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In US v. Wright, No. 09-12685, the court of appeals affirmed defendant’s conviction and sentence for knowingly possessing a firearm and ammunition that affected interstate commerce, holding that 1) because the Sentencing Commission’s intent was clear, there was no need to address the rule of lenity; 2) community control was sufficiently analogous to probation to warrant the application of U.S.S.G. section 4A1.2(k); and 3) 18 U.S.C. section 922(g) only required that the government prove some “minimal nexus” to interstate commerce, which it may accomplish by demonstrating that the firearm possessed traveled in interstate commerce....

Making friends outside the legal department can be difficult. For one, you might be shy or maybe you lack the shared interests needed to make a friendship stick. Or, maybe you just know too much inside dirt. For in-house lawyers, spreading your social connections outside your department can raise some tricky issues. The legal department can often seem like an outsider within a business. After all, their work isn’t usually tied to the company’s actual business, but rather to making sure that it gets done legally and with the least liability possible....

In a professional liability insurance coverage dispute, judgment dismissing plaintiff’s complaint is affirmed where plaintiff stated no plausible claim for breach of contract or for deceptive business practices under Massachusetts law as the insurance claim was neither made nor reported within the relevant policy coverage periods. Read Gargano v. Liberty Int’l Underwriters, Inc., No. 08-2287 Appellate InformationAppeal from the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Decided July 14, 2009...

In plaintiffs’ case against the Office of the Insurance Commissioner of Puerto Rico and two consecutive Insurance Commissioners claiming that they were investigated and sanctioned for Insurance Code violations solely because of their political affiliations, district court’s judgment in favor of the plaintiffs in the amount of $4.7 million and a permanent injunction is affirmed as all of defendants’ grounds for relief are without merit. Read Guillemaro-Ginorio v. Contreras-Gomez, No. 08-1302...

For attorneys, getting on a video chat with a potential client, or an expert witness, is a great way to avoid actually having an in-person meeting. And with the prevalence of smartphones, and integrated microphones and webcams in computers, video calls are easier than ever before. Unfortunately, due to the fact that not everyone’s cellular phone service will be compatible for video calling (notably thanks to the Android/Apple divide), or will allow video or even regular calls across platforms, services like Skype can really stand in as a perfect alternative....

In plaintiffs’ action raising substantive due process claims under 42 U.S.C. section 1983 and state law claims under Rhode Island negligence law for damages against two state employees of the Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF), grant of judgment as a matter of law to the defendants under Rule 50(a) is affirmed as the district court properly granted defendants qualified immunity on the section 1983 action and judgment for defendants pursuant to state sovereign immunity and qualified immunity defenses under Rhode Island state law....

To the lawyer who wanted a standby deduction for his aircraft, the Ninth Circuit said, “Oh no, that’s not gonna fly.” Engstrom, a plaintiff’s firm in Los Angeles, tried to write off “standby” expenses for a Gulfstream IV and a Beechcraft King Air 350 turboprop between 2008 and 2010. Partner Walter Lack and attorney Thomas Girardi, a partner in his own firm, set up an aviation company to split the cost of keeping the aircraft....

Microsoft’s newest requirements for providers of contract employment services, such as for the company’s building services, and other operational roles, is making a bit of a stir. Microsoft will require all contract employee providers that provide more than 50 positions to agree to giving their employees 12 full weeks of (60 percent) paid parental leave in order to renew contracts. Notably, the new policy does not extend to all of Microsoft’s suppliers, but rather just the company’s partners that fulfill the staffing needs for janitorial, culinary, and/or reception roles....

For a while there, I was truly, madly, deeply in love with Google’s products. They could do no wrong. Gmail? Brilliant. Google Apps? Yes, please. Google Docs’ collaborative editing? Oh yeah! Android OS and Nexus devices? But of course. But the world wasn’t with me. Google Docs, while used by a significant number of teams for project management or quick collaborative edits, hasn’t become the full-fledged Word replacement that many of us hoped for....

Well, this one hits close to home. At the end of last year, the State Bar of California proposed a formal ethics opinion on attorney blogging. We here at FindLaw’s Strategist are all in favor of attorney blogs (well, when they’re good, anyway), but the California opinion raises a few issues that blogging lawyers will want to consider. Public comment on the proposed opinion is being solicited until March 23, 2015....

This year marks the 50th Anniversary of passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which passed “on the backs of Northern Democrats and Republicans” by a vote of 73-27 in the Senate, and 289-126 in the House, reports CNN. As he announced the passage of the Act, President Lyndon B. Johnson stated, “It does say that there are those who are equal before God shall now also be equal in the polling booths, in the classrooms, in the factories,” says CNN....

In the last couple of weeks, two shootings have lead to the deaths of two lawyers. In one shooting, a lawyer was murdered in the parking lot of the courthouse by two men in an apparent hit. In the other, a disgruntled party to a lawsuit shot the opposing counsel and another victim during a mediation session. Understandably, these two shootings have hit close to home for some. How do you know that your disgruntled client or opposing party won’t snap and turn a gun on you?...

Charles H. Houston, a lesser-known luminary in the civil rights movement, may have been the best legal strategist in American history. Long before the U.S. Supreme Court completed its 180-degree turn-around on equal rights, Houston was planning the demise of Jim Crow. Thurgood Marshall won Brown v. Board of Education, but he credited Houston for winning cases decades earlier that led to the end of segregation. “We wouldn’t have been anyplace if Charlie hadn’t laid the groundwork for it,” Marshall said....

Who doesn’t want to be on TV? It is a chance to be famous, even if only for your 15 minutes, and it’s a great chance to market your skills and that of your firm. But, if you’re going to be interviewed for a TV news story (especially on national TV), there’s a chance the interview will be conducted via speakerphone. So how do speakerphone interviews work, and how can lawyers prepare for them?...

The fast-track program allows federal prosecutors to offer shorter sentences to defendants who plead guilty at an early stage in the prosecution and agree to waive appeal and other rights. If there’s substantial evidence that a client is guilty, the fast-track program is good option. Except the client might turn around and accuse you of ineffective counsel. On appeal, Gonzalez asserted that there were no meritorious issues for appeal, but questioned the effectiveness of defense counsel’s assistance in permitting Gonzalez to enter his guilty plea....

What’s your preferred way of communicating with clients? An in-person meeting? On the phone? Over email? Through a client portal? My guess is, not the last one. But maybe it should be. Client portals can provide a safer, easier way to keep in touch with clients, avoiding some of the dangers of email. Here’s what you should know about them. If you have a document for a client to review, you might shoot them a quick email....

Last Thursday, President Obama outlined his plan for dealing with the problem of undocumented immigrants. It involves selective enforcement of immigration laws, focusing more on criminals and less on families and children. With the implementation of new immigration regulations come new opportunities, both for undocumented immigrants and for attorneys. Here’s what you should know about the immigration order. It’s expected that Obama’s executive order will take effect Jan. 1, 2015, so only undocumented immigrants who entered the United States on or before Jan....

Malpractice is the potential danger to every attorney that should be regarded with deadly seriousness. If you’re a rash go-getter, this can both be good and bad for you. Your personality can be good at the negotiating table in pushing up settlement figures for your client. But it can also have a tendency to make you arrogant and flip. Such lawyers tend to also run legal-mills. Know this: only dissatisfied or unhappy clients sue you for malpractice....

After paying $60 million to a Chinese company, Apple is now free to use the iPad name and sell the popular tablet freely in China. Apple had been hampered from selling its popular iPad in China because of a protracted legal dispute with Chinese company Proview over the iPad trademark in China, reports Reuters. Proview had trademarked the name back in 2001, well before Apple came up with the iPad....

In a rather shocking disciplinary action out of Ohio, an attorney has been indefinitely suspended for counseling a client in a rather peculiar way that he claims was mere puffery to bolster the client’s confidence in his representation. In short, it was found that he pretty much lied to his own client while bragging about playing games and obstructing discovery. He admitted as much, and more. And if you’re wondering why he admitted all this, it’s likely due to the fact that the client had made a secret audio recording of their deposition prep meeting, and making the extraordinarily damning admissions was the only way to keep the actual recording out of the record....