Category: News Feeds

* Troutman Sanders and Pepper Hamilton have merged to form Troutman Pepper Hamilton Sanders. Congrats to all involved, but they could work on their name… [The American Lawyer]

* A Florida government lawyer has been fired after his arrest on child porn charges. [Tallahassee Democrat]

* The jury is out about whether Harvey Weinstein’s female lead defense lawyer might help him beat criminal charges. [Reuters]

* The lawyer for Covington Catholic families is also suing a former CNN host. Guess everyone’s getting in on the action. [Washington Examiner]

* A bizarre lawsuit alleges that Derek Jeter ruined the career of a minor league Yankees prospect. [NJ.com]

* Rudy Giuliani has suggested that the Supreme Court should step in and declare Trump’s impeachment unconstitutional. That’s not how the process works. [Fox News]

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Jordan Rothman is a partner of The Rothman Law Firm, a full-service New York and New Jersey law firm. He is also the founder of Student Debt Diaries, a website discussing how he paid off his student loans. You can reach Jordan through email at jordan@rothmanlawyer.com.

About half the country’s population, 7.7 million people, will need food assistance in 2020 as the country grapples with a severe drought and economic melt-down.

A report issued by WFP Thursday said Sub-Saharan Africa dominated its analysis of countries in need of emergency relief, with Zimbabwe, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central Sahel region (Mali, Burkina Faso and western Niger) needing immediate attention.

The report said while a new decade may have dawned, there was little cause for fresh optimism in countries and regions where conflict, political instability and climate disasters were threatening the food security of millions of people.

“The UN World Food Program (WFP) has identified 15 critical and complex emergencies at risk of descending further into crisis without a rapid response and greater investment. While WFP continues to provide extensive assistance to high-profile emergencies such as Yemen and Syria, Global Hotspots 2020 highlights the fastest-deteriorating emergencies requiring the world’s urgent attentionm,” the report said.

The situation in Zimbabwe has been described as “overheating” as the country experiences its worst drought in years with temperatures hitting more than 40 degrees Celsius.

“Food production has been severely affected. Driven by climate change, the drought is exacerbating Zimbabwe’s severe economic crisis and causing a humanitarian emergency characterized by hyper-inflation and rising food insecurity,” WFP said.

It said food insecurity levels were the highest in a decade with the 2019 cereal harvest falling more than 50 percent short of the needs for the 2019-20 lean season.

The world body pledged to nearly double its assistance to reach up to 4.1 million of the hardest hit Zimbabweans and said it would switch to distributing food in rural areas from January, due to concerns over hyper-inflation and reduced availability of commodities in rural markets.

It added that it was also supporting efforts to boost community resilience to crisis, including construction of small dams to conserve water and establishing vegetable gardens.

Overall, the prevailing drought will affect 45 million people across Southern Africa, WFP said.

Other countries needing emergency assistance are Afghanistan, Lebanon, Iraq, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Libya, Nigeria, Bolivia and Ethiopia.

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In an exclusive interview with VOA Zimbabwe Service, Mubaiwa’s lawyer, Taona Nyamakura, confirmed the development saying Marry Mubaiwa, who is out on bail and was ordered by the court to live at the matrimonial Borrowdale Brooke mansion in Harare, has been denied entry.

“We are actually considering court action against General Chiwenga.”

Chiwenga’s wife was arrested late last year on allegations of attempting to murder her husband and for contravening the country’s exchange control laws by transferring more than a million United States Dollars abroad.

She was denied bail by the lower court before it was granted by the High Court. State prosecutors had opposed bail arguing that she was a flight risk as she is facing at least 25 years in prison if found guilty of attempted murder.

Human Rights lawyer, Dewa Mavhinga called the acting president’s actions unconstitutional and “abuse of state institutions and the army.”

VOA Studio 7 did not get comment from Chiwenga as his lawyer Wilson Manase was not responding to calls on his mobile phone.

This is not the first time Retired General Chiwenga has been accused of abusing the army in his domestic issues. In 2014, when he was divorcing another wife, Jocelyn Mauchaza, she accused him of using soldiers to deny her entry to their farm located 1,5 kilometers off the Shamva Road. The army stepped in only hours after the court had issued a divorce decree ordering her eviction.

Chiwenga masterminded the coup that led to the ouster of the late former President Robert Mugabe in 2017.

The office of the President and Cabinet announced recently that President Emmerson Mnangagwa is on leave until end of month.

“During this period, Honourable Vice Presidents, General (Rtd) Dr C. G. D. N Chiwenga and Colonel (Rtd) Cde KCD Mohadi will take turns to act in his place, starting with the Honorable Vice President Chiwenga,” read the statement from Acting Chief secretary of Cabinet George Charamba.

From 2010 to 2016, how much in annual revenue did law schools lose?

Hint: The study, Competitive Coping Strategies in the American Legal Academy: An Empirical Study, looked at the tuition and discounting data to arrive at the conclusion that law schools are doing a lot worse over that time period.

See the answer on the next page.

I’ve very rarely had a male candidate accept the offer terms as they were given. Men will negotiate every point of an offer, while women a lot of times will take whatever the offer is at face value.

—Shannan Rahman, managing partner at The Partners Group, told Law.com how negotiation effects the compensation of men versus women. She also noted that men tend to overstate the value of their book of business, while women tend to undervalue it, “It’s as if men are giving the number of what they want their book to be or what it could be, instead of what is actually there.”

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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).

The student loan industry is a wretched hive of scum and villainy and it’s spent the last couple of decades systematically molding a legal regime to protect the pound of flesh it extracts from students. While the Bankruptcy Code theoretically exists to allow people to rebuild from crushing financial pressures, one of the primary sources of debt in the country is functionally walled off from the bankruptcy process. “If student loan debt is the main reason you’re filing for bankruptcy, your lawyer should tell you not to expect it will be discharged,” Dan Austin points out in a quote that any impoverished law grad can easily find.

But while the hurdles have become so daunting that most debtors don’t even try to get student loans discharged, the fact of the matter is that the law does allow it under the 1987 Brunner test and Chief Bankruptcy Judge Cecelia Morris of the Southern District of New York just dusted off Brunner and discharged $220,000 in student loan debt for Cardozo Law School grad and Navy vet Jared Rosenberg.

The Chief offered harsh words for the powers-that-be that have whittled Brunner down to a long-forgotten myth of fair bankruptcy relief:

Morris said she was applying the so-called Brunner test for discharge of student debt as it was originally intended. Since the test was created in a 1987 decision, cases interpreting it have set out “punitive standards” and “retributive dicta,” she said. Those harsh cases “have become a quasi-standard of mythic proportions, so much so that most people (bankruptcy professionals, as well as lay individuals) believe it impossible to discharge student loans,” she said.

“This court will not participate in perpetuating these myths.”

One hopes this is the dawn of a new day that doesn’t afford student debt magical protections under bankruptcy law. But, if history is any guide, an appeal will swiftly follow. In a world where the Department of Education openly ignores court orders to keep student debt dollars following, the lenders will find a way to strike back.

Law grad wins discharge of his student debt in opinion criticizing ‘punitive standards’ [ABA Journal]

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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.

Women’s health startup Advantia Health has landed a $45 million investment that it will use to expand its provider network, bolster its technology offerings and open a flagship clinic in the nation’s capital.

Based in Arlington, VA, the company also is gearing up to sign a value-based contract for pregnancy-related services, its co-founder and CEO, Sean Glass, said in a phone interview Wednesday.

“There’s a lot of opportunity for us to do lot better,” Glass said, noting the high costs of pregnancy and the high rate of C-sections in the U.S.

The funding is from BlueMountain Capital Management LLC. The firm, a subsidiary of insurer Assured Guaranty Ltd., has experience in moving companies to value-based contracting, Glass noted.

“That is one of the things that was attractive about BlueMountain,” he said.

For its part, BlueMountain was drawn to Advantia beacuse of its focus on integrating care and technology.

“The market for comprehensive women’s healthcare continues to grow, and we believe that Advantia is at the center of innovation and value that is defining the future of care,” said Ameya Agge, managing director at BlueMountain, in a statement. Agge is joining Advantia’s board.

Advantia was founded in 2014 by Glass and his father, an anesthesiologist. They wanted to design a customer-centric healthcare product focused on the doctor-patient relationship, explained Glass, whose background is in technology and venture capital. They settled on women’s health because women use a significant portion of care and often are a family’s medical decision-makers, whether it involves their children or their aging parents.

The company’s first move was to acquire an OB/GYN practice in Silver Spring, MD, Glass said. It has since grown to 50 offices in Illinois, Maryland, Missouri and Virginia, mostly through acquisitions but also through some organic growth. Advantia employs 200 physicians and allied health professionals and more than 200 lactation consultants, Glass said.

The acquired practices typically retain their names, Glass said, since patients often know them — and search for them online — by their doctors. But this year, Advantia plans to unveil its own branded clinic in Washington, DC. The retail-focused practice will offer OB/GYN care, primary care, behavioral health and wellness services, including nutrition and acupuncture, Glass said. The clinic’s opening is slated for the fourth quarter.

The company also has been incorporating technology into its approach. Last year the company bought the tech startup Pacify, which provides post-partum support via telemedicine. Many women call on the service for lactation consulting.

“We use it with our practices to improve experience and outcomes for our moms,” said Glass. But Pacify’s services also are available to other customers, including insurers and health systems, he added.

A partnership with a women’s health technology company also is in the works. Glass said he expects to announce the details in the next month or so.

Other companies also have targeted women’s health, a fast-growing segment of health care. The tech market alone for women-focused health products is expected to reach sales of $50 billion in the U.S. by 2025, according to Absolute Markets Insights.

Some firms are focused on specific areas, such as Genneve, which addresses menopause. A New York-based company, Progyny, offers employer-based fertility benefits. In the wearables space, there are companies like Willow, which makes connected, wearable breast pumps.

On the direct-care side, companies like Advantia are building out networks of women’s health clinics, ramping up the use of technology and promising a more comprehensive approach to care.

One of the largest such networks is Axia Women’s Health, which operates more than 100 clinics in Indiana, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Another firm, Women’s Health USA, backed by Sverica Capital Management offers practice management solutions for OB/GYNs who want to remain independent. Large health systems also have been consolidating OB/GYN and women’s health practices.

Providers in women’s health are not just competing for patients. They also are competing for practitioners. The country is facing a shortage of up to 9,000 obstetricians and gynecologists this year, according to the American Journal of Managed Care, citing figures from the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

Glass believes Advantia can stand out based on its customer focus, its interest in value-based care and its proprietary technology. Those factors also help the company recruit OB/GYNs who might not be interested in joining a larger health system, Glass said.

“Our mission orientation is toward women’s health,” Glass said. “Hospitals can be mission-driven but it may not be women’s health.”

Advantia also has been investing in building relationships with residency programs and developing its recruiting platform, Glass added.

Photo: asnidamarwani, Getty Images

As was reported here yesterday, the London-based contract-management company Juro announced a $5 million Series A investment round led by the U.S. investment banking firm Union Square Ventures. What does the investment mean for the company’s expansion in the U.S. market?

In a conversation yesterday, I put that question to Richard Mabey, CEO of Juro and cofounder together with Riga-based Pavel Kovalevich, the company’s chief product officer.

Juro already has customers who are headquartered in the United States, Mabey said. “Even though our business is based in Europe, we’ve seen demand coming from the U.S.,” he said.

During 2020, expect to see Juro expand “gently” within the U.S., Mabey said. He expects to open a U.S. office this year and have employees here.

That said, the thrust of the company’s sales efforts and expansion plans will remain focused on Europe. “We will continue to double down on selling into the E.U. broadly,” he said.

Noting that some European companies that receive U.S. investments are forced to flip their sales towards the U.S., “that is not our plan,” Mabey said, adding that USV supports that strategy.

Founded in 2016, Juro currently has 20 employees in London and Riga. By year end, Mabey expects the headcount to be around 55, with “a handful” in the U.S.

Much of this new investment will go to further development and refinement of the product. “In an area where there’s been so much failure to execute well, then quality of execution is absolutely a priority,” he said.

(Juro is transparent about its product roadmap, posting it publicly for anyone to see.)

Contracts As Data

In a market crowded with contract management, review and automation products, Juro seeks to stand apart by its focus on turning contracts into machine-readable data. Its proprietary editor automatically tags key terms and provisions as data and captures all amendments and approvals in an audit trail.

Inspired by his experience as an associate at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Mabey wanted to figure out why contract management continued to have so many pain points. The problem, he decided, was not one of efficiency, but of design.

“Whenever you’re creating unstructured, static Word documents and PDFs, it is deeply problematic,” he said. “You have to go back and manually tag the data to make it useful. That’s work you can avoid.”

Juro’s approach, he said, was to create a new format for legal documents, one that is “super easy” to use and that makes the data “structured from the get-go.”

So much of current contracts technology is focused on unpacking unstructured data — going through individual contracts or collections of contracts and using sophisticated technology to structure and extract data.

“Core to our mission,” Mabey said, “is to convince the legal community that there’s a better way to do this.”

Connecticut has joined the ranks of states that have formed task forces in recent years to examine potential changes to regulation of the legal industry.

Connecticut Bar Association President Ndidi Moses said the creation of her organization’s State of the Legal Profession Task Force was driven by the access-to-justice gap, as well as the challenges lawyers face in the current system.

“The legal industry needs to take a hard and fast look at how we are operating,” Moses said. “I feel like there is a way for everyone to win. It is just a matter of being more creative.”

Various task force subcommittees will examine alternative business models, how technology can be leveraged to advance the legal profession and ethics rules.

Additionally, the task force will review reforms law schools may need to implement to properly prepare future lawyers.

“If you want to make changes that will last and be effective, you have to start at the law-school level,” Moses said.

Jayne Reardon, a member of the Connecticut task force’s advisory committee, said the focus on law schools and the skill set aspiring lawyers will need differentiated the state’s panel from some of the other task forces nationwide.

She praised the consideration of such issues, noting the time and financial investment required of law students.

“If they are not being trained in the skills that are going to be needed tomorrow, then that is not a good investment,” said Reardon, who is a member of Illinois’ Task Force on the Sustainable Practice of Law & Innovation.

The Connecticut task force held a kickoff meeting in December and is aiming to produce a report by 2021.

Moses said the panel is certainly keeping an eye on the work of task forces across the country, such as those in Illinois, California, Utah and Arizona.

But she emphasized that the task force’s objective is developing solutions that will work in her state.

The goal is to make sure we do what is right for Connecticut,” Moses said.

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Lyle Moran is a freelance writer in San Diego who handles both journalism and content writing projects. He previously reported for the Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Diego Daily Transcript, Associated Press, and Lowell Sun. He can be reached at lmoransun@gmail.com and found on Twitter @lylemoran.