You saw him on Fox news last night, joined by Sean Hannity, to discuss his recent book, " How can you defend those people." However, the Legal Broadcast Network and Scott Drake talked to him first in our interview last week with nationally renown trial lawyer, Mickey Sherman. You've seen him on Court TV, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC and just about every law show or commentary and now you can listen to him on LBN.

In our daily broadcast on Speaking of Justice, we were joined last week by Mickey Sherman to discuss in greater detail his recent book, " How can you defend those people?", a look at his life as one of the nations most high profile criminal defense attorneys.  As his book jacket and review says " In the tradition of true crime bestsellers by Alan Dershowitz and Dominick Dunne, Mickey Sherman delivers a powerful and extraordinarily candid account of his legal career that gives the readers an all-access backstage pass to not only the sausage factory that is the criminal justice system but the “big cases” we have all lived with on TV. "

Speaking of Justice host Scott Drake gets a deeper look at the issue of how criminal defense attorney's need to view their professional and ethical responsibilities, as well as attempt to educate the public on the constitutional right every citizen has to a vigorous and powerful defense. If you are a fan of legal issues, a practicing trial or defense attorney or a law student this well written book is going to be of value to you. 

Listen in to our podcast with famed criminal defense Attorney Mickey Sherman and learn "how he can defend those people" and the crucial role a defense attorney plays in our legal system.

 

You may also purchase his book on Amazon by click this link. We encourage you to purchase it for yourself or for the next person who asks why "criminals" are entitled to a vigorous defense.  

This podcast is a further example of the kind of authors, legal experts and commentators you can expect to find every day on The Legal Broadcast Network and our daily audio show, "Speaking of Justice". In the next few weeks you will witness our transformation to a daily video show as well, capitalizing on our recent expansion and the acquisition of the people and talent necessary to evolve LBN into the daily watering hole for lawyers of all types, practices and areas of interest.

If you have a guest, a topic or material you'd like to see us cover on Speaking of Justice, drop us a note or call our studio and we will be happy to get them on the air.  

In an extended piece of commentary, this weeks featured guest on Speaking of Justice-Weekend edition, the Legal Broadcast Network's showcase of the nations top lawyers, is Attorney Billy Murphy. Known nationally as one of the premier criminal defense attorney's practicing law today, Attorney Murphy is also recognized as one of the most passionate advocates of civil liberties and an astute commentator on the legal scene. 

This podcast interview with Scott Drake of LBN and Billy Murphy took place a few days after the resignation of N.Y. Governor and former Attorney General Eliot Spitzer as a result of his being exposed in an online prostitution ring. Unlike most of the media coverage that was gloating, sarcastic and focusing on the lurid elements of the hooker with whom he had the liaison, this extended podcast looks at the cost of this resignation to the people and taxpayers of New York.  If you are looking for thoughtful, provocative and unvarnished analysis of what this spectacle was really all about, you absolutely want to listen to this podcast with Billy Murphy. While Governor Spitzer certainly visited this personal tragedy upon himself through his actions, Billy looks at the larger issues of what exactly has become of the American concept of privacy in a world where banks are required by FINRA and other federal agencies to report cash flows as small as a few thousand dollars on the pretext of looking for terrorists and drug dealers, but instead turn the enforcement arm of the US Justice system on citizens engaged in behaviors that are typically misdemeanors.

This is a fascinating and engaging conversation and if you are tired of the tabloid TV coverage on Eliot Spitzer you will want to listen to this podcast from start to finish.

A member of the Board of Governors of the Maryland Trial Lawyers Association and the Board of Directors of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the recipient of the inaugural Charles Hamilton Houston Award for Lifetime Achievement in Litigation, the Murphy Firm's founder and senior partner, Judge William H. "Billy" Murphy, Jr., graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a B.S. in electrical engineering in 1965 and a J.D. from the University of Maryland School of Law in 1969 where he was a member of the Law Review.  He has practiced law for over thirty years, including three years as a judge on the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, the highest level Maryland trial court. Judge Murphy has tried numerous high-profile criminal and civil cases including some of the most celebrated criminal and civil cases in Maryland history. Making history comes naturally to Judge Murphy, as he comes from one of the most distinguished African-American families in the country. His father, William H. Murphy, Sr., was one of the first African-American judges in Maryland. His great-grandfather, founded the Afro-American Newspaper. His sister, Laura Murphy, is a top lobbyist for the American Civil Liberties Union and heads their Washington D.C. office.

You can look forward to more commentary in the future from this legal legend and one of the nations most provocative and thoughtful legal minds. If you are tired of the same old TV talking heads on what pass for legal shows on the networks, check out Attorney Billy Murphy here on LBN for a breath of fresh air.

As you will notice from looking at our newest features we are doing a beta test of our Legal Broadcast News video widget as well as our audio podcast widget as well.

You will soon be able to join our network in a variety of new and exciting ventures, but until those are unveiled you can "steal" these widgets that can be cut and pasted into your web site or blog to provide instantly updated audio and video podcasts of LBN content.

This is free of charge and in fact we encourage you to steal them by putting a little button there that walks you through the process. If you are a lawyer, paralegal or tech savy person who wants to have access to our content at your firm, feel free to take these and put them on your site or blog.  

At our most recent event in Austin, TX the Legal Broadcast Network team sat down with NSSTA President Henry Strong to discuss what the structured settlement trade association was working on at their regional convention. NSSTA ( National Structured Settlement Trade Association) has begun to make a practice of inviting prominent trial lawyers to speak at their regional and national events and last week in Austin the speaker was famed trial lawyer Joe Jamail. Henry and LBN host Jan Schlichtmann discuss the work of NSSTA, it's out reach to trial lawyers as well as educational programs for injured parties and others wanting to learn more about structured settlements. Click on the video to listen in or learn more.

The Legal Broadcast Network features  Vanderbilt Professor Richard Nagareda, the author of the recently published " Mass Torts in a world of Settlements." This book, available on Amazon by clicking here, covers the evolution of Mass Tort litigation through the asbestos cases, pharmaceutical litigation and up to the recently announced Vioxx settlement.

You can listen to the entire podcast interview with Professor Nagareda on " Mass Torts in a world of Settlements" by clicking here.  

In his interview with Scott Drake, host of LBN's " This week in the Law", Professor Nagareda outlines how we are now looking at torts that are too big to litigate but essentially evolve into highly complex and politically charged business transactions between big business and "big law".

A fascinating interview, the first of our new features here on The Legal Broadcast Network, and particularly timely given the recent Vioxx settlement.

You can also check out the WSJ blog that features Professor Nagareda by clicking here.  

One of the new weekly features on The Legal Broadcast Network is our " This week in the Law" podcast that is hosted by Scott Drake and covers the podcasts, blog posts and new items of key interest to trial lawyers nationwide.

The first weekly podcast is available by clicking here and features Mark Wahlstrom and Jan Schlichtmann doing a wrap up of the recent CLE event in Scottsdale.  

Each week a different set of guests, podcasts and shows will be featured in a concise summary form that allows trial lawyers and others to get up to speed on cases and decisions of importance to them.  In this weeks show we cover the wide range of guests we had in Scottsdale, among them Zoe Littlepage and Rainey Booth, Angel Reyes and Jim Orr, Rex Burch, Rick Kuykendall, Rob Wood, Matt Bracy, Christina Fountain and others. We will be posting our first videos early next week of this event as well as starting to finish the CLE DVD's that will be available through the offices of WTLA.

Be sure to subscribe to our feed through Itunes, Yahoo or other podcast directories and don't miss a show. 

This week the Legal Broadcast Network was pleased to announce our association with Miller Capital as the firm selected to implement a broad range of media and financial strategies for LBN.

As many of you know the Legal Broadcast Network has operated quietly for over two years as we constructed studio's in Phoenix, AZ, developed our proprietary search engine and podcast tools and prepared for an expansion that would allow the firm to be the premier source of information for trial lawyers nation wide. On November 1, 2007 we were finally able to announce this arrangement with Miller Capital and begin to implement the strategies that we feel will transform The Legal Broadcast Network.

You may read the press release here and as we begin to add to our staff and partner with other attorneys nationally we will report on those changes here on the LBN blog.

As always we thank our readers, viewers and listeners for their patience as we have developed our capacity to deliver material. We look forward to the next months and years of providing valuable information, news and education for attorneys in all 50 states.  

On November 1, 2007 in Scottsdale AZ nationally renown attorney's Zoe Littlepage and Rainey Booth will be the featured speakers at the first annual WTLA/LBN continuing education and networking event. This two day CLE and social networking opportunity is being held at the beautiful Scottsdale Plaza Resort and is being filmed from start to finish by the Legal Broadcast Network. Virtually every speaker, sponsor and expert will be interviewed and featured in over 14 hours of CLE video that can be purchased by attorney's anywhere in the United States through the Wyoming Trial Lawyers web site the week after the event.

 Attorney Zoe Littlepage is one of the nations leading trial lawyers and earlier this month won a stunning $134.5 million verdict in the hormone replacement therapy litigation, also know as HRT, and best recognized by the brand name of the Wyeth product Prempro and Premarin.  The suit that produced these record verdicts was filed in Washoe County District Court in Reno, NV and were just three of the some 5,300 hormone replacement cases filed against Wyeth on behalf of 7900 plaintiffs. The cases allege personal injury as a result of the plaintiffs use of one or more of Wyeth's hormone or estrogen therapy products, including Prempro and Premarin, each of which was marked as a solution to a variety of menopausal symptoms. 

 Attorney Littlepage will be joined by her partner Rainey Booth in a full hour of CLE presented in a unique LBN format that will replace the dull, power point style of interviews that make up the vast majority of video. Too often when a trial lawyer goes to a convention to hear from speakers such as there, they are sitting in a massive convention hall or ball room with little or no chance to actually meet the speakers, and are treated to a "stand up routine"  in which the attorney speakers about their case, what they did and how it was done. LBN and the WTLA have instead designed this event to be dramatically different for both the small group that attends and gets to be part of this taping and in person CLE, but also in producing a high quality interview format of the speakers by another attorney who knows the questions on the minds of trial lawyers watching this hour of video in a CLE format.

The LBN and WTLA event is hosted in this case by nationally renown mass tort expert Attorney Frederick "Rick"  Kuykendall of the Murphy Law Firm in Baltimore, MD, this will be an hour of these innovative and dynamic attorneys being interviewed by one of their peers about how the litigation was conceived, the issues faced by trial lawyers in bringing a mass tort case against a well funded drug company like Wyeth and what the future holds for other victims of Prempro and Premarin. If you are a trial lawyer interested in this area of litigation, if you or a family member were affected by these drugs or if you are just a "legal watcher" who wants to learn more about these nationally respected trial lawyers, be sure to look for these interviews here on LBN the week after the event.

These interviews will be highlighted here on LBN and it's affiliated channels, but the DVD of the CLE on mass tort cases in HRT cases will be available only through the Wyoming Trial Lawyers web site. Be sure to contact the Wyoming Trial Lawyers and order your hour of CLE, or any of the other 13 hours produced at this event, by going to their web site or calling their offices. We will have a click through link here at LBN to all of the CLE once it is posted.