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Law firm a low-cost alternative for small companies
Legal Business |
2010/06/28 08:45
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| pWhen clients call Washington attorney Sue Wang, the clock doesn't start ticking. /ppPhone calls aren't billed in six-minute intervals and each hour of work won't cost several hundred dollars. /ppWang and the four other lawyers in Clarity Law Group aim to reconfigure the billable-hour business model at law firms that she said tends to shut out small and start-up companies with shallow pockets. /ppPeople have been speaking about the death of the billable hour, but people had been saying that for years and they weren't really acting on it, said Wang, formerly of Latham amp; Watkins. /ppClarity Law Group is designed like a timeshare, where clients pay a set fee for access to the entire firm, Wang said. The firm also reduces costs by forgoing the standard luxuries at big-name firms like secretaries, wall art and swanky office space. /ppThe firm opened its Illinois office last October and secured its Washington license in April. /ppThe relationship between attorneys and clients is not a friendly one, said Kim Le, who works at Clarity. They're worried all the time about getting billed for every little thing, and that doesn't build a good, trust[ing] relationship. /ppWhile other firms around the country are also trying to lower the barrier of entry to legal services, Wang said the idea for Clarity came to her and her former University of Michigan law school roommate, Leah Goodman, while on a recent vacation in Greece. /ppAt Clarity, each client is assigned two attorneys who act as the primary counsel, but any of the lawyers may be called on depending on the legal needs. It's a hybrid model between big-firm contractors and in-house counsel, Wang said. /p |
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The Lanier Law Firm Investigating 401(k) Retirement Plan for BP Employees
Press Release |
2010/06/28 08:44
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| The Lanier Law Firm is investigating possible legal claims related to a 401(k) retirement plan for U.S. employees of energy giant BP span id=quote119047824 class=quotepeekbase bgQuote up jquery1277739795078=28span class=bgChannel/quotes/comstock/13*!bp/spanspan class=bgRealtimeChannel/quotes/nls/bp/span/span. The law firm believes there are potential violations of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) by those in charge of BP's retirement plan, which is known as the BP Employee Savings Plan (ESP). pThe Lanier Law Firm has maintained a prominent role in the BP litigation since filing one of the nations' first class-action lawsuits against BP following the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico. BP has yet to stop the millions of gallons of crude oil currently spewing into the gulf. /ppBP not only disregarded important safety rules, they also took unbelievably unnecessary risks, which is why people are facing one of the worst environmental and financial disasters in history, says attorney Evan Janush of The Lanier Law Firm. There are laws designed to protect employees from the precise, devastating scenario facing a lot of workers at BP. /ppAt the end of 2009, BP's U.S. Employee Savings Plan had more than $2 billion invested in BP stock. Since the explosion and eruption of oil, BP's stock price has fallen by approximately half, accounting for more than $100 billion in lost stock value. The retirement plans for many company employees are tied to the stock, costing them what is believed to be hundreds of millions of dollars. /ppThe Lanier Law Firm founder Mark Lanier, who recently was named by The National Law Journal as one of the most influential attorneys in the nation during the past decade, says the people responsible for BP's 401(k) plan knew or should have known about the company's inability to provide a safe work environment on the Deepwater Horizon, as well as its inability to contain the massive release of oil -- two factors that have contributed heavily to the downturn in BP's stock price. /ppThe law firm has identified several potential legal claims for participants in the BP Employee Savings Plan whose accounts included units from the BP stock fund. Learn more at a href=http://www.lanierlawfirm.comfont color=#004176www.lanierlawfirm.com/font/a. /ppAbout The Lanier Law Firm /ppWith offices in Los Angeles, Palo Alto, Houston and New York, The Lanier Law Firm is committed to addressing client concerns with effective and innovative solutions in courtrooms across the country. The firm is composed of outstanding trial attorneys with decades of experience handling cases involving oil amp; gas law, maritime law and ERISA litigation. /p |
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Martin Ginsburg, justice's husband, dies
Legal Career News |
2010/06/28 08:42
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| Martin Ginsburg, the husband of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and a prominent lawyer in his own right, died Sunday from complications of metastatic cancer. He was 78. The Supreme Court said in a statement that Ginsburg died at home.pThe Ginsburgs celebrated their 56th wedding anniversary last week. They met on a blind date as undergraduates at Cornell University./ppMartin Ginsburg was an expert in tax law and taught at New York University, Columbia University and Georgetown University over the course of his career./ppJudy Areen, interim dean of Georgetown University Law Center, said Sunday: Marty Ginsburg was not only one of the most innovative legal thinkers of our time, he was a gifted teacher and respected colleague. He will be deeply missed./p |
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Calif man accused of extortion through hacking
Headline Legal News |
2010/06/24 09:00
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| Federal agents have arrested a man accused of hacking into computers to obtain personal data to extort sexually explicit videos from women and teenage girls in exchange for keeping their information private.pThe Los Angeles U.S. attorney's office says 31-year-old Luis Mijangos was arrested Tuesday in Santa Ana./ppFBI experts say he infected more than 100 computers used by about 230 people, including at least 44 juveniles./ppThe alleged scheme involved using peer-to-peer networks to infect computers, induce victims to download malware disguised as songs, and control those computers to spread malware through contact lists./ppMijangos allegedly searched computers for sexual or intimate images to blackmail victims into making videos for him. Prosecutors say he also was able to control some webcams to capture intimate scenes./p |
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Woman pleads guilty to burglaries while pregnant
Legal Business |
2010/06/24 02:01
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| An Ohio woman who authorities say burglarized homes while her children waited in her car and at times used her 5-year-old son to help with break-ins has pleaded guilty to various charges. Samantha Brewer, of the Cincinnati suburb of Cleves, pleaded guilty Wednesday to burglary, attempted burglary and child endangering.pA prosecutor says most of the crimes occurred while 26-year-old Brewer was taking her sons, now 6 and 7, to or from school. Authorities say she sometimes used her younger son as a lookout and at least once put him inside a house through a window to unlock the door./ppBrewer was pregnant at the time of the April and May burglaries in Harrison. She says she gave birth to a girl on June 4 while in jail./ppShe blamed the burglaries on an addiction to pain medication./p |
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