September 24 2007 Legal Blog Roundup Hi, friends.The September 12 post titled ''Rich Lawyers, Not-So-Rich Lawyers'' at Footnoted, the Chronicle of Higher Education's daily look at academic blogs, says salary distribution for lawyers is a ''two-humped camel.'' The lower hump primarily consists of prosecutors, public defenders, and other public-interest lawyers earning salaries between $40,000 and $50,000. The... (2 views)
Larry D. Thompson, General Counsel for PepsiCo, Speaks to FBA This month, Larry D. Thompson, senior vice president of government affairs, general counsel, and secretary of PepsiCo, was a guest speaker at this year's Federal Bar Association (FBA) annual meeting and convention held in Atlanta. (2 views)
NY District Attorneys Send Letter to Cuomo for Stricter Gun Laws On Tuesday, the District Attorney’s Association of the State of New York (DAASNY) sent a letter to Governor Andrew Cuomo calling on legislators for stricter gun measures following the massacre at Sandy Hook, Connecticut. The letter sent by DAASNY, carried terse comments by the association’s president and Manhattan District Attorney, Cyrus Vance. (2 views)
Job Hunting Difficulties that Female Legal Professionals Face Women may have lost somewhat the competitive advantage gained during the last ten years from the "reverse discrimination" trend in hiring. Law schools burst with women today. Organizations no longer are surprised to see women's names in interviewing slots. Although a woman with excellent grades still commands interviewing deference, women are no longer automatically... (2 views)
Cyber Warfare Now Has a Manual While treaties, pacts, and agreements like the Geneva Convention exist between countries with respect to conventional warfare, cyber warfare conducted between countries is a new phenomenon and largely unregulated. The Tallinn Manual is a response to the gap and has been written by experts from Australia, Canada, U.S., Netherlands, and the U.K., under the aegis of the... (2 views)
Conviction Vacated on Presumption of Psychological Stress in Identification On Tuesday, a divided Appellate Division, First Department, New York, vacated a 2008 robbery conviction, because it held the single witness identifying the robber could have erred as she was under considerable psychological stress. The majority pointed out that scientific studies have questioned the relation between stress and an witness’s ability to accurately identify... (2 views)
Question Over 9/11 Double-dipping May Go to Jury In a curious turn of events, a compensation case for additional damages, after the plaintiff has been fully paid by insurances, may go to the jury. In the instant case, possibly the only lawsuit over damages from the 9//11 attack on the World Trade Center still remaining in the courts, two bids to dismiss the suit by defendants have already been dismissed. (2 views)
Spies Make Ardent Plea for Renewal of Surveillance Law, Legislators Act Deaf On Tuesday, on the 11th anniversary of 9/11 attacks, U.S. intelligence officials publicly raised a plea for renewing the controversial U.S. electronic surveillance law, exasperated by delays and hurdles over the issue. (2 views)
Court Permanently Blocks a Section of Military Detention Law On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest in Manhattan made permanent her order blocking the enforcement of Section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act’s “Homeland Battlefield” provisions. The provision authorizes persons of nonprofit groups or reporters, or anyone for that purpose, to be indefinitely detained upon suspicion of having... (2 views)
Principles of law Naturally, when you have a tool that explains a certain kind of reality, you can be tempted to apply it to everything. For example, physicists may be right in saying that the world consists of subatomic particles, just as lawyers say that everything is, or should be, governed by principles of law. (2 views)
Former “Pay to Play” Pension Fund Officer Sentenced The former chief investment officer at the New York State pension fund, David Loglisci, was sentenced on Tuesday for permitting a “culture of corruption” at the fund. Loglisci is among eight persons who pleaded guilty in an investigation over “pay-to-play” at the New York state Common Retirement Fund. Alan Hevesi, the comptroller who managed the fund from 2003 to... (2 views)
Be Grateful for Your Friends Summary: It is important to put effort into the friendships that you know are most important and learn from them. Learn to appreciate the time you have together. (2 views)
Spring 2007 State of the Market Report Spring 2007: State of the Market Reports for U.S. and International Regions. (2 views)
Now That You Are Employed, Analyzing Your Legal Job Hunt You hunted the law Job, pinned employers to the mat, and came away victorious. Neatly done. Every element of Appearance described here is essential to the job hunt and to the practice of law or use of a law degree in other fields. The techniques and awarenesses gleaned from this book are fundamental to locating law jobs. (2 views)
Two Different Firm Offers - Which One to Choose? Two Different Firm Offers - Which One to Choose? (2 views)
NY State Court of Appeals Rejects Claims of Six Bar Associations; Chief Judge Dissents New York’s City’s agenda to move tens of thousands of criminal cases involving indigent defense from the hands of private attorneys to the Legal Aid Society and similar institutions is here to stay and has been declared legal by the NY State Court of Appeals on Tuesday. The narrow 4-3 decision rejected the claims made by six bar associations that the consent of bar... (2 views)
County Cannot Sue State over Voting Machines in New York On Thursday, the Appellate Division, Third Department dismissed a petition brought by Nassau County alleging that the state law requiring adoption of electronic voting machines is unconstitutional. The appellate court passed a unanimous decision holding that the county did not possess the locus standi to sue the state as the Board of Elections, Nassau, and not the county... (2 views)
Anti-Abortion Protester Wins Rights to Claim Attorney Fees On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the decisions of two lower courts that had denied the claims for attorney fees made by an anti-abortion demonstrator. The demonstrator, Steven Lefemine had won the rights to conduct his activities against challenge by the police. However, the federal judge in Greenville, South Carolina, who ruled that Lefemine had a First... (2 views)
The Right to Live According to an Unwritten Code The law insists that you get it in writing.'' That's wise, of course, to prove that there was an agreement and to help you avoid misunderstandings. But let's not pretend that contracts make the world go 'round. (2 views)
SEC Won’t Delay Transparency Rule for Oil, Gas and Mining Companies Last Thursday, the U.S. Securities and Exchange commission denied requests to delay its new rules, which will compel oil, gas, and mining companies to disclose payments made to foreign governments. Business groups have also sued against the rules. However, in its order, the SEC held that the groups had failed to prove any “imminent, irreparable harm” to justify a stay. (2 views)
Babysitter Faces 100 Charges of Child Sex Abuse A previously convicted sex-offender was indicted on Thursday on more than 100 counts of child sex abuse perpetrated by him in an unlicensed day care business run by his wife. The child victims, all from suburbs of Boston and ranging from between the age of 8 days to 3 ½ years. (2 views)
Scalia Claims Constitution a Dead Document – Compares Homosexuality with Murder On Monday, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia again made news by comparing laws banning homosexuality with laws banning murder, and by emphasizing that the U.S. constitution was a dead document as opposed to being a “living document.” (2 views)
Lawyers Finding Jobs as Coporate Secretaries Long before legally trained persons were working in the regulatory compliance area, lawyers were involved in the corporate secretarial area. Indeed, it is not uncommon that the title "Secretary" is also held by the "General Counsel." Thus, this area was one of the first to demonstrate that non-legal positions within a corporation could benefit from the attention of legally... (2 views)
Iowa Supreme Court Says Boss Can Fire Worker for Being Too Sexy On Friday, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled that a boss can fire an employee for finding her too sexy, even if the employee did not make any overtures or remotely consider any romantic relationship with the boss. Writing for an all-male panel in the case of a female employee fired because her boss found her too sexy, the Justice Edward M. Mansfield wrote, “The question we... (2 views)
Federal Judiciary Warns Sequestration Would Weaken the Justice System On Tuesday, the U.S. federal judiciary warned that compulsory budget cuts will weaken the ability of the system to dispense justice, and in turn would affect the ability of citizens to access justice. The simple reason being that the judiciary is already undermanned and running on a shoestring budget. Further cuts are going to ensure a functionally disabled judiciary,... (2 views)
Utah Attorney General Calls for Fed Probe into Allegations of Bribery Pointed at Him On Monday, John Swallow, the Utah Attorney General, sent a letter to the U.S. Attorney for Utah, David Barlow, asking him to conduct an investigation into allegations raised by indicted businessman Jeremy Johnson that Swallow had helped him in bribing to quash a federal probe. (2 views)
Developing Your Legal Practice By Utilizing Demographic Data Demographics is a methodical breakdown of any population grouping into similar characteristics which are defined by the person doing the demographic research. These characteristics can be age, gender, education, occupation, income, marital status, or a host of other qualities. Demographic can be used to classify existing client characteristics as well as to define possible... (2 views)
Leaving Behind A Career In Law Deciding to go to law school is a risky decision that is surprisingly hard to reverse. Many people attend law school for lack of anything better to do or despite major misgivings. They do not drop out at the top schools, despite the fact that a large minority dislike law school itself. (Harvard's attrition rate is typically under 1 percent.) (2 views)
New York’s ‘Stop and Frisk’ Regimen Back on its Track for Now After ordering the NYPD to immediately stop conducting its ‘stop and frisk’ program outside certain residential buildings on the second Tuesday of this month, this Tuesday, the U.S. District Judge, Shira Scheindlin agreed to lift her order at the request of the NYPD. (2 views)
How Staff Involvement Impacts Attorney Practice Development As a partner in a small boutique firm, Jeff diligently worked to communicate the firm's practice objectives to staff. He and his partners had decided to work toward an efficiently run law office that would permit them a reasonable amount of personal time. He wanted staff to understand the importance of their role in making this possible. He also wanted them to know that he... (2 views)