ung, 28, is — or “was,” to use the exact language from the Philadelphia Inquirer article — a law student there.

CORRECTION: Ung is not a 3L, as we originally wrote. Rather, he’s a fourth-year law student in Temple’s evening program.

It is unclear what exactly provoked the shooting, although it appears that Ung and DiDonato were engaged in an argument before the incident. You can see this by watching (somewhat grainy) video footage of the altercation over here. One tipster’s reaction:

This happened in my hometown, which I miss less and less these days. And the [alleged] perp lived three blocks from where I used to live. I wonder if having an appreciation of the law and how much it’s going to run over you makes it any more difficult to sit in jail knowing you’ve done something like this.

UPDATE (2 PM): A different perspective on this incident, after the jump.

A former Bush lawyer has been charged with attempted murder after strangling and beating his wife, a counsel at Skadden Arps.

John Michael Farren, 57, served as deputy counsel to the president under Fred Fielding in the most recent Bush administration, as general counsel at Xerox, and as Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade under President George H.W. Bush. Since leaving the White House, the UConn law grad returned to Connecticut.

Last night, he made the news there when he allegedly attempted to kill his wife. From the Greenwich Time:

John Michael Farren, 57, of New Canaan, was charged with attempted murder and first-degree strangulation after police received a panic alarm from his home shortly after 10 p.m.

Farren was arraigned in state Superior Court in Norwalk Thursday. He appeared in court with a large bandage on the right side of his neck and has been placed on suicide watch.

According to CBS News, his wife is Mary Margaret Farren, an energy regulation and litigation counsel in Skadden’s D.C. office.

Timothy Hendron was supposed to be in a federal court in St. Louis this morning for a trial that started on Monday. He and his co-workers had filed a class action suit against ABB power company alleging that its pension review committee had mishandled employee finances and incurred unreasonable losses. ABC News is reporting that Hendron decided a gun was more powerful than his lawyers.

Early Thursday morning, Timothy Hendron took the fight against his employer from a federal courtroom to the company’s headquarters, according to law enforcement sources in St. Louis. And instead of using an ongoing class action lawsuit to achieve his goals, Hendron is suspected of using an AK-47 assault rifle.

Early reports indicate that three people were killed and four were wounded. Hendron may be among those killed.

St. Louis shooting suspect was on trial against employer [ABC News]

Monday’s shootout at the Lloyd George Courthouse in Las Vegas can be described as tragic, frightening, and now, surreal. Reports are out this morning that the gunman, Johnny Lee Wicks, previously served prison time for killing his brother. The ABA Journal collects the information:

Stories by the Associated Press, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and the Memphis Commercial Appeal detail Wicks’ criminal past.

Wicks killed his brother after an argument escalated over whether his motorcycle could outrun his brother’s car, according to the Commercial Appeal account. Wicks had claimed he killed his brother in self defense, although no weapon was found near the body. He was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 55 years in prison. On appeal, the sentence was reduced to 12 to 15 years, and Wicks was paroled after serving six years.

I’m not a huge fan of taking legal advice from the Bible, but surely killing your brother because you’re jealous over his sheep car deserves a harsher penalty than six years.

But we’re not done with Johnny Lee Wicks’s past. More after the jump.

Details continue to roll in about Johnny Lee Wicks, the shooter during yesterday’s gunfight at the Lloyd George U.S. Courthouse in Las Vegas. Apparently Wicks set fire to his own house before heading to the courthouse. ABC News reports:

The senior citizen who is being blamed for a Las Vegas courthouse shooting that killed a security officer had set his condo on fire in a fit of rage before the attack.

Friends and family told ABC News that Johnny Lee Wicks, 66, was so upset that his monthly Social Security check was being reduced that he set fire to his home in a gated retirement community around 5 a.m. Monday.

Wicks had filed a racial discrimination suit against the Social Security Administration because his benefits were cut. The suit got tossed and, apparently, that is what set him off. Over on True/Slant, Michael Roston hopes that Wicks’s deranged understanding of race in America isn’t used by neocons as a polemic against tolerance:

Of course, I’m still trying to be hopeful that the fact that Wicks was a black man shooting at a federal building won’t also be worked into the kulturkampf by agents of conservative histrionics. Rush Limbaugh is taking a few days off after his brush with the medical system, so he won’t be going on air tomorrow to declare that crimes like this happen only in “Obama’s America.” If anyone else out there was thinking about saying something like that, please, don’t. Let’s just all be thankful that there weren’t any more senseless deaths from this tragedy today.

Hear, hear. Bullets don’t care about skin color. An Above the Law reader who works at the Lloyd George Courthouse provides an eyewitness account of the harrowing minutes during the shooting.

The story after the jump.

A deputy U.S. marshal and a court security officer were shot this morning when a gunman opened fire in the lobby of the Lloyd D. George Federal Courthouse in Las Vegas. The gunman was shot in the head and killed near the courthouse. The identity of the shooter and possible motives for the shooting are not yet known.

UPDATE: Las Vegas Now reports that the court security officer has died. You can check out an amateur video, featuring loud gunshots and the cameraman muttering “holy s**t,” over here. (Gavel bang: commenter.)

If you have additional information — e.g., you were at the courthouse when the shooting took place — feel free to email us. Thanks.

UPDATE: A first-person account appears here.

2 Guards Shot in Las Vegas Federal Building [Associated Press via ABA Journal]

We mentioned this story on Friday (second item). But since we’re continuing to get tips about it, we thought it might merit further mention.

From today’s New York Daily News:

A lawyer got his nose bent out of shape during an altercation over an occupied bathroom stall — and retaliated by chomping off part of a man’s schnoz.

Mark Lambert admitted during an interview with WMC-TV to biting off a portion of Greg Herbers’ nose, according to a report on the TV station’s Web site. The bite occurred during a fracas at Memphis-area hot spot Dish.

Herbers is now reportedly suing Lambert, claiming he needs plastic surgery and might have to wear a prosthetic nose. He also claims Lambert swallowed what he bit off.

Silly lawyer! Noses are for picking, not for eating.

For the record, Lambert denies eating Herbers’s flesh — he claims that he spat, didn’t swallow.

More details, plus a gory picture, after the jump.

UPDATE (3:07): The Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) just held a press conference. FHP announced that Tiger Woods was found “at fault” in his traffic accident, guilty of careless driving. The fine is $164 and four points on his driving record. This ends the Florida Highway Patrol’s investigation.

FHP determined “that there was insufficient evidence to issue a subpoena for any further evidence. There are no claims of domestic violence by any individual.”

Hmm… No evidence, you say? It looks like not talking was in fact the smart thing to do.

* * * * * * * * *
Lawyers, members of the bar, law students, and others with a smattering of legal training: we all have a duty to stand up and defend Tiger Woods’s decision to keep his mouth shut. The mainstream media has this story completely wrong, and it is up to us — those blessed with a basic understanding of criminal jurisprudence — to educate the public about why Tiger is staying silent. We must explain to our mothers and fathers and doormen and bodega owners that Tiger probably has to keep his mouth shut, in order to keep his wife out of jail.

I’ve explained elsewhere that we are looking at a potential domestic violence situation. If some of the reports are true, Elin Nordegren attacked her husband, allegedly threatening him with a golf club.

Now this is the part that laypeople seem to be having difficulty grasping. Just because Tiger is a man doesn’t mean he gets to decide whether or not his wife gets prosecuted for domestic violence. Criminal law doesn’t work that way. If the police find that Elin Nordegren assaulted Tiger, then this process gets taken out of Tiger’s hands. Right now, shutting up is the only thing Tiger can do if he wants to retain a modicum of control over the situation.

Especially in Florida.

More details, after the jump.

We mentioned L’Affaire Tiger Woods in Morning Docket (first three links), but since it was the big story of the long holiday weekend, we thought we’d revisit it in more detail. This story has a number of interesting legal angles.

The most thorough coverage appears over at TMZ. Check out these posts, which thrown together could make for quite the law school exam hypothetical (we’ve included study questions with each one):

• Cops Pursue Warrant in Woods Case: According to TMZ, the Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) may be “obtaining a search warrant — allowing them to seize medical records from the hospital that treated Tiger Woods — in an attempt to determine if the wounds Woods sustained are consistent with a car accident or domestic violence” (allegedly perpetrated against Woods by his wife).

Is there probable cause?

More links and questions appear below.

When talking about instances of normal people exhibiting superhuman strength and bravery, the most common example is the mother who lifts a car when her child is trapped beneath it, thanks to an adrenaline rush. It seems that law school students are similarly inspired by threats to their laptops.

Thomas M. Cooley 3L Shady Yassin was studying at a coffee shop in Grand Rapids, Michigan last week. A would-be robber walked in with a hunting rifle, according to the Grand Rapid Press, and demanded that all the patrons give him their laptops and valuables.

That’s when Yassin morphed into a coffeehouse superhero. Like a former Law Student of the Day, Arizona State’s Alex Botsios, Yassin decided to fight off the laptop-stealing villain.

Yesterday I had the quintessential New York City moment. At the bodega around the corner from Breaking Media’s lavish Nolita office, the bodega’s proprietor engaged me and two other people in a conversation involving three languages. I was speaking English, another guy was speaking Spanish, and I believe the third woman was speaking Portuguese, and the bodega owner was talking to all of us and translating where necessary.

I love this town!

I would have loved this conversation if we had been talking about dog poop. But instead the four of us were talking about a lawsuit that New Yorkers have been buzzing about all day. The cover story in yesterday’s Daily News involves a pretty lady (pictured) suing her co-op board:

Christina Ambers, once dubbed the “Heidi Klum of foot models,” says a romance with her porter-turned-husband, Angel Rotger, turned her into a pariah among workers at 340 E. 74th St., who made her hail taxis and retrieve packages on her own.

“I hope that people can understand how awful it is to come home and to then be treated with hostility in a building where I have paid a lot of money to live,” Ambers told the Daily News. “Nobody should have to live this way.”

Oh, to live on the Upper East Side — as I do — is to know the true definition of pettiness.

At the bodega, I made the mistake of telling my interlocutors that I “write a legal blog.” At that point, the bodega owner, the construction worker who speaks Spanish, and the Brazilian nanny had all kinds of legal questions.

Details about the suit and the street-level reaction, after the jump.

How would you like to be sitting in property class at Iowa College of Law, and realizing that you are in the same section as this guy? The Iowa City Press-Citizen reports:

An Iowa City man is accused of physically and verbally abusing his live-in girlfriend on Sunday.

According to Iowa City police, Alvin K. Seals, 35, choked the woman after an argument and caused her to hit a wall with her elbow. The woman scraped her elbow and also cut her finger during the struggle, police said.

A tipster reports:

Seals is a 1L at Iowa College of Law. Word on the street is he dropped one of the three doctrinal first-semester classes (property) already.

Alvin Kwesi Seals apparently has quite the temper. More urine soaked allegations, after the jump.

We have another episode in the saga of Deidre Dare, one of our favorite laid-off lawyers. She was an attorney in Allen & Overy’s Russia office until she penned typed a salacious online novel about her expat adventures, which featured lots of drinking, sex, drugs, donkeys, and dwarves. After the firm let her go, she sued.

Dare’s still in Moscow, where she writes an often controversial column for the Moscow News called sExpat. The latest reveals that Deidre likes it rough:

Anyone who has spent even five minutes in bed with me knows that I have a strong proclivity for S&M. My experience in the area ranges from the mild (spanking) to the extreme (ball gags, golden showers and the like), according to how much experience my partner has and what he or she likes.

The column goes on to praise Russia’s abusive men. Dare writes: “If you’re hanging out with real men and you’re a little slutty, you’re going to get hit. Period.” Roll On Friday photoshops A&O’s chairman into being a “real man” here.

Ed. note: We at Above The Law do not condone physical violence against women. We do, however, condone violence against the commenter ShaFeef.

In a previous column, Dare said money was tight and suggested that prostitution might be a way out of her money woes. That might have led to more hitting than even Deidre likes. Luckily, she’s come up with a different way to make money. She’s written another book. Its title, fittingly, is SLUT.

Have you ever considered the possibility of getting sued for not being able to dance? That’s the reality now facing James Graeber, who allegedly flung a hedge fund employee right off of a dance floor at a New Jersey wedding. The New York Post reports:

An Upper West Side woman is suing a rowdy reveler who drunkenly clobbered her on the dance floor at his sister’s reception last year.

Christine Mancision said she was grooving after dinner at the Hyatt Morristown in New Jersey when, “all of a sudden, I turn and I’m grabbed by this really tall individual.”

“I had no idea who he was. And he grabbed my arm and spun me around to dance with me and then just flung me off to the side of the dance floor, and I went flying to the floor,” the petite 27-year-old recalled.

Turn around, bright eyes
Every now and then I fall apart
Turn around, bright eyes
F***in every now and then I fall apart
And I need you now tonight
I f***in need you more than ever.

In related news, people who can dance do not go to weddings in New Jersey.

Mancision suffered a broken wrist and is suing James Graeber. But she’s also suing the Hyatt, for reasons passing understanding.

Details and updates after the jump.

A battle went down the other day on a basketball court at Gregory Gym on the University of Texas - Austin campus. It’s a battle that has been fought across time and generations. It pitted a freshman defensive back from the Texas Longhorns (ranked #2 in the latest Associated Press Top 25 poll) and a UT law student (ranked #15 in the latest U.S. News law school rankings). Who hasn’t been a part of a strong kid v. smart kid fight?

The football player is freshman Kenny Vaccaro. The law student is Jonathon Fuhrman. The Austin-American Statesman takes it from here:

Fuhrman, who is identified as a UT student, told police Vaccaro and his friends were throwing basketballs at him. The affidavit said Fuhrman threw a basketball back at Vaccaro, hitting him in the head.

Fuhrman said Vaccaro then punched him in the face. The affidavit stated that Fuhrman, when he was interviewed by police, had blood coming from a cut lip.

Guys at my high school used to throw basketballs at future legal scholars all of the time. Then they would make love to all the women and be treated like gods. But now they all have multiple out-of-wedlock children and/or priors, while the future legal scholars enjoy prosperous careers and fulfilling romantic relationships. It was no big deal.

Will Vaccaro get punished for this? I’ll share some painful childhood memories, after the jump.

Here’s a strange little story that we meant to cover during the week but missed. From the Philadelphia Daily News:

Ever heard the one about the exploding toilet? Well, an Olney woman could tell you all about it, from firsthand experience….

It happened on Oct. 30, 2007, according to the lawsuit, when a toilet the woman was using “exploded” in an eighth-floor ladies’ room at the 1900 Market Street building.

“Excess water pressure caused a toilet to explode causing plaintiff to be thrown from the bathroom stall, thereby causing her severe and permanent injuries,” the suit said.

And then they tried to charge her for an enema. The nerve!

So what injuries does plaintiff claim as a result of sitting on Old Faithful?

Mental note: Do not mess with lawyers in South Carolina. Don’t believe me? Just read the Charlotte Observer:

Conway Attorney Irby Walker was charged today with trying to hire someone to kill another attorney, according to police.

Walker, 58, was charged with solicitation of a felony after Doug Thornton told police Sept. 11 that Walker had made threats against his life and believed he was trying to follow through on those threats, according to Horry County police Lt. Jamie DeBari.

According to The Sun News, the going price to take down a fellow member of the bar is $10,000.

Really? I mean, who can even afford that in this economy?

Irby Walker’s attorney responded to the charges with the Chewbacca defense:

“I know there’s some bad blood between [Walker and Thornton], but this entire thing defies comprehension, and I suggest it is illogical,” said Walker’s attorney, George McMaster, during the hearing. “He didn’t get a gun, he didn’t go try to go shoot somebody, he’s probably not capable of shooting somebody.”

Police: S.C. lawyer plotted to hire killer [Charlotte Observer]
Police: Lawyer sought hitman to kill rival [The Sun News]

Hampton Behavioral Health Center is a mental health clinic in New Jersey. Its website makes the place seem quite tranquil: lots of pastels and photos of clouds. A safe place.

The tranquility was disrupted on Christmas Eve 2007 when a masked gunman burst into the clinic’s pharmacy, reports Courthouse News Service. The gunman told pharmacy worker, Babette Perry, that he had already taken another hospital worker hostage and demanded Oxycontin. Perry tried to call for help but the phone line was down.

But it turns out this was all just a surprise safety drill. The “gunman” was actually a fellow hospital worker. The phones had been cut on purpose. There was no actual threat of being shot or taken hostage. Woo hoo, right?

Perry was not exactly relieved by this news. She’s now having mental health issues of her own, and has filed a suit against the clinic for compensatory and punitive damages. But even if she wins, she might have a hard time spending her money.