All in Quick Hits
A quick reminder from our friends at the State Bar of Wisconsin: it is pretty much always scamming season and attorneys are not at all immune. The Inside Track newsletter this week offers some practical tips for recognizing and avoiding trust account scams.
I recently recorded a podcast for Legal Talk Today, and discussed Rudy Giuliani’s future and the limits of zealous advocacy. (Loyal readers will recognize some of this.)
I’m writing this at 4:30 pm the Friday before Memorial Day. Throughout the day, I’ve received multiple communications, from multiple agencies and entities, telling me bad things about my clients.
By now, just about every lawyer has received multiple forwards of the Lawyer Zoom Cat video. For those of you not so lucky, a Texas lawyer accidentally appeared at Zoom court with a filter activated that turned him into a talking cat.
The Wisconsin State Bar Standing Committee on Professional Ethics (of which I am a member) recently approved Formal Opinion EF-21-01, which clarifies when you can threaten someone with criminal prosecution to gain advantage in a civil manner.
I remember at the end of the George W. Bush administration, some comedians said that the Obama administration would put them out of business, what with Obama’s lack of propensity for scandal or gaffes. While of course that didn’t happen (the comedy world survived Obama’s tan suits and fancy mustard just fine), I’ve been asked (once) whether I am worried I won’t have blog fodder after all of the ridiculous election and Trump-related litigation is over.
All eyes are on the Middle District of Pennsylvania, which is set to hear arguments in one of the Trump Campaign’s voting lawsuits today. Enter Rudy Giuliani, who has applied for pro hac vice admission despite his last federal court appearance being before some lawyers were born.
However, it looks like Rudy may have some problems right out of the gate, in addition to all of his other problems.
Typically, courts redo their Web sites and it’s not for the best. They don’t display right on a mobile device and I end up not being able to find anything regardless of where I am. But credit where it’s due.
Under normal circumstances I'd be in Chicago right now, checked into the Hotel Palomar, hanging out with my nerd friends from the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers at the Annual Meeting. This blog would be quiet but I’d be annoying everyone on Facebook with out-of-context giddy snippets from the conference.
Instead, it's Yet Another Zoom.
Todd Banks’ valiant attempt to invalidate Al Johnson’s Restaurant’s Goats on the Roof trade dress as “demeaning to goats” (chronicled here in December) has ended not with a bang, or a whimper, or even with a fish fry, but with a denial of a cert petition.
I don’t think you need to be an ethics attorney or an attorney at all to know you generally need your client to be a client and to know that they’re a client before filing a lawsuit on their behalf and then litigating it for two years and then having it dismissed with a petition for attorney’s fees made against you.
Still playing catch-up after Austin, but a couple of quick related points about ambulances and the fact we don’t literally chase them.
