Category: News Feeds

While once the news was filled with reports of icon Britney Spears’s fantastic music, Las Vegas performances coupled with  photos of erratic behavior, and mystifying social media posts, her name is currently synonymous with legal debates as to civil rights, autonomy, and, oddly enough, trusts and estates.

Instagram, newspapers, and even fellow superstars like Cher have voiced their concerns for Spears and her conservatorship, some even expressing objection. The American Civil Liberties Union, on August 19, 2020, tweeted that they were willing to help Spears regain her civil liberties and remove the conservatorship. The tremendous attention paid to Spears, including the #freebritney online campaign, brings important attention to the conservatorship, often called guardianship system.

Simply, when an individual is unable to provide for her personal and/or property needs, a conservator is appointed to assist. Depending on the functional limitations or disabilities of the individual, the conservator, sometimes called a guardian, can exercise total control, or perhaps limited control. Some courts tailor a guardianship to allow the guardian to only act on certain powers.

As a celebrity, the world is intrigued by Spears. We wonder, how is someone with such talent, work ethic, and wealth, in need of a conservator? How does someone who looks so good and healthy need assistance? If someone can work that hard and make that much money, how can they require a conservator? Finally, why does someone so young, with children, require so much assistance and court intervention?

Unfortunately, as the public we do not get to listen to the court hearings and read the confidential reports. As Phaedrus said, “Things are not always what they seem.”

What we do know is that a Los Angeles Court in 2008, after hearing copious amounts of testimony and evidence, decided that Spears required a conservator of her person and property. If we have faith in the justice system, we respect the findings of the court. Further, we know that this matter has remained under the supervision of the court for the past 12 years, with the conservators filings various accountings and reports and parties participating in court appearances.

As of August, the court has ruled that the conservatorship would be continued until at least February 2021. In the past, Spears has voiced her objection to the conservatorship, especially her father, Jamie Spears, serving as her sole property conservator. Spears’s family has been public with their concerns for their loved one, especially her brother Bryan and her sister, Jamie Lynn Spears who at 29 years old is the trustee of Spears’ SLB Revocable Trust. She has been trustee, according to court papers, for the past two years. Recently, Jamie Lynn has filed papers to move all the assets of the SJB Revocable Trust into one or more accounts that she has under her control, with Fidelity Brokerage Services. It is unclear at this point what further role Jamie Lynn will be taking with respect to the conservatorship or what such a transfer of assets would mean to the conservatorship.

Regardless of the legal maneuvers, Jamie Lynn’s very public support of her sister represents the qualities of a competent and sensitive sister and, in this case, trustee. She took to social media to respond to the #freebritney movement and other attention asking for privacy and inferring that their family is just trying to protect their loved one. Wisely she stated: “I pray this doesn’t bring shame to anyone dealing with mental illness, you are not alone, and you are loved.”

Jamie Lynn’s participation in the matter reveals that sometimes family members make good fiduciaries, even when we are dealing with millions upon millions of dollars and public scrutiny. A court should look to Spears’s case and see how she can best be protected, while also making certain that she is comfortable with those who are entrusted with her life management. Assigning a devoted relative, someone who shows compassion, but is strong enough to make decisions, is the right choice for any fiduciary role, whether it be a trustee, conservator, or executor. Sometimes in guardianships, the initial arrangements need tweaking. The personalities involved may not get along or there may diverge in opinions. As Spears ages, her desires may change, and she may better work with an individual different than whom she was assigned she was younger. Perhaps a child will become their parent’s conservator when they grow up. It is imperative that anyone who is subject to a conservatorship feel comfortable with their conservator, be able to speak to the fiduciary, and of course, feel like she is heard.

As the public, we do not know the details of Spears’s conservatorship nor do we know or should we know how she gets along with the various family members and other professionals working on her matter. From what we can see, her siblings are expressing great love and support to her and it would behoove any court to use them as best as they can. Sometimes the best guardians are third parties, separate and apart from the familial entanglements. And sometimes, it is more organic.

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Cori A. Robinson is a solo practitioner having founded Cori A. Robinson PLLC, a New York and New Jersey law firm, in 2017. For more than a decade Cori has focused her law practice on trusts and estates and elder law including estate and Medicaid planning, probate and administration, estate litigation, and guardianships. She can be reached at cori@robinsonestatelaw.com.

I can’t believe that it’s September already, and we’re in yet another month of “safer at home,” social distancing, masking, working from home, and all the other ways that the virus has impacted our careers and our lives. It will continue to do so until there’s a vaccine or something available that will help us get to whatever “normal” looks like in a post-pandemic world. Whatever is it, it probably won’t look much like life was before. All the things we took for granted are out of our reach, at least for the foreseeable future.

And the future is not foreseeable. Courts ask for trial time estimates, and we give them, but fingers are crossed with an attitude of “please don’t hold me to this” because anything can happen in trial.

I understand the frustration of everyone, especially the young’uns for whom life is just beginning. To come up against the COVID-19 brick wall is galling. And yet there’s nothing we can do about it.

I don’t understand why law students (and college students) are so cavalier about partying, social distancing, and the other guidelines set forth to protect peeps from the disease. You can read David Lat’s columns on ATL about his battle with the virus, and how he is still recovering. I can tell you about two friends in New York City, one of whom almost died, and the other, her husband, was equally ill, but in different ways. I’m sure that many, if not all, of you can share similar stories of illness or even death.

So, when I read about law students partying in defiance of the deadliness of this disease, I want to shout out “What The F—Are You Doing?” If travel wasn’t discouraged, it would almost be worth a trip to Oklahoma (I’ve never been there) to shake some sense into these students. But maybe I should start with the administration and its cavalier attitude about who gets to know and who doesn’t. Although the party was thrown by a 1L, the law school only notified the 1Ls who attended. Isn’t it possible that there were 2Ls, 3Ls, even graduates, and even (surprise surprise) non-Ls? Of course, we know that Ls only like to socialize with other Ls; that’s part of the reason why we have achieved our dubious arrogant reputation.

Where’s the harm in “overcommunicating?” What’s the downside in sharing the news far and wide? How could the Oklahoma administration have made the assumptions it did? It couldn’t.

I understand the feelings of being cheated out of experiences that used to be considered normal, and partying was one of them. There’s nothing like a good party, especially after finals. Also vital is the interaction among students, whether college or law school, and so is the academic life that being on campus provides. I get it.

So, even though social distancing, wearing a mask, and other recommended procedures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 do not have the force of law (to the dismay of some and the delight of others), I wonder whether the disregard shown for these measures would ever factor into the character and fitness evaluation needed for bar admission. Don’t laugh; it’s entirely possible that in the future, questions related to conduct during COVID-19 could show up on the questionnaire. Yes, I know it sounds farfetched now (e.g., now what have I been smoking, drinking, or both?), but we all know that the NCBE marches to its own out-of-step drummer. Even if moral fitness and character don’t trip up admission, reputation is all we have and that follows us during our entire career.

What troubles me about this is the lack of judgment shown by this IL who hosted the party. We dinosaurs do complain about the lack of maturity that some new lawyers have, and this is a classic example of that. Would you want your new associate to demonstrate such a lack of judgment in working with a client? Yes, I know that in Biglaw working with a client does not happen out of the gate, but in most firms, newbies must have some sense of judgment, some sense of responsibility from the get-go. Otherwise, how will they succeed in a practice that is as difficult as ours?

Contrast the Oklahoma response with the concerns expressed by the University of Notre Dame law school dean, G. Marcus Cole, who learned of a planned party that was to be maskless. He warned the students in an email sent law school-wide both about the virus and concerns for their professional reputations. Cole noted that the students’ behavior in law school now will begin to establish their professional reputations.

Just as lawyers, law firms, and the courts have had to make radical adjustments in how they practice and how they operate while maintaining health standards necessary to keep everyone safe, law students need to have more than a clue about what’s happening in the world.

For everyone in the practice, it’s a time to get used to a new normal, one that none of us wanted. When the ball dropped at midnight in Times Square ushering in this dreadful year, no one could have predicted what has happened.

This situation brings out the best (and the worst) in peeps. Moral character? Judgment? Reckless disregard? Think about these things before anyone invites you to a maskless, crowded, no-social-distancing party, or even out to dinner, especially over this upcoming Labor Day weekend. And if those are not enough, then read LA Times sport columnist Bill Plaschke’s encounter with the virus and the things that nobody tells you. Do not overestimate the world.

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Jill Switzer has been an active member of the State Bar of California for over 40 years. She remembers practicing law in a kinder, gentler time. She’s had a diverse legal career, including stints as a deputy district attorney, a solo practice, and several senior in-house gigs. She now mediates full-time, which gives her the opportunity to see dinosaurs, millennials, and those in-between interact — it’s not always civil. You can reach her by email at oldladylawyer@gmail.com.

Every firm is looking at staffing, with the intention of a head-count reduction. Law firms had more staff than they needed even prior to COVID. Working from home made clear that some staff weren’t busy. Also, lawyers have learned to do things on their own that they used to rely on other people for help with. It’s an overdue and appropriate business reaction.

— Altman Weil principal Eric Seeger, commenting on the fact that there are certain to be more layoffs ahead. Seeger says he’s spoken to about three dozen managing partners over the past month, and they’re all looking to trim down headcount at their firms. “[I]n an uncertain environment, they don’t want to let a crisis go to waste,” says Zeughauser Group consultant Kent Zimmermann.

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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.

Look out Antifa! Bill Barr is watching your leaders fly around the country racking up those frequent flier miles and hitting Triple Platinum Marriott rewards status. Did you ruffians think you could just go from town to town, swiping your Anarchobank Mastercard for hammers and sickles to use in the night’s marauding and avoid the eagle eye of our fearless Attorney General? Think again, thugs!

Oh, it’s funny because there are actually people out there who think it’s true. Whether Deputy Dawg himself actually believes this sh*t is an open question. But he was certainly giving it the old Kirkland and Ellis try last night with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.

Asked whether he had instructed the FBI to look into Trump’s insane ranting to Laura Ingraham about hordes of black-clad thugs boarding planes to fly across the country and start riots, Barr insisted that, “I don’t have to ask the FBI because we received numerous reports of individuals coming from Portland, Washington, Seattle, and several other cities for the specific purpose of causing a riot.”

Note that Barr didn’t say “credible reports” as opposed to easily debunked Facebook hoaxes or nonsense whispered into the presidential ear by a conspiracy loving congressman from California. Because the DOJ has made exactly zero arrests of people who bought a $400 ticket and flew clear across the country to start “riots” at the Republican National Convention.

Where would these imaginary traveling rioters get the money for airfare and hotels? Barr’s not saying, but safe bet it rhymes with Seorge Goros!

“They are flying around the country, we know people who are flying around the country, we know where they’re going, we see some of the purchases they’re making before the riots of weapons to use in those riots,” Barr said. Although the president apparently thinks cans of soup are weapons, so perhaps the AG is referring to bags of groceries from the Piggly Wiggly when he claims to be tracking purchases of riot swag.

Interestingly, Barr refers to “people going into Kenosha from different states,” while failing to note it was a gun-toting teenager from Illinois hopped up on a toxic brew of imaginary patriotism and toxic masculinity who killed two people last week, not those itinerant anarchists we’ve all been warned about.

But if Mr. Barr is looking for a guy who actually does travel from town to town trying to start trouble, he might check in on the Patriot Prayer leader who told the Washington Post that he and his bros “go into smaller areas, and we have been putting all of our effort into meeting with victims of government overreach.” It’s just a thought!

But if Barr can’t imagine groups with strong ties to white supremacists posing a real threat, perhaps it’s due to his truly bizarre ideas on racism.

“I don’t think there are two justice systems,” he told Wolf Blitzer.” “I think the narrative that the police are in some epidemic of shooting unarmed black men is simply a false narrative and also the narrative that’s based on race.”

What do those words even mean? Dunno, but they definitely don’t mean that black men are three times as likely to be killed in encounters with police as white men.

“I think there are some situations where statistics would suggest that they are treated differently. But I don’t think that that’s necessarily racism,” Barr said. Which kind of sounds exactly like racism, but can’t possibly be because, ummm, Jesse Jackson?

“Didn’t Jesse Jackson say that when he looks behind him and he sees a group of young Black males walking behind him, he’s more scared than when he sees a group of white youths walking behind him,” Barr added. “Does that make him a racist?”

No, seriously, that really happened.

On voting by mail, Barr exuded a similar Grandpa’s-okay-to-drive-but-don’t-ask-him-about-the-war-or-you’ll-ruin-Thanksgiving vibe. Here he is flipping out because Wolf Blitzer pointed out that five states vote entirely by mail without a problem.

“Wolf, this is playing with fire! This is playing with fire,” he barked, waggling his finger in rage. “We’re a very closely divided country here. People have to have confidence in the results of the election and the legitimacy of the government.”

Which is an odd position for a man whose boss has insisted for the past four years that 3 million undocumented immigrants voted illegally in California and that New Hampshire polls were swamped with hordes of people bussed in from Massachusetts. The entire Republican strategy at this point amounts to little more than destroying confidence in the results of the election and legitimacy of the government. (Well, that plus racism.) But Barr wasn’t done.

“People trying to change the rules to this methodology which as a matter of logic is very open to fraud and coercion is reckless and dangerous,” he shouted, before admitting that he himself votes absentee, as does virtually every high-ranking member of the Trump administration.

But while Barr was absolutely certain — despite being unable to cite a scintilla of evidence — that universal voting by mail is rife with fraud, there was one question of election law which flummoxed the great man: Is it legal to deliberately cast your ballot twice?

President Trump forced the issue by telling his followers in North Carolina to cast mail-in ballots and then going to try to vote in person as well. Because why not encourage your supporters to commit felonies en masse!

“So let them send it in and let them go vote, and if their system’s as good as they say it is, then obviously they won’t be able to vote. If it isn’t tabulated, they’ll be able to vote,” Trump actually said out loud.

“So that’s the way it is. And that’s what they should do.”

That is not what they should do, a fact Bill Barr knows perfectly well.

BLITZER: It sounds like he’s encouraging people to break the law and try to vote twice.

BARR: Well, I don’t know exactly what he was saying, but it seems to me what he’s saying is, he’s trying to make the point that the ability to monitor this system is not good. And if it was so good, if you tried to vote a second time, you would be caught.

Ah, yes. Despite the plain language of his exhortation, the president was urging his followers to vote twice metaphorically. But it’s still illegal to cast two ballots, even if you do it to just make a point, right?

BARR: Well, I don’t know what the law in that particular state says and when that vote becomes final.

BLITZER: Is there any state that says you can vote twice?

BARR: Well, there’s some … maybe you can change your vote up to a particular time. I don’t know.

BLITZER: But that’s not what he’s saying. He’s saying test the system.

BARR: Well, if you know what he’s saying, why are you asking me?

Cool, cool. The president of the United States is dispatching his followers to commit vote fraud en masse, and the Attorney General is busy pretending that mail-in voting is the real crime.

Who could have predicted that there could be a worse AG than Jeff Sessions, and yet … here we are.

Transcript: The Situation Room [CNN]

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Elizabeth Dye lives in Baltimore where she writes about law and politics.

In the past few days, Above the Law has reported on a number of firms that have been conducting layoffs and announcing those layoffs at the same time as their COVID-19 salary restorations. We’ve just learned that Nixon Peabody — a firm that placed 75th in the most recent Am Law 100, bringing in $505,520,000 in gross revenue in 2019 — is one of those firms.

As we reported in April, Nixon Peabody furloughed about 25 percent of its staff members, and later that same month, the firm cut 10 percent of its non-partner attorneys (divided by approximately 5 percent layoffs and 5 percent furloughs). In May, the firm came for employees’ salaries and deferred its incoming associate class. Now, sources tell us that some of those whose salaries were reduced had had them restored, and further that while some of those furloughed have returned to the firm, others have been laid off.

Here’s an excerpt from a confidential Nixon Peabody memo sent sometime last month (available in full on the next page) regarding staff salaries:

When we went remote abruptly in March, we took steps to ensure that we could navigate the uncertainty of the pandemic. One of the decisions we made in May, that took effect in June, was to temporarily reduce all NP staff schedules and salaries to 80%.

Now that we are a few months into this schedule change, people are getting busier. As a result, we have made the decision to restore many staff members to a 100% schedule and base compensation effective August 31.

In the same memo, Nixon Peabody discussed furloughed staff, noting that while some will return to work at the end of September, others never will. As far as attorneys are concerned, many have been brought back, but some are still waiting for word on when their careers will resume. Take a look:

Today, we will reach out to all of our furloughed staff colleagues to provide an update to each of them. Some will be notified that their position has been restored and that the current plan is for them to return to active work with NP on September 28th. Others will be informed that their position has been eliminated and their employment with NP will be ending. HR directors will be reaching out to these colleagues today. …

Our furloughed attorneys are not part of the communications occurring today. Over the past several months, we have brought back a number of our furloughed attorney colleagues. We still have a few who are currently furloughed. We are in the process of evaluating our business needs to determine who we may be able to bring back to NP, and the potential timing for any returns.

At this time, we do not believe any movement has been made in terms of restoration of associate salaries. We reached out to Nixon Peabody for comment, but the firm did not immediately respond.

Best of luck to all those who are affected by the layoffs at Nixon Peabody.

(Flip to the next page to see the full memo from Nixon Peabody.)

If your firm or organization is slashing salaries, closing its doors, or reducing the ranks of its lawyers or staff, whether through open layoffs, stealth layoffs, or voluntary buyouts, please don’t hesitate to let us know. Our vast network of tipsters is part of what makes Above the Law thrive. You can email us or text us (646-820-8477).

If you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Layoff Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the layoff alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each layoff, salary cut, or furlough announcement that we publish.

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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.

We’re closing in on the national day of reckoning when many of the largest jurisdictions in the country are going to hold simultaneous online bar exams on the same ExamSoft platform that got tripped up running the modest Michigan bar exam earlier this summer.

At the time, ExamSoft told the world that its problems weren’t caused by its own shortcomings but by a sophisticated cyberattack from shadowy actors with no apparent motive. What would be the point of crashing the bar exam? Even in the NCBE’s most outlandish fever dreams, diploma privilege advocates have no reason to undermine the online bar exam since they know full well the only lesson bar examiners would take from such a disaster would be the need to hold the exam in person as quickly and as cramped as possible.

But let’s take ExamSoft at its word that this was an attack and not a design flaw. Well, it’s exactly that messaging that has understandably got people worried that the platform is vulnerable and their personal data along with it. Hence this:

A California examinee reported the same issue to us. Bar Exam Tracker compiled some additional screenshots that applicants are sharing:

And…

This is bad, but the “good” news is that it might not be ExamSoft’s fault. In a statement sent around yesterday, the company explained that this is a feature of Google Chrome — indeed those using other browsers have not reported the issue — and coincidental to downloading the test software:

This password notification alert is unrelated to Examplify download and use. This is a feature in Chrome where the browser automatically scans the user’s saved passwords against security breaches. Any appearance of this message popping up around the time an applicant is downloading the Examplify software is completely coincidental. ExamSoft applications do not store and do not have access to any password information on exam-taker devices.

Hopefully that’s true. Chrome’s password manager can flag you upon entering a password for the first time that this password has been on black market lists in the past and if the new password being used with ExamSoft is something you’ve used for other compromised accounts in the past this is going to be the warning.

But to be clear, this is ExamSoft’s fault for failing to defend against whatever happened in Michigan and then hyping the result as a “sophisticated attack specifically aimed” at their software. They can’t credibly treat people as overreacting when ExamSoft claims they were hacked TWO MONTHS AGO. That’s exactly how you get thousands of nervous students terrified that KGB ninja hackers are out there trying to bust in through ExamSoft and it’s how you seed a panic.

We’ll keep an eye on these reports about compromised passwords.

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Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

Another day, another firm that’s hopped on board the salary restoration train. We’ve been documenting all of the Biglaw firms that were perhaps a bit too cautious when it came to the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis here. Today, we have news on yet another Am Law firm that’s partially rolled back its salary cuts.

This morning, Kelley, Drye & Warren — a firm that placed 135th in the latest Am Law 200 rankings, with $232,400,000 in gross revenue in 2019 — announced that the salary reductions it made earlier this year will now be halved. Here’s a statement we received from James Carr, the firm’s chairman:

As you know, the Firm implemented a number of cost cutting measures this Spring to minimize the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis and to protect the financial health of the Firm. Thanks to these actions and your dedication to our clients, we are now in a position to restore some of the salary reductions implemented in May. The 10% pay cut for associates, special counsel and staff earning more than $100,000 will be reduced to 5%. The partner reductions will remain in place for now.

If you recall, those cuts for partners were up to a 20 percent reduction on their draws. So while partners at Kelley Drye continue to feel the pain, it’s nice that associates, counsel, and staff will have some of theirs lessened.

Let’s hope more firms are able to roll back COVID-19 austerity measures — and soon.

If your firm or organization is slashing salaries, closing its doors, or reducing the ranks of its lawyers or staff, whether through open layoffs, stealth layoffs, or voluntary buyouts, please don’t hesitate to let us know. Our vast network of tipsters is part of what makes Above the Law thrive. You can email us or text us (646-820-8477).

If you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Layoff Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the layoff alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each layoff, salary cut, or furlough announcement that we publish.

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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.

Well, it looks like we can expect the Biglaw trend of layoffs to get worse before it gets better.

The coronavirus has wrought a lot of changes in Biglaw — we’ve seen firms announce their office is closing until 2021, we have partners and associates are sharing offices, bunches of firms slashed salaries, and we’ve even seen partners forced out of firms. But the very, very top of the Biglaw pile remained mostly quiet during this tumultuous time. Now, that’s changed.

Tipsters at the firm reported to Above the Law that none other than Skadden Arps has been cutting back on professional staff, apparently taking the unprecedented upheaval to make some staffing changes. A spokesperson for the firm confirmed the layoffs to Above the Law, “We can confirm that we have laid off just under 4% of professional staff across our U.S. offices.”

Best of luck to those who find themselves out of work.

Now that an ultra prestigious firm has decided layoffs are the way to go (and one that instituted no previous COVID-19 austerity measures to boot), will we see even more firms willing to take a carving knife to their ranks? Only time will tell.

If your firm or organization is slashing salaries or restoring previous cuts, closing its doors, or reducing the ranks of its lawyers or staff, whether through open layoffs, stealth layoffs, or voluntary buyouts, please don’t hesitate to let us know. Our vast network of tipsters is part of what makes Above the Law thrive. You can email us or text us (646-820-8477).

If you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Layoff Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the layoff alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each layoff, salary cut, or furlough announcement that we publish.

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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).