Friday Open Thread: Holiday Weekend Addition

Happy Halloween Nevada Day!

Enjoy your (hopefully) long weekend. Here's a chuckle for the five of you who haven't already seen it:

It's Nice To Be Loved ...

Cam Ferenbach, "the highly respected president of the State Bar of Nevada, a shareholder in the prestigious Lionel Sawyer Collins firm and a 30-year veteran of the profession," recently spoke at the swearing-in ceremony our new July admittees. His topic was avoiding professional unhappiness.

His example was from our comments.

Lovely to have such a highly respected member of our bar citing our humble little blog in such an important speech. Although we have a sneaking suspicion we may have just uncovered the identity of "double kickstands guy."

(LV Legal News; Thanks Tipster!)

Kishner Gets Censured

From the RJ:

A judicial ethics panel censured Clark County district judge candidate Joanna S. Kishner on Monday for making "reckless" statements about her opponent, Philip J. Dabney.

The Standing Committee on Judicial Ethics and Election Practices found Kishner knowingly made reckless statements that omitted facts about Dabney during their joint appearance on the Sept. 13 television show "Face to Face with Jon Ralston." Dabney and Kishner are candidates for the Department 31 district judge seat in Clark County.

A censure is a public reprimand.

Well, it's kind of like a public reprimand ... except for the "public" generally only includes people who read the small print in the back of legal publications.

(LVRJ; Thanks, Tipsters!)

Mixed Juice

Last week, the Nevada Supreme Court (specifically the three justice panel of Cherry, Saitta and Gibbons) decided that O.J. Simpson got a fair trial and his conviction should stand - and the decision had nothing to do with the fact that he killed his ex-wife and her boyfriend and got away with it.

In the same breath, the same panel decided that C.J. Stewart did not get a fair trial and reversed his conviction - you know, because O.J. Simpson killed his ex-wife and her boyfriend and got away with it.

What do you guys think ... did they get it right?

(Simpson Decision (PDF); Stewart Decision (PDF); LV Sun; Thanks, Tipster!)

How does your small firm salary stack up?

That other (far superior) legal tabloid Above The Law is doing a series on small law firms, and has started publishing the results of its survey of small firm lawyers regarding their salaries. With over 650 respondents, they had a pretty good sample size, and came up with some interesting numbers.

Check it out. If you work for a smaller firm, let us know if the figures look accurate for our market.

(Thanks, Tipster!)

Friday Open Thread

Happy Friday Everyone!

Get out there and early vote this weekend.

Righthaven Loses MTD

Everyone's favorite bluetool lost a Motion to Dismiss on Tuesday based upon the application of fair use doctrine - the first of what will hopefully be many in his overzealous copyright suit-o-rama.

The attorney who handed Gibson the loss was Sergio Salzano of Lynch, Hopper & Salzano, LLP. U.S. District Judge Larry Hicks was presiding.

Although the court dismissed Righthaven’s claims, Salzano and Gibson reached a confidential settlement based upon "other potential infringements."

(LV Sun; Thanks Tipsters!)

Penny for your picks ...

In last week's Open Thread, an anonymous commenter asked our WWL brain trust to help her out with judicial picks for this election season. We think this is a great idea, and wanted to give it the full post it deserved. Nobody knows these candidates better than our readers!

Commenters, here's your mission: Copy and paste the candidates listed below into your comment, and let us know who's got your vote (or who you will definitely not be voting for). If you're up to it, give us a Twitter-style (read: short) parenthetical explaining the reason for your decision.

District Court

Gale or Sturman
Allf or Beckstead
Howard or Israel
Pollock or Scann
Davidson or Wiese
Dabney or Kishner
Bare or Stoebling

Family Court
Jones or Maskall
Eccles or Gonzalez
Ochoa or Wallace
Nathan or Piazza

Justice of the Peace

Abbatangelo or Marshall

Kephart or Kuzemka

Bennett or Kurth

Baucum or Gubler

Hafen or Zadrowski

Hill or "Batman"

District Attorney

Roger or Chairez

Sheriff

Gillespie or Bisch

Attorney General

Masto or Barrick or Hafter or Hansen

(Thanks, Voting Girl!)

Candelaria Decision Posted

The Nevada Supreme Court has issued its decision in In re Candelaria.

As you may remember, this was the case of Boyd Law student graduate Amber Candelaria, who attempted to meet the judicial candidacy requirements of NRS 4.010(2)(a) for justice of the peace by relying on her invoice from the State Bar requiring her to pay the dues of a fifth year attorney.

Justices Cherry and Saitta were "deeply troubled" by the majority justices defining a year as (generally) 365 days, and filed a dissent to the opinion. Hooray for elected judges!

(Opinion; Thanks, Tipsters!)

Friday Open Thread

Happy Friday everyone!

What else is going on in the legal world?

Very effective assistance of counsel ...

Time to open up the rumor mill!

Here's what we've heard about the so-called "PD scandal" so far:

A female deputy public defender (let's call her Suzy Squarebush) allegedly got caught giving an inmate (let's call him Prince Charming) oral sex while visiting the inmate at Clark County Detention Center.

Suzy was allegedly caught because she photographed the act, and sent the photos to Charming's cell phone (how an inmate has a cell phone, we have no idea). Charming then allegedly showed the photos around to some inmate friends ... thus blowing everything. [Rimshot!]

Anyone have more information on this?

(Thanks, Tipsters!)

Las Vegas Sun gives their judicial candidate endorsements

On the heels of the RJ, the LV Sun has released their judicial candidate endorsements.

What do you guys think?

(LV Sun)

WTF Syndrome?

What do you do when business is slow? Create your own niche, of course.

If you're Kurt Harris, you make up an ailment, then you get an "expert" to legitimize it, then you offer to sue on behalf of people with your made-up ailment. Genius!

Bonus points if you're able to get elected to the bench and recognize said "expert" as qualified to testify regarding said made-up ailment.

(Thanks Commenters!)

RJ Announces Endorsements in Contested Judicial Races

Elections are getting close. The Review Journal released its endorsements.

District Court Endorsements

Family and Justice Court

What do you think of their selections? Do these candidates have your vote or did the RJ get it wrong?

UPDATED: Now with working links!

Friday Open Thread

Happy Friday everyone!

It's been a good week for some of you newly-minted (pending swearing in, of course) attorneys.

Congratulations to those who passed, condolences to those who did not. Hope to see all of you out at the big CPK bash tonight!

Happy Bar Results Day!

It's that time again ... time for all you out-of-state J.D.'s (and some of you Boyd students) to sweat it out. Nevada may be the wild wild west of the legal world, but we have a very difficult bar exam that you must pass before we allow you to go out and commit unrestrained malpractice.

Don't worry, we're sure most some of you did fine. For the rest of you ... well, we know of a pretty sweet party tomorrow night where you can drown your sorrows.

Commenters, how about posting some happy thoughts for our soon-to-be-hyperventilating pals? Let them know that life goes on, regardless of the results ... tell them your tales of woe.

Results are usually posted around 1:00 PM ... press button below to check.

Good luck!! Don't forget about tipping us when you become big shot attorneys!

County commission panel to study coroner's inquest process

Because, as we all know - nothing solves problems like convening a panel.

(LVRJ; Thanks Tipster!)

Revisiting Landreth v. Malik

The Nevada Supreme Court in an en banc setting on Monday reheard the "landmark" Landreth v. Malik, 125 Nev. Adv. op. 61 (2009), a case that limited the jurisdiction of state family courts to married parties and children, but not unmarried, childless cohabitating couples.

Any guesses as to how the Supremes will come down on this one?

(Las Vegas Legal News)

Jobs!

Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP's Las Vegas office is currently seeking to fill several associate positions. All types of civil litigation and one specific to med mal. From their website:

Wilson Elser is a full-service firm with clients in the United States, Latin America, Europe and Asia. Domestically, we are ranked among the top law firms identified by The American Lawyer and listed in the "Top 50" by The National Law Journal.

Call (702) 727-1400 to inquire.

"Bad Service" Trial Begins

Defense attorney Craig Mueller has promised the trial of Maurice Carroll will be a "barn burner." Judge Elissa Cadish will be presiding, with Boyd grad Mike Staudaher for the prosecution.

From the RJ:

The felony charges against Carroll focus on civil cases in which 17 people were sued by Richland Holdings. In each case, the defendant was hit with a default judgment. In some cases, defendants told police they were working when Carroll's employees claimed in affidavits to have found them at home.

(LVRJ; Thanks, Tipster!)

Do you really need an invitation?

Once again, the nicest guy in P.I. is preparing to host one of the biggest lawyer shindigs of the year.

This years CPK "Open House" is this coming Friday (10/08/10) at 5:00 PM. Live music will be provided by Acoustic Soul, followed by a D.J. for those of you who like to shake a leg. Grub will be provided by Chino & Antonio's Pizza.

For those of you new to the scene, Craig's parties are a great place to eat, drink and walk that thin line that separates debauchery from disbarment. But seriously, there is no better networking opportunity for those of you seeking to make some law-friends. Pictures from last year's festivities are available here.

For those of you more experienced CPK party-goers, let's hear your favorite moments from years past. Hope to see you all there!

Friday Open Thread

Happy Friday everyone!

What's happening?

George Foley Sr., Dead at 88

George Foley Sr., former Clark County district attorney and all-around good guy, died last Sunday night.

Please use this thread only for condolences and stories about George.

(LV Sun)