Alberto Gonzales Lawyer of the Year. Really? Seriously?

In a story that can only be categorized as " you have to be kidding me" former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was named Lawyer of the Year by the ABA Journal today. You can read the entire synopsis by clicking this link to the MSNBC story.

This is sort of up there with Time Magazine naming Joseph Stalin as Man of the Year way back when. Sure the laying of waste to the Ukraine was a bad thing, but gosh darn it that crazy Joe Stalin sure had an impact didn't he?

I realize the ABA looks at the award as a way of simply naming the attorney who was in the news the most, or who had the biggest impact on the legal profession. However, you can't tell me that this award makes any sense what so ever in the context of recognizing lawyers who had a major impact.

If I were to name anyone lawyer of the year, it would be  the general counsel of Merck, Kenneth Frazier, the architect of the legal defense that essentially handcuffed the trial bar on the Vioxx litigation and forced them into a settlement posture that is far less in value then anyone ever imagined the Vioxx cases actually settling for. 

Instead of some symbolic slap at a guy who is already out of the attorney generals office, how about the guys at the ABA Journal actually look at legal minds and attorneys who did real work, had a material impact on the profession and, in the case of Frazier, may have set the blue print of legal defense in mass tort cases for the next 5 to 10 years. As much as I regret the out come of Vioxx I certainly respect the legal acumen of the attorney's involved in the strategic decisions made in that case.  

Merck will seek approval for new drugs in 2008.

Merck has announced that  it will seek approval for new drugs next year and more are in the final test stage.

Read the story here. 

NY Times article on Dickie Scruggs and Mass Torts.

At what point in time are the trial lawyers in the United States going to wake up and realize the mass tort/class action law suit model is badly flawed and rife with conflicts, back door deals and potential for abuse?

Todays article in the Sunday NY Times profiling Dickie Scruggs and the allegations being leveled against him in Federal Court regarding an alleged bribe made to a state court judge is sickening to read.  

I have no idea if the allegations are true and I have no doubt that Attorney Scruggs and the other defendants will put up a vigorous defense. They are portraying this as a situation where a rogue attorney in the Scruggs firm was acting on his own and when busted is turning states evidence in order to mitigate his own sentence. That very well may be true and only time will tell.  I sincerely hope for the sake of trial lawyers nation wide that this case turns out to be a witch hunt and the allegations are proved to be false because quite frankly the mass tort lawyers and the trial lawyers in general have been taking a beating for the better part of the last six years and the profession is definitely hurting at the moment.

As the article outlines quite clearly, there has been a string of high profile cases where mass tort or class action lawyers have corrupted judges, lied to the court, lied to their clients, paid kick backs to lead plaintiffs, stolen client money, cheated co-counsel, filed fraudulent medical records to the court, etc, etc, etc.

It's sickening, it's criminal and the attorney's who have engaged in this conduct have disgraced not only themselves but have created ammunition for the tort reform movement that is systematically stripping US citizens of their rights and access to the courts. Just read the quotes in today's NY Times article from the lobbying arm of the US Chamber of Commerce about how they are going to take these cases and headlines and use it to validate the wave of state and federal tort reform legislation that is about to hit the profession again.

What really makes me sick is that there are vehicles and processes that are far better, far more transparent and avoid the temptation of corrupt attorneys to enrich themselves at the expense of their clients, co-counsel and others then the hopelessly broken class action process. My question for the day is when will the trial lawyers of this country realize the class action model is hopelessly flawed and begin to use some of the innovative and client friendly methods that have been developed over the last few years as opposed to the miserably flawed process used in cases like Vioxx.

Quite frankly, at the moment the trial lawyers biggest enemies are themselves and the sloppy and often criminal business practices they have engaged in over the last decade or so. The tort reform movement shouldn't say a word right now but just follow the maxim " that if your enemy is destroying him self, don't stop him."

Attorney Rob Wood podcast. A new book on independent contractors.

In another featured podcast interview, Attorney Rob Wood of the Law firm Wood & Porter sat down with Scott Drake and Jan Schlichtmann to discuss the issue of independent contractors and their status in the law. 

This is a discussion of his new book, " The Legal Guide to Independent Contractor Status." It is published by Tax Institute and you can purchase it by going to the Tax Institute web site at www.taxinstitute.com

You may also read the recent review of this book that appeared in Tax Notes by clicking here.

One of the hottest areas of litigation in employment law, wage and hour litigation and other areas involving the status of permanent and temporary workers is the use of companies creating squadrons of " independent contractors". This podcast with Rob Wood goes into some intriguing areas, among them the use of independent contractors in the Blackwater murders in Iraq and other areas of increasing seriousness. The courts are starting to finally take a long look at this issue of how you handle taxation and liability in determining if someone is an employee or independent contractor. This podcast and this book look at some of the landmark cases as well as the evolving area of law that will be of increasing importance to employment attorneys, ERISA experts and others trying to work out the complicated area of employment law.

Listen to the full podcast of Robert Wood on independent contractors by clicking here.  

Dickie Scruggs, could he really be that dumb?

In a story we have been watching closely hear at the Legal Broadcast Network, famed trial lawyer Richard "Dickie" Scruggs of Mississippi has been named in a federal indictment alleging he was behind an attempt by his firm to bribe a state court judge with $40,000 to influence the allocation of legal fees on Katrina claims. The amount of fee's at question total over $26 million but the facts as they are being reported are so shocking that you almost are in a state of disbelief that an attorney of the stature of Dickie Scruggs could even contemplate such a clumsy and immoral attempt to corrupt the court.

The Wall Street Journal today has an online profile of Attorney Scruggs and the facts in the case. You can also find the back stories in the Journal archive as well.  Keep in mind the WSJ is generally anti-trial lawyer, but their reporting is superb on the facts so you can make up your own mind.

As for the LBN group, while i'm stunned that this could in fact take place in this day and age, I'm not so naive as to believe this hasn't happened before in other states and other courts. Anyone who has worked in and around the legal profession knows that there are bad judges and lawyers out there and as one of my friends likes to say, when there is enough money on the table human life has very little value.  Unfortunately, while I would very much like to believe this story is not true, i've had to witness the spectacle of William Lerach, Melvin Weiss, the Cincinatti Phen Fen lawyers, the asbestos/silicosis frauds and others dragged into court for equally atrocious behavior, so I'm thinking where there is smoke there is probably fire.

The bottom line is that there has been a subculture of corruption in many areas of litigation where the money is big and the stakes are high and unfortunately the trial lawyers are feeding the perception that they are just " a bunch of greedy cheating lawyers", instead of people fighting for justice.  It is disgusting to watch this, I hope these charges prove to be false, but if they aren't it is just one more huge black eye against the legal profession, particularly trial lawyers that further stains an honorable profession. 

The trial lawyers in America are better then this and they deserve better from the more prominent firms then corrupt behavior that stains then entire profession.