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Finessing Tech to Navigate Immigration Mazes
May 14, 2014
Hats off to the legal wranglers of the capaciously complex beast that is immigration law. The practice area features land mines of law, rules, forms and filings. If anything demanded a techno-fix or two to help streamline processes, immigration practice was it. Julie Pearl owns the quintessential URL—immigrationlaw.com—for her small but mighty 12-attorney, four-partner San Francisco-based Pearl Law Group. Not every firm website’s “About Us” page boasts a separate menu tab, “Technology”...
May 14, 2014
Hats off to the legal wranglers of the capaciously complex beast that is immigration law. The practice area features land mines of law, rules, forms and filings. If anything demanded a techno-fix or two to help streamline processes, immigration practice was it. Julie Pearl owns the quintessential URL—immigrationlaw.com—for her small but mighty 12-attorney, four-partner San Francisco-based Pearl Law Group. Not every firm website’s “About Us” page boasts a separate menu tab, “Technology”...
FRCP E-Discovery Rule 37(e) Revision Is Pending
May 14, 2014
At its May 29-30, 2014 meeting, the U.S. Judicial Conference's Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure will be asked to approve a new Rule 37(e) as proposed by the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules to govern the failure of parties to preserve electronically stored information “that should have been preserved.” The new rule—along with its Committee Note—is part of a package of civil rule amendments developed by the Rules Committee in the wake of the 2010 Civil...
May 14, 2014
At its May 29-30, 2014 meeting, the U.S. Judicial Conference's Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure will be asked to approve a new Rule 37(e) as proposed by the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules to govern the failure of parties to preserve electronically stored information “that should have been preserved.” The new rule—along with its Committee Note—is part of a package of civil rule amendments developed by the Rules Committee in the wake of the 2010 Civil...
Insurer’s Due Process Rights Trumps California’s Mediation Confidentiality Statute
May 14, 2014
A federal trial court concluded that California’s strict mediation confidentiality provisions were not applicable in a bad faith claim by homeowners against their insurer, as the insurer needed to be able to show that its failure to settle the case was the result of the homeowners’ excessive demands in mediation. The court relied on the seminal California Supreme Court case, Cassel v. Superior Court, in which due process is recognized as a limit on the mediation confidentiality statute, even...
May 14, 2014
A federal trial court concluded that California’s strict mediation confidentiality provisions were not applicable in a bad faith claim by homeowners against their insurer, as the insurer needed to be able to show that its failure to settle the case was the result of the homeowners’ excessive demands in mediation. The court relied on the seminal California Supreme Court case, Cassel v. Superior Court, in which due process is recognized as a limit on the mediation confidentiality statute, even...
(Yawn) Lawyers Are the Most Sleep-Deprived
May 14, 2014
“Good night my someone, goodnight, my lawyer.” Though not quite the lyrics from "The Music Man," perhaps Marian was onto something. According to Donalee Moulton in The Lawyers Weekly, lawyers are among the most sleep-deprived of all workers. “For lawyers, insomnia is often caused by an inability to shut down our brains,” Cheryl Canning, a partner at a litigation firm in Canada, told Moulton. “We have so many pressures and deadlines, both in the office and with family,” she said....
May 14, 2014
“Good night my someone, goodnight, my lawyer.” Though not quite the lyrics from "The Music Man," perhaps Marian was onto something. According to Donalee Moulton in The Lawyers Weekly, lawyers are among the most sleep-deprived of all workers. “For lawyers, insomnia is often caused by an inability to shut down our brains,” Cheryl Canning, a partner at a litigation firm in Canada, told Moulton. “We have so many pressures and deadlines, both in the office and with family,” she said....
The Dance of Opposites
May 13, 2014
“Rather than proclaim abstract universal principles, or assert the priority of liberty over equality, or impose one approach...
May 13, 2014
“Rather than proclaim abstract universal principles, or assert the priority of liberty over equality, or impose one approach...
Survey: Law Firms Are Guilty of Info Overkill
May 13, 2014
To stand out from the crowd, more firms are taking to the Web to showcase their wins and services. But is it too much? As Kevin O’Keefe explains on Real Lawyers Have Blogs, the 2014 State of Digital and Content Marketing Survey shows that corporate lawyers often feel overwhelmed by the large amounts of content that firms are producing. O’Keefe says the survey, released by ALM Legal Intelligence (an affiliate of CorpCounsel.com), Greentarget, and the Zeughauser Group, implies that firms need...
May 13, 2014
To stand out from the crowd, more firms are taking to the Web to showcase their wins and services. But is it too much? As Kevin O’Keefe explains on Real Lawyers Have Blogs, the 2014 State of Digital and Content Marketing Survey shows that corporate lawyers often feel overwhelmed by the large amounts of content that firms are producing. O’Keefe says the survey, released by ALM Legal Intelligence (an affiliate of CorpCounsel.com), Greentarget, and the Zeughauser Group, implies that firms need...
Reverse Engineering of Jury Instructions
May 13, 2014
Reverse engineering of jury instructions requires (1) creating a decision structure or decision tree for a case, based on a theory of the case, (2) identifying crucial points in the decision structure or decision tree, and (3) incorporating crucial points into the jury instructions. This paper suggests that reverse engineering of jury instructions can be used to instruct jurors about legal concepts and technical terms before they hear jury instructions or closing arguments. The goal is to improve...
May 13, 2014
Reverse engineering of jury instructions requires (1) creating a decision structure or decision tree for a case, based on a theory of the case, (2) identifying crucial points in the decision structure or decision tree, and (3) incorporating crucial points into the jury instructions. This paper suggests that reverse engineering of jury instructions can be used to instruct jurors about legal concepts and technical terms before they hear jury instructions or closing arguments. The goal is to improve...
Book Review: Short and Happy Guide to Mediation by Will Pryor
May 13, 2014
Will Pryor’s “Short and Happy Guide to Mediation” is both. You can read it in a sitting, and probably will. But it covers...
May 13, 2014
Will Pryor’s “Short and Happy Guide to Mediation” is both. You can read it in a sitting, and probably will. But it covers...
How to Tell When Someone is Lying
May 13, 2014
People lie all the time. According to the psychologist Robert Feldman, who has spent more than four decades studying the phenomenon, we lie, on average, three times during a routine ten-minute conversation with a stranger or casual acquaintance. Hardly anyone refrains from lying altogether, and some people report lying up to twelve times within that time span. I might open a conversation, for instance, by saying how nice it is to meet someone—when I’m really not at all happy about it. I might...
May 13, 2014
People lie all the time. According to the psychologist Robert Feldman, who has spent more than four decades studying the phenomenon, we lie, on average, three times during a routine ten-minute conversation with a stranger or casual acquaintance. Hardly anyone refrains from lying altogether, and some people report lying up to twelve times within that time span. I might open a conversation, for instance, by saying how nice it is to meet someone—when I’m really not at all happy about it. I might...
These Venture Capitalists Skip Law Firms for Legal Services Startups
May 12, 2014
Venture capitalist Jason Mendelson, in a speech he gave last year, was not venturing much oral capital into the concept of investing in legal services. A corporate and securities-law attorney before he co-founded the Foundry Group, his venture capital firm, Mendelson told a conference he found it difficult to invest in companies serving law firms because, unlike regular enterprise customers, they don't always act rationally when it comes to economics. He warned that most legal startups would fail...
May 12, 2014
Venture capitalist Jason Mendelson, in a speech he gave last year, was not venturing much oral capital into the concept of investing in legal services. A corporate and securities-law attorney before he co-founded the Foundry Group, his venture capital firm, Mendelson told a conference he found it difficult to invest in companies serving law firms because, unlike regular enterprise customers, they don't always act rationally when it comes to economics. He warned that most legal startups would fail...
