Here are today's three burning legal questions, along with the answers provided by the blawgosphere.
1) Question: How am I supposed to confine my brilliant, lengthy legal argument to the court's page limits? Maybe I should just ignore the "double-spaced" line requirement and pack in twice as much brilliance? What is the court going to do about it anyway, sanction me?
Answer: Next time, yes. (The Crime Scene: "Blackwater lawyers reprimanded ... for not double-spacing")
2) Question: Miley Cyrus once appeared in a photograph with friends where they "slanted their eyes." As such, $4 billion is now owed to all Asian and Pacific Islanders living in Los Angeles County, right?
Answer: Nope. (THR, Esq.: Miley Cyrus $4 Billion Lawsuit Dismissed)
3) Question: I'm at home minding my own business and listening to my emergency radio scanner. I just heard that the police are searching for a man wearing khaki pants and a San Francisco 49ers sweatshirt. Hmm, I have khaki pants and a San Francisco 49ers sweatshirt in my closet... Would there be any problem if I put on these clothes, get the police's attention, and then lead six police officers, a helicopter and a police dog on an hour-long chase through the streets and backyards of my town?
Answer: Definite problem, and watch out for a charge of "suspicion of obstructing and delaying a police officer." (Redding.com: "Police search yields alleged prowler and fugitive imposter" via Lowering the Bar)
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 25, 2009 at 03:15 PM | Permalink
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A man named Willis Willis is not happy, and not for the name-related reason you might think.
Willis, who is unemployed, has been playing the same set of lottery numbers at the Lucky Food Store in Grand Prairie, Texas for about 10 years. On May 29, Willis' ship came in, or at least it should have, when he bought the winning "Mega Millions" ticket that had a $1 million jackpot. The Associated Press reports that Willis asked Pankaj Joshi, the clerk at the Lucky Food Store, to check his tickets that day, but Joshi falsely told him that his ticket was worth only $2. Joshi immediately cashed in the ticket himself,
collected about $750,000, and disappeared -- possibly back to his native Nepal, authorities believe. Joshi, now considered a fugitive, was was indicted in September on a second-degree felony charge, and law enforcement officials were able to recover $365,000 of the $750,000 from his U.S. bank accounts.
The question now, as you may have guessed, is what, if anything, WIllis Willis is entitled to recover in this mess. His lawyers believe that Willis is the rightful winner, and they want the Texas Lottery Board to pay him the full $1 million. So far, however, lottery
officials reportedly consider the indicted Joshi to be the "winner" because he is
the one who redeemed the winning ticket. Today, Willis' lawyers announced that they have asked a local court to allow them to depose Texas Lottery officials about the incident in advance of a possible lawsuit to learn whether lottery officials were aware of past accusations of fraud by store clerks.
There is at least one bright spot for Willis: Patricia H. Robertson, the Travis County Assistant District Attorney, said yesterday that she will ask a judge to award the $365,000 recovered thus far to Willis.
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 25, 2009 at 11:31 AM | Permalink
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On April 10, 2006, David Hackbart was attempting to parallel park his car on a street in Pittsburgh when a car pulled up behind him, blocking his path. Hackbart responded by giving the driver behind him "the middle finger," and promptly heard another voice outside his car tell him, “Don’t flip him off.”
Hackbart, of course, then gave the finger to the interloper who was instructing him what not to do, a person who he would soon learn was Sgt. Brian Elledge of the Pittsburgh Police Department, who was seated in his patrol car at the time. After being flipped off, Sgt. Elledge turned on his patrol lights and conducted a vehicle stop of Hackbart's car, shouting, “You don’t flip me off!”
Sgt. Elledge issued Hackbart a citation charging him with violating Pennsylvania’s disorderly conduct statute based on Hackbart's giving the middle finger to Sgt. Elledge and the other driver.
Hackbart challenged the citation but at his preliminary hearing, a district justice found him guilty of violating the disorderly conduct statute and imposed a fine and court costs totaling $119.75. Hackbart appealed the decision and on Oct. 17, 2006, the Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office finally decided to withdraw the charges against him.
End of story? Lesson learned, by anyone? Hardly.
A few months later, on Feb. 8, 2007, the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the City of Pittsburgh and Sgt. Elledge on Hackbart's behalf. The complaint alleged, among other things, that the defendants violated Hackbart's rights under the First Amendment "to be free from criminal prosecution or to be retaliated against in any way for engaging in constitutionally protected speech."
Sara Rose, an ACLU staff attorney, stated that "the law is clear that using one's middle finger to express discontent or frustration is expressive conduct that is protected by the First Amendment. The City has an obligation to train its officers to respect citizens' free-speech rights." Thomas J. Farrell, an attorney who assisted the ACLU on the matter, added that "the police practice of detaining and charging people for impolite behavior gives the police arbitrary power to harass citizens they do not like. This practice must stop."
Today, Hackbart's middle-finger-odyssey may have finally ended with the announcement that the city of Pittsburgh has tentatively agreed to pay $50,000 ($10,000 to Hackbart, $40,000 to the ACLU and lawyers' fees) to settle his lawsuit. As part of the settlement, the city promised to "train its officers in recognizing when they are violating someone's civil rights, including taking action against anyone who flips them off," the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports.
The Post-Gazette also notes that this latest blow to law enforcement's effort not to have people give them the finger is part of a growing line of such losses. In the most high-profile example, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Duran v. City of Douglas, AZ in 1990 that a man pulled over in Douglas for flipping off and swearing at a police officer did not break the law.
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 25, 2009 at 10:17 AM | Permalink
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What was it like to work at the Fort Lauderdale firm of Scott Rothstein, the lawyer who now stands accused of running a Ponzi scheme that may have swindled more than $1 billion? Two sources offer inside looks at life inside the now-defunct Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler.
For Andrew Perez, it was somewhat mesmerizing, at least at first. He was just 18 years old when he arrived at RRA as an intern, he writes at the blog The New Argument. Imagine this as your first day on your new job:
My first day of work at Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler was a unique experience. Scott Rothstein, now-accused Ponzi schemer extraordinaire, carted me around town in his Bentley Continental, stopping first at a local elementary school, where we met with Governor Charlie Crist, after he gave a short press conference.
Next, we ate lunch at Capital Grille, where Scott dined daily and had his own table. Afterwards, Scott reserved a bike at Eddie Trotta’s Thunder Cycles. Three years ago, Scott was on top of the world and wanted everyone to know it, including me, an eighteen-year-old intern.
Life was not all rides in Bentleys and meetings with governors thereafter, Perez writes. "From that point on, I actually worked and my contact with Scott was fairly limited." But Rothstein would regularly "strut loudly through the halls" and "make a small scene all over the place ... just to make sure you knew who you were working for."
Still, even this young intern had his doubts. Not long after Rothstein replaced one recently purchased yacht with another, even grander yacht, Perez half-jokingly remarked to a lawyer-friend, "I wouldn't be surprised if, a few years from now, we find that he's been running a massive Ponzi scheme." Without missing a beat, the lawyer responded, "You know, I've been hearing a lot of that lately."
Meanwhile, the Sun-Sentinel examines new documents filed in federal court this week that shed light on Rothstein's lifestyle and his management of his firm. "Rothstein's tentacles extended into nearly 100 corporations and businesses, according to federal prosecutors, from a California software company to a Pembroke Pines night club, as well as equity interests in two banks, a chain of fancy restaurants, a luxury watch business, a mortgage company and an alternative biofuel company."
The alleged Ponzi scheme not only supported Rothstein's lavish lifestyle, it also kept his firm afloat, the documents suggest. In one year, the RRA firm brought in just $8 million in revenue but paid $18 million in salaries. "The additional $10 million for salaries, as well as the other expenses for operation of the law firm, came from the operation of, and the funds generated, by the 'Ponzi' scheme," prosecutors said in court filings.
With Rothstein having all that money to throw around, you might think he could have bought himself a better costume than the Afro-wigged, tie-dyed hippie get-up uncovered by the blog South Florida Lawyers.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on November 24, 2009 at 02:02 PM | Permalink
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News flash: Corporate law departments are tightening their belts.
That may strike you as a bulletin on par with "Dog Bites Man." But it is useful every so often to get some hard-and-fast data to confirm what we all suspect -- and even to shed some light on what is happening out there in the real world of law department spending. In this case, the news comes from the Hildebrandt consulting firm, which just released its 2009 law department survey.
The survey paints of picture of spending internally and on outside counsel. For the latter, the survey shows what many have suspected -- more companies are asking their outside lawyers to ditch the billable hour in favor of flat-fee pricing. More than half the 231 companies surveyed said they have implemented or will implement non-hourly fee arrangements. Another 27 percent said they are considering them.
As Amy Miller at Corporate Counsel magazine writes, even the survey's editor is not surprised by this. "Everyone wants to do it," Lauren Chung, director of Hildebrandts' law department consulting practice, tells Miller. "But the question is: to what extent? Will they make up 5 percent of legal spending or 100 percent? It will be interesting to see to what extent they will be utilized."
In terms of inside spending, law departments are cutting corners by reducing non-essential spending. The most common cuts are in travel, with 82 percent of departments reporting reductions in their travel budgets and another eight percent weighing them. Next to go are meetings, with 77 percent of companies reporting cuts in spending for meetings and training.
While travel and meetings may be the most common cuts, salaries and staffing could be the biggest. Surprisingly, 90 percent of companies say they have no plans to reduce salaries for in-house legal staff. If that's the good news on the salary front, the bad news is that over half have plans to freeze salaries or already have.
At least those who face a salary freeze still have a job. Some 27 percent of law departments have reduced staff and another 10 percent are considering cuts. Still, 63 percent of companies have no plans to cut the number of in-house lawyers they employ and 59 percent have no plans to reduce support staff.
Of course, if the economy remains weak, the belt-tightening will continue. Hildebrandt's Chung predicts this will lead even more companies to pursue alternative fee arrangements with outside counsel. "Alternative fees might not work for every type of matter or case," she says. "But I think the number will certainly increase going forward."
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on November 24, 2009 at 01:00 PM | Permalink
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As two of the original 13 colonies that rose up against British rule in the United States, Georgia and Massachusetts share common legal roots. But in addressing the current-day question of bar admission for graduates of online law schools, they have come down on opposite sides.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court of Georgia issued a ruling that a 2009 graduate of the online law school Northwestern California University School of Law is not eligible for bar admission in that state. A year ago -- almost to the day -- the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court reached the opposite result, deciding that a graduate of the wholly online Concord Law School would be allowed to take the Massachusetts bar examination.
In both cases, the applicants sought waiver of the requirement that they be graduates of an ABA-accredited law school. In the earlier Massachusetts case, the SJC emphasized that its decision in favor of applicant Ross E. Mitchell was confined to the unique circumstances of his case. Mitchell had already been admitted to practice both in California and before the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, had a stellar academic record and was valedictorian of his class, had scored well on the California bar exam and on the MPRE, and, through his representation of himself in his admission case, had provided a "positive illustration of his skills."
The applicant in the Georgia case, Joyce K. Batterson, bears some parallels to Mitchell in her prior achievements. In addition to graduating from NWCU in July 2009, she completed her master of laws degree that same month from a second online law school, Thomas Jefferson School of Law. While NWCU is unaccredited (except in California), TJSL's LL.M. program is accredited by the ABA. Batterson had passed California's bar exam for first-year law students in 2004 and the MPRE in 2006. She is a nationally certified paralegal who has been employed as a legal assistant and paralegal since 1990.
Ironically, it was neither accreditation nor qualifications that lost Batterson her bid for bar admission in Georgia. It was paperwork. The Supreme Court said it would consider waiving the accreditation requirement "for good cause shown by clear and convincing evidence." That evidence would have to include proof that the non-accredited school provided a legal education on par with that of an accredited school. The Board of Bar Examiners had told Batterson that she could establish that equivalency by providing a letter from the dean or the dean's designee at an ABA-approved law school providing an analysis of her legal education.
She provided a letter from the dean of her non-accredited school and letters from an associate dean at the accredited TJSL program. While the TJSL letters praised Batterson, they "contained only general conclusions" about the quality of her legal education, the Supreme Court said. For this reason, it affirmed the board's denial of her application. "Batterson's petition was denied because she did not provide what the Board expressly required," the court said.
As for Concord grad Ross Mitchell, he went on to pass the bar exam and, in June, to become the first online law school graduate to be admitted to the Massachusetts bar. Perhaps Batterson should consider a career in this other original colony.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on November 24, 2009 at 12:00 PM | Permalink
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There seems to be no shortage of blogs tracking law firm layoffs. Anyone with a penchant for punishing news can read about the latest downsizing at sites such as AmericanLawyer.com, Above the Law and plenty of others. One blog, Law Shucks, even has its own dedicated Layoff Tracker, where we learn that, as of Nov. 15, major U.S. law firms have laid off more than 14,000 employees since Jan. 1, 2008.
Surely, it can't all be doom and gloom. Someone out there must be hiring.
Turns out they are. And Melissa Sachs is letting us know about it. At a time when so many blogs bear only bad news, Sachs is using her blog, RecruiterEsq.com, to deliver the good news of lateral openings at large law firms. Sachs is scouring the Web sites of Am Law 100 firms for job listings and compiling them on her blog. She plans to update this every week or two and also send the list out through her newsletter.
Job drought? Sachs lists more than 150 lateral openings at major law firms throughout the United States. Akin Gump is hiring associates in New York and Washington, D.C. Cooley Godward has openings in San Diego, San Francisco and D.C. DLA Piper lists a whopping 11 openings for associates, staff attorneys and counsel in Chicago, Palo Alto, New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Diego and D.C.
"We hear all of the news about law firm layoffs," said Sachs, a lawyer and former recruiter who provides legal career consulting and technology training. "Perhaps it's time to highlight the law firm hirings?" Plus, she adds, it is interesting to note which firms are hiring and in which practice areas.
Granted, it is a big gap between 160 or so openings and 14,000 layoffs. But it is a start. And if the trend of layoffs turns to hiring, at least one blog will be following it.
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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on November 24, 2009 at 10:09 AM | Permalink
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Here are today's three burning legal questions, along with the answers provided by the blawgosphere.
1) Question: I am having difficulty visualizing the linkage structure of the legal blogosphere. Can you help?
Answer: Why, yes! (Computational Legal Studies: "Visualizing the Linkage Structure of the Law Blogosphere")
2) Question: I have a Twitter account but don't really feel like tweeting right now. The cops are in my face saying that if I don't tweet immediately I'm going to jail. Must I tweet?
Answer: Tweet now or face the charges. (Newsday: "Record exec pleads not guilty in mall fiasco")
3) Question: I'm no herpetologist, but I'm pretty sure the guy in the seat next to me on this flight has two geckos, two monitor lizards and 11 skink lizards fastened to his body.
Answer: Does he have a permit? If not, maybe this would be a good time to call the stewardess? (New York Daily News: Michael Plank arrested at Los Angeles International Airport for strapping 15 lizards to chest)
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 23, 2009 at 03:06 PM | Permalink
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Attention all hack golfers: It has now been judicially decreed, in Nova Scotia, at least, that the "Happy Gilmore" golf shot is a breach of the standard of care required of a golfer playing on a course with other golfers.
As a refresher, this is what the "Happy Gilmore shot" looks like (from the Adam Sandler movie "Happy Gilmore," of course):
The Slaw blog wrote on Friday that in the recent case of Bezanson v. Hayter, the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia had no trouble concluding that the Happy Gilmore shot was, as Carl Spackler similarly said about gophers in "Caddyshack," a menace to the golfing industry. Looking at the facts of the case, they are pretty much exactly what you would expect from a bachelor party golf outing that involved dozens of beers, a bottle of tequila, several marijuana joints smoked "before the third hole," "power slides" in the golf carts and clubs smashed against trees.
All of this action was a mere warm-up to the 16th hole, however, when the defendant hit his first shot into the woods, took a mulligan second shot, and then decided to take one more shot "Happy Gilmore"-style despite the fact that the other players had moved ahead with their carts up the fairway. The court says the defendant stepped back five or six feet from the ball and then took two full steps up to strike the ball, which went off the heel of the club directly at the plaintiff. Although the plaintiff did not seek medical attention before the wedding, he later alleged “significant daily left hand and wrist pain" to the point that he "is unable to grip to hold his chain saw,” and therefore was “completely disabled from doing his work.”
The court concluded that the defendant did breach the standard of care owed to other players on the course:
Having taken his tee shot, and then a provisional second shot, he was, or ought to have been, aware that the players ahead of him believed he was finished at the tee. He did not give any indication that he was taking a third shot -- let alone a “Happy Gilmore” shot -- until he was in the process of doing so. I am convinced that the “Happy Gilmore” shot would have been less controllable than a normal tee shot, both because it involved a run-up to the ball (rather than an aimed shot from a stationary position) and because the defendant had been drinking throughout the day...
The defendant's conduct breached the standard of care required of a golfer playing on a course with other golfers. The defendant's behaviour was not among the “natural risks” of golfing to which the plaintiff can be said to have consented.
And so it is written, golfers. You take your Happy Gilmore shots at your own peril!
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 23, 2009 at 01:08 PM | Permalink
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We've all learned by now that second-hand smoke presents a health risk, and should be avoided. But here's a new risk posed by second-hand smoke that you might not have known: It may void the warranty on your Apple computer.
The Consumerist notes in this post that at least two of its readers claim Apple deemed their "Applecare" warranties to be void due to secondhand smoke. Indeed, both readers reported that not only would Apple not repair the computers under warranty, it refused to even have its tech people work on the computers because they were a "bio-hazard."
Apple reportedly told Consumerist reader Derek that his warranty was void due to the second-hand smoke, and that they refused to work on the machine due to "health risks." Similarly, Consumerist reader Ruth says she was told by an Apple tech person that her son's computer couldn't be worked on because it was "contaminated with cigarette smoke which they consider a bio-hazard!" When Ruth complained to Steve Jobs' office, she says that an Apple employee in that office told her that "nicotine is on OSHA's list
of hazardous substances and Apple would not require an employee to
repair anything deemed hazardous to their health." According to Consumerists' readers, the Applecare warranty says nothing about the warranty becoming void due to second-hand smoke. Consumerist says Apple has not responded to its requests for an explanation.
Commenters on the post pointed out that the written warranty does exclude damage for an "improper environment," but most commenters seemed to agree that it was not at all clear that second-hand smoke would void the warranty. Some commenters noted that they have seen the inside of computers owned by smokers that were completely covered in a nasty, tar-like substance. However, the prevailing sentiment seemed to be captured by a commenter who wrote, "I am in utter disbelief. Citing OSHA? Really? Put on some damn gloves and fix these computers, Apple."
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Posted by Bruce Carton on November 23, 2009 at 11:51 AM | Permalink
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