ABA President Elect Stephen Zack
Tuesday, October 13, 2009 at 03:30PM
justiciaparatodos.squarespace.com

Miami lawyer Stephen N. Zack, a partner in the national law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner, was elected as president-elect of the American Bar Association - the first Hispanic American to achieve that distinction. Zack will serve one year as president-elect before taking office as president in August 2010 at the ABA's Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

Is Letterman's job in jeopardy - hardly - he's a ratings machine in a world where ratings are falling faster than ever. Was he a cad? Does it matter? Allegedly, during all his dalliances, he wasn't married and no one has suggested that he coerced any of the women he had sex with.

Had Halderman called my law firm, we would have advised him to tell his girlfriend, Stephanie Birkitt, that if she suffered sexual harassment at Letterman's company, she should sue him.

Getting "crafty" never works. Lawsuits work to bring out dirty laundry, especially when the defendant has been a cad. We'll soon find out how honest Letterman was when he said "he never had sex with any employee, after he got married." Stay tuned.

Guys are often in between things like jobs and houses, which means they’re more likely to stay up with you all night, drinking wine and playing gin rummy. They’ll rub your belly. They’ll lick chocolate off it. They’ll like your cute little dog. A guy is never going to shoot Old Yeller in the woods.

Men like innocuous dress shirts or pastel polos with colors as nauseating as chewable Tums. Do men want to be guys? I don’t think men know guys exist, at least not as a permanent condition. They assume guys are boys who haven’t manned up yet.

Then there's always Mike Gundy:

See snippets of today’s NY Times article “In Phoenix, Weekend Users Make Light Rail a Success” below.

The light rail here, which opened in December, has been a greater success than its proponents thought it would be, but not quite the way they envisioned. Unlike the rest of the country’s public transportation systems, which are used principally by commuters, the 20 miles of light rail here stretching from central Phoenix to Mesa and Tempe is used largely by people going to restaurants, bars, ball games and cultural events downtown.

The rail was projected to attract 26,000 riders per day, but the number is closer to 33,000, boosted in large part by weekend riders. Only 27 percent use the train for work, according to its operator, compared with 60 percent of other public transit users on average nationwide.

The gaggle of light rail users — including Arizona State University students, who use a line that connects its Tempe campus with the downtown campus — have given a small part of the city a new, dense connectivity that was more or less unheard of in the city two years ago. Pub crawls along the light rail have become a weekend staple, and restaurants have seen new customers from outside the neighborhood popping in off the line for brunch on the weekends.

“I think the biggest impact of the light rail is less tangible,” said Matt Poolin, owner of Matt’s Big Breakfast, a busy spot along the line, “which is that it really improves the image and perception of Phoenix’s downtown, which, although experiencing a significant renaissance in recent years, still is undergoing many improvements and changes. The light rail, largely because it is so well run and nicely appointed, is something that I think most people are really proud of and feel positive about. It is rare to hear anyone complain, despite all of the controversy.”

Shih notes that now even top law school grads face dimming prospects at landing the big law firm career. Why should it matter? If you go to a top 10 law school, certain things are expected. It is expected that the world’s largest law firms will come a courtin’ and it is expected that you will receive a job making high six figures and that will soothe any anxiety you face when looking at the staggering debt you took out to get that top 10 law school degree.

Downturn Dims Prospects Even at Top Law Schools

By GERRY SHIH

Published: August 25, 2009

This fall, law students are competing for half as many openings at big firms as they were last year in what is shaping up to be the most wrenching job search season in over 50 years.

Skip to next paragraphFor students now, the promise of the big law firm career — and its paychecks — is slipping through their fingers, forcing them to look at lesser firms in smaller markets as well as opportunities in government or with public interest groups, law school faculty and students say.

How bad is it? Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, the juggernaut of New York, has slashed its hiring by more than half. For the first time in 136 years, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, a respected Philadelphia firm, has canceled its recruiting entirely. Global firms like DLA Piper and Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe have postponed recruiting for several months to see if the market improves.

At Yale, students accustomed to being wooed by Big Law’s glittering names — like Baker & McKenzie; Milbank, Tweed, Hadley, & McCloy; and White & Case — were stunned when those firms canceled interviews in New Haven this month.

New York University, Georgetown, Northwestern and other top universities confirm that interviews are down by a third to a half compared with a year ago, while lower-ranked schools are suffering more. What is more, when interviews finish in a few weeks, even fewer offers will be extended, said Howard L. Ellin, the chairman of global hiring at Skadden, Arps, because many firms are interviewing students for slots they may not fill.

After he lost his job as a television reporter two years ago, Derek Fanciullo considered law school, thinking it was a historically sure bet. He took out “a ferocious amount of debt,” he said — $210,000, to be exact — and enrolled last September in the School of Law at New York University.

With the cost of law school skyrocketing over the years, the implicit arrangement between students and the most expensive and prestigious schools has only strengthened: the student takes on hefty debt to pay tuition, and the school issues the golden ticket to a job at a high-paying firm — if that’s what the student wants.

“Students came in with a certain sense of what the compact was going to be,” said Irene Dorzback, the assistant dean for career services at the New York University School of Law. But with the system crumbling in recent months, Ms. Dorzback said, “people are now accepting this notion of a lost year.”

When Julia Figurelli, a second-year student at the University of Pennsylvania, decided to enter law school a year ago, she expected to find a lucrative law firm job in three years — if not collecting the $160,000-a-year associate salaries at one of the uppermost partnerships. By the time she obtains her J.D., she says, she will have around $200,000 in debt.

“Had I seen where the market was going, I would’ve gone to a lower-ranked but less expensive public school,” she said. “I’m questioning whether law school was the right choice at all.”

Once aiming to work in Philadelphia, Ms. Figurelli is now hunting for jobs in lower-paying markets, like Pittsburgh and Fort Lauderdale, Fla. “I’m looking anywhere my competition isn’t looking,” she added.

School officials are pushing students to look beyond the white-shoe firms, to delve deep into alumni networks and to start mass letter-writing campaigns to potential employers. Like Ms. Figurelli, many students say that for the first time, they are considering and seeking work with government and public-interest groups.

The Social Security Administration, for example, said applications for lawyer positions and clerkships had more than doubled this year, to 2,000, from 800. The public-interest job fair at N.Y.U. this year was “packed to the gills,” Mr. Fanciullo recalled, but whereas in past years students had seven or eight interviews, some of his classmates this year had zero. “There’s a humongous trickle-down effect,” he said. “When the big firms don’t hire, everyone looks to government. And when those get filled up, then what happens?”

It has been a bizarre new reality, especially for elite schools. At Harvard, officials have had to hawk résumés or tell students, quite simply, to buck up. (“Now is not the time for avoidance, denial or panic,” Mark Weber, the assistant dean of career services, wrote in a March memo to Harvard Law’s graduating class.)

On a recent Friday afternoon, Mr. Fanciullo sat at home waiting anxiously for his first callback after four days of interviews. Firms customarily called within 48 hours, he explained.

“You almost bank on the big firms hiring you because they’re really the only ones who can help you pay your debt,” he said, his mind already skipping forward to a situation he didn’t choose to articulate. “Quite frankly it would be an absolute disaster. I don’t know what I’d do."

Police say slain model's car showed evidence of a struggle

Buena Park police said Thursday there was a violent struggle in slain swimsuit model Jasmine Fiore's Mercedes-Benz, which authorities recovered in a West Hollywood parking lot.

But investigators said they don't know whether she was killed in the car, a San Diego hotel room or somewhere else. Her body was put into a suitcase, and police believe it was dumped in a Buena Park trash bin on Aug. 14.

Investigators said they found significant amounts of blood and some hair in the Mercedes. The interior of the car appeared to have been wiped down, and the car's exterior had been washed.

Still, officials said they found evidence of twigs, grass and mud on the undercarriage and grill of the car, suggesting it was taken off road, most likely in the Corona area near the junction of the 91 and 15 freeways.

Sgt. Bill Kohanek said police were combing that area looking for, among other things, the missing tips of Fiore's fingers and her teeth, which they believe were removed after she was killed.

They said there was evidence that a violent struggle took place between Fiore and her ex-husband, Ryan Alexander Jenkins, in the vehicle.

They said an older note written by Jenkins to Fiore was also found in the car. In the note, police said, Jenkins expressed jealously, but they did not elaborate.

Jenkins eventually fled Southern California, passed through Las Vegas and over the border into Canada after leading authorities on a dangerous boat pursuit.

He was found dead Sunday in a British Columbia motel, apparently a suicide.

Police said Thursday that they also found blood on the patio of the L'Auberge Del Mar hotel where Jenkins and Fiore had gone Aug. 13.

Investigators said that it appeared Jenkins had placed Fiore in the suitcase in their room there.

As reported, Fiore was identified by her breast implant identification numbers and Jenkins was found hanged in a Canandian hotel room.

Wow, reality TV just might be the next tort! And I am not talking about desert!
 

That probably closes our story about how Ms. Fiore was identified through the serial numbers on her breast implants. I wonder if this reality TV stuff is ever going to end?

Somehow our star got star crossed and in a quickie Las Vegas wedding last year married ex-model, Jasmine Fiore. Ms. Fiore and Mr. Jenkins checked into a hotel room in San Diego on August 13th. The next morning Jenkins checked out and Fiore was later found in a bloodstained suitcase without fingers or teeth. 

Au contraire, we live a a world of CSI and lovely enhancements performed by thousands of plastic surgeons across the country.  Indeed, a recent story broke that nearly a third of all the Miss America contestants have undergone plastic surgery. 

Ms. Fiore's killer was diabolical and gave it a good junior college effort to make her body unidentifiable.  The only thing he forgot to extract was the rack that probably first interested him in Fiore in the first place. 

Jenkins is missing, presumably in Canada, when he's found he'll be going down a lot more than he expected when he signed up for Megan Wants a Millionaire. ‬

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

So does this mean we’re no longer a nation of couch potatoes?  Far from it.  The most recent reports from Nielsen Media Research reveal that the average American watches 153 hours of television every month at home, which is a 1.2% increase from last year.  In this economy,  people are simply looking for ways to save money, and cutting off their cable with DVR is one great way to do it.  According to David Poltrack, chief research officer of CBS Corp. and president of CBS Vision, online video will be the growth area for time-shifted viewing.  New TV sets with Internet access and Microsoft Vista operating system-enabled computers with DVR capability will help this trend.

And our lust for constant stimulation just keeps growing. Most of us now juggle our television viewing with Internet usage, regardless of age.  In fact, an average of 30.8% of adults 35-54 and 33.8% of adults 55-64 watch television and use the Internet simultaneously.  David David Poltrack, chief research officer of CBS Corp. and president of CBS Vision said, “They may not be online as much as the younger generation but when they are, they are just as likely to be watching TV at the same time.”

Now let’s talk about children’s television viewing habits and their dramatic effect on health, emotions, behavior and overall well-being.  Better yet, let’s save that story for another time.  American Idol comes on in five minutes so I’ve gotta run.  Maybe between commercials, I’ll do a little Internet research on this topic for a future blog post.  Stay tuned...

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

Little Information Given About Solo Law Practice Run by Sotomayor in '80s
The New York Times
By SERGE F. KOVALESKI
Published: July 6, 2009
 
Since Sonia Sotomayor was nominated for a seat on the United States Supreme Court, her career and accomplishments have come to light in public and voluminous fashion.

Skip to next paragraphHer Senate questionnaire lists dozens of her awards and honors, her letters to the editor of her college newspaper, her speeches and cases she handled as a prosecutor, a lawyer in private practice and, for the last 17 years, as a federal judge.

Yet as she moves through the confirmation process, Judge Sotomayor has explained very little about one facet of her legal life: Sotomayor & Associates, the solo law practice she ran out of her Brooklyn apartment for several years in the 1980s.

In her questionnaire, Judge Sotomayor says she was the "owner" of Sotomayor & Associates, which she described as a consulting business she operated on the side from 1983 to 1986. During this period, she also worked, first for the Manhattan district attorney's office and then as a member of Pavia & Harcourt, a large firm in Manhattan.

As a single practitioner, she told the Senate, she had helped "family and friends in their real estate, business and estate planning decisions." The only other thing she has said about the practice is that if her clients "required more substantial legal representation, I referred the matter to my firm, Pavia & Harcourt, or to others with appropriate expertise."

The White House has described Ms. Sotomayor's outside legal work as an informal practice, one that never required her to file legal documents or appear in court. She never incorporated Sotomayor & Associates or registered it as a business in Manhattan or Brooklyn, where she then lived, according to public records, though she was not required to do so.

Associates in the district attorney's office and George M. Pavia, the senior partner of Pavia & Harcourt, said they did not recall that she had done outside legal work at the time. "It is news to me," Mr. Pavia said. He said she likely cleared the outside work with her direct supervisor, who is now dead.

At the time she began her legal consulting work, Ms. Sotomayor was an assistant district attorney, going through a divorce and earning about half of what lawyers in private practice made.

White House communications officials said the judge no longer had copies of the tax returns that listed the income, and any deductions, that she attributed to her outside work. A White House spokeswoman said at one point that because of the considerable passage of time, Judge Sotomayor could not estimate how many people she had counseled or remember their names.

The White House later provided names of three clients: an independent insurance salesman, no longer alive, for whom she helped review contracts; a cousin for whom she prepared a divorce — although the filing came a few years after the judge said she had stopped her outside work — and a friend who sought help setting up his dry cleaning business. The friend, Ken Kinzer, is married to one of the judge's close friends, Dawn Cardi. Ms. Cardi, a lawyer, said initially that she did not recall the judge operating an outside legal practice. But Ms. Cardi said she subsequently remembered her friend's assistance, and recalled that she gave her a pocketbook in appreciation.

Ms. Sotomayor's outside work was approved, she said through a spokesman, by the Manhattan district attorney's office, which has a policy that governs such work. Although the White House said Judge Sotomayor earned income in 1983, a spokeswoman for the district attorney's office, Alicia Maxey Greene, initially said that the office did not allow prosecutors to charge for outside work. Generally, they were only allowed to help friends and family for free on a case-by-case basis.

Several former members of the office said they remembered the policy as being quite clear. "We were expressly prohibited from having a law practice on the side," said Katharine Law, a friend of the judge who worked with her at the time.

But District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said subsequently that his spokeswoman had been wrong and that the office had been quite liberal at the time in approving outside work by staff, even if they charged fees.

The judge's choice of the name Sotomayor & Associates is regarded by some legal ethicists as a confusing departure for someone generally regarded as meticulous about preparation and following the rules.

Stephen Gillers, professor of legal ethics at New York University Law School, said Judge Sotomayor's use of the larger-sounding title was "inadvisable because it is inaccurate." He noted that bar associations frown on the use of the term "and associates" by single practitioners. "She could have just said, 'Law Offices of Sonia Sotomayor,' " he said.

Bar associations have held that the use of such a name can be misleading. But Mr. Gillers said that since Ms. Sotomayor never appears to have advertised or to have put the name on letterhead, it is a technical issue and not one likely to ever have been cited by a disciplinary committee in the New York State court system. But he said that if the panel had received a complaint about the name, it would have required her to change it.

White House officials disagreed that the use of the name was a misstep, and they offered a written analysis by Hal R. Lieberman, a former disciplinary committee chief counsel in New York.

"Neither bar opinions nor cases to date have held that it was misleading for a sole practitioner to use the name 'and Associates' in such private communications," he wrote in an e-mail message. "In fact, in the early 1980s, no rule prohibited the use of 'and Associates' in these circumstances and the only authority regarding the use of 'and Associates' in an advertising context was advisory, not mandatory, and thus not readily enforceable."

A White House spokesman, Ben LaBolt, said, "All of the clients were well aware of the limited services Judge Sotomayor could provide given the other positions she held."

Mr. LaBolt said that Ms. Sotomayor came up with the name when she was filling out her tax returns. "It was necessary to list a name for the practice on her tax returns," he said.

Tax experts say there was nothing in the law that requires a lawyer, or any other self-employed person, to create a corporate name to report income, or deductions, on the standard form, known as a Schedule C. Just one's own name will do. But Mr. LaBolt pointed out that the 1983 copy of the form asked the filer to list his or her "business name."

"Significant time was not spent in choosing a name," he said.
 
Her Senate questionnaire lists dozens of her awards and honors, her letters to the editor of her college newspaper, her speeches and cases she handled as a prosecutor, a lawyer in private practice and, for the last 17 years, as a federal judge.

Yet as she moves through the confirmation process, Judge Sotomayor has explained very little about one facet of her legal life: Sotomayor & Associates, the solo law practice she ran out of her Brooklyn apartment for several years in the 1980s.

In her questionnaire, Judge Sotomayor says she was the "owner" of Sotomayor & Associates, which she described as a consulting business she operated on the side from 1983 to 1986. During this period, she also worked, first for the Manhattan district attorney's office and then as a member of Pavia & Harcourt, a large firm in Manhattan.

As a single practitioner, she told the Senate, she had helped "family and friends in their real estate, business and estate planning decisions." The only other thing she has said about the practice is that if her clients "required more substantial legal representation, I referred the matter to my firm, Pavia & Harcourt, or to others with appropriate expertise."

The White House has described Ms. Sotomayor's outside legal work as an informal practice, one that never required her to file legal documents or appear in court. She never incorporated Sotomayor & Associates or registered it as a business in Manhattan or Brooklyn, where she then lived, according to public records, though she was not required to do so.

Associates in the district attorney's office and George M. Pavia, the senior partner of Pavia & Harcourt, said they did not recall that she had done outside legal work at the time. "It is news to me," Mr. Pavia said. He said she likely cleared the outside work with her direct supervisor, who is now dead.

At the time she began her legal consulting work, Ms. Sotomayor was an assistant district attorney, going through a divorce and earning about half of what lawyers in private practice made.

White House communications officials said the judge no longer had copies of the tax returns that listed the income, and any deductions, that she attributed to her outside work. A White House spokeswoman said at one point that because of the considerable passage of time, Judge Sotomayor could not estimate how many people she had counseled or remember their names.

The White House later provided names of three clients: an independent insurance salesman, no longer alive, for whom she helped review contracts; a cousin for whom she prepared a divorce — although the filing came a few years after the judge said she had stopped her outside work — and a friend who sought help setting up his dry cleaning business. The friend, Ken Kinzer, is married to one of the judge's close friends, Dawn Cardi. Ms. Cardi, a lawyer, said initially that she did not recall the judge operating an outside legal practice. But Ms. Cardi said she subsequently remembered her friend's assistance, and recalled that she gave her a pocketbook in appreciation.

Ms. Sotomayor's outside work was approved, she said through a spokesman, by the Manhattan district attorney's office, which has a policy that governs such work. Although the White House said Judge Sotomayor earned income in 1983, a spokeswoman for the district attorney's office, Alicia Maxey Greene, initially said that the office did not allow prosecutors to charge for outside work. Generally, they were only allowed to help friends and family for free on a case-by-case basis.

Several former members of the office said they remembered the policy as being quite clear. "We were expressly prohibited from having a law practice on the side," said Katharine Law, a friend of the judge who worked with her at the time.

But District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said subsequently that his spokeswoman had been wrong and that the office had been quite liberal at the time in approving outside work by staff, even if they charged fees.

The judge's choice of the name Sotomayor & Associates is regarded by some legal ethicists as a confusing departure for someone generally regarded as meticulous about preparation and following the rules.

Stephen Gillers, professor of legal ethics at New York University Law School, said Judge Sotomayor's use of the larger-sounding title was "inadvisable because it is inaccurate." He noted that bar associations frown on the use of the term "and associates" by single practitioners. "She could have just said, 'Law Offices of Sonia Sotomayor,' " he said.

Bar associations have held that the use of such a name can be misleading. But Mr. Gillers said that since Ms. Sotomayor never appears to have advertised or to have put the name on letterhead, it is a technical issue and not one likely to ever have been cited by a disciplinary committee in the New York State court system. But he said that if the panel had received a complaint about the name, it would have required her to change it.

White House officials disagreed that the use of the name was a misstep, and they offered a written analysis by Hal R. Lieberman, a former disciplinary committee chief counsel in New York.

"Neither bar opinions nor cases to date have held that it was misleading for a sole practitioner to use the name 'and Associates' in such private communications," he wrote in an e-mail message. "In fact, in the early 1980s, no rule prohibited the use of 'and Associates' in these circumstances and the only authority regarding the use of 'and Associates' in an advertising context was advisory, not mandatory, and thus not readily enforceable."

A White House spokesman, Ben LaBolt, said, "All of the clients were well aware of the limited services Judge Sotomayor could provide given the other positions she held."

Mr. LaBolt said that Ms. Sotomayor came up with the name when she was filling out her tax returns. "It was necessary to list a name for the practice on her tax returns," he said.

Tax experts say there was nothing in the law that requires a lawyer, or any other self-employed person, to create a corporate name to report income, or deductions, on the standard form, known as a Schedule C. Just one's own name will do. But Mr. LaBolt pointed out that the 1983 copy of the form asked the filer to list his or her "business name."

"Significant time was not spent in choosing a name," he said.

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

Dallas law firms traveling a softer road than many national offices
09:34 AM CDT on Monday, July 6, 2009
By ERIC TORBENSON / The Dallas Morning News

While a painful recession has forced many big law firms nationwide to downsize, Dallas' law practices have dodged most of the bullets and are changing their tactics to fire back when the economy rebounds.

Angel Reyes and partners Luis Bartolomei, Spencer Browne and Ryan Browne, and associate Nick Farris created the Reyes Bartolomei Browne law firm to focus on local cases in Dallas and Tarrant counties. The region's firms have held up better because of North Texas' relative economic strength and because the kind of law specialties that dominate here, such as energy and intellectual property, are somewhat recession-proof.

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

Attorney: Why are Hispanics 'last in, first out' of jobs?
Guest Writer: Angel Reyes
Orlando Sentinel
June 4, 2009

Angel Reyes is an attorney, Hispanic immigration expert and author of Hispanic Heresy: What is the Impact of America’s Largest Group of Immigrants? (Mead Publishing, January 2009) He is the founder and managing partner of Heygood, Orr, Reyes, Pearson & Bartolomei law firm in Dallas, Texas. He also blogs at angelreyesblog.com.
 
The Hispanic population in the United States has been growing substantially in recent years, providing businesses with burgeoning workforces. The Census Bureau expects that by 2015, 17% of the American population will be of Hispanic origin. Demographically, no group of Americans is growing faster than Hispanics. Hispanics are now 8% of the workforce and by 2050, that number is expected to reach 25% of the workforce.

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com

Flu, border violence may poison immigration debate
May 13, 2009
Houston Chronicle

Because of the swine flu scare, an airline passenger is checked by a doctor after arriving in Mexico City recently.

(Today we are posting a guest blog post from Angel Reyes, an attorney, Hispanic immigration expert and author of Hispanic Heresy: What is the Impact of America's Largest Group of Immigrants? (Mead Publishing, January 2009)

©2009 Angel Reyes
www.ReyesLaw.com