Posts on ‘November 7th, 2008’

Kilpatrick Stockton has opened a small Dubai office to expand its construction practice into the Middle East. The two-lawyer office is starting with several U.S. clients that also are newcomers to the region, with the goal of also representing local participants in the Gulf construction boom. Kilpatrick partner Thomas P. Wilson and senior associate Drew D. Baiter have relocated from Atlanta to Dubai to open the office.

Peter Tourison isn’t the first judge to come up for discipline as the result of a drunken driving conviction, but he may be the first to have tried to beat the DWI rap by exploiting the foibles of New Jersey’s new breath-testing device, Alcotest. While in custody at a police station, Tourison used several common ploys to disrupt the Alcotest protocol, including attempting to apply Chapstick to his lips and placing a penny in his mouth when a patrolman turned his back.

A federal appeals court has declared unconstitutional a statute that sets a goal that 5 percent of defense contracting dollars be awarded to small businesses owned by the socially and economically disadvantaged. The Federal Circuit ruled Tuesday the statute violates the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment. The panel, voting unanimously, said Congress did not have a “strong basis in evidence” in determining that a race-conscious measure was necessary for diversity in federal defense contracts.

In a free speech case that reached the nation’s highest court, the Juneau-Douglas School District and former student Joseph Frederick have reached a settlement. Frederick was suspended during a 2002 Olympic torch relay for holding up a banner that read “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” while standing across from the high school. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the school’s assertion that he was celebrating drug use. The district will pay Frederick $45,000.

The burden of proof for plaintiffs in Florida product liability cases could steepen based on a tobacco case argued Thursday before the state Supreme Court. Justices were asked whether plaintiffs who sue over design defects in inherently dangerous products, such as cigarettes, must find a safer design option to prove liability. The case could change the future of product liability cases in Florida, a fact that concerned some of the justices and that caught the attention of groups on both sides of the issue.

Rightly or not, the LSAT has been king in law school admissions. Now, UC-Berkeley School of Law researchers say they have identified tests that could be used along with it to better predict success in the practice of law. They say the LSAT, with its focus on cognitive skills, does not measure for skills such as creativity, negotiation, problem-solving or stress management. The law school’s dean is trying to round up support from other schools to take the research to a national level.

The Justice Department is involved in talks with several attorneys for sick smokers in an effort to collect federal income tax and Medicare money from a $580 million trust fund being distributed to members of a disbanded Miami class action, according to confidential memos. Some lawyers for smokers say the fund isn’t subject to federal taxes or Medicare liens because the fund isn’t part of a judgment for monetary damages caused by any illness. “It’s not a duck, and it’s not a goose,” says the fund trustee.

Trademark enforcement isn’t unusual for companies with famous marks like Intel. But the number of suits sets the company apart. So far this year, it has sued 15 companies with the word “intel” in their names in federal court. Only some of Intel’s targets are computer-related businesses, and few if any manufacture or sell microprocessors like the ones that made Intel so famous. By comparison, McDonald’s, known to pursue any fast-food restaurant with the same prefix, has filed only one such suit this year.