On the Record

Picture this: you’re a lawyer in Hagerstown, doing some family law, some litigation, some mediation; you’ve applied for a spot on the circuit court, but it will be more than a month until you hear if you made the first cut.

So how cool would it be to get quoted in the Wall Street Journal and the ABA Journal’s Law News Now, both on the same day? And not only quoted, but both stories lead with you!

True, they lead with the fact that you have a tendency to put things off. That’s OK, because the stories are all about “structured procrastination,” techniques for turning that tendency into a motivating force instead of an immobilizing fear. Procrastinator power!

So, just how cool IS it to be Dana Moylan Wright today?

Well. Can we get back to you on that later?

Turns out she took the day off.

The person who answered the phone at her law firm, Miller, Oliver, Baker, Moylan & Stone, didn’t know if Wright, the daughter of retired Judge Charles E. Moylan Jr., had even seen the articles. And no, she said, the phones had not been ringing off the hook with friends and neighbors who saw the stories.

I expect that will change as the week wears on, and I’d sure love to hear all about it. And what about the rest of you procrastinators: Is this technique worth a shot? Or do you think structured procrastination isn’t procrastination at all? Send me an e-mail or post your response below.

Just as soon as you get around to it, I mean.

BARBARA GRZINCIC, Managing Editor/Law

Some of the biggest Ravens fans — steadiest tailgaters — are none other than lawyers, writes Richard Simon. Read about their M&T Bank Stadium tailgates, along with how they think tailgating is like preparing for a case. ONLINE EXTRAS: Blog about your own tailgate and watch video of tailgating lawyers.

What will the Supreme Court decide to hear this term? Will Baltimore County’s LNG appeal be on the docket?

Real estate attorney Susan Eleff helped make a Montgomery County family’s dream of owning a home — a refurbished “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” home, that is — a reality.

In this week’s Verdicts & Settlements, Danny Jacobs writes about a Sparks insurance firm that won a coverage dispute; Brendan Kearney tells an interesting story about a case of a stapled-shut rectum.

Read about the fate of Kimmel & Silverman’s lemon law cases after its two name partners were suspended by the Court of Appeals for 90 days.

A. Harold DuBois talks about his first job interview and how he used what he learned in the Navy to make his case and land a job.
DuBois.

In other news: the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is poised to decide another Sarbanes-Oxley whistleblower case; a 4th Circuit judge thinks Justice Antonin Scalia is engaging in judicial activism; defense contractor CACI claims immunity in Abu Ghraib torture lawsuit; the Honorable Steven G. Salant and Sharon V. Burrell have been appointed to the Montgomery County Circuit Court; and Baltimore City Circuit Judge Stuart R. Berger takes over the court’s Business and Technology Case Management Program.

PLUS:
* The Big Picture, by Jack Gohn: Too much information
* Andy Baida’s Art of Appellate Advocacy: A civil appeal
* Check the 16 cases in our Law Digest this week, including decisions from the Court of Appeals, Court of Special Appeals (3 parts), 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and U.S. District Court, Maryland.

CHRISTINA DORAN, Assistant Legal Editor

Happy Monday! Here are some law-related stories and blog posts from around the Web:

• Maryland is getting a whole bunch of the community development block grant funding set aside by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to address the foreclosure crisis. Of Maryland counties, Prince George’s County will get the largest chunk.

• TheDeal.com examines the Constellation sale. HT: Gabe’s Guide.

• The Post had a story over the weekend on the three new judges on the Court of Appeals. In large part, the story doesn’t offer much on the ways Judges Murphy, Adkins and Barbera might affect the court’s rulings. (The first quote is “The truth is no one knows.” Maybe the story could have waited, then?) The one specific point is a conjecture that the new judges might help shift the court to the left on growth and land development issues.

• Ron Miller says that when lawyers hear about another lawyer behaving badly, their instinct is to hope for the lawyer to be disciplined. When doctors hear about an allegation of medical malpractice, “their instinct is to defend the doctor and attack the accusers (not the victims, but their medical malpractice lawyers),” he says.

• Lawyers have started Googling and Facebooking prospective jurors to get a sense of whether they want them on the jury. “Anyone who doesn’t make use of [Internet searches] is bordering on malpractice,” says a trial consultant. Thanks to How Appealing for pointing the way to this story.

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer

In an article in today’s print edition, Jim Astrachan shares his memories of the life and work of Frederick DeKuyper, the retired associate general counsel at the Johns Hopkins University who died last week at the age of 70. But DeKuyper shared his own memories of the GC’s office with the JHU Gazette more than 13 years ago. Here’s a sample:

“There was a man in California who believed we had a brain-wave modification machine staffed 24 hours a day,” said DeKuyper, a Hopkins associate general counsel. “This machine allegedly was sending electronic emissions to the West Coast. These emissions, he said, were entering his left ear and doing harm to him.”

Eventually, the case was dismissed.

“I realized later I should have said, ‘You’re right, there is such a machine — but it’s at Harvard,’” he added, laughing.

What were your favorite DeKuyper quips?

BARBARA GRZINCIC, Managing Editor/Law

Some of the best reactions I got while I was conducting interviews for today’s cover story, “The Tailgate is Now in Session,” were when I asked lawyers the question, “How is tailgating like preparing for a case?”

I received some befuddled looks, but I did receive some great answers. Take Rob Erdman of Webb & Blitz LLC, who said:

Preparation is key. You don’t want to get caught with your pants down and not have enough food at the tailgate. Just like you want to have the right case ready for your arguments.

Below is a video of some other responses from lawyers. Have any better ones?

[kml_flashembed movie="http://blip.tv/play/AdCBcI6SPQ" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="450" height="300" wmode="transparent" /]

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Also, I tried to get to as many lawyer-led tailgates as I could, but I know I missed some. Do you feel that there are others that deserve recognition?

RICHARD SIMON, Multimedia Reporter

A class-action lawsuit against ExxonMobil stemming from a 2006 gas leak at a Jacksonville gas station will go to trial next week in Baltimore County as scheduled, despite a flurry of last-minute activity based on a settlement judge’s request for postponement.

A notification letter sent out Sept. 9 required all involved parties to appear Tuesday in Baltimore County Circuit Court for a settlement conference. A courtroom had even been reserved to accommodate what could have potentially been hundreds of people from the 91 families collectively known as the Alban plaintiffs.

So when only the lawyers in the case appeared, retired Judge Barbara Kerr Howe, overseeing the settlement talks, was none too pleased. She wrote a letter to retired Judge Maurice W. Baldwin Jr., the former Harford County judge specially assigned to the case, seeking to postpone the trial’s Oct. 1 start date as a sanction.

That led to a conference call between Baldwin and counsel Wednesday. Baldwin decided Thursday not to postpone the trial but ordered all parties to appear before Howe “at a time that can be arranged after the trial commences.”

“The parties will be required to honor Judge Howe’s directives concerning who should attend the settlement conference,” Baldwin wrote.

Jury selection begins Oct. 1. The plaintiffs are represented by Snyder Weltcheck & Snyder in Pikesville, led by Stephen L. Snyder and Robert J. Weltchek. ExxonMobil’s local counsel are Andrew Gendron and C. Carey Deeley Jr. of Venable LLP’s Baltimore and Towson offices, respectively.

DANNY JACOBS, Legal Affairs Writer

For an interesting read that a) gives a nice round-up of the push to give animals more legal rights and b) offers a glimpse inside the mean little world of the late Leona Helmsley, check out this New Yorker piece. It’s about Helmsley’s decision to create a $12 million trust for her beloved Maltese, Trouble, and the continuing legal fights over Helmsley’s estate. (HT: WSJ Law Blog.)

It caught my eye because a couple of years back, I wrote about the birth of animal law (did that birth have to be attended by a veterinarian, do you think?) in Maryland.

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer

NALP has released a survey on compensation for lawyers in the public sector. It shows that the median entry-level salaries run from $40,000 for civil legal services lawyers to $50,000 for state prosecutors. In between are lawyers for public interest groups.

To put it in perspective, recall that some big-firm starting salaries are up around $160,000. That means big-firm lawyers just starting out make between three and four times what their public interest counterparts do. Wow.

Things don’t get much better for our Hypothetical Median-earning Do-gooder even when he’s got more experience. The salary for an HMD with five years’ experience ranges from $48,000 (civil legal services) to $62,000 (state prosecutors).

Meanwhile, another NALP survey shows, a fifth-year associate at a firm with more than 700 lawyers (Hypothetical Median-earning White Shoe-er) is pulling down $210,625 a year. Even associates at sort-of-big or big-for-Baltimore firms, those with 101-250 lawyers, are earning a median $115,000 by year five.

And 11 to 15 years down the line? Our humble HMD is making between $60,000 and $80,830. And the HMWS? Well, if she’s spent her whole career at a firm, she ought to be a partner by now. The sky’s the limit.

One thing that surprised me about the data was the median salary figures for public defenders and local prosecutors. The defenders are actually making $1,760 a year more than the prosecutors starting out. With five years’ experience, though, the median salaries are identical, and with 11 to 15 years’, the prosecutors have a $2,500 edge.

HT: National Law Journal.

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer

Lawyers may not allow clients to perform nude dances in their office as a way of reducing their legal bill, the Illinois attorney disciplinary commission has decided.

The commission suspended attorney Scott Erwin from practice for 15 months after he asked a professional exotic dancer to perform several private dances in his office and then issued her a credit of $534 toward her $7,000 fee.

The pair met in 2002 at a club called “Heartbreakers,” and while talking, realized they had been speaking on phone earlier about some pending legal matters.

Erwin is the former chair of a DeKalb County committee charged with finding ways to provide low-cost legal services to people who can’t afford them. The client has since given up exotic dancing and is working as a real estate agent.

TOM HARRISON, Exhibit A

Source: The Chicago Tribune.

Once again, it’s pop quiz time! Who said the following in 1976:

“Grave dancing is an art that has many potential benefits. But one must be careful while prancing around not to fall into the open pit and join the cadaver.”

If you guessed Tribune Co. CEO Sam Zell, you have a very good memory – or you may be one of the six current or former Los Angeles Times staffers who filed a federal class action lawsuit against Zell and Tribune last week in California.

Zell’s quote serves as a prologue for the 64-page lawsuit stemming from his buyout last year of Tribune that more than tripled the company’s debt to nearly $13 billion, now shouldered by the company’s 18,000 employees. The lawsuit seeks to recover money lost from the employee stock-option plan, which Zell used to make the deal, as well as removal of Zell and other members of Tribune’s board of directors.

(Tribune Co. is the owner of The Baltimore Sun, whose recent layoffs, budget cuts and redesign under new management have been adeptly chronicled by my colleague, Liz Farmer.)

Zell has already called the lawsuit “frivolous” and “unfounded,” and much of it recaps the documented changes Tribune and its subsidiaries have undergone since he purchased it.

But, as Richard Siklos of Fortune magazine writes: “the notion that these might constitute actionable wrongs is fresh, as is the idea that Zell is a villain for wildly overpaying for the company and saddling it with an additional $8.3 billion in debt.”

So what do you think? Is the lawsuit a legitimate employee beef? Or simply sour grapes?

DANNY JACOBS, Legal Affairs Writer