BP

* Victoria Espinel, chief IP counsel to the White House (better known as the “copyright czar”), has stepped down. A tech or trade company will snap her up in 3… 2… [Corporate Counsel]

* Child custody train wreck alert: Baby Veronica of SCOTUS fame was in the news after her father was arrested for refusing to return his child to her adoptive parents. [ABC News]

* Rather than watching people pump gas, BP is watching people pump out lawsuits against the company at a rather alarming rate as a result of its 2010 oil spill. [Businessweek]

* Cynthia Brim, the Illinois judge who was reelected despite the fact that she was legally insane, finally had a complaint filed against her by the state’s judicial board for being just a little bit too kooky for court. [Chicago Tribune]

* Your degree might not be worth a million dollars, but if you went to one of these schools, you probably got a good bank for your buck. We’ll have more on this later. [The Short List / U.S. News & World Report]

* The fight over attorneys’ fees in the antitrust lawsuits filed against BARBRI continues rage on, and class members still haven’t received a penny — which is all they’d really get, anyway. [National Law Journal]

* Congratulations to Newark Mayor and Yale Law alumnus Cory Booker! Last night, he handily won the New Jersey Democratic primary election for the late U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg’s seat. [CBS News]

If you don't like something, wait and the courts will probably overturn it.

* Enjoy your Biglaw bonuses now, because according to managing partners, layoffs and de-equitizations may soon be making their return. Oh, only in Pennsylvania? Woohoo, break out the bubbly! Just kidding, that really sucks if it’s true. [Legal Intelligencer]

* The Environmental Protection Agency has temporarily banned BP from entering into future U.S. government contracts because of the company’s “lack of business integrity,” aka the Deepwater Horizon explosion. Ouch, super sick burn, EPA! [National Law Journal]

* Considering going to law school? Then you should also take into consideration the fact that you’ll have to become a lawyer if you want to stand a remote chance of ever being able to pay off your loans. [Fox Business]

* Paul Ceglia pleaded not guilty to fraud charges yesterday in federal court. If only he actually owned half of Facebook as he claims, he probably wouldn’t have a court-appointed attorney representing him. [Bloomberg]

* “No matter how many high-priced lawyers and publicists she employs, she has been exposed for what she is.” Jill Kelley’s lawyer is on the offensive, and his targets are none too pleased about it. [Associated Press]

* Avvo has decided to sell its health business to focus entirely on providing services to lawyers and legal customers. Now the company will be able to do the law justice. (SWIDT?) [Puget Sound Business Journal]

Are the BP oil spill penalties too much, or just right? You be the judge!

* BP agreed to plead guilty to 14 charges and pay $4.5B in fines, but before going through with it, several Biglaw firms helped the company sell off assets to fund litigation- and spill-related costs. [Am Law Daily]

* According to HBR Consulting, compensation for in-house attorneys has risen over the past year — including bonuses, which went up to $62,500. Sorry, but Biglaw isn’t following suit. [Corporate Counsel]

* It’s better to leave well enough alone: Pryor Cashman was ordered to pay more than $21K in legal fees for filing a frivolous motion over its repeated attempts to dismiss a case. [New York Law Journal]

* Judge Susan McDunn, who claimed that her “life [was] being ruined” by the secret lawsuits of many powerful Chicagoans, has resigned. Looks like her $182K salary wasn’t enough to buy crazy pills. [Chicago Tribune]

* James T. Hayes Jr., the ICE agent who accused his superior of subjecting male employees to her “sexually offensive behavior,” settled his discrimination lawsuit against the government for $175,000. [Washington Post]

Remember former Allen & Overy associate Deidre Dare, and her effort to raise $25,000 online through Kickstarter, to publish her sex-soaked novel about expat escapades? Did she succeed?

* BP has its granny panties in a bunch over Transocean’s liability for the oil spill. So they’re suing. [Bloomberg] * Major League Baseball sought to take over the Dodgers from Frank McCourt yesterday. Your move, Wilpon. [Los Angeles Times] * Tax Lady Roni DEUTCH may be thrown in jail. I’m not entirely sure what’s […]

Yesterday, after whining about law schools on NPR, I motored over to the Fox headquarters on Sixth Avenue. They wanted me on to to talk about a post I did a couple of weeks ago, encouraging oil-spill victims to take their BP money from the $20 billion fund being administered by Ken Feinberg, instead of […]

As we mentioned this weekend, the BP oil spill has been capped (for the time being), and now we can fully focus on who needs to get paid. As with so many things, it’s Ken Feinberg’s world and we’re just living in it. Bloomberg reports: Kenneth Feinberg, who is overseeing a $20 billion fund to […]

Jamie Gorelick is a Washington D.C. power lawyer. She’s a former Deputy Attorney General, former general counsel to the Defense Department, and current partner at WilmerHale, where she chairs the national security and public policy practice groups. She’s had — and continues to have — an amazing career. But does she really want to be […]