They say not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and a good mentor, typically, is doing just that: gifting her time and energy towards helping a younger attorney progress in her personal and professional life. But, like tube socks on Christmas morning, not all mentors are a hit. 1. You Don’t Even Know Your Mentee’s Last Name. In fact, you don’t know your mentee at all as a person....
Unless you happen to be working as counsel for the Department of Homeland Security or for the CIA, a legal career does not usually intersect with national security issues. Americans were recently reminded of the intersection between the law and international affairs, as apparently, a select few attorneys were ready to lay their lawyering skills down on Osama Bin Laden if he was captured alive. Senior officials in the Obama administration revealed that there two teams of specialists ready and on-hand during the Pakistan raid....
A federal appeals court ruled the California legislature wrongly carved out a law to help workers’ unions in lawsuits against their employers. In a final order to elaborate its earlier decision, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals explained that the Legislature passed a “safe harbor” provision in Assembly Bill 1513 to gain the support of the the United Farm Workers of America. The UFW was engaged in litigation against one the plaintiffs at the time, and the safe harbor provision denied them a defense in the case....
We get it: crack sentencing was a bit draconian. In order to address this disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentences, which disproportionately affected black men, two major remedies were employed: the Fair Sentencing Act and Amendment 750 to the Sentencing Guidelines. Nathaniel Hargrove argues that both apply here. He faced a mandatory minimum of 120 months, and a sentence of 120 to 125 months based on the drug tables and his prior felony conviction, but the court chose to depart upward, under U....
ROTC officer’s civil rights suit against a university for injuries during a student protest Melendez-Garcia v. Sanchez, 08-2530, concerned a challenge to the district court’s grant of defendants’ motion for summary judgment on the federal-law claims and dismissal of the state-law claims, in plaintiff’s suit against various university officials pursuant to 42 U.S.C. section 1983 and Puerto Rican state laws, claiming that they failed to protect him from injury during a student protest at a university....
Data analytics and the law is a burgeoning, promising field. Lawyers can use data analytics to help sift through discovery, identifying responsive documents faster and easier, for example. They can apply analytics to monitoring client communication, gathering valuable insights into their top clients. There are even services that will sift through data on individual judges, letting you know how quickly you can expect a decision on that motion. And now, there’s a new analytics service that crunches the numbers for entire court systems....
The NLRB’s Notice Posting Rule, which required businesses to post notifications reminding workers’ about their right to unionize, has met its demise in a legal war of attrition. The National Labor Relations Board gave up the fight and will not challenge two federal court decisions that invalidated the Posting Rule. Here’s a breakdown of the employer-friendly cases and what this means for employer obligations: In National Association of Manufacturers v. NLRB, a three-member panel of the D....
In case you missed it, President Barack Obama has issued a statement (and accompanying video!) outlining his hope for an “open Internet” and actually using the words “net neutrality” several times. The statement is notable in that there’s no hedging and no weasel language: It’s a hortatory policy statement calling on the FCC not only to implement the “net neutrality” that its advocates – and not its opponents – have sought, but to go further and “reclassify consumer broadband service under Title II of the Telecommunications Act....
Non-lawyers running law firms – what could possibly go wrong? “Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!” Maybe that’s an over-reaction, but it’s a fact that more non-lawyers are running big law firms. And they have been successful enough for a few sequels. So what’s going right with this new creature in law firm management – the non-attorney, chief executive officer? Here are some things to consider in deciding whether to get one:...
FindLaw columnist Eric Sinrod writes regularly in this section on legal developments surrounding technology and the internet. The United Kingdom website for Lush, a cosmetics retailer, voluntarily was shut down after having been hacked recently. According to an announcement posted on the website, ongoing monitoring demonstrated that the site continues to be targeted for further hacking entry attempts. Thus, in order not to put its customers “at risk,” the website will remain closed....
Virtual law practice is nothing new to solo practitioners; they have been doing it successfully for decades. With varied success, virtual practitioners cracked the ranks of mid-sized firms less than a decade ago. But now that some wrinkles have been ironed out, virtual law firms are luring BigLaw attorneys with the carrot of working from home. According to American Lawyer, virtual firms like Culhane Meadows and FisherBroyles – with 180 partners – are breaking the mold of traditional law firms....
Dennis Haynes, who is blind and disabled, can navigate the internet using screen-reader software. He wanted to read the Hooters website, but the website was not compatible with his software. He sued under the Americans with Disabilities Act to compel Hooters to make its website accessible to the visually impaired. A trial judge dismissed, saying the case was moot because Hooters had already settled a similar suit that required the company to make similar accommodations....
For successful relationships, it’s a basic rule that trust is paramount. If you don’t trust your partner, basically you have a weak relationship. It’s true in personal and business relationships, too. So what do you do when your company has a credibility problem with customers? Here’s how some big businesses are dealing with it. Wells Fargo Wells Fargo, the oldest bank in the United States, lost the trust of Americans a few years ago....
When I was a wee lad, I worked at a firm that was handling a child custody dispute. As with most custody situations, the signs were pointing towards some sort of a joint arrangement, which was unfortunate, because the opposing party was not exactly fit for parenthood. Or smoking something, at least. And it wasn’t tobacco or marijuana. Last month, the Cleveland Plain Dealer did a feature on how social media is changing the law, including a similar family law case where an ex-spouse found out about a new marriage via Facebook photos....
George Lombardi, a skilled trial attorney, almost called the witness a liar in a high-profile case against Monsanto. He was questioning the plaintiff’s expert, a professor of medical oncology and cancer epidemiology, about the link between a weedkiller and cancer. The plaintiff alleges Monsanto’s Roundup caused deadly lymphoma. But the expert started yelling when the lawyer repeatedly implied he was lying. Win or lose, it was definitely not a good look....
If you want to make it rain, you’ve got to hustle. But some of us would prefer not to. Maybe you’re an introvert, or maybe inauthentic schmoozing turns you off, or maybe you’d just rather go home after a long day and take a nap. We understand. But you’re still going to need to get out there and make connections anyway. So here are some tips to help you network – tips that don’t require you to collect every business card or attend every cocktail party....
Prospective clients are researching lawyers online more than ever, but getting them through your firm’s door (or to your website) requires more than just putting together a .com address or a Yelp page. To take advantage of online marketing opportunities, you need to have a strong Internet presence. Here are five ways to get started. 1. Know Your Internet Footprint You need to know what potential clients will see when they look for you....
Disney is very protective of its marks, understandably so, and now it’s most iconic mark is getting some competition and Disney is not standing for it. In this game of mouse and mouse, who will win? Mouse v. Mau5 The other mouse is the mark representing DJ Joel Zimmerman’s stage name Deadmau5 (pronounced “dead mouse”). Last year Deadmau5 filed an application to trademark a black mouse with large round ears, white eyes and white smile....
The American Bar Association has released a new guide for lawyers designed to help increase their productivity through the use of Google. The ABA issued a press release about the guide, entitled Google for Lawyers: Essential Search Tips and Productivity Tools. Google has become far and away the number one search engine, as well as offering a number of apps which can be sued to boost productivity and organization. The guide is designed to help attorneys take advantage of Google’s advanced search capabilities and tools for productivity....
Apple launched a new privacy website last week, seeking to better explain its privacy commitment to the public. It starts by stating what any sophisticated technology user has known for years: “When an online service is free, you’re not the customer. You’re the product.” But now the tech giant wants to give users a better understanding of and more control over what information is collected about them. A More Transparent Privacy Explanation Apple’s privacy policy now comes surrounded by a series of webpages explaining the company’s commitment to privacy and the effects of its policy....
