Lawyer & Law School Megathread #12: Started Out Barrister, Ended Up Barista

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Business, Finance, and Careers > Lawyer & Law School Megathread #12: Started Out Barrister, Ended Up Barista

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ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Direwolf posted:

Job goes up on job board, I like job description, I send in application, they call me same day and have lovely conversation with lady on other end about position and firm.

Google named partner, he was publicly censured in 2011 for misconduct from 2005/2006 where he filed several things late/missed deadlines. According to the records he hasn't had any issues since 2007, but how much of a red flag is this?

Depends largely on the area of practice. A few substantiated grievances in either criminal defense or family (especially if it's a high volume practice) isn't that big a deal because they are often dealing with irrational/emotional clients and probably get grieved all the time. Stay under the microscope log enough and someone is bound to spot some ~~dirt~~ ebola particles.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 19:42

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 08:27

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Yesterday I spent the better part of an afternoon conducting voir dire around the deep philosophical question of "Horde or Alliance"

Today I spent the better part of an afternoon listening to a trial judge complain about how old he felt and answering questions that may as well have been "So...is that anything like Pong? I hear the kids like Pong."

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 19:48

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

joat mon posted:

There's a big difference between having someone file a grievance, which is an occupational hazard in criminal defense and in particular public defender work, and going to a disciplinary hearing and losing. I've averaged a grievance every two years. In one they opened an investigation (I had blown a deadline) but it was already fixed by the time they contacted me. The rest were, "this is what your client said you did/didn't do, what's your side of the story?" and were closed upon my reply.

Best one: "In open court, the judge accused me of stabbing my grandmother in the neck and robbing her and Mr. Mon didn't do anything about it!"
(He was charged with stabbing his grandma in the neck and robbing her - and stealing her car. The 'accusation' was the judge reading the basis for the application to revoke probation in his two other cases)

Three simple tricks bar grievers HATE:
1. Communicate with your client. Explain what's happening and why. Answer their questions. Take their calls, return their calls, keep them updated. Make them think, "God, my attorney won't stop talking to me about my case!"*
2. Keep contemporary notes. KEEP CONTEMPORARY NOTES KEEP CONTEMPORARY NOTES
3. When you screw up, start getting it unscrewed immediately. Ask for help if you need it. Then tell your client what you did and how you are fixing it.

*Know when this isn't working.

Completely agree. My point was just that having *a* public record, by itself, isn't necessarily a red flag that the person is not worth working with. But yeah...talk to your client.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 21:26

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Alaemon posted:

Sovereign citizen filed a lawsuit in our court today. So that's fun.

Fun. One of our judges has a beautiful way of dealing with these on the criminal side: sir, since you don't recognize the laws of this state or the authority of this court, you can't make a valid promise to appear, so I can't set bail. Marshalls?

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 22:45

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Soothing Vapors posted:

My last divorce client would call me to bitch about his ex-wife, sometimes for up to an hour at a time. I would turn the timer on and play Minesweeper. Every 5 minutes or so I'd interject and remind him I was billing for the call and we were accomplishing nothing. No effect.

Every single month he'd call to complain about the bill. He could not seem to make that causal link.

In a former life I was a JAG type...had to advise sailors who married strippers and were now dealing with the completely foreseeable consequences of that decision. After multiple iterations of "OK, I can talk to you about what forms to fill out and where to file and whether or not your separation agreement looks legit...but if you want to spend the next hour talking about how the bitch done you wrong, the chaplain is down the hall" didn't work, I went to build a bear workshop and made a bear in a rough approximation of our uniform that said the following when you squeezed its paw: "Hi. I'm the divorce bear. Please tell me all about that rotten bitch you married. I care so LT [redacted] doesn't have to." He sat on the shelf next to the "Ethics and Appropriations Kitty".

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 23:39

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Soothing Vapors posted:

Hahaha

But dear god, the only thing on earth I can imagine worse than doing family law is doing family law for soldiers and army wives

It was my personal vision of hell. The later anecdote was from an SJA tour where legal assistance was only done as a courtesy to the command and most of my focus was on operational and fiscal law (and responding to ~~form letters from people who have to pretend they give a poo poo about some rear end in a top hat's whining about something stupid because it's an election year~~ congressional inquiries.)

But my first assignment was straight up legal assistance. And yes...military wives are the worst. Surpassed only by wives of retired military. I volunteered to go to Iraq just to get away from it...and then volunteered to extend in Iraq to avoid having to go back. In the balancing test, mortars were more appealing than dealing with those hambeasts (though in fairness...they weren't particularly precise mortars. more like some dudes sticking a rocket in a PVC pipe and hoping for the best)

# ¿ Oct 17, 2014 23:56

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

HiddenReplaced posted:

This is the first time I've actually enjoyed reading two posts in a row from someone new to the thread.

I nominate this ~~guy~~ girl/lady/female/wmyn/whatever won't get my avatar changed again for best new poster of the year.

fixed

and thank you. Will there be acceptance speeches involved?

patentmagus posted:

Is there a SCOTUS threadnaught contest going on?

Heh...yeah...about that...I don't know what I loved more: (1) having avatar changed to Godwin's law violation (is that still a thing?); (2) having someone flounce only to start sending PMs 15 minutes later because they were too embarrassed to return post flounce but damnit must get that last word in!; or (3) the standard go-to irony of being called a misogynist by a man in response to a conversation about women's health.

Phil Moscowitz posted:

loving debate threads. I don't understand how a lawyer would spend all goddamn day arguing against real people, in real courts, for real money and at the expense of the lawyer's humanity...and then spend his/her precious spare time arguing against internet keyboard jockeys for free.

What kind of sick monkey gets off on that? TELL ME

The kind who had all their cases pushed over to the next term and is going through adversarial withdrawal. But you're right re:debate threads...it's like playing chess with a chicken. Eventually it will just knock over all the pieces, poo poo on the board, and then fly back to the roost to cluck about its victory.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 02:33

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

nm posted:

Non lawyers discussing the law is like a kitten trying to figure out a tortoise.

D'aawwwwwwwwwww... now I feel all warm and fuzzy.

Incidentally, a friend of mine and I were recently involved in a 24 hour play festival, in which she chose to write a "space opera" for her submission. Her conclusion was that anyone can write sci-fi if they just put the word "space" in front of random nouns. Actual Dialog: "Space Prom? Are you kidding? Isn't that just a lame bit of under the space suit, over the space bra action?" Your title text reminded me of that...good times.

Only registered members can see post attachments!

ActusRhesus fucked around with this message at 03:11 on Oct 18, 2014

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 03:08

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

TheMadMilkman posted:

Please tell me this is posted somewhere for me to read.

I can probably get a copy of it from her. Caution; most of it devolves into alien puppet sex for pretty much the entire last act

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 11:29

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Roger_Mudd posted:

Go on....

k. lemme see if she still has a copy, as there seems to be so much valid interest in space bras and puppet sex.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 14:14

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

OK...puppet sex and space bras have been acquired. If you seriously want to read it PM me.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 22:04

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

ThirdPartyView posted:

Amergin is the best poster in D&D, unironically.

Apparently I'm an Amergin alt. I don't know whether to be flattered or horrified.

# ¿ Oct 18, 2014 22:05

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Serious question: there was discussion of a goon becoming an art III judge. Are there any goons sitting on the state benches?

# ¿ Oct 20, 2014 19:19

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

nm posted:

My advice if you really want to do this: Come to California. As far as I know, we're the only place that pays a living wage to PDs as we're all at parity with DA's. At a large, urban office, you can top out near $200k and starting salaries aren't terrible. Except San Diego because people who work there are suckers.
Note that our big urban offices (San Francisco, Alameda, Santa Clara, LA, maybe OC DO care where you went to law school). Other offices don't (Anything in the Valley, IE, smaller counties). You get a pension which can still near 100% at 65 y.o. after pension reform (I have an old pension, I'm retiring at 55 bitches), vacations, and it is virtually impossible to be fired.
On the other hand, it is stressful as gently caress, thankless, everyone hates you, politics, and a continuous fight between what is best for the clients and what is best for the office. If the idea of having hundreds of open cases, doing too many trials without enough prep time and few resources appeals to you, PD work may be for you. Everyone "wants" to be a PD, but most people burn out quick and note that the skills are hard to transfer.
Caveat: We still have hundreds of people applying for every opening, and it is expected that you'll work for free for a year or so somewhere to even get an interview.

edit: DAs on the other hand, have an easy as gently caress job. If you have no soul, do that. Bonus: Good for getting into politics.

CT is the same...PD contract has to mirror the prosecutors. (They aren't allowed to unionize though)

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 00:21

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

enraged_camel posted:

I have a question and I figured I'd ask here.

I'm starting a business and will be employing primarily independent contractors. I need an independent contractor agreement. I did some research and it seems like the type of thing I should NOT try to write myself. The problem is that lawyers are loving expensive. Most that I've looked at charge hundreds of dollars an hour, which is money I don't have right now.

Anyone here got experience with this sort of thing? The agreement won't be complex - I just need to cover my bases and make sure it doesn't say anything that is against California state law.

A. Drafting a contractual agreement actually is VERY complex.
B. So let me get this straight...you want to start a business, presumably to make money...but you don't want to pay a "loving expensive lawyer." Will you be offering your services for free once your business is set up? If not, you're a bit hypocritical, no?
C. BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
D. No, really. BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

ActusRhesus fucked around with this message at 13:58 on Oct 29, 2014

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 13:54

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

Another acquittal on a sexual assault case today.

goarmy.com

pfft...acquitting someone of sexual assault at court-martial is like shooting porpoises in a bucket. Was it a "sexual assault" or a "I got drunk and hosed a guy from my work station. Then my boyfriend/husband/parents/LCPO found out. RAPE!" case?

Anyway, gratz on your acquittal.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 13:56

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

I'm the trial counsel

Ah. Bummer. Well, then don't take it personally because I stand by my statement that getting an acquittal in a court-martial is like shooting a porpoise in a bucket. Most sexual assault cases I saw while I was in were cases a civilian prosecutor wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole. Ironically, when DoD does have a valid case, they invariably are too chicken poo poo to do anything about it, trip over their own dicks, and then blame the most junior person in the room...usually the trial counsel. See e.g. US v. Velasquez.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 14:05

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

Oh yeah this (like 90% of my Art. 120 cases) would have never seen the light of day in the civilian world. Somehow that never makes it on the news stories though! It's all about how we don't do enough.

probably because the rare occasion there is a real case, some convening authority invariably fucks it up and people who are ignorant of the complete lack of prosecutorial discretion in the military just blame the lawyers. Check your inbox.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 14:16

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

So apparently we have a litigant arriving in family court at my courthouse from...wait for it...Liberia. Note to self: Avoid public bathroom.

~~I wonder what our worker's comp laws say about catching Ebola?~~ Can anyone in here who is a worker's comp or employment attorney tell me for free what the law says about catching Ebola?

ActusRhesus fucked around with this message at 15:10 on Oct 29, 2014

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 14:28

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Soothing Vapors posted:

AR is easily my favorite new poster to this thread in several years

still waiting for my plaque and/or statuette and/or gift certificate.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 15:18

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

This sounds cynical but I'm honestly starting to think it's a backlash to the over-saturation of "training" potential panel members are receiving on this poo poo...

You may very well be right. I always drank most heavily after the alcohol awareness stand downs. Because gently caress you, you're not the boss of me.

In all seriousness though...there is definitely a perception that the DoD has a "get the numbers up at all cost" mentality, which I'm sure will either consciously or subconsciously make the members adopt a more critical view towards the evidence. The very public (and terrible fact pattern) cases don't help this.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 15:22

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Mr. Nice! posted:

Note this does not count for staff corps, but you guys don't really count anyways.

I was going to type some clever reply but...you're right. :cry:

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 15:51

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

We actually had a metrics tracking system that included fields for "lean 6 sigma." How many hours a day would you say you spend Lean Six Sigmaing?

When I pointed out that "According to Wikipedia, the most informative source on all things ever 'Lean Six Sigma is a methodology that relies on a collaborative team effort to improve performance by systematically removing waste; combining lean manufacturing/lean enterprise and Six Sigma to eliminate the eight kinds of waste (muda): defects, overproduction, waiting, non-utilized talent , transportation, inventory, motion, extra-processing (abbreviated as "DOWNTIME")' and therefore my greatest Lean Six Sigma contribution was not using their metric tracker, as all the information in it was already cumulative of my appointment log and client notes" my CO was not amused. Said CO later became a three star.

# ¿ Oct 29, 2014 16:04

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

blarzgh posted:

Mr. Olfman argues the claim may be lengthy and that he could pare it down to �an ordinary claim� of 20 pages or less, but that would do it an injustice as it is an �extraordinary claim� that will alter the course of Canada for years to come.

God, I love pro se litigants. Unrelated, Ebola litigant's case has apparently been continued. Will keep posted.

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 16:04

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

bummer

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 17:40

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

woozle wuzzle posted:

Seems like a natural segue into discussing jehovah's witnesses as clients...

Fee Agreement: 200/hr plus copying expenses, and I get a letter of recommendation to be one of the 144,000.

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 18:43

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

So how much trouble would I get in if I submitted a response brief that just said

ARGUMENT

This guy is a loving rear end in a top hat.

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons this Court should affirm the ruling of the habeas court.

Because that's kind of where I'm at with this.

# ¿ Oct 30, 2014 21:05

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

joat mon posted:

None, but only if you work at Code 46.
(Or some attorney general's office doing criminal appeals)

jesus, how many loving JAGs are in here?

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 01:23

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

joat mon posted:

If we can find a zoomie and a coastie and we'll have the full set!

Yay joint goons. Btw, how's that whole "i may or may not have actually completed marine training" thing shaking out?

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 02:47

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Subterfrugal posted:

I can't see how this is anything but a cathouse.

*nods*

Could also be meth lab, bbut they generally don't worry about taxes

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 10:41

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

joat mon posted:

/\ /\ /\
"Joe" or "dogface" or "meh"

What thing is that?
My era's thing was "I may or may not have actually passed the bar."

Oh, it's quite the scandal. Birtheresque, except possibly real. Apparently the commandant may have lied about completing tbs. From what i understand in his era certain specialties got waived which ok fine, whatever, but on more than one resume he's claimed to have graduated. Then claimed kt was via corrrespondence course. typing on a tablet right now so linking is difficult but if you google sempre lie you'll get the jist. (:this comes right after all the "the weirick" peeing on taliban uci drama. Good times for Amos!)

And i can think of nothing more derrogatory than simply being called army. *shudder*

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 10:53

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

I have paralegals friend defendants on Facebook using a fake "sexy lady" account then screenshot the dumb poo poo they say on their walls. Haven't tried to introduce anything from these efforts yet, BUT SOMEDAY

The only thing better than facebook is myspace. Half of our gang intel comes from facebook. And yes, it's admissible so long as its relevant and more probative than prejudicial etc. etc. Just did a murder trial where we pulled tons of pictures from facebook to prove "associations" between various fine upstanding youths. (Of course with the proper limiting instruction that the jury was not to consider the gang symbols being flashed by the defendant in any of these photos blah blah blah)

Though if your paralegal actually communicates with them, that might be a problem...better stick to the publicly available info.

ewr2870 posted:

This almost certainly violates your state's rules of professional conduct.

Yup. Tread lightly there.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 16:08

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

the milk machine posted:

Yeah, I would definitely not do that. I wouldn't be too excited about trying to explain how friending someone on facebook is different than communication with a represented adverse party.

especially when so many of them are stupid enough to have public profiles anyway.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 16:20

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

And if you really believe there's incriminating evidence behind a locked profile, facebook is actually wonderful about complying with warrants, subpoenas and court orders.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 16:44

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Defleshed posted:

I had no idea these opinions existed, but after some thought it is definitely one interpretation of how things go. Overzealous mistake I guess. There is no communication going on other than the initial "friend" request, but better safe than sorry.

There isn't anything specifically on-point on this in the Illinois ethics opinions, but I certainly don't want to be the test case. Guess I better forward those opinions to the individuals who suggested this to me as well! Thanks for the links guys.

Did you have success with that while in the military? I never have been able to get FB to comply with our subpoenas, normally because we don't ever really have "specific and articulate facts" under the SCA. We just wanna have a look around.

only time i needed a subpoena for a non-military person, I had the USAO do it for me. Networking...it pays.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 19:14

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Kalman posted:

Lecture notes is the most boring one - technical expert gave his opinion, turned out to have said pretty much the opposite thing in a lecture he gave his students.

One of my co-workers crossing a defense expert:

You're getting paid for your testimony today, right?

Yes.

How much?

whatever the amount was...it was a lot.

If I gave you (Amount +1) would you testify for me?

THAT WOULD BE UNETHICAL!!!!! *witness proceeds to have indignant melt down on stand.*

*awkward silence*

What about (amount +50)?

This of course is the same co-worker who, upon receiving notice that he was going to be laid off at the end of the day due to a statewide budget issue, walked into traffic court and nolled the entire motor vehicle docket. I don't even want to know how much that cost the state. Probably enough to have kept him on the payroll for at least a few more months. (epilogue, the budget issue resolved itself and all the laid off attorneys were promptly rehired.) Needless to say, I consider this man one of my most valuable mentors.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2014 21:40

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

Kalman posted:

We prep our experts on how to answer that (the answer is "No, of course not. I am working for client because I believe they're correct.") (Also it can backfire if your expert is cheaper, and they will get asked about their rate - sometimes juries will say "well that guy is getting paid more so he must be smarter" because god drat juries.)

I'm sure they did too. They underestimated this particular attorney's ability to really piss people off.

# ¿ Nov 1, 2014 00:45

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

yronic heroism posted:

The (pro tem) judge I deal with has insisted to me all facebook is inadmissible hearsay and "I won't look at it." Fortunately the end results in child support cases are difficult to alter.

well...things that are written on facebook, he's probably right about admissibility but for the wrong reason. unless you can give sufficient evidence that it really is in fact their account...it's not a hearsay issue, if it's allegedly the statement of a party opponent, but there is a sufficiently reliable issue.

HOWEVER...pictures...oh yes. Pictures. Pictures are worth 1,000 words.

# ¿ Nov 2, 2014 13:36

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

yronic heroism posted:

It's a party opponent situation, and when they're right there on the stand I think I should be able to hand them a copy of the printout and ask about it. There's ways around it, but just seems more cumbersome to ask "Are you Noglove Freelove on facebook? What did you mean by 'I hope those kids know how to forage for their meals'? Do you remember being photographed at Gentleman Johnson's last month and what denominations were you shoving in that stripper's G-string."

And there's where my practice are bias creeps in. Our party opponents don't usually take the stand unless they have an exceptionally dull defense counsel or are truly stupid, so we have to authenticate via other means. Still, it's more an issue for typed statements than photos. The photos we are almost always able to get in.

# ¿ Nov 3, 2014 12:56

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 08:27

ActusRhesus: Sep 18, 2007; "Perhaps the fact the defendant had to be dragged out of the courtroom while declaring 'Death to you all, a Jihad on the court' may have had something to do with the revocation of his bond. That or calling the judge a bald-headed cock-sucker. Either way."

evilweasel posted:

It's a lot more work working with new lawyers. You've got to remember thoug that many of their fuckups are most likely your fault and not theirs. Assigning out work to people, especially new lawyers, is a real skill and it takes effort, and the first few times it's probably not going to go that well and you need to remember what it was like when you had no loving idea what was going on and figure out how to do it better next time. You definitely can't blame some first-year lawyer for not knowing the case and/or reading your mind when they started three months ago, even though every time you get back something that wasn't what you needed is frustrating and I'm guessing that's what zoozle is dealing with right now. That said though, every so often a new lawyer pulls a doozie that shows they have no regular common sense or judgment at all and that's never a good sign.

It's like you worked at my old firm or something. First job out of JAG land was with a biglaw white shoe type place.

Was asked to write a motion for summary judgment. Was given an outline written by an associate who was leaving the firm. Outline had been worked on for over 6 months (file churning, anyone?) and approved by both partner in charge of case and client's in house counsel.

I wrote motion based on outline. And was then torn a new one for not including an additional argument that was not on the outline, and I had not been asked to include. Apparently I "should have known to include it." Whereas I thought "hi, here's an outline we spent six months working on and have already had approved by our client's counsel, so please write a motion based on this outline" was a fairly straightforward tasking.

Long story short: biglaw blows.
Epilogue: I ended up leaving the firm, the case went to trial, resulted in one of the largest jury verdicts in our state's history against our client, and I got a good chuckle listening to seasoned members of the local bar asking "why didn't they do this, or that?" where "this" and "that" were all suggestions I had made but was told to shut up because I had no civil litigation experience.

ActusRhesus fucked around with this message at 15:46 on Nov 3, 2014

# ¿ Nov 3, 2014 15:42

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Business, Finance, and Careers > Lawyer & Law School Megathread #12: Started Out Barrister, Ended Up Barista

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