Posts on ‘March 5th, 2010’

In a potential reversal, White House advisers are close to recommending that President Barack Obama opt for military tribunals for self-professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four of his alleged henchman, senior officials said. The review of where and how to hold a Sept. 11 trial is not over, so no recommendation is yet before the president and Obama has not made a determination of his own, officials said. The review is not likely to be finished this week.

The Federal Circuit will likely be getting its first district court judge. The Obama administration is zeroing in on Kathleen O’Malley, a judge from the Northern District of Ohio, for a spot on the court that hears all appeals in patent cases, according to three people familiar with the situation. The American Bar Association has been vetting O’Malley, these people said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the process isn’t public.

Overseeing legal holds requires an organization to manage them like business processes with specific policies and procedures, say Howett Isaza partner John Isaza and Goldberg Segalla partner John J. Jablonski. For proper oversight, you need a firm grasp of all the steps for legal holds.

A New York judge concluded that a juror who sent a Facebook “friend” request to a witness made “a serious breach of her obligations and a clear violation of the court’s instructions.” Juror online behavior has prompted revisions to suggested jury instructions in federal and state courts.

Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines
Thursday to move forward on Dawn Johnsen’s nomination for a top position
in the U.S. Justice Department: assistant attorney general in charge of
the Office of Legal Counsel, an office that handles sensitive questions
of constitutional law and was at the center of interrogation policy
during the Bush administration. The vote came almost a year after the
committee first weighed in on Johnsen — a sign of how divisive her
nomination has been.

The Chapter 11 cases of copper mining company Asarco and casino operator Station Casinos have been a gold mine for bankruptcy lawyers. Baker Botts broke the $100 million billable mark in the five-year-old Asarco case last August, and the legal bills in the seven-month-old Station Casinos case are approaching $20 million for a dozen law firms. But future fees might not be paid out so easily, now that the bills have come under increasing scrutiny.

The bankruptcy case of Thornburg Mortgage has already involved an
anonymous letter, allegedly stolen laptops, lawsuits against the
company’s former top executives and law firms bowing out of the case.
Thursday brought a new development: a suit brought by the U.S. Trustee
now handling matters for the debtor charges Orrick, Herrington &
Sutcliffe partner Karen Dempsey with being part of an alleged conspiracy
to defraud Thornburg and divert the company’s money to a new entity
started by ex-Thornburg management.