Two More Law Firms Shorten Their Names
The firms formerly known as Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan and Pillsbury, Winthrop Shaw Pittman have re-branded themselves with shorter names, reports the Fulton County Daily Report, via Blog of the Legal Times. Not only have the firms truncated their names to Sutherland and Pillsbury, respectively, but they've also renovated their Web sites, giving them a cleaner more updated look to match their sleeker names.
Shortening names isn't new. Many other firms -- including Skadden, Orrick and Bingham -- now use shortened versions of their names on their Web sites and marketing materials, even though they've kept the longer version as their legal name.
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 16, 2008 at 01:05 PM | Permalink
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LA U.S. Attorney Indicts Missouri Woman for Role in MySpace Suicide
The U.S. Attorneys' Office in Los Angeles indicted Missouri woman Lori Drew for her alleged role in perpetrating a hoax on MySpace that lead to a thirteen year old neighbor's suicide, reports Law.com. Drew created a fake MySpace account and used it to impersonate a sixteen year old boy named Josh Evans to befriend, then humiliate Megan Meier, a rival of Drew's daughter. Ultimately, Meier hanged herself after Drew-as-Evans sent her a note saying that the world would be better off without her.
In a case of first impression, Drew was charged with violating a federal law that prohibits unauthorized access to protected computers to obtain information to inflict emotional distress -- a law that has never before been applied to a social networking case. State authorities declined to prosecute Drew after concluding that no state criminal statutes outlawed her conduct.
Notwithstanding the sympathetic nature of the facts here, two prominent law bloggers take the position that the indictment should not -- and ultimately will not -- stick. At Volokh, Orin Kerr argues that the courts should dismiss the indictment, explaining that it effectively prosecutes her for what amounts to a violation of the MySpace Terms of Service:
The indictment is not charging Drew with harassment. Nor are they charging her with homicide. Rather, the government's theory in this case is that Drew criminally trespassed onto MySpace's server by using MySpace in a way that violated MySpace's Terms of Service (TOS). Here's the idea. The TOS required Drew to provide accurate registration information, not to harass or harm other people, and not to promote conduct that was abusive. She didn't comply with these terms, the theory goes, so she was criminally trespassing onto MySpace's computer when she was logging into her account. The indictment turns this into a federal felony conspiracy charge by arguing that she did this in concert with others to obtain information and to further tortious conduct — intentional infliction of emotional distress — violating the felony provisions of 18 U.S.C. 1030(a)(2).
Kerr suggests that the government won't be able to prove its case. Because it's a criminal case, the government must show that Drew intentionally violated the TOS, which Kerr predicts will be difficult because it's likely that Drew, like most users, never read them. In addition, Kerr argues that while Drew did intend to harass Meier, she didn't intend to take confidential information, which is another element of the statute.
For Jeralynn Merritt, the Drew indictment is nothing more than overreaching by the federal government. She argues that the federal charging document represents a growing trend towards the federalization of local crime:
Should a federal prosecutor in Los Angeles be entrusted with the power to punish a local incident that occurred in a different state? We should not applaud the "novel" or "groundbreaking" interpretation of a statute that clearly was not meant to apply to harassing messages sent through bogus MySpace accounts.
Kerr's and Merritt's arguments convince me. But they also make me realize that going forward, states should enact criminal laws to prevent and deter this kind of conduct. Otherwise, I anticipate that victims of harassment perpetrated by social networking sites will sue to hold them accountable for failure to protect site users or guard against fraudulent use. I'd much rather see conduct like Drew's criminalized so that the perpetrator is held responsible rather than shifting the blame to the Web site owners, and forcing all of the rest of us users to bear the cost for their misconduct.
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 16, 2008 at 12:47 PM | Permalink
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Lawyers Rank 17th on List of Best and Worst Paying Jobs
Forbes Magazine just released the latest list that should capture the attention of rankings-obsessed lawyers -- "The Best and Worst Paying Jobs List." With an average salary of $118,280, lawyers place 17th, below most medical specialists, CEOs and airline pilots. Still, lawyers can take heart -- not only do their earnings surpass dishwashers, bus boys and salon workers -- but they also make more than Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffet, who pays himself a miserly $100,000 a year.
So does a career in medicine make more sense from a financial perspective than law? Not necessarily. The Forbes story explores some of the reasons not to become a doctor, including anticipated cuts in Medicaid reimbursements to doctors over the coming years and the cost of malpractice insurance.
In addition, tuition costs for medical school are higher than ever, with most medical students graduating with a median debt of $135,000. And lucrative specialties like dermatology or anesthesiology (the top paying position on the Forbes list) require extra years of training, which means that most doctors won't start earning money and paying down debt until their mid-30s. By contrast, new law grads, at least those who matriculate to Biglaw, earn six figure salaries for on-the-job training. So why do large firm lawyers complain so much, when at least at the outset, they're doing far better than new doctors?
Even with the stress of malpractice actions and reduced insurance payments looming, it's always been my impression that doctors felt more satisfied in their careers than lawyers -- even though both law and medicine are service professions with a focus on helping others. Do you agree that doctors more content than lawyers -- and if so why?
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 16, 2008 at 07:27 AM | Permalink
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Twittering From the Courtroom
"There's a new kind of journalism coming from a Kansas courtroom this week," writes Anne Reed at her blog Deliberations. She calls it "Twitter journalism." Whereas blogging a trial already seems old-hat, Wichita Eagle reporter and multimedia producer Ron Sylvester is reporting a capital murder trial through a series of Twitter posts -- each capped at 140 characters.
As he explains at the Society of Professional Journalists blog Technolo-J, his "tweeting" of this trial evolved from his experiment last year live blogging an earlier trial, e-mailing his posts to the newsroom, where other staffers would post them online. But the workflow lagged, and he found himself filing faster than the staff had time to post. So this time, he decided to try Twitter as an experiment, thinking to himself, "Who would notice?" As it turned out, plenty of people noticed. "I didn't expect the reaction," he writes. "This is important to me, because they are local people, looking for local news. They're not readers or viewers or audience anymore -- in this world of social networking, they're my friends."
Back at Deliberations, Anne Reed sees this as another way in which Twitter is finding its way into the legal world. "Ron Sylvester is reporting jury selection with a fresh and direct style you don't often see," she says, "except on Twitter."
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 15, 2008 at 08:18 AM | Permalink
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WIPO Elects Next Director General
In a hard-fought election decided by a one-vote margin, the World Intellectual Property Organization elected Australian lawyer Francis Gurry to be its next director general. Gurry has worked for WIPO in Geneva, Switzerland, since 1985, most recently as deputy director general in charge of patents. Before assuming that role in 2003, he was assistant director general and legal counsel. In the mid-1990s, he founded the WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center and remained its director up to the time of the election.
The election was hard-fought, reports Intellectual Property Watch, with 15 candidates originally in the running after it became clear that the current director general would be pressured out over lack of confidence in his leadership. "But in the end, Gurry, considered a favourite as one of the most senior officials in the organisation who had nevertheless crafted a reputation for relative independence from the existing administration, prevailed."
After the vote, Gurry told WIPO members, "I want to assure the membership that as of conclusion of this process my mind will be set on all members. I’m very much aware of the diversity of the organization."
More about Gurry here in his resume.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 15, 2008 at 08:13 AM | Permalink
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Not All Quiet on the John Yoo Front
My, how the blogosphere buzz over John Yoo has quieted. Just a month ago, I posted here about the debate among legal and academic bloggers over whether the co-author of Bush Administration memoranda condoning torture should be allowed to retain his professorship at the University of California's Boalt Hall School of Law. Now, there is hardly a murmur about his tenure. But not all is quiet on the John Yoo front, with two noteworthy developments this week.
First, Yoo himself speaks out once again on the issue of presidential power, asserting that the central purpose of executive power is "to respond quickly and decisively to unforeseen crises and emergencies in foreign affairs." Sounds familiar, only he is referring in this case not to President Bush, but to President Thomas Jefferson. In a Boston University Law Review article, Jefferson and Executive Power, Yoo argues that Jefferson was "a bundle of contradictions," perhaps nowhere more so than in his views on executive power. Nonetheless, Yoo contends, "Jefferson's success as Chief Executive is closely intertwined with his broad conception of presidential power." He concludes by contrasting Jefferson with his successor, James Madison, whose narrow view of presidential power, Yoo says, was his downfall.
Elsewhere, the National Lawyers Guild, which last month led the charge for Boalt to dismiss Yoo, this week issued a statement calling on Congress to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate and prosecute Yoo and others for their roles in condoning torture. Along with the statement, the NLG published a white paper setting out the legal and factual arguments for prosecuting the memo writers under international and U.S. law. NLG President Marjorie Cohn recently testified on Capitol Hill that Yoo and others were "part of a common plan to violate U.S. and international laws outlawing torture."
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 15, 2008 at 08:08 AM | Permalink
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Study Debunks Med-Mal Crisis
Massachusetts has the fourth-highest median malpractice settlement payments in the nation. It only follows that Massachusetts doctors should pay the fourth-highest insurance premiums. Right? Turns out, Bay State physicians actually saw their inflation-adjusted malpractice premiums drop between 1990 and 2005. This is the finding of a newly released study conducted by researchers at Suffolk University Law School in Boston. Published this week in the May/June issue of the journal Health Affairs, the study "raises serious questions about claims that Massachusetts doctors are facing a medical malpractice premium crisis that threatens the viability of medical practice in the Bay State," say its authors. From the announcement:
Suffolk University Law School researchers Marc Rodwin and colleagues analyzed malpractice premiums from 1975 to 2005 using data from the state-regulated mutual insurer known as ProMutual Group. In 2005, inflation-adjusted malpractice premiums were $17,810 for the coverage level and policy type that physicians most frequently purchased, compared with $17,907 in 1990. Despite premium increases since 1995 or 2000 for all physicians, premiums were still lower in 2005 than 1990, when they reached a 30-year peak. Mean premiums increased only in three specialties comprising 4 percent of physicians: obstetrics, neurology and orthopedists performing spinal surgery.
Even in high-risk specialties, where insurers charge surcharges, the situation is not as dire as so-called tort reformers would suggest. In OB-GYN, for example, nearly one third of physicians paid lower premiums in 2005 than in 1990, the study found.
In The Boston Globe, the president of the Massachusetts Medical Society countered the study with this confounding statement: "The issue of the malpractice crisis is not purely a premium-based issue, although we certainly have documented the high cost of liability insurance is a major factor in [physicians'] perspective on the practice environment. I think to some degree looking at malpractice premiums ... may provide an unfair picture of what is really going on."
What I think he said is this: If the insurance argument isn't going to work anymore to deflect those nasty tort lawyers, we'll think of something else.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 15, 2008 at 08:01 AM | Permalink
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Are Tort Reformers Going After the Wrong Target?
New York personal injury lawyer Eric Turkewitz takes a critical look at a lawsuit by numbers kingpin-cum-Rikers Island inmate Raymond Marquez, alleging that the New York City Department of Corrections' indoor smoking policy caused Marquez's bladder cancer. Despite the fact that Marquez had smoked for thirty years before quitting around the mid-1970s, his lawsuit attributed his cancer to the second hand smoke that he endured between 1998 and 2001 while awaiting trial at Rikers Island for a crime for which he was subsequently acquitted. On Friday, a jury returned a verdict in favor of the City.
Turkewitz comments:
When I first heard about the litigation, it sounded like a dog, and I don't know any reputable personal injury firm that would have taken it. And as it turns out, the suit was brought by the plaintiff's son, who happens to be a local attorney.
Because most reputable lawyers would have -- and indeed did -- decline this case, Turkewitz argues that it's unfair for the City to make the case a poster child for "ridiculous lawsuits" as it has done in recent press releases.
Turkewitz makes an interesting point. Some of the most notable examples of litigation-gone-wild -- such as Roy Pearson's $65 million pants suit against the dry cleaners or the $54 million suit against Best Buy for losing a woman's computer in the repair shop -- were brought by pro se litigants (though Pearson is a lawyer). In many pro se cases, or cases where a plaintiff is represented by a friend or a relative, it's often because most sensible plaintiffs' lawyers turned the cases down. For that reason, is it fair to use cases that no lawyer would have taken anyway as an example of what's broken in the tort system or as a basis for criticizing trial lawyers?
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 14, 2008 at 10:41 AM | Permalink
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Vista Won't See the Light of Day at Most Law Firms
It's been about two years since Microsoft launched Vista, a Windows-based operating system that has been so poorly received that even Wikipedia devoted an entire entry to "Criticism of Windows Vista." Because of its many problems, Vista is being bypassed by many large corporations, reports Rick Georges at Future Lawyer.
As for law firms, this is one case where their complacency in adopting new technology plays to their advantage. Georges writes that "until someone makes [law firms] adopt it, Vista will not likely see the insides of a majority of law firm computers." Thus, most law firms will be spared the headaches that other users have experienced with Vista.
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 14, 2008 at 10:32 AM | Permalink
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Web Users Would Support Code of Conduct
Though blogging, Web 2.0 applications, and user-generated content sites represent the still-wild, untamed frontier of the Internet, most users would not resist efforts to settle the laws of this territory. According to a story in the Guardian, nearly half of Internet users would support a voluntary code of conduct for bloggers and online commentators, according to a survey by DLA Piper. The survey revealed that currently, roughly 75 percent of Web users who have posted comments on blogs and news sites had no understanding of laws governing libel, defamation or intellectual property that might potentially apply to their conduct on the Web.
At the same time, while 46 percent of Web users were receptive to a voluntary code of conduct, users' current actions suggest otherwise. At present, only one third of Web users surveyed actually read the legal liabilities in the terms of conditions of Web sites that they use. And 14 percent have had content removed from a site due to violation of applicable terms and conditions. Bottom line: While Web users may say they want a code of conduct, in practice, few obey the rules in place now.
Do you support a code of conduct for Web users? And if so, what features would it include?
(H/T to ABA Journal.)
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 14, 2008 at 08:23 AM | Permalink
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Ropes & Gray CMO Leaves Firm
The Boston Business Journal is reporting that Jim Durham, the chief marketing officer at Ropes & Gray in Boston, left the firm. Durham was well known nationally as a law firm consultant based near Boston before he joined the firm in 2004. According to the BBJ, Victoria Arnold is serving as interim CMO until the firm names a replacement.
When Durham joined the firm, Larry Bodine wrote at his Law Marketing Blog that Durham had surprised many by his decision to go in-house. When Bodine asked him why he did it, he replied, "After eight years of working with hundreds of firms (and staying in hundreds of hotels), it is a chance for me to work closer to home. Most importantly, though, it is a chance for me to work with some of the finest lawyers in the world at an amazing law firm."
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 13, 2008 at 01:01 PM | Permalink
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From Music to Law and Back Again
I don't know what's in the water at Boston's Meehan, Boyle, Black & Bogdanow, but I do know I want to get me some. On lawyering alone, this eight-lawyer PI firm is nationally known for a string of million-dollar verdicts and settlements. As to bar involvement, one need look no further than firm founder Leo V. Boyle, who as president of the American Association of Justice at the time of the Sept. 11 attacks (when it was still ATLA) was instrumental in bringing about the federal Victim Compensation Fund and in creating Trial Lawyers Care, a national organization of volunteer attorneys created to help victims' families. And then there are the lawyers' lives outside of law. Partner Michael Bogdanow, for example, has long had a successful parallel career as a painter and sculptor.
Now the firm can claim a recording artist among its ranks. Karen R. Ristuben, who is of counsel to the firm, recently released Too Much, her debut CD as a jazz singer. This is no mere vanity pressing -- the CD was produced by Mason Daring, the lawyer-turned-musician who has scored all of John Sayles's films (he was an entertainment lawyer when Sayles asked him to score Return of the Secaucus Seven), was recorded on a sub-label of Rounder Records, and features a who's who of backup musicians.
For Ristuben, it was a circuitous route that took her from music to art to law then back to art and finally again to music, as this recent profile of her relates. She started out playing the guitar, then went to art school and then to law school. After representing plaintiffs in med-mal cases for several years, she felt a pull to do something else. That led her to the decision to scale back at the firm and return to school to study art and then to become an art teacher in a high school. From there, she began studying guitar again, an instrument she had not played in decades, and then started voice lessons. Music led her to working and performing with Daring and ultimately to her new release.
The CD features a number of old-time jazz standards, such as "Stars Fell on Alabama," "I'll Be Seeing You" and "Cry Me A River." According to the profile of Ristuben, a Boston-area public-radio host said her interpretations bring to mind the voices of Julie London and Peggy Lee. He is close to the mark, I can attest; she lives not far from me and I've heard her perform live. You can judge for yourself by ordering Ristuben's CD from her Web site.
And, yes, she continues to practice law part-time. It's got to be something in the water.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 13, 2008 at 01:00 PM | Permalink
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The Lateral That Got Away
Recruiting law students is like shooting fish in a barrel, suggests headhunter Stacy Humphries, a principal in the Houston office of MS Legal Search. But when it comes to luring in those more trophy-worthy laterals, few firms know how to land the catch. "Too often, poor communication, bureaucratic processes, disorganization and misinformation thwart even the best firms' efforts," she writes this week in The National Law Journal. To help firms reel in the prized lateral, Humphries offers 10 anecdotes illustrating what not to do, all drawn from real life. Like Harry Highbiller, for instance, someone we've all met at some point:
Harry Highbiller's secretary informs him that Lee Lateral is waiting to see him in the lobby. Harry, always conscious of his billable hours and wanting to look important, keeps working away for another 30 minutes before asking his secretary to bring Lee into his office. Throughout the interview, Harry keeps his eyes on his computer in case he receives an important e-mail. At one point, Harry even pulls out his keyboard drawer and begins composing an e-mail message. Harry keeps the conversation focused on his own accomplishments rather than telling Lee about the firm or trying to get to know Lee. Harry does ask Lee a couple of questions about his current firm's clients and recent partner attrition, but those questions only make Lee more uncomfortable.
The "convince us why we should hire you" approach is fine for law students, but it simply will not work with laterals, Humphries writes. "When it comes to lateral recruiting, firms should consider themselves sellers in a buyer's market -- any misstep or misinformation along the way could mean the difference between getting and losing many potential hires." As for the law students out there, jump right in the barrel -- the water's fine.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 13, 2008 at 09:48 AM | Permalink
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When the Legislator is a Lobbyist
Legislators and lobbyists are often accused of getting too close, but usually they are not close enough to share the same skin. Not so in Maryland, where several state lawmakers also hold down positions as congressional lobbyists on Capitol Hill, according to a report this week in the Baltimore Sun. Take Heather R. Mizeur, for example. A Democratic member of the Maryland House of Delegates representing Montgomery County, she was also employed until recently as a government affairs adviser in the Washington, D.C., office of the law firm Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis. In her role as legislator, she helped push through a bill to establish a new fund supporting the emerging field of nanobiotechnology. In so doing, says the Sun, "she also succeeded in securing a potential funding source for companies she had registered to represent on Capitol Hill." Mizeur says she did nothing wrong and that she received clearance from the state legislature's ethics counsel to sponsor and vote on the legislation.
The Sun reports that the state legislature includes several lawmakers who are also federal lobbyists -- and whose work in Annapolis sometimes intersects with the clients they represent in Congress. "At least four other Maryland lawmakers are registered as lobbyists in Congress: Del. Sheila E. Hixson, chairwoman of the Ways and Means Committee and a lobbyist on manufacturing and defense issues; Del. Maggie L. McIntosh, chairwoman of the Environmental Matters Committee and who is registered to lobby in Washington for the Johns Hopkins University; Del. Gerron S. Levi, a lobbyist for the AFL-CIO; and Sen. Jim Rosapepe, who is a federal lobbyist for states on issues of tax fairness." Of those four, only Levi is a lawyer, a 1994 graduate of Howard University School of Law.
William G. Somerville, the General Assembly's ethics counsel, tells the Sun that nearly all members of Maryland's part-time legislature will have some appearance of a conflict of interest because of the need to supplement their incomes with outside employment. "He says the state's ethics rules are designed to provide disclosure and encourage lawmakers to participate in areas where they are knowledgeable, so that a farmer can participate in debates about agriculture and a doctor on health care issues, for example."
Still, something about legislators and lobbyists sharing one skin feels a little like the wolf who dressed up as a sheep.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 13, 2008 at 09:46 AM | Permalink
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Can Flextime Create Work-Life Balance if Lawyers Aren't Comfortable Using It?
In theory, benefits like extended maternity leave, part-time options and telecommuting are the hallmarks of a robust and effective law firm work-life balance initiative. But as it turns out, in practice, less than half of eligible attorneys feel comfortable availing themselves of these options, at least according to the results of this survey jointly sponsored by Above the Law and Lateral Link. Of the 1 ,669 respondents, only 45 percent of women and 18 percent of men said they would feel comfortable asking to go part-time after having a child, while 39 percent of women and 25 percent of men would feel comfortable asking for an extended unpaid leave. Finally, roughly one third of respondents of either gender said they would feel comfortable asking to telecommute after having a child. At the same time, most lawyers -- two third of men and 59 percent of women -- did feel comfortable leaving the office at 6 p.m. to be home with children and then continue to work remotely.
My guess is that lawyers are comfortable with leaving earlier because they could do so on an ad hoc basis, rather than through a formal law firm program. Thus, they would not suffer the same stigma that they might if the firm were required to make a special accommodation, as it would with initiatives like telecommuting or part time work.
It seems that even in these supposedly more enlightened times, the "parent track" doesn't run parallel to the partnership track. As Ellen Ostrow suggests in this piece, unintentional biases still remain within the workplace -- and that for retention programs to succeed, firms must develop mechanisms for preventing biases from influencing judgments and behavior. (H/T to Women Lawyers Back on Track.)
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 12, 2008 at 11:20 AM | Permalink
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Blawg Review #159
Blawg Review #159 is up at The Whistleblower Law Blog, sponsored by the law firm of LaBovick and LaBovick. Blawg Review #159 includes interesting picks such as the greatest pro defense decisions from the Drug and Device Law Blog and this update from Lowering the Bar on a brewing copyright battle between the state of Oregon and some of the legal Web sites that publish its statutes online for free. And if links like these aren't enough incentive to draw you to Blawg Review #159, perhaps you'll be enticed by the opportunity to reacquaint yourself with some of your favorite nursery rhymes which are interspersed throughout.
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 12, 2008 at 11:17 AM | Permalink
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Bike Couriers Riding Off Into the Sunset
First, it was the typewriter. And now, another former sine qua non of law firm practice -- the bike courier -- faces endangered species status in this Internet-enabled paperless era.
The Providence Journal reports on how e-filing is impacting the bike courier business in Rhode Island and nationwide. Back in 1999, the state had about 480 couriers and messengers, but that number dropped to 400 -- down nearly 20 percent -- by 2006. The state's trend aligns with national statistics from the U.S. Department of Labor, which show a decline in couriers and messengers from 134,370 in 1999 to 105,070 in 2006.
Not surprisingly, Walter J. Marshall, the Boston-based regional economist for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, attributes the decline to the emergence of electronic communication and e-filing. In Rhode Island, both U.S. Bankruptcy Court and federal district court have been using e-filing for the past few years. Even the Secretary of State's office began accepting corporations' annual reports electronically in August 2007, and is now considering extending the electronic filing program to nonprofits and limited liability companies. Indeed, thus far, the state courts remain the only hold-outs, though they are expected to implement e-filing by 2011.
In the meantime, courier services, which rely heavily on court filings and law firm business, are coping with the changes. One company, Dash Delivery, lost 30 percent of its business when the Bankruptcy Court went electronic and another 25 percent when the federal district court went online. The company continues to deliver important documents, as well as charging documents in criminal cases and initial complaints, which are still filed in paper form. And it is diversifying, now delivering blood samples and medical files for hospitals.
Do you or your law firm still rely on messenger services and bike couriers? Will there always be a need for messenger services -- or will we see their ranks continue to decline?
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 12, 2008 at 10:43 AM | Permalink
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Sports Law Is a Tough Game to Enter
Transitioning from a conventional law practice to work as a sports agent can be a tough game for lawyers, as discussed in this Fulton County Daily Report story profiling several Atlanta lawyers who attempted to make the play. For one lawyer, Bondurant, Mixson & Elmore partner Von DuBose, a gamble on Michigan State University defensive end Ervin Baldwin paid off. After months traveling across the country to watch Baldwin practice and play, and counsel him on handling media interviews, the Chicago Bears drafted Baldwin, allowing DuBose to continue to build his sports agent business. On the other hand, personal injury and criminal defense lawyer Mawuli Davis, who focused his efforts on representing basketball players, never found an opportunity to represent a player in a major league deal. Without a client to build on or the funding needed to pursue clients, Davis "decided to cut his losses and stick to traditional legal work."
Given that the sports agency business demands high up-front costs to lure clients, one might think that the field would be dominated by deep-pocked, mega law firms. But the truth is that very few agents work for the Am Law 200:
"Being an agent doesn't work with big firm economics," said Brandon Witkow [a sports agent lawyer]. Big firms bill by the hour, but the vast majority of sports agents receive a percentage of their clients' salaries, Witkow said. Also, a big firm lawyer working as an agent can't bill for the countless hours he'll spend doing tasks that are standard agent fare. "You incur a lot of time as an agent preparing pitch packets for clients, traveling to meet team general managers and to summer camps," Witkow said. "Those are costs that can't be directly passed on to the client."
A few large firms, including Bryan Cave, Dow Lohnes, Stinson Morrison Hecker and Williams & Connolly have a sports agent practice. And some firms, such as Covington & Burling or Proskauer Rose have sports law practices, representing the leagues or teams rather than acting as agents for individual players. Indeed, by representing individual players, these firms would conflict themselves out of their ability to represent the big corporate entities that can afford large firm rates. As a result, despite the initial start up costs, the sports-agent field continues to remain dominated by small shops or solo practices.
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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on May 11, 2008 at 09:25 PM | Permalink
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