* Crocs have no teeth when it comes to fighting legal battles. The footwear company has settled five design defect lawsuits filed by parents whose children suffered escalator injuries. [On Point News]

* Yolanda Young’s suit against Covington & Burling is back on. [BLT]

* The ATL editors are not the only legal groupies in New York. [New York Times via Gothamist]

* Blago’s judge is prepared for theatrics in the court. [Associated Press]

* Looks like Rihanna and Chris Brown may be violating the judge’s “two-way” stay-away order. [New York Post]

* The latest abortion legislation. [Slate]

* Senators Orrin Hatch and John Cornyn will vote against Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court. [Associated Press]

* Law school students interning in the Brooklyn DA’s office lack salaries and chairs. [New York Times]

* Is the ABA a club that’s not cool anymore? [National Law Journal]

We’ve been following the lawsuit filed by former Covington & Burling staff attorney Yolanda Young against Covington. She alleged that various incidents of racial discrimination derailed her Covington career.

Covington denied those claims.

Today, we have a judgment. Attorneys from Akin Gump — which represents Covington in this matter — sent out the following press release, earlier today:

United States District Court Judge Reggie B. Walton today dismissed Yolanda Young’s lawsuit against Covington & Burling LLP after Ms. Young and her attorney failed to appear for a court hearing.

Young filed her complaint in February 2009 against Covington and five of its present or former lawyers. Covington answered, denying Ms. Young’s allegations. Separately, on March 11, Covington filed a motion to strike certain of plaintiffs’ allegations on the grounds that they were false and scandalous, a motion which plaintiff neither responded to nor disputed. In addition, two of the individual lawyer defendants moved for dismissal for failure to state a claim against them, which the Court granted on May 28.

The Court on May 14 issued an order warning plaintiff that her failure to abide by the Rules and participate in a meet and confer conference might be treated as grounds for dismissal. Today’s hearing was scheduled more than two months ago. When neither Ms. Young nor her attorney, Latif Doman, appeared for the hearing or contacted the Court, Judge Walton dismissed the case without prejudice for want of prosecution.

Talk about anticlimactic.

After the jump, more details from the order.

In March, we reported that Skadden was essentially canceling its staff attorney program. We reported:

Only staff attorneys that were “integral” to ongoing matters have been kept on. And there is no word on whether those people will have any job security after their matters wrap up.

It appears that Covington & Burling is also undergoing a major reduction of its staff attorney program.

Tipsters (including some recently laid off staff attorneys) report that firm management has decided to effectively discontinue its staff attorney program. The firm has been letting go of staff attorneys at the rate of a couple per week over the last few weeks. As we understand it, as staff attorneys finish up their active matters, they are being let go.

Our sources tell us that the decision was made by firm management some weeks back. At the time the decision was made, the staff attorney manager was out of the office on vacation. When she came back, she allegedly told Covington’s staff attorneys that they should start circulating their resumes.

In some cases, laid off staff attorneys are being given a one week severance option. One week, if they sign a form promising not to sue the firm over the circumstances of their termination. Some Covington personnel that spoke to Above the Law believed that clause is proof that Covington decided to move out staff attorneys as a response to the lawsuit filed by former-Covington Staff Attorney Yolanda Young.

After the jump, we have statements from Covington & Burling, and Yolanda Young.