Author: TSA Press

In my first column at Above The Law a year ago, I chose to discuss the failures of principled consistency. I felt it necessary to begin a column that focused primarily on civil liberties to discuss whether consistent application of an enumerated set of deals is even possible. As was the case a year ago, I must admit there is not much evidence to support the notion.

I mean think about it, four years ago Republicans were accusing Democrat president Barack Obama, without a shred of evidence of course, of initiating an armed coup against the state of Texas. These were not just hyperbolic accusations either. Texas Governor Doug Abbot ordered the Texas State Guard to monitor the routine federal military exercises. Yet this same Republican party is now trying to claim this president is being treated unfairly because of things like, and I am not kidding, that people won’t agree the president never lies.

Most of the time I must admit I don’t even know how to respond to the supporters of this current president. What could I even say to a group of people who continue to claim this guy is all about “America first” despite the clear and unambiguous report by his administration’s DOJ that he welcomed illegal acts committed by our top foreign adversary against fellow Americans? How does the supposed party of law and order expect my respect, much less my vote, when they excuse this president illegally obstructing the investigation into a hostile foreign power’s crimes?

I understand that no party or person is likely going to live up perfectly to a set of ideals, I also understand that terrible leadership is “as American as apple pie.” In fact, gross hypocrisy is an original American feature. For example, at the same time the framers were demanding “freedom” from oppression, they themselves kept millions upon millions of African Americans in ghastly bondage.

I know all this, yet I continue trudge on with my belief that principled consistency is not only possible, but ideal. In the past year, I have tried my best to call out the threats and violations to civil liberties as I see them, regardless of which party or which person is behind them. I am still here writing, so I guess all I can say is thank you to everyone who reads my stuff, and cheers to another year of trying to be consistent. I’ll end with some other personal reflections from my first year at ATL:

• The Mueller report was a heavy f*cking lift.

• The Fourth Amendment exists in name only.

• The Drug War is a catastrophic, bigoted, expensive, ineffective failure.

Tyler Broker’s work has been published in the Gonzaga Law Review, the Albany Law Review, and is forthcoming in the University of Memphis Law Review. Feel free to email him or follow him on Twitter to discuss his column.

Checklists are important. Pilots (and their passengers) rely on them every time they fly. So do surgeons when performing even the most routine of operations. As with many things, however, a checklist is only as good as the person or people who put it together. A checklist created by an amateur pilot without deep and broad experience flying planes, for example, might be helpful to that pilot. But it would pale in comparison to a checklist created for taking off and landing a 777, created by an industry-wide consortium of expert pilots. In short, the value of a checklist is reflective of the expertise and thoughtfulness of those creating it.

In my experience, lawyers do not use checklists nearly enough. Perhaps because they are time-consuming to create. Nor are they easily delegated to associates to craft, except for perhaps the most mundane or routine tasks, like handling ECF filings in a particular court. Moreover, creating checklists runs counter to the familiar lawyer pretension that all matters are necessarily unique — thereby justifying static (and high), rather than variable, billable rates whenever the lawyer can get away with it. Either way, I have no desire to create a checklist in this series of columns. Instead, I want to encourage IP associates — particularly the newbies who may be starting work at their first post-law school firms over the next few weeks — to start thinking about what kinds of checklists a successful IP associate might aim to use.

To that end, it is helpful to consider what the true goals of a successful IP associate should be. Now that I am over a decade removed from my own time as an IP associate, I think the best articulation of what an IP associate (and any lawyer) should strive for was made by one of my own supervising partners, the inimitable and exacting Barry Schindler of Greenberg Traurig. He would often exclaim how important it was to learn how to do things right so “you know what you are doing when you are 40 years old.” A clear exhortation that I should do whatever I could to get both broad and deep experience in as many aspects of IP legal practice as possible, while I still had the guidance of more senior lawyers readily available.

At the same time, the built-in wisdom of that statement is in forcing associates to recognize that the lawyer they will be at 40 can and should be a much better version of the lawyer they are now. To get there, however, IP associates must be both curious and determined, as well as self-motivated. I have yet to see a firm where there is a genie doling out the “best experience” for each and every associate out at each step of every associate’s career. But that is okay, since it helps distinguish the associates actually cut out for long-term success in IP practice from their just-collecting-a-check compatriots. But before you can start planning how to achieve the goal of becoming a well-rounded IP associate, it is helpful to think a bit about the difference between broad and deep experience, while acknowledging how important getting both is in any successful legal field.

Let’s start with how to get broad experience — otherwise known as trying to get exposure to as wide a range of lawyers, clients, and legal matters as possible. We can discuss each in turn, but first a word of caution. It can be very frustrating to ambitious young lawyers when they don’t get the exposure they want to a breadth of matters. If you find yourself in that situation, try and remember a few things. One is that nothing lasts forever, and that good work on whatever you are stuck with will open up other opportunities later. Second, that you can and should always seize whatever control you can of your time to make sure you don’t get discouraged. So try and keep a side project — whether it is an article, research project, or whatever — going at all times. Heck, you can even create a checklist for the type of matter you are stuck on to help the next generation of unlucky souls stuck with a similar project.

Back to acquiring a breadth of experiences as an IP associate. We can assume you will seek them out, while keeping in mind that the words “I can help” carry disproportionate power at law firms. Start by taking an inventory of the partners in your group. Can you find a way to work with as many of them as possible? Expand that out over time to trying to work with partners in other offices (believe me that making a good impression on them is super important in partnership election discussions about you) and other practice groups. Grab opportunities to interact with other lawyers you are working with, whether they are local, co-, or even opposing counsel. There is something to learn from everyone, even other IP lawyers

Take a similar approach to acquiring a breadth of exposure to different types of clients. In IP, you can find yourself working with inventors and designers during one hour, followed by discussion with in-house counsel at a global technology company the next. Breadth of client exposure includes seeking out a chance to serve foreign and domestic companies, of all sizes, operating in a wide variety of industries. Again, true breadth of experience needs time, so be patient. But also be mindful of whether the firm you are at is giving you as broad an exposure to a range of clients as you think you need for long-term success.

Perhaps most importantly, seek out breadth of exposure to as full a range of different IP matters as possible. It helps keep things from getting stale professionally, and in my view, there is little value to either a lawyer or a firm for junior associates to classify themselves as strictly patent or trademark lawyers, for example. Yes, client matters will drive an associate’s exposure to the different IP disciplines, but associates should also be seeking out exposure to each of those disciplines as well, which means looking out for patent (including design patents,) trademark, copyright, and trade secret matters. Ideally, that exposure will include experience with litigation, prosecution, and licensing matters — including at least some exposure to marketing of IP services, litigation funding considerations, and IP acquisition or divestment matters. It may not all be possible at your current firm, or with your current practice, but it is worth being ambitious about acquiring that full breadth of experience as quickly as possible. 

Ultimately, acquiring breadth of experience as an IP associate bears important fruit later in a lawyer’s career. Having broad experience can make a senior lawyer more marketable, as well as more attractive to clients with a range of IP needs. Broad experience also helps prevent burnout, while allowing the bearer to see and appreciate the interplay of different aspects of IP rights. In short, broader is better when it comes to experience for IP associates. So start thinking about how achieving breadth would impact on your personal IP associate checklist. Next week, we will strive for some depth.

Please feel free to send comments or questions to me at gkroub@kskiplaw.com or via Twitter: @gkroub. Any topic suggestions or thoughts are most welcome.

Gaston Kroub lives in Brooklyn and is a founding partner of Kroub, Silbersher & Kolmykov PLLC, an intellectual property litigation boutique, and Markman Advisors LLC, a leading consultancy on patent issues for the investment community. Gaston’s practice focuses on intellectual property litigation and related counseling, with a strong focus on patent matters. You can reach him at gkroub@kskiplaw.com or follow him on Twitter: @gkroub.

Travis County, Texas Court-at-Law No. 3 Judge John Lipscombe doesn’t like Brett Kavanaugh, which, amen. He also believes that Kavanugh’s elevation to the Supreme Court is a blight on the nation’s judiciary, which, again, same. But when Lipscombe’s outrage over Justice Kavanaugh spilled over into a protest in his courtroom, he wound up in hot water with the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct.

In October of 2018, Lipscombe closed his courtroom with a black cloth over the door as a form of protest over the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. Lipscombe’s protest was even covered by local news.

The resulting media attention garnered Lipscombe five complaints over his protest. As reported by Texas Lawyer, even after getting called out by the Commission for his protests, Lipscombe gave the ultimate sorry, not sorry response:

“I strongly felt, and continue to feel, that the Supreme Court and our entire judiciary has been besmirched and that I had a personal obligation to show my disapproval and demonstrate my utmost respect for the judiciary and my dedication to our constitution and its principles of fairness and justice,” Lipscombe said, according to the reprimand.

The Commission ultimately found Lipscombe’s behavior was a violation of judicial ethics as it was influenced by “partisan interests and public clamor” and “cast public discredit on the judiciary or the administration of justice.” The Committee issued a public admonition, which can be read below, as punishment for his actions.

Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

We’ve branded them a “Will-They-Or-Won’t-They romantic comedy,” but now we know that the answer is definitively “won’t” with the two firms calling off merger talks.

As recently as July, we were hearing that this deal was right around the corner. It made all the sense in the world with Allen & Overy broadcasting a commitment to major expansion in the United States with O’Melveny sitting right there with almost no gap in firm PPP. Why wouldn’t these kids get together and launch a 3,000-lawyer firm with around $2.8 billion in revenue?

But there were problems lingering from the beginning of this saga. Immediately after the story came out, O’Melveny fiercely denied it, declaring, “We have no plans to merge and never have.” It was news to Allen & Overy, who didn’t try to lie to the press and confirmed they were in negotiations with an American firm. To say the firms weren’t on the same page at the time is an understatement — they weren’t on the same document set.

But somehow they got beyond the opening gate stumbles and enjoyed a long courtship complete with reported leadership trips to London and Frankfurt to hash out details. O’Melveny made concrete changes to its U.K. recruitment efforts in a seeming nod to an impending merger.

Still, rumors swirled that a small enclave of powerful A&O London partners were opposed to the deal. As the U.K. stares down the barrel of a business cataclysm entirely driven by old Englishmen refusing to embrace economic globalism… this all tracks.

Whether the deal died because of those partners, or the stated reason of troublesome foreign exchange rates, it’s back to the drawing board for Allen & Overy leadership reiterating that expanding in the U.S. “remains the highest priority.”

Allen & Overy and O’Melveny & Myers abandon merger talks [Legal Cheek]

Earlier: The ‘Allen & O’Melvery’ Merger Seems To Be Gaining Steam
Checking In On ‘Allen & O’Melvery,’ Biglaw’s Most Hilarious ‘Will They Or Won’t They’ RomCom
Allen & Overy And O’Melveny Are Considering Merger (Please Name It Allen & O’Melvery)
O’Melveny Tells ATL ‘We Have No Plans To Merge And Never Have.’

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg isn’t just considered an expert when it comes to doling out legal rulings from the highest court in the land. As it turns out, thanks to her lengthy marriage of 50+ years to the late Martin Ginsburg, she’s apparently also considered an expert when it comes to doling out relationship advice from the court of love.

Earlier this summer, global pop star Jennifer Lopez felt the need to consult with Ginsburg in her search for marriage advice prior to making it official with her fiancé, baseball star Alex Rodriguez. Over the weekend at an event sponsored by the Library of Congress, the Notorious RBG revealed that she took a meeting with J. Lo in her Supreme Court chambers, where they “had a very nice visit” and that Lopez “mostly wanted to ask if [Ginsburg] had any secret about a happy marriage.” CNN has the details:

“So what was your secret to a happy marriage? Did you pass on your mother-in-law’s secret?” Ginsburg was asked on Saturday by NPR’s Nina Totenberg.

The justice laughed and then shared the advice she received on her own wedding day.

“On the day I was married, my mother in law — I was married in her home — she took me aside and said she wanted to tell me what was the secret of a happy marriage,” Ginsburg said Saturday.

The “good advice” Ginsburg shared with the audience has helped her not just in her marriage, but in “every workplace, including the good job [she has] now.”

In case you’re wondering, Ginsburg told Lopez that “[i]t helps sometimes to be a little deaf,” and truer words have never been spoken when it comes to marriage advice.

RBG was married for more than 50 years. J.Lo asked her for marriage advice [CNN]

Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

Twenty-plus years of working at law firms and with lawyers and you learn a few things about the practice of law, client service, and legal operations in general. I frequently read and hear about leaders in corporate legal departments who want a law firm partner working on their legal problems.

Is this necessary when you can get the same or better legal counsel for half the cost?

Don’t misunderstand, GCs don’t want a 23-year-old first-year fresh out of law school as their lead attorney either. But there are plenty of legal minds to go around, many of which have matured within lawyers who are not partners.

There’s been some talk about the demise of the old-school law firm partner model. Sara Randazzo’s recent article in the Wall Street Journal made a splash when she wrote that the emergence of two-tier partnership structures at law firms sounds the death knell for life-time partnership at law firms. ATL’s Joe Patrice and David Lat recently wrote critically of non-equity partner structures, too.

I say, it probably doesn’t matter anyway.

I had a boss who argued to me that titles just don’t mean much. The thought was “who cares what we call the position; titles are free.” That may or may not be true, since clearly advantages are afforded to those who hold loftier titles. But when it comes to actually delivering legal services, does the lawyer’s title matter? My experience is that it does not.

A partnership is merely a way of setting up a business. In the end, law firms provide professional services and it shouldn’t matter whether the lawyer performing the work is a “real” partner, special counsel, or an associate. Frankly, most corporate legal leaders I talk to look at law firms as just another vendor.

The better question I think is why law firm partnerships thrive at all? Few firms actually function as partnerships, least of all the behemoth-sized firms. Practice areas, even in smaller firms, are siloed and function as separate little fiefdoms. Some firms are so large, it has been observed, that the so-called “partners” do not even know each other. If it weren’t for shared administrative services such as accounting, marketing, and the like, I’m not sure many firms would qualify as a going concern.

Anyone who has ever worked at a law firm figures out fairly quickly that most lawyers are terrible businesspeople. Smart firms leave the administration and operations to people with that experience.

So, where does this leave us? What does it mean to be a partner in a law firm today?

Honestly, the only discernable difference between partners and other lawyers at a firm is tenure and compensation. Some partners are good at generating business, but all lawyers are encouraged to develop new business. And sure, tenure generally means experience, and with experience comes a certain level of knowledge and skill, but given that it now takes like 10 years to become a partner, does anyone think the knowledge gap between the seventh-year associate or counsel and the partner is that far apart?

And the fact is that the attributes of being a partner have no correlation to how good one is at understanding complex litigation or transactional issues. Compensation means you’re successful financially, not necessarily that you’re any good. Prestige doesn’t mean a thing if you cannot execute.

No, what makes a lawyer valuable as outside counsel is their understanding of the client’s business, the client’s legal needs, and exposure to risk. Navigating and mitigating those needs, particularly in the face of contentious or complicated litigation or complex transactional issues, are what’s valued. Collaboration, creative problem solving, and great client service — these are the value points that corporate legal leaders seek. And you don’t need to be a partner to meet these needs.

In fact, arguably, some partners today are not as well-suited to manage modern litigation, eDiscovery, information governance, and cybersecurity issues. As the practice of law becomes more complex and the legal industry — hopefully — continues to evolve, it seems to me that young, technology-oriented lawyers are going to be positioned best to solve client business problems.

The hundreds of lawyers I’ve worked with over the course of my law firm career, many of whom I trained as first-years, are more than capable of working on and resolving complex legal issues. So, next time outside counsel’s invoice arrives, look at the partner’s hourly rate. The next call should be to a senior associate who probably bills at half that rate.

Mike Quartararo

Mike Quartararo is the managing director of eDPM Advisory Services, a consulting firm providing e-discovery, project management and legal technology advisory and training services to the legal industry. He is also the author of the 2016 book Project Management in Electronic Discovery. Mike has many years of experience delivering e-discovery, project management, and legal technology solutions to law firms and Fortune 500 corporations across the globe and is widely considered an expert on project management, e-discovery and legal matter management. You can reach him via email at mquartararo@edpmadvisory.com. Follow him on Twitter @edpmadvisory.

The Federalist Society is a political organization and the only people who won’t say that are willfully ignorant or actively lying. It is beyond obvious that the group does not merely exist to “debate” conservative and libertarian legal theories; it exists to advocate for specific political and legal outcomes in line with their policy agenda. The only reason FedSoc even maintains a facade of being a non-partisan organization is so the judges —  and lawyers who want to be judges — can support the FedSoc, show up at their events, and maintain an intellectually dishonest stance that they’re just there for the lobster rolls.

An old letter from FedSoc President Eugene Meyer, unearthed in the papers of Robert Bork and reported on in Politico, show plainly that the FedSoc is, and always has been, a political organization with a specific policy agenda:

Federalist Society documents that one of us recently unearthed, however, make this position untenable going forward. The documents, made public here for the first time, show that the society not only has held explicit ideological goals since its infancy in the early 1980s, but sought to apply those ideological goals to legal policy and political issues through the group’s roundtables, symposia and conferences…

But the newly unearthed documents—a 1984 grant proposal and cover letter, written by Meyer on the Federalist Society’s behalf and now housed in the late Judge Robert Bork’s papers at the Library of Congress—provide evidence that the Federalist Society, in contravention of what the new Code states, in fact “advocates for specific outcomes on legal or political issues.” This suggests that federal judges, by attending Federalist Society events, are transgressing the Code’s new guidelines. Given the importance of active federal judges to the Federalist Society’s long-term goal of reshaping the law, barring them from the society’s events could hamper its continued ability to exert the political influence it has impressively built over decades…

The Federalist Society promised the prospective donor that the Lawyers Division would have a “dual purpose.” First, to “an even greater extent than the activities of the student and faculty divisions,” the new division would “educat[e] lawyers on legal developments with ideological connotations and how to deal with them.” The second purpose was “the formation of groups of conservative lawyers in the major centers for the practice of law, who feel comfortable believing in, and advocating, conservative positions.” The division, Meyer wrote, would mimic the style of workshops and seminars hosted by bar associations: “Unlike those events, however, the panels will also have ideological overtones, picking topics where the developments are especially good and should be encouraged, or especially bad and should be stopped.” The proposal offered examples of these workshops. Seattle might focus on the problems posed by “Environmental Regulation”; in New York, “Banking Regulation”; and in Houston, “Employment Discrimination (including the question of whether reverse discrimination is even constitutional).” The proposal also mentioned the Lawyers Division potentially “making its own recommendation for judicial appointments.”

Simply put, when the Federalist Society was describing its mission in private to a politically sympathetic donor, it let drop the group’s public-facing fiction that it is merely a debating society for the organic development of ideas.

Acting like the Federalist Society tries to hide the ball here is actually giving them too much credit. The FedSoc’s secret isn’t that it is subtle, it’s that most people don’t understand what it does. They’re basically like leopards, an apex predator that most people will never see. Right now they’re up in a tree, eating the remains of our judicial system, while people on the ground react to Donald Trump like he’s the Chupacabra.

You didn’t need a 1984 grant application to tell you that.

Which is also why it won’t matter. Conservatives have long since stopped pretending that they are restrained by ethics in pursuit of their supremacist ideology. They want to deny equal rights to blacks, gays, and women. They know that in order to accomplish that, they have to reinterpret the Constitution along its original lines which protected the rights of wealthy whites and no one else. They are close to total victory. That victory is being achieved by getting an army of conservatives jurists to be picked directly by the Federalist Society based on their level of indoctrination and willingness to abandon settled precedent in favor of the FedSoc’s agenda. They don’t give a damn about judicial ethics. If they did, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh wouldn’t have jobs from which they can never be fired.

The FedSoc will shrug off this memo like Cersei Lannister shrugged off Robert Baratheon’s last will and testament.

The only guiding ideology of the Federalist Society is winning — which is why they win.

Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals Judge William Pryor is speaking at a FedSoc event this Thursday. He was on the shortlist to replace both Merrick Garland and Anthony Kennedy, and while he is a fire-breathing conservative asshole, some have worried if he’s fully committed to the FedSoc’s agenda. You think he’d risk pissing these people off by not speaking at their events? Please. If he wants to be on the Supreme Court one day, these are the people he has to impress. And he knows it. And I know it. And FedSoc knows it. And anybody who is paying attention yet claims to not know it is full of crap.

The Federalist Society Says It’s Not an Advocacy Organization. These Documents Show Otherwise. [Politico]

Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and a contributor at The Nation. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.

Year two of Mansfield certification has rolled around and it’s time to check in and see which firms have made a commitment to diversity. For those of you who might not be tracking the initiative, a brief history lesson.

In 2017, the idea was formed at a Diversity Lab event to really hold Biglaw firms accountable for their lofty diversity goals. Modeled after the NFL’s Rooney Rule, which requires teams to interview a minority candidate for head coach or general manager vacancies, the idea — first proposed by Mark Helm, a partner at Munger, Tolles & Olson — was to create a system to encourage Biglaw firms to consider women or minority candidates for leadership roles at the firm. The rule — named for Arabella Mansfield, the first woman admitted to practice law in the U.S. — asks firms to consider two or more candidates who are women, LGBTQ+, or attorneys of color when hiring for leadership and governance roles, promotions to equity partner, and hiring lateral attorneys. To be considered “Mansfield Certified” by Diversity Lab, a firm needs to show that 30 percent of the candidate pool for these positions are diverse.

For this second year of the certification process, Diversity Lab has added LGBTQ+ to its diverse designations, and in next year’s list, they plan to include disability into their definition of diversity. And they’re reportedly pushing to become increasingly more diverse as the Mansfield Rule ages:

“Our plan is to raise the bar each year,” said Lisa Kirby, Diversity Lab chief intelligence and knowledge sharing officer, in a statement. “It’s especially meaningful to lead this initiative this year because it marks the 150th anniversary of Arabella Mansfield’s becoming the first woman admitted to a U.S. bar association.”

Last year, the inaugural list of Mansfield Certified firms had 41 entries, though an additional 50 claimed to be in the process of obtaining certification. This year’s list sees 64 firms claim their certification:

Akerman
Arnold & Porter*
Baker Botts*
Baker McKenzie*
Beveridge & Diamond*
Blank Rome*
Brinks Gilson & Lione*
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck
Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner*
Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney*
Clifford Chance
Cooley*
Covington*
Crowell & Moring
Day Pitney*
Dechert*
Dentons*
DLA Piper*
Dorsey & Whitney*
Drinker Biddle & Reath*
Eversheds Sutherland*
Faegre Baker Daniels*
Fasken
Fenwick & West Neal*
Finnegan*
Fish & Richardson*
Foley & Mansfield
Gerber & Eisenberg
Goodwin*
Goulston & Storrs*
Hogan Lovell*
Holland & Hart*
Holland & Knight*
Husch Blackwell*
Jenner & Block*
Katten
Kaufman Dolowich & Voluck
Latham & Watkins*
Littler Mendelson*
McDermott Will & Emery*
Merchant & Goul
Miller Canfield*
Morgan Lewis*
Morris, Manning & Martin*
Morrison & Foerster*
Munger, Tolles & Olson*
Nixon Peabody*
Norton Rose Fulbright*
O’Melveny & Myers*
Orrick*
Pepper Hamilton
Reed Smith*
Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr*
Schiff Hardin*
Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis*
Seyfarth Shaw
Sheppard Mullin*
Steptoe*
Stoel Rives*
White & Case*
WilmerHale*
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati*
Winston & Strawn*
Womble Bond Dickinson

The firms with the * designation have achieved Certified Plus status, which means they have at least 30 percent diverse lawyer representation in a notable number of their current leadership roles and committees.

Already 99 firms have signed up to be considered for next year’s certification process. And five firms — Eversheds Sutherland, Hogan Lovells, Holland & Hart, Miller Canfield, and Stoel Rives —  are piloting a new program to track individual demographic groups.

Congratulations to the firms that are working to make the legal profession a little more diverse.

Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).