Category: News Feeds

One of the funny things about modern patent litigation is that there is, at least on the nonpharma side of things, a pretty narrow stable of “big” defendants that patent owners take aim at. I do not have to name the usual suspects, but they do tend to share a number of characteristics. If they are consumer-facing brands, a dead giveaway of a big defendant is the operation of their own multiunit retail stores or a presence in nationwide mass-market retail (Walmart, Best Buy, etc.), or both. Add in the major suppliers to such brands, as well as the major social media and web search purveyors and you pretty much have the list of major targets, particularly for well-funded NPEs looking for a big payday. In support of those NPEs is a veritable host of litigation funders, ready and able to deploy capital in support of the rare patent case they deem fundable. To counter this threat, most — if not all — of the frequently targeted defendants tend to have a roster of both in-house and outside counsel litigation talent to call on, as well as a willingness to litigate hard in the face of what they deem unreasonable demands by patent plaintiffs. With these capabilities supplemented by the third-party patent defense impresarios, we end up with a pretty even playing field when it comes to funded NPE v. prominent defendant big-ticket patent litigation.

Level playing field aside, cases actually getting to trial against a big defendant are relatively rare. Whether it is because the parties reached a settlement or because the defendant was successful in an IPR or via motion practice, getting to trial is unlikely in the vast majority of patent cases. While I have consistently advanced the idea that a lot can be learned from how those rare trials involving big defendants turn out, there is also a lot we can glean from the pretrial maneuverings of the parties — particularly in a case involving a disclosed litigation funder. (As to the latter, it is becoming easier than ever in certain jurisdictions to find out whether there is a litigation funder involved in some capacity since disclosure of financially interested parties is compelled under certain local rules at time of case filing.)

One such case currently pending in the Central District of California, Pinn v. Apple, fits the bill as one where a litigation funder — styled as an “investor” on the mandated disclosure — was identified early on in the matter. And as the case approaches trial, various and sundry pretrial matters, including disposition of motions in limine, have taken place. Of significant interest, in a July 14 decision by the Hon. David O. Carter, a number of rulings on motions in limine made by a special master were addressed, including with respect to discussion of the presence of litigation funding in the case, among others. While we will discuss the court’s comments on the litigation funding aspect in a bit, it was also interesting to see that the plaintiff’s motion in limine regarding the location and size of the law firms involved were granted — perhaps reflecting a concern by Pinn about having Texas-based trial counsel commented on by Apple in a California matter. In any event, the court found: “Locations and sizes of counsel and their law firms is irrelevant.” Not a surprising holding by the court, considering the wide variety of more important issues for trial in a patent case.

What about the litigation funding piece? There, Pinn had filed a motion in limine seeking to bar evidence or argument on “Attorney compensation, litigation funding, or contingency arrangements.” The special master recommended granting of the motion “regarding: (a) litigation funding (if, however, Defendant believes at trial that Plaintiff has ‘opened the door’ by presenting evidence or argument that is calculated to tell a so-called ‘David vs. Goliath narrative,’ Defendant should raise the issue at trial so that the Court can evaluate the issue at that time); and (b) compensation arrangements for Plaintiff’s trial counsel (including any financial interest Plaintiff’s trial counsel may have in Plaintiff or in the outcome of the present litigation).” Carter affirmed the special master’s conclusion, adding “that litigation funding and compensation arrangements for counsel are collateral matters and would be unduly consumptive of time at trial.” In short, Carter indicated that he has no appetite for discussion of financial interests at trial, irrespective of the local rule in his district compelling disclosure of those interests. At minimum, his ruling suggests that the utility of early financial interest disclosure is most pronounced early in a case, but that by the time trial is imminent, such disclosures are a sideshow.

This latest ruling on admissibility of funding arrangements will be heartening to litigation funders, as it serves as further proof that there is little appetite in many judicial quarters for making funding arrangements a centerpiece of patent cases. Informed perhaps by a recognition that patent trials are often compressed enough for time due to the myriad issues requiring attention, it is clear from Carter’s ruling that carving out additional time at trial to deal with financial interests — whether they be of a litigation funder or contingency counsel or both — is a nonstarter, at least in his court. Considering how the weight of decisions regarding discovery around litigation funding arrangements continues to illustrate just how little interest most courts have around the topic, this decision is in line with a developing consensus that patent cases are crowded enough with issues requiring adjudication so as to make spending time on litigation funding arrangements a hard sell — during both discovery or at trial itself. Put another way, if the case itself is the show you have on your DVR, litigation funding is the commercial you fast forward through.

Ultimately, decisions like the one in Pinn are yet more evidence that big defendants must be strategic about their approach to funded plaintiffs, at least with respect to allocating resources toward discovery regarding litigation funding arrangements. Yes, it is good to know as a big defendant that the case against you is funded; even better when you know who the funder is. But unless there is reason to believe that the funder has settlement control or input, or that a separate deal with the funder that would get them to withdraw funding is advisable or even possible, there is really not much use for spending defense dollars toward pressing the issue, at least under the current legal framework. Better to take that knowledge and see whether you can drive early settlement, before the funder’s expensive capital alters the financial landscape of the dispute too much. At the same time, because of the lack of empirical evidence around the deployment of litigation funding in patent cases, the prevailing wisdom that patent cases are harder to settle if a funder is involved might also find support in the fact that Pinn is headed for trial. For now, however, we know for a fact that at least in one California court, litigation funding is a “collateral matter” and not worth a minute of trial time to pursue.

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.

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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.

A question I often receive from job seekers, no matter their career level, is whether cover letters are still required or expected. I am still very much a traditionalist when it comes to the job search and all forms of communication. I always recommend sending a cover letter with the resume (even if it’s not required), submitting an email variation of a “thank you” letter within 24 hours following an interview, and attaching a “note” when you request to connect with someone on LinkedIn.

Even if cover letters have a low readability rate of around 30%, the key is to be professional at all times as it is a matter of first impression. However, the approach of cover letters has changed, and I do believe it’s worthwhile to touch on it in this week’s column.

When I graduated law school in 2003, my cover letter was extensive — a full page in length. I can still vividly remember obsessing over it and increasing the length as I continued through a decade-plus of practicing law.

We were ingrained to believe that our cover letter length equated to sharing enough detail about our legal aspirations, commitment to the craft, law school curriculum/relevant coursework, and, of course, accolades. Further, our cover letter represented our writing skills (not to be confused with the resume and the writing sample we also attached to showcase our writing aptitude).

In today’s digital world, an entire-page cover letter is obsolete. In fact, it screams boring and an inability to be succinct. The majority of applications (resume included) are read on a smartphone or other digital device. Just as the old ways of doing business have shifted, so have the methodologies of outreach and interest in roles. Today, your cover letter functions as an e-note, which is why I recommend two strategies: (1) create a master cover letter that you can tweak accordingly for different positions; and (2) keep the cover letter to under 250 words (I strive for closer to 200).

Remember, your cover letter must get the point across — and fast, in less than 10 seconds. Readers prefer language that is direct and succinct. State your objective clearly. Research the company — find things that interest you about the company as well as the position. Connect yourself to the reader and the company — the mission, the values, the projects, and the long-term goals. Think about some of your career wins or best assets that align with the company’s needs for its next in-house counsel or associate attorney.

Make sure your current contact details are easily seen and noticeable. Double check that you aren’t listing an old, outdated phone number. Research who you are sending the cover letter to — that means going the extra mile and analyzing the job posting to see who you will be directly reporting to at the company. Address the cover letter personally to that individual, but also look up that person on LinkedIn to see if there is anything that connects you or your career trajectories.

The key is to show an avid interest in the company, rather than just a “spray and pray” method of applying to 50-plus positions. Keep your focus and keep the reader’s interest. One other importance piece of advice: always follow up after applying for a position and reaffirm your interest. If you do follow up with an e-note message via LinkedIn, the reader will have your profile in front of them, making it easy to see your career trajectory. Just make sure your profile is optimized and updated.

Have a question about cover letters? Send me a message on LinkedIn.

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Wendi Weiner is an attorney, career expert, and founder of The Writing Guru, an award-winning executive resume writing services company. Wendi creates powerful career and personal brands for attorneys, executives, and C-suite/Board leaders for their job search and digital footprint. She also writes for major publications about alternative careers for lawyers, personal branding, LinkedIn storytelling, career strategy, and the job search process. You can reach her by email at wendi@writingguru.net, connect with her on LinkedIn, and follow her on Twitter @thewritingguru.  

This is phenomenal news. Putting race and gender aside, Tiffany [Cunningham] is a fantastic lawyer and will be an excellent addition to this bench given her trial litigation experience and her commitment to the rule of law. As a Black female trial lawyer, it is nice to see another glass ceiling cracked knowing that it took nearly 40 years to do so.

— Jeanne Gills, an intellectual property partner at Foley & Lardner, commenting on the recent confirmation of Tiffany Cunningham, a Perkins Coie partner, to the Federal Circuit. She will be the first African American judge in the court’s 39-year history.

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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.

Law firm business is booming and the frenzied tussle for associates — particularly transactional talent — already brought us a few rounds of special bonuses and a still raging raise cycle. But as much as firms can sway associates with money to pay down their lifetime debt load, at a certain point firms might need to think outside of the compensation box.

Again, there’s no substitute for salary when trying to pry someone away from their current employer, but keeping someone inside the tent is a little different. This is where some well-crafted perks — like an office policy that embraces the remote working model that we all saw succeed in 2020 — might make a difference.

But another weapon available to firms might not even be on their radar: ALSPs.

Speaking with Ed Sohn from Factor recently, he described what the “scale up” — it can hardly be a start up having grown out of Axiom — is doing with Legal Transaction Optimization and while its primary advantages come in the form of high-quality work product at reasonable cost, the implication for associate retention stood out as a powerful fringe benefit.

As the name suggests, Legal Transaction Optimization aims to make the transactional workflow more efficient. Specifically, Factor provides value through slicing off the perfunctory work currently performed by first- and second-year associates, reducing costs without reducing rates.

By unbundling transactional tasks from legal advice, law firm juniors billing at high rates are replaced with tech-enabled teams specialized in producing better output. Unbundling means law firms win more advisory work and clients get better value.

Handing this work to junior associates does little for the firm that’s writing it all down anyway or for the associate’s sense of career development and general quality of life. Move those tasks to cheaper options and allow junior associates to actually enjoy their work.

Because drudgery isn’t inevitable. Sohn shared an anecdote from a senior Biglaw partner he’d worked with who told him that back in his day, every deal was leanly staffed and juniors weren’t spending weeks doing administrative work. In a sense, slicing that work off isn’t a radical new direction for the industry, it’s returning the practice to normal.

All else equal, get associates good work and they’re not going to want to leave. Get associates good work by handing off the stuff that isn’t advancing their careers to a more efficient provider.

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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.

Ed. note: This column originally appeared on Original Jurisdiction, the latest Substack publication from David Lat. You can learn more about Original Jurisdiction on its About page, and you can subscribe through this signup page.

Like many lawyers, I’m a sucker for rankings. In the world of Biglaw, some of the most notable rankings are the Am Law 100 and Am Law 200 rankings, which rank the nation’s largest law firms by total revenue (and also include data on such metrics as profits per equity partner), and the Vault 100 rankings, which rank firms by prestige.

Not to be overlooked, however, are the NLJ 500 rankings, in which the National Law Journal ranks the 500 largest firms in the United States by lawyer headcount — the firms that put the “big” in “Biglaw.” They might not be as sexy as rankings of firms based on profitability or prestige, but they still matter.

First, the NLJ 500 rankings remind us that large U.S. law firms, even if they’re not publicly traded, can be bigger than all but the biggest companies, generating billions in revenue and employing thousands of people, including not just lawyers but paralegals, legal assistants, and other professionals. Second, the rankings also reveal how many people’s careers and lives are tied to a particular firm, and in that sense they reflect a firm’s influence and importance within the Biglaw ecosystem.

As I’ve mentioned in these pages, I’ve been a bit distracted over the past few weeks by our family’s big move from Manhattan to the New Jersey suburbs. So I actually missed the latest NLJ 500 rankings when the National Law Journal issued them late last month. I’d like to take this occasion to double back and discuss them.

Here are the top 10 firms from the NLJ 500, i.e., the ten biggest firms in terms of headcount based on 2020 data. I calculated myself and added in two columns of calculations that I thought might be of interest — partners as a percentage of total attorneys at a firm, and equity partners as a percentage of total attorneys at a firm:

Some brief observations:

• The headcount of the largest firm, Baker McKenzie, is a staggering 4,699 — 700 lawyers more than second-place DLA Piper. And Baker McKenzie’s headcount actually decreased last year, by 2.3 percent, meaning that it was even bigger in 2019.
• In the top 10, the firm where equity partners make up the smallest slice of total headcount is DLA Piper, where they amount to a little more than 10 percent of all attorneys.
• I was surprised by how high the percentages were for partners as a percentage of total attorneys. The title of “partner” doesn’t mean as much as it used to, given the rise in the ranks of nonequity partners (a group that grew in size last year by 3 percent, even though overall lawyer headcount at NLJ 500 firms declined by 0.1 percent). But I was still surprised to see that at most of the top 10 firms, about a third of lawyers carry the “partner” title.
• I wasn’t shocked to see that at Kirkland & Ellis, where you get the title of (nonequity aka “nonshare”) partner if you stick it out for six years or so, more than 40 percent of lawyers have the partner title. But K&E wasn’t even the highest in this regard; at Greenberg Traurig, more than half the lawyers are partners (or “shareholders,” in GT parlance).
• In the top 10 largest firms, the only firm with a single-tier, all-equity partnership is Jones Day. So in one sense it’s easier to make equity partner at JD, but it might mean less once you do: profits per equity partner (PPEP) at Jones Day were just shy of $1.3 million in the latest Am Law 100 rankings, which is quite low by Biglaw standards in 2021. And under the firm’s “black box” compensation system, Jones Day can get away with paying many partners well below that average PPEP figure.

If you hop over to the National Law Journal, you can access the full rankings plus extensive color commentary. Here are a few other highlights from elsewhere in the NLJ 500, including the cities and states with the most NLJ 500 lawyers.

Continue reading over at Original Jurisdiction.

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David Lat, the founding editor of Above the Law, is a writer and speaker about law and legal affairs. You can read his latest writing about law and the legal profession by subscribing to Original Jurisdiction, his Substack newsletter. David’s book, Supreme Ambitions: A Novel (2014), was described by the New York Times as “the most buzzed-about novel of the year” among legal elites. Before entering the media and recruiting worlds, David worked as a federal prosecutor, a litigation associate at Wachtell Lipton, and a law clerk to Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. You can connect with David on Twitter (@DavidLat), LinkedIn, and Facebook, and you can reach him by email at davidlat@substack.com.

On July 15, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced that it would be awarding an individual more than $1 million. No, it’s not a lottery: This person was reaping the promised reward of the SEC’s whistleblower program.

We don’t know a whole lot about the person who is receiving more than a million bucks from the federal agency tasked with regulating securities. Indeed, anonymity is part of the appeal of becoming an SEC whistleblower. Under the Dodd-Frank Act, whistleblower confidentiality is protected, and the SEC is barred from disclosing any information that could reveal a whistleblower’s identity. But we do know that this person, whoever he or she may be, participated in an interview with SEC staff and provided the SEC with documents which helped the agency bring an enforcement action.

“Today’s whistleblower played a critical role in the SEC bringing an enforcement action,” Emily Pasquinelli, Acting Chief of the SEC’s Office of the Whistleblower, said in a press release. “The whistleblower timely reported the securities law violations to the Commission and then played a key role in the successful resolution of the action.”

In many cases, the SEC relies on whistleblowers to identify possible fraud and other sorts of legal violations early on, before more investors are harmed. Congress has provided for cash payouts to some of these individuals who come forward with information about securities fraud or other types of wrongdoing within the financial sector.

There are fairly strict eligibility criteria. For one thing, in order to receive a monetary award, a whistleblower must provide high-quality, original information. In other words, there has to be a level of specificity that will at least allow an investigation to move forward, and the tip probably can’t be about something the SEC is already well aware of. Additionally, the information provided must actually lead to an enforcement action from the SEC, and that enforcement action must result in at least $1 million in sanctions being ordered.

Provided that the eligibility criteria are met though, the rewards can be substantial. The range for SEC whistleblower awards is anywhere from 10 percent to 30 percent of the money collected. Even 10 percent of what is collected in a large enforcement action can be a fairly overwhelming figure, and whistleblowers don’t have to be concerned about their awards coming from the investors they’re trying to protect, because all of the reward money is paid out through an investor protection fund which is replenished with sanctions paid by securities law violators. Recovered investor money goes back to the investors.

The SEC made its first award under its whistleblower program in 2012. Since then, the federal agency has awarded close to $939 million to 182 individual whistleblowers. I’ll save you from doing the math yourself on that one: This means that on average, eligible SEC whistleblowers are walking away with awards in excess of $5 million. Not bad for reporting legal violations that some would say you have an ethical duty to report even without realizing a huge payday at the end.

The latest SEC whistleblower award of a little more than a million bucks is small potatoes compared with the average payout since the program began. That being said, a cool million for doing the right thing sure doesn’t sound like a bad outcome.

Now might be a particularly good time to speak up for those who see securities laws being violated. Almost half of the total amount ever awarded through the whistleblower program was awarded in just the last 10 months, from September of last year to mid-July. More and more whistleblowers seem to be getting with the program. According to the SEC, from fiscal year 2012 to 2020, the annual number of whistleblower tips received by the agency grew by around 74 percent.

So, congratulations to the newest SEC whistleblower millionaire, whoever you are. And to all the readers out there, if you yourself have any hot info on securities laws being violated, I can think of about a million good reasons to report it.

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Jonathan Wolf is a civil litigator and author of Your Debt-Free JD (affiliate link). He has taught legal writing, written for a wide variety of publications, and made it both his business and his pleasure to be financially and scientifically literate. Any views he expresses are probably pure gold, but are nonetheless solely his own and should not be attributed to any organization with which he is affiliated. He wouldn’t want to share the credit anyway. He can be reached at jon_wolf@hotmail.com.

Having the right technology is critical to running an efficient and effective law practice today. If you’re like most attorneys, you probably find yourself or your staff spending too much time on administrative tasks or reconciling information from various systems in order to get your work done. What if you could spend more time doing the work you actually enjoy and making your clients happy rather than just juggling your caseload? The answer: use the right practice management software.

Enter MyCase. MyCase sets a high bar for customer experience, and for that reason they’ve committed to building their most crucial features in-house, rather than outsourcing mission-critical functions to third-party tools and software. This approach makes for the seamless workflows you need to unify your practice from client intake through collecting final payments. Even better, it won’t break the bank – all the natively built features are included in MyCase’s low monthly or annual subscription rate, with no hidden charges for extra features..

An impressive collection of natively built features makes for a sophisticated and intuitive practice management system that allows attorneys to seamlessly handle cases from end to end, including:

• Client Intake & Lead Management
• Case Management
• Calendaring
• Billing and Invoicing
• Practice Oversight
• Client Portal

How it Works

MyCase is a cloud-based practice management system that allows you to better manage your practice from end to end, taking you from client intake all the way to final payment.

Your MyCase experience starts on your home dashboard, where you have all your main features and functionalities laid out at the top left. 

From there, you can click directly into the tools you want to use without navigating to other applications or windows. 

Among MyCase’s roster of natively built solutions are four features that truly make it easy to manage your entire case from start to finish right within MyCase.

Top 4 High-Impact Features of MyCase

Lead Intake

The Lead Intake feature in MyCase makes it easy to keep track of potential clients so no potential case ever slips through the cracks. All you have to do is enter the client’s contact information as a lead, and MyCase will create a potential case in the system. There is even an option to add a Contact Us form to your website so that leads are added directly to your MyCase account.

The intake system is built in-house, which means the potential case you create is integrated directly into the entire MyCase system. If the lead becomes a client, you can convert it to a case with just a few clicks. 

The next step is to add the case details – things like the nature of the case, the fee structure, the responsible attorney, and more.

In just a couple minutes, you’ve converted a potential client to a full matter in MyCase, where you can start accessing all the other features as your case develops. The ability to quickly and easily intake new matters is a powerful tool for ramping up caseloads and building your firm. With everything in one place, you no longer lose time chasing down or consolidating information from different systems.

E-Signatures

Electronic signatures are a crucial feature of any practice management system, and often one that you have to pay extra for, because most systems use third-party tools – not so with MyCase. MyCase has doubled down on its e-signature tool as the pandemic made it clear just how important this functionality is in modern law practice.

MyCase incorporates e-signature templates for standard documents like retainer agreements and NDAs, meaning you can set it up once and then use it every time you need a similar document signed.

Within MyCase, you can designate a specific firm user to be the cosigner on particular types of documents, for example if there’s one person who signs all NDAs on behalf of the firm. Whenever the outside party submits their e-signature, MyCase notifies whatever cosigner has been designated and prompts them to complete the document.

With MyCase, you get your agreements signed as quickly as possible and convert a new client in seconds. Even if your outside signatures come in at 8pm while you’re at a baseball game, you’ll get the notification and you can add your signature right from your phone. Then just confirm the signatures and hit save, and you’re done. The document then seamlessly becomes part of your MyCase matter with almost no effort on your part.

MyCase’s e-signature functionality is more robust than many others on the market, because they’ve implemented a number of merge fields directly in MyCase. This means the system pulls your specific case information and incorporates it automatically into your e-signature documents, speeding up the process even more.

You can also see the signature status of all your documents in MyCase, so you always know what’s complete, what’s outstanding, and who’s holding up the process. Completed documents are available for download with signatures so you can share out or save as needed.

Texting and Communication

MyCase makes communication easy by incorporating two-way text messaging. Directly from your MyCase matter, you can access text messaging and send texts that are linked to your specific client and case.

Your recipient will receive the communication as a normal message in iMessage or whichever SMS app they use. For you, the MyCase user, you’ll see the texts in MyCase on your computer or in the mobile app if you’re using your phone. You get notifications when texts come into MyCase, but they won’t be blowing up your personal text messaging with client texts.

The text record is retained with the matter, so you can access or reference it at any time. You can also see all the texts that have been exchanged between any users on that matter, all in one place.

In addition to texting, MyCase includes other communication tools including internal chat, event reminders, and invoice payment reminders (more on payments in a minute). All these communication functionalities are a great example of how MyCase integrates every aspect of your matter, from your communications and case documents to your calendars and invoicing.

Built-In Payment System

Finally, MyCase includes automated billing and invoicing functionality for no additional fee. You can set up payment plans and recurring charges that automatically tell your clients what they owe and make it easy for them to pay. Whatever your billing arrangement is, you can set it and forget it, spending less time on billing and more time on your case work.

Simply add your invoice and MyCase will calculate your ultimate fee for you based on the payment plan you specify and generate installment payments. You can set it up to accept online payments and have them deposited directly into a specified account. Your clients can add credit card information directly to the system to streamline payments as well.

Much like with the text messaging, the invoicing and payment history is tied directly to your matter in MyCase. You can always go in and see what’s been billed, what’s been paid, and what’s still owed. You can even send out payment links via MyCase that make it easy for your clients to pay.

Affordable, Efficient Practice Management

The icing on the cake is MyCase’s price – an annual subscription is $49 a month for their complete practice management software, including e-signatures and text messaging functionality. There are no add-ons, no hidden charges for certain features, and no surprises. You won’t find a better deal on the market for a comprehensive practice management solution.

With solutions built in-house that are designed to take your case from initial intake to final payment, MyCase is positioning itself as one of the most effective and affordable case management tools on the market now. Given the demands of running a legal practice today, you can’t afford not to try it.

A new federal lawsuit alleges former New York state trial judge Matthew Rosenbaum subjected his secretary to forced sex acts and other harassment between March 2005 and June 2009. Plaintiff Rebecca Klymn alleges the judge demanded she perform fellatio on him, saying it was part of her job to relieve his stress. According to the complaint, Rosenbaum also vaginally raped Klymn in her home in 2006.

As reported by Bloomberg Law, the complaint, filed in the Western District of New York, also contains other allegations of harassment:

Rosenbaum also touched Klymn, put his arm around her, made comments about her clothing, and called her demeaning names including “honey” and “sweetie,” according to the suit.

That harassment occurred daily in the presence of others and continued even after she told the judge she would no longer accede to his sexual demands, Klymn said.

She performed the sex acts under threats to her job and custody of her minor son while she was going through divorce proceedings, she said.

In addition to Rosenbaum, the lawsuit also names the New York Unified Court System, the Office of Court Administration, the Monroe County Supreme Court and a number of court officials as defendants. Klymn says she told a number of state officials about the abuse and filed three complaints with the Office of the Special Inspector General for Bias Matters starting in November 2007. The complaint says Klymn never received a response to the first two complaints, saying they were “lost” when they finally acted on the allegations in 2019. The complaint goes on to allege that an OIG investigator suggested during an interview with Klymn that she “asked for” it because of how she dressed.

The suit alleges Rosenbaum was allowed to resign to avoid disciplinary action.

Defendants have not yet commented on the allegations.

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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. 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).

While a good number of firms have moved to a national salary scale for all associates during this summer’s salary wars, others have stuck with their prior, market-based approaches to compensation. For those firms, associates in larger markets moved up to the now-prevailing $205.000 salary scale, while associates in smaller markets received commensurate raises.

That’s exactly what’s going on at Philadelphia-based firms Blank Rome and Duane Morris. Both firms recently raised salaries, but some associates will be receiving less money than others based simply on their office location.

Thanks to Jeff Blumenthal’s intrepid reporting over at the Philadelphia Business Journal, we now know that Blank Rome has raised salaries for first-year associates in its larger markets (New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and D.C.) to $205,000 and increased starting salaries for associates in its smaller markets (Wilmington, Princeton, and its home base of Philadelphia) to $190,000. All other associates will receive commensurate market salary increases. The firm did not disclose what raises, if any, first-years in other offices would receive.

Duane Morris, on the other hand, has raised salaries for all associates in its major markets (Philadelphia, New York, D.C., and Chicago) to $190,000, with commensurate raises for all other associates depending on class year, market location, and practice area.

This all seems a little black-boxy for our tastes, but as we keep saying, a raise is a raise is a raise. If you’d like to help us crack the compensation code for Blank Rome and Duane Morris for other class years, please feel free to send us an email. We will be sure to keep you anonymous.

We depend on your tips to stay on top of this stuff. So when your firm matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Matches”). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.

And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we’ll also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish.

Two more big Philadelphia law firms join associate salary wars [Philadelphia Business Journal]

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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.

You saw that headline and thought: “This can’t possibly be real.” Alas, it is very much a real thing that’s really happening in America in 2021. The asteroid cannot come swiftly enough.

For weeks, an unknown man has called libraries around the country asking for a specific Supreme Court opinion to be read to him. As the librarians comply, it becomes clear that he’s pleasuring himself to the words of the Court.

“Oh yeah, give it to me. Give me that exculpatory evidence. Spank those prosecutors!”

But here’s the thing… it’s always Brady v. Maryland. There are actual Supreme Court opinions with pornography discussed in the facts! If this guy was asking about Lochner, we could at least narrow it down to the Federalist Society. Instead, we’ve got a guy a crim pro fetishist who gets off on defendants… getting off? I guess there is some logic there.

Another librarian added her personal experience with The Slippery Gavel:

I understand why they hang up, but it robs us of learning if he concludes the call yelling, “Comes now the plaintiff!”

Even more bizarrely, this may not be this legal jerkoff’s first rodeo. This is from the Library Think Tank group on Facebook and they see a pattern in the recent spate of calls:

“John Grisham titles.” Just a list of titles like “Firm” and “Rainmaker” and oh… I guess I see where this is going.

Seriously, don’t harass librarians. Don’t harass anyone, but included within that, don’t harass librarians. If you need this kind of thrill, call a late night SCOTUS party line like Shadow Docket Girls where real clerks are just dying to get you standing! Just dial 1-CER-TIO-RARI.

A quick poll:

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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.