Posts on ‘August 24th, 2009’

Law firms are increasingly being run like businesses, especially in this economy, with an emphasis on the bottom line. Therefore, when experienced attorneys wish to change firms, they should be prepared to discuss with a prospective employer how hiring them will improve the employer’s market position, say consultants Valerie Fontaine and Roberta Kass. They discuss how to create a business plan that can show what you have to offer and how your expertise and clients will contribute to a new firm.

The Thelen law firm has agreed to a $1.12 million judgment in favor of Schiff Hardin to settle a suit arising from a sublease contract the firms entered into two years ago for office space. But Schiff Hardin partners aren’t likely to see the money anytime soon. Thelen’s accounts receivable are getting stale since its partners voted to dissolve in December, and it still owes millions to Citigroup. If Thelen files for bankruptcy, Schiff Hardin will have to compete with other unsecured creditors for what’s left.

In a sign of just how far a recent Supreme Court decision on age discrimination could reach into labor law, a federal judge cited the opinion as she ruled against a woman who had sued Washington, D.C., under the city’s juror protection law, alleging she was transferred out of her job as a school guidance counselor because she had spent four months serving on a jury. The judge applied the high court’s standard, requiring the plaintiff to prove that she would not have been transferred “but for” her jury service.

A federal appeals court has dealt a major blow to descendants of Armenian genocide victims, ruling that a California law that had opened the door to multimillion-dollar settlements against life insurance companies is unconstitutional. The 9th Circuit ruled 2-1 that U.S. foreign policy, which does not officially recognize the genocide, pre-empts California’s statute. The ruling came one day after the panel used the same reasoning to strike down a law meant to help heirs to artwork allegedly stolen by the Nazis.

A webcasting service that provides users with individualized Internet radio stations is not required to pay licensing fees to copyright holders of the songs the service plays, the 2nd Circuit ruled in a closely watched case on Friday. The circuit found that as a matter of law the service that provides the stations, in which content is affected by customers’ ratings, is not “interactive” enough to impose the fees. The 2nd Circuit is the first appellate court in the U.S. to address the issue.

If not for banker Bradley Birkenfeld, “a massive tax fraud scheme” by Switzerland’s UBS bank to hide the assets of wealthy Americans from U.S. tax collectors would never have been uncovered, prosecutors told a Florida federal judge. But the former UBS banker was sentenced on Friday to three years and four months in prison for failing to disclose his UBS client list when he went to the Justice Department two years ago with details of widespread tax evasion coordinated by high-level UBS bankers.

A longtime aide to former House Majority Leader Dick Armey was indicted Friday for taking thousands of dollars worth of gifts from jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff. According to the indictment filed Friday at the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Horace Cooper received more than $14,000 worth of gifts, including high-priced sports and concert tickets, in return for assisting Abramoff’s firm on various matters.

A Hamptons mayor charged with securities fraud for “cherry-picking” stocks did not engage in a “continuing” course of conduct, a federal judge has ruled in dismissing part of the government’s case against George Motz of Quogue, N.Y. Prosecutors charged that Motz would buy stocks early in the day and wait to see how the market reacted. If the securities went up in value, he would allocate the securities to favored accounts; if they went down, he would allocate them to one of his discretionary accounts.

Four years ago, Planned Parenthood called Dorsey & Whitney in Minneapolis to ask for help fighting a South Dakota law that would require doctors to inform women of several issues before proceeding with an abortion. On Thursday, Dorsey partners Timothy Branson and Michael Drysdale won a partial victory when a federal judge upheld one part of the proposed law but threw out the others, concluding they violated the Constitution and precedents set in Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Victorious plaintiffs lawyers routinely seek statutory fees in class actions and other civil rights litigation, but defense attempts are much less numerous. Yet a small cluster of defense moves — like the one before Northern District of California Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Laporte, in which the Metropolitan Transportation Commission sought attorney fees after plaintiffs lost a suit challenging San Francisco Bay Area transit policies as racist — has lawyers like Brad Seligman of the Impact Fund worried.