What in the Bitter Lawyer is going on in this picture?
Put your lawyerly wit to the test and post a comment with a hilarious caption about this courtroom drama. And keep it clean. (Ish.) The editors’ favorite entry will be announced next Saturday, March 7th.
Editors’ Pick (Feb. 21-27):
Craig: “And you thought being a lawyer was making YOU go crazy!!!”
Quick headlines from the Bitter Newsroom that you can read after you stop imaging Bundchen/Brady honeymoon sex:
“Latham & Watkins has confirmed to The Am Law Daily that it is laying off 190 associates, or approximately 12 percent of the firm’s associate base. The firm also announced cuts of 250 non-legal staff, including paralegals. The layoffs are the most dramatic cuts announced so far by an Am Law 100 firm.” ‘Nuff said. [Am Law Daily]
Not so fast, six-year-old boy molester, despite the fact that SCOTUS ruled in your favor, the state’s high court says the ruling stands. “The court’s ruling upholds Danforth’s 1996 conviction. Danforth, who was a lawyer and represented himself at trial, is serving a 26-year prison term.” So sit your ass back down and stay awhile. [StarTribune.com]
Jack Kevorkian’s lawyer says that Dr. Death isn’t vibing with the killing methods of Final Exit Network, a national assisted suicide ring. He’s got to protect his legacy somehow. [Detroit Free Press]
A bankruptcy trustee and attorneys from the law firm Baker Hostetler LLP are finding assets of Madoff’s to sell and return to investors. They’ve found $950 million so far. And that’s just change from the couch cushions. [Bloomberg]
Law schools going gradeless—I thought we covered this, ASHBY. [WSJ Law Blog]
Many people use statistics the way drunk people uses a light post—more for support than illumination. Here are 17 facts to drop into a conversation this weekend.
300
Percentage by which enrollment in bankruptcy CLE courses has grown in the past six months according Lawline.com.
$5 million
Minimum guaranteed annual paycheck for Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker lawyer Luc Despins, who came on board last year to beef up the firm’s high-profile bankruptcy practice, according to The WSJ Law Blog.
$200,000
Average salary for IT Support Managers in Big Firms according to Sue Magazine for women in litigation.
$86,159
Median expected salary for a typical litigation manager, according to CNN Salary Wizard.
14
Number of law firms included in the Project for Attorney Retention’s annual survey on gender in the legal profession that failed to promote a single female to partner.
8
Nationwide median number of schools legal employers visit, according to the National Association for Law Placement.
$7 million
Approximate amount paid out to 35 retiring partners at Heller Ehrman before the firm filed for bankruptcy late last year, according to a Statement of Financial Affairs filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Northern District of California.
271
Number of results for the Google query “law school gunner.”
2
Number of lawyers who graduated from Golden Gate University School of Law who are employed at Morrison & Foerster according to mofo.com.
88
Number of lawyers who graduated from University of California, Berkeley, School of Law employed at Morrison & Foerster according to mofo.com.
$18.95
Price of the “Sorry, I only date lawyers” t-shirt available on Zazzle.com.
$75,000
Yale Law School’s threshold for instituting a pay freeze. The new policy limits salary increases to faculty and staff earning below $75,000, according to The ABA Journal.
30
Percent increase of new boutique and solo law firms opened in 2008 in Charlotte, North Carolina, according to Charlotte Business Journal.
5
Number of Catholic Justices currently serving on the U.S. Supreme Court, according to the site Religious Affiliation of the U.S. Supreme Court.
$1.2 billion
Estimated total cost in fees for bankers, accountants and lawyers, should General Motors file for bankruptcy according to Bloomberg.com.
$258,000
Amount awarded in grants for public interest law programs by the state bar of California according to the California Bar Journal.
20
Estimated number of law schools with official Twitter feeds according to Social Media Law Student.
Got a fascinating factoid to share? Of course you do. Email us at .
Check out other lists, tallies and scores to settle in Bitter by Numbers.
Phew, Tiger’s back. Now how about some quick headlines from the Bitter Newsroom?:
How did one woman contract herpes? It wasn’t from playing beer pong! In a landmark verdict, a jury awarded nearly $7 million to a 56-year-old woman infected with incurable genital herpes after sexual contact with a 77-year-old man. The man knew he’d been infected for 25 years but failed to disclose it prior to their relationship. I guess if you live as lavishly as the Valtrex advert people, it can easily slip your mind, but honestly, is $7 million nearly enough? [Fox News]
And this will make you want to wear a body condom: According to the Charlotte H Social Club for STD infectees (FUN!), one in four adults have genital herpes. Happy dogging! [Creative Loafing]
Matthew Richardson isn’t the only one playing the race card this Black History Month—it’s everywhere these days. While Rupert Murdoch is trying to stuff it back in the deck, the NAACP isn’t so willing to call it a misdeal. (And let’s not even discuss the royal flush that is the watermelon patch at the White House.) But Obama isn’t the only one in Washington feeling burned by discrimination, Yolanda Young, a former Covington & Burling associate, filed a suit against her former firm. Complete with blog play-by-play. As Spike Lee would say, Do the Right Thing—and be careful about what lawyers you owe favors. [Am Law Daily]
Of the 56,481 law school applications so far this year, 6,169 of them belong to Penn Law, which is a 6% increase. An exact percentage increase of their head size over the situation is TBD. [The Daily Pennsylvanian]
Attorney General Eric Holder gives five stars to an exclusive Cuba B&B called Gitmo, lauding the people and facilities. [CNN]
When your flight turns into a cruise and you survive, do you sue? “In apparent confirmation that America remains the most litigious society in the world, Kreindler and Kreindler, a New York law firm, says it has been contacted by passengers of Flight 1549 about claiming damages for post-traumatic stress disorder.” Damn geese. [Times Online]
Courtesy of Solicitr, we discovered the addictive fun of Partner Doppelgangers and Associate Photo Captions. Enjoy. [Litination]
“Matthew, I need your help with something,” the senior partner said as I stepped into his office.
Even I couldn’t get you laid with that gigantic mole on your face.
“There are going to be some changes around here.”
I don’t like where this is going… I am way too hung over to get canned today. I wouldn’t have the energy to go down in a blaze of glory.
“I’m just gonna put it out there,” he said. “Matthew, I need your opinion about some cutbacks we’re making.”
Yes, I am the firm’s greatest asset. Don’t fire me.
Quick headlines from the Bitter Newsroom that you can kick back, relax and enjoy now that Mary Jane has the California budget crisis solved:
The much-anticipated Watchmen movie’s success will determine how significant of a reversal of fortune its producer stands to pay out of pocket. It all stems from a complicated legal battle between feuding Warner Bros. and Fox studios over the movie rights. Sort of a superhero Springtime for Hitler situation. [THR, Esq.]
It’s freezing in New Haven. Yale has instituted a flat line in pay for faculty. Go Eli! [ABA Journal]
“Celebs” faced some consequences for grandstanding with automobiles. Britney Spears’ paparazzo ex-boyfreind, Adnan Ghalib, discovered that life sucks on the other side of the camera. He was charged with felony assault with a deadly weapon and hit-and-run. Meanwhile, hoops star Charles Barkley was sentenced to 10 days of riding the bench in prison for drunk driving. [People (Ghalib) | Reuters (Barkley)]
Heller Ehrman’s partners took the money and ran in 2008. $7 million between 35 departing or retiring partners, which triggered the firm’s collapse. [Law.com]
When you mix together all the bubblegum of The Hills with all the relevance of the White House, you get The District. And with Obama as Lauren Conrad—I believe that makes Hill and Bill the DC Heidi and Spencer. [Newsweek]
Possible future episode: DC voting rights. Democrats become likely to receive a new permanent seat, but it results in a brooding fight between the cast over whether it’s constitutional. Then there’s a fashion show. [WSJ Law Blog]
Having first discovered Catalina Girald’s BigLaw connection on Law Shucks, we recently caught up with Ms. Girald to find out more about the former Big Firm lawyer turned model/fashion entrepreneur.
Catalina Girald
Founder and Fashionista-in-Chief
Moxsie, the online retail destination for independent designer fashion.
Boston College Law School.
I would have never made law review. I absolutely hated law school, so I enrolled in New England School of Photography concurrently. I spent a lot more time in the dark room and hanging out on the floor of the photo galleries at NESP with the artsy folk than I did in the law school library.
Skadden, Arps.
Mergers and Acquisitions.
In my family, there were really only two career options: Doctor or lawyer.
In college, I majored in biology because I wanted to be a surgeon—but the one thing I was terrified of was Calculus. Every time I enrolled in the class (about three times beginning my senior year in high school), I would drop it for fear that it would hurt my GPA. One day my career counselor pulled me aside and told me that if I wanted to pass the MCAT, I would have to overcome my fear of Calculus. There was no way that was happening, so I changed my major to political science and decided to go for career option number two.
Five years later, I was standing in line in Albany to take the New York Bar Exam, and the guy in front of me started asking people why they had gone to law school. When I told him my story, he said, “But there’s no Calculus on the MCAT!”
“How would you know?” I replied.
“Because I paid my way through law school by teaching MCAT for Kaplan—trust me, there is no Calculus on the MCAT.”
So, I stared at him in frustration and exclaimed, “So, what the hell am I doing here?”
And that is the story of why I went to law school. Ironically, I ended up having to learn Calculus to attend business school at Stanford. It wasn’t on the GMAT, but it was a pretty big part of the economics class.
Academically, law school was harder. Especially because of the competition for grades.
I had the good fortune of going to Stanford for business school where there are no grades, so class was a lot more about learning than about making the grade. In business school there were classes, like statistics, that I had to take, but I wasn’t at all interested in. So I would go, but I had the choice of focusing my energy on an engineering class “across the street” (the term for non-business school classes) and a design class at the Stanford Design School that was teaching something I really wanted to learn.
I learned a lot in both schools, but I learned a lot more in business school than I did in law school.
My best and worst moments were actually the same. In Mergers & Acquisitions, we used to take a sick pleasure in working (and bragging about working) really long hours. I once billed 137 hours in one week and by the end of it, I barely knew my name.
But there was always something really exciting about those weeks, closing a deal, feeling the adrenaline flowing in the room, watching the press release appear in the Wall Street Journal after submitting the last change to the PR hours before, and running around like crazy at the printers. It was hellish, but it taught me that I could do anything.
I used to love working 100-hour weeks and bragging about it to colleagues over Thursday’s attorney lunches. But then it got to the point that I couldn’t stand being at Skadden any longer—not even to use the free gym facilities with subsidized personal trainers and gym clothes that they would wash for you. A lot of us felt this way, and people dealt with it differently.
One friend of mine at Skadden took a job across the street at The New York Times writing for Bold Face Names (a now-defunct gossip column). He would hop back and forth from the NYT office and Skadden as needed. It kept him sane.
He eventually convinced me to enroll at FIT (Fashion Institute of Technology). So, I started doing the same—I would hop back and forth from classes on 27th and 7th to meetings on 42nd and Broadway. In between all of that I would take Kaplan GMAT classes online and do practice questions on the subway.
I’ve always been obsessed with fashion and design, and through my travels, I have amassed a collection of pieces that you can’t find locally and aren’t readily available online either. There is no way for online consumers to find cool, new brands online using simple keyword searches, so solving the problem of creating a direct connection between the designer and the end consumer so that the consumer can efficiently discover fashion online became my mission.
I think we’ve made great headway in solving this problem—but it is all still hidden in our private beta.
Moxsie is all about independent fashion designers from around the world. I set out to create a centralized destination where consumers could go to find the coolest brands on the planet as well as brands that are green or socially responsible.
Moxsie is a place to purchase, but it is also a place to come and hang out and learn. We place a lot of emphasis on telling the story of each designer and each particular product so that the consumer can develop an intellectual and emotional connection with the product or brand. I was always a fan of the J. Peterman catalog when I was a child. I loved reading about the exotic places that the pieces came from, the history behind the garment, and the inspiration behind the design. That is the feeling I am trying to recreate at Moxsie.
I want to show the world that beauty is in the everyday person. The iconic, anorexic model shouldn’t be the ideal of beauty—a lot of Photoshop goes into those shots, and they create unreal expectations and low self-esteem in girls and women. I want to move away from that, so Moxsie uses real people as models. I just happen to be one of the real people.
Our current models include an architecture student and a physicist from Hewlett-Packard who one day hopes to win the Nobel Prize in Physics.
This is so cliché, but there’s no such thing as a typical day. That’s why I like it.
Right now, I’m in Las Vegas for the industry shows with designers (who are a crazy bunch), and then I’m flying to New York to meet with more designers. On nights that I travel, I usually end up at a club or bar around 3:00 AM with assorted designers, stylists, celebrities, and backers. I get to meet a lot of interesting people and learn about their experiences.
For example, I got to hang out with Eric Ryan, one of the founders of Method, two nights ago. That was really exciting for me since I’ve always admired his business—even better was his willingness to share his experiences with me as an entrepreneur.
Last week you would have found me ironing clothes, styling photo shoots and taking breaks to talk to our VC investors. We’ve just launched five new designers and orders are flying out the door, so I want to be back in the office to keep an eye, but I have to rely on the staff to keep me updated.
I don’t think I’m a Bitter Lawyer. When people ask me, “Should I go to law school?” my first reply is “No!” But that is just because so many people I know become lawyers, don the golden handcuffs and end up feeling unfulfilled with their work life.
But I owe a lot to the practice of law. For starters, the first partner I ever worked for (at Winston & Strawn) invested $100K in Moxsie and has been a phenomenal mentor throughout this process. I also owe a lot to Skadden, which taught me that I could push myself to work so hard that I could accomplish anything. I know that it is possible to work around the clock and get the impossible done within a very short timeframe because we worked miracles all the time at Skadden—and no one ever died of exhaustion.
Lastly, had I not become a lawyer, I would never have met my best friends.
I think that if you are unhappy with your job you should move somewhere else. Life is too short, and lawyers are too risk averse. Go out there and try to do what you love. If you don’t like it, you can always go back to the practice of law—it is a skill set that will never leave you.
The clothes you wear at work really give you credibility.
For men: Stick to nicely tailored suits, 100% wool (always). When in doubt about ties, play it safe. Funky socks give you a little bit of personality.
For women: This one goes out to a particular partner at Skadden—don’t wear tights with your skirt suits. Ever.
Obviously, with a mission to promote independent designer fashion, Moxsie won’t carry Hermes or Ferragamo, but we do carry stuff lawyers can wear off hours.
I recommend the men’s shoes from 100 Styles and Running, which are a hybrid between dress shoes and street shoes—like the most comfortable Vans you wore in high school, but with better lines and the highest-quality material.
For women, I love the trinkets and baubles that we carry from Potluck Paris, a bold and sometimes delicate line of jewelry from Europe.
Quick headlines from the Bitter Newsroom for fat Val Kilmer’s Fat Tuesday pleasure:
He might be willing to predict her time of death, but thank God Sen. Jim Bunning isn’t engraving RBG’s headstone. He misspelled her name twice in his letter of apology for referring to her as good as dead. It’s not Ruth Ginsberg. And Barbi reminds you that it’s not Ruth Gerber either. [Kentucky.com]
The “mega-firm business model” is feeling serious strain. The sky and profits are falling all over BigLaw’s creation (Proskauers, Cravath), and some are doing a lawyer dump round two. But get some perspective already! [Adam Smith, Esq.]
Who’s the man behind the man? Madoff couldn’t have gone it alone. [Bloomberg]
The textbook economic model is guns and butter, but one lawyer thought trading in guns and drugs was more complimentary. Till he got arrested for possession of methamphetamine and more than 30 firearms. [Los Angeles Times]
We chide lazy children. We wish they showed some entrepreneurial spirit. And everyone should be more self-sufficient, right? So what kind of message are we sending our kids when we bust and arrest sweet sixteeners like Jazmine Finley and Tatiana Tye for starting a small, mom-and-pop prostitution business? [Fox News]
Strippers. Customers. Six-foot buffer. Moral crusade. Settle out of court. [MSNBC]
QI think I made a big mistake, and as my friends jump up and down about their jobs, I am somewhat scared. I elected to come to law school to make a big difference. If you ask me to define “big difference,” I would be as perplexed as someone trying to define the standards for reasonableness. After one year, the naiveté wore off; reality hit me. There were loans, parents getting older, and the desire to some day have a family. I realized I looked like a hippie, and if I wanted to make a living, I needed to not look like I hit the bong before, after, and during class.
Keep Reading ⇒
Quick headlines from the Bitter Newsroom, whether or not your law school is retiring in Florida:
Promptly closing shop at 5:00 PM got Texas’ “top criminal judge” charged with failing to ensure proper access to the legal system and eroding public confidence in the fairness of judges for an incident with a lawyer seeking a last-minute delay for a client’s execution. [Statesman.com]
A top grad at a top law school? Quit your bellyaching. It’s all bueno for Big Firm jobs. [The National Law Journal]
It’s not just Law Firm 10 who’s begging female attorneys to spruce up their look. In these lean economic times, U.K. firms have brought in the big guns as a “perk” to teach lady lawyers to “embrace their inner femininity.” There’s a woman in there somewhere. They swear. [The Delaware Employment Law Blog]
Damn, who knew refusing to condemn waterboarding as torture was going to come back to haunt him so much? UNC Law School’s pick of former Bush-administration Attorney General Michael Mukasey as commencement speaker is going over, well,…it isn’t going over. [Myrtle Beach Online]
A gorilla law student in his natural habitat as observed by Diane Fossey? My guess is that as long as the subject doesn’t go crazy and rip someone’s face off, it’s going to be pretty boring. [Virginia Law Weekly]
We declare Junichi Semitsu the first Asian American Bitter Lawyer identified on this site. Because we think Do the Right Thing got robbed by the Academy too. [Angry Asian Man]
