Judicial Notice (05.05.24): Not Above The Law

A bad day for a DA, Columbia sued over antisemitism, the debut of A&O Shearman, and other legal news from the week that was.

The Columbia University campus, during happier times (photo by David Lat).

This week’s Judicial Notice is sponsored by

ShareFile helps you deliver a modern client experience with workflow technology that is easy to use and made to fit your firm. ShareFile’s secure digital solution simplifies workflows and improves collaboration by working with your existing technologies. To learn more about ShareFile, check out our website.

I had a pleasantly laid-back week, thank you very much, so I don’t have much to report on the personal side. My kids continue to be incredibly cute.

I didn’t have any speaking engagements last week, but I have two coming up this week. On Monday, I’ll be in New York for the Practising Law Institute’s Ethics in Social Media program—which offers coveted ethics CLE credits. On Wednesday, I’ll be at the Philadelphia Regional Office of the Securities and Exchange Commission, where I’m giving a lunch talk for AAPI Heritage Month.

This week’s testimonial for Original Jurisdiction comes from Aliza Shatzman, founder and president of The Legal Accountability Project: “Original Jurisdiction is a must-read for legal news. I always look forward to receiving the newsletter in my inbox! After doing a quick scan for my name (I imagine I’m not the only reader who does this), I always enjoy reading David’s unique and thoughtful takes on the week in law.”

Now, on to the news.

Lawyer of the Week: Sandra Doorley.

“I have been humbled by my own stupidity.” When a district attorney utters these words in a video apology, you know she really stepped in it.

The district attorney for Monroe County, New York, Sandra Doorley, was driving home—and driving 55 miles per hour, on a suburban road with a speed limit of 35. A police officer attempted to pull her over but she ignored his lights and sirens, instead driving the remaining half-mile to her house. The officer followed her home. When he approached Doorley (very politely) in her garage, she berated him, cursed at him (“f**king a**hole”), and repeatedly invoked her office.

“I’m the DA,” she said. “If you give me a traffic ticket, that’s fine. I’m the one who prosecutes it.”

Unfortunately for Doorley, the entire episode was recorded on cringe-inducing bodycam footage. After the video went viral, the incident garnered coverage in multiple national news outlets (helpfully collected by the ABA Journal, along with links to the bodycam footage and Doorley’s video apology).

Doorley pleaded guilty to speeding, paid the ticket, and issued a video apology. But she’s not yet out of the woods. All nine members of the Rochester City Council signed a letter to New York Attorney General Letitia “Tish” James, calling for Doorley to be investigated; Governor Kathy Hochul referred Doorley to New York State’s Commission for Prosecutorial Conduct; and she’s facing calls to resign.

Moral of the story: nobody is above the law. (Except for maybe the president, to a limited extent—we’ll see what the Supreme Court says.)

Other lawyers in the news:

• Last week we learned that Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, was arrested in July 2006 for allegedly attacking her ex-husband with a knife (and slicing his finger to the bone). The arrest was later expunged, and she didn’t disclose it during her confirmation process—even when asked, “Have you ever been arrested for or accused of committing a violent crime against any person?”
  
  She told CNN that she was not obligated to disclose the arrest because it was expunged—and further claimed that she was the victim of “years-long abuse and domestic violence” by her ex-husband (which he denies). But some experts consulted by the Daily Signal, which broke the news of her arrest, argued that she should have disclosed—especially since at least one federal background-check form requests disclosure “regardless of whether the record in your case has been sealed, expunged, or otherwise stricken from the court record.”

• Trial in the Donald Trump hush-money case continues—and it seems that Trump might be losing confidence in his lead lawyer, Todd Blanche.

• New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who previously hired Alex Spiro of Quinn Emanuel to defend him in a lawsuit alleging sexual assault, might be adding another big name of Biglaw to his legal team: Randy Mastro, currently at King & Spalding, is Mayor Adams’s pick to serve as New York City’s corporation counsel.

• And speaking of Spiro, Judge Maria Cantú Hexsel of Travis County, Texas—who’s currently considering a motion for sanctions against him, arising out of his defense of a deposition of Elon Musk—told some of Spiro’s Quinn Emanuel colleagues that it wouldn’t be “a bad idea for him to come” to a May 7 hearing. (The underlying suit involves defamation allegations against Musk.)

Judge of the Week: Judge Roger Benitez.

Some of you might recall allegations last year of egregious behavior by Judge Roger Benitez (S.D. Cal.). He was accused of ordering the 13-year-old daughter of a criminal defendant to enter the well of the court, where he then directed a U.S. Marshal to handcuff her—causing the poor girl, who was there simply to support her father, to start crying.

It appears Judge Benitez was going for a “scared straight” effect: after the handcuffs were removed, he warned the girl that if she didn’t stay away from drugs (which is how her father got in trouble), she would “wind up in cuffs” and “right back there where I put you a minute ago.” But public reaction to his conduct was universally negative, with pretty much everyone agreeing that his actions, even if well-intentioned, were wildly inappropriate.

At the time, Chief Judge Mary H. Murguia (9th Cir.) announced that Judge Benitez would be investigated for alleged misconduct. And now we have a decision from the Judicial Council of the Ninth Circuit—which unsurprisingly found that Judge Benitez committed misconduct.

In defending himself, Judge Benitez argued that he was trying to help the girl—fair enough. But Judge Benitez also complained that Puente’s lawyers from the Federal Defenders of San Diego “injected [Mr. Puente’s daughter] into Mr. Puente’s sentencing by telling [him] how much she loved her father,” which Judge Benitez felt constituted “[e]motional manipulation.”

It’s both routine and understandable for a defendant’s family members to write letters to a judge explaining how much they care about the defendant—which doesn’t make them fair game for handcuffing. As the Judicial Council wrote in its order, “the shackling of a spectator at a hearing who is not engaged in threatening or disorderly behavior exceeds the authority of a district judge,” and “creating a spectacle out of a minor child in the courtroom chills the desire of friends, family members, and members of the public to support loved ones at sentencing.”

As punishment, the Council publicly reprimanded Judge Benitez, and it also prohibited him from hearing any new criminal cases. But since he had already chosen not to get new criminal cases after taking senior status in 2017, this wasn’t much of a sanction. (Judge Benitez was sentencing Mario Puente for violating the terms of his supervised release; he was sentenced in his underlying drug case years ago.)

The punishment of Judge Benitez might strike some of you as pretty weak sauce—but by the standards of judicial-misconduct cases, it’s actually on the harsher side. For starters, Judge Benitez was named and shamed—“a rare public rebuke for a federal judge,” in the words of Nate Raymond of Reuters. Most resolutions of misconduct complaints keep the judge anonymous—e.g., the Second Circuit judge with an “overly harsh” approach to managing her law clerks.

If you think complaints of judicial misconduct aren’t taken seriously enough, check out the work of Gabe Roth of Fix the Court and Aliza Shatzman of The Legal Accountability Project (both prior guests on my podcast, here and here). Whether you agree or disagree with any of Roth’s or Shatzman’s specific views, it’s clear that federal judges, while often very admirable, are not infallible—with Judge Benitez’s treatment of Mario Puente’s daughter as Exhibit A.

Speaking of judicial misconduct, here’s my Ex-Judge of the Week: former bankruptcy judge David R. Jones (S.D. Tex.), who resigned after it came to light that he was in a years-long relationship with bankruptcy lawyer Elizabeth Freeman—during which he oversaw cases (and approved fees) involving her and the firm where she worked at the time, Jackson Walker. James Nani and Ronnie Greene of Bloomberg Law took a deep dive into the controversy, producing a two-part investigation: Sex, Secrets Trigger Downfall of Star Texas Bankruptcy Judge and How Four Judges Kept Romance Allegations Quiet for Two Years.

In nominations news, the Senate confirmed assistant U.S. attorney Georgia Alexakis (N.D. Ill.) to Chicago’s district court. Presidents Biden and Trump are now roughly tied in terms of the number of judicial appointees by this point in their term—194 for Biden, 193 for Trump—but Trump confirmed 51 circuit judges, while Biden is only at 41.

The controversy over Third Circuit judge Adeel Mangi isn’t helping matters for Biden. The White House and Senator Cory Booker (D.N.J.) continue to stand by the nominee—but at a certain point, they could run out of time to put up a replacement if Mangi can’t get through. (Thanks to Howard Bashman of How Appealing, who has been following the situation closely, for the links.)

Ruling of the Week: Kadel v. Folwell.

It seems that legal news these days boils down to two topics, both starting with “Tr”: Trump, and transgender issues.

Just two weeks ago, the Fourth Circuit took Ruling of the Week honors with B.P.J. v. West Virginia State Board of Education, in which it ruled that a West Virginia law barring transgender athletes from participating in girls’ or women’s sports violates Title IX. And last week the Fourth Circuit—sitting en banc, no less—issued Kadel v. Folwell, holding that “healthcare plans that cover medically necessary treatments for certain diagnoses but bar coverage of those same medically necessary treatments for a diagnosis unique to transgender patients violate… the Equal Protection Clause.”

So as a practical matter, state healthcare plans must now pay for “gender-affirming” or “gender-reassignment” surgeries—to use the terms of the majority and the dissenters, respectively. According to the Washington Post, the ruling is “a major win for transgender rights amid a nationwide wave of anti-trans activism and legislation.”

More specifically, the Fourth Circuit held that North Carolina’s state healthcare plan and West Virginia’s Medicaid program discriminate on the basis of gender identity and sex, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. The Kadel court also ruled that the West Virginia Medicaid program violates the Medicaid Act’s availability and comparability provisions and the Affordable Care Act’s anti-discrimination provision. It therefore affirmed summary-judgment rulings in favor of the plaintiffs by Judges Loretta Biggs (M.D.N.C.) and Robert Chambers (S.D.W. Va.)—appointed by Presidents Obama and Clinton, respectively, in case you were wondering.

And there’s reason to believe that the party of the appointing president matters, at least in this case, since the Fourth Circuit ruling broke along partisan lines. The eight judges in the majority were Democratic appointees,¹ while the six dissenting judges were Republican appointees. Judge Roger Gregory wrote the 66-page majority opinion, while the 80 pages of dissents came from Judge Julius “Jay” Richardson, who wrote the lead dissent, as well as Judges J. Harvie Wilkinson and Marvin Quattlebaum Jr. (Judge Nicole Berner did not participate; the case was argued in September 2023, and she took office this past March.)

The majority argued that denying gender-affirming surgery to transgender patients amounted to “textbook sex discrimination”—citing the Supreme Court’s ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County, which held that discriminating against transgender employees constitutes discrimination “because of sex” under Title VII. Judge Gregory reasoned that gender dysphoria, which is what leads patients to seek gender-affirming surgery, “is so intimately related to transgender status as to be virtually indistinguishable from it.”

Judge Richardson—agreeing with the defendant states, which relied heavily on cost considerations—took the position that “[s]tates can reasonably decide that certain gender-dysphoria services are not cost-justified, in part because they question the services’ medical efficacy and necessity.” He also argued that “[t]he Equal Protection Clause does not license judges to strike down any policy we disagree with,” faulting the majority for “treat[ing] these cases as new fronts” in the culture wars.

The case is soon heading for One First Street, with West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, currently running for governor, declaring that he would “take this up to the Supreme Court and win.” But will SCOTUS take the case? The justices haven’t been eager to wade into this area of law.

But if the Court grants certiorari, there’s a decent chance the states will prevail. Although Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion in Bostock and Chief Justice John Roberts joined, there’s a big difference between (1) whether transgender employees are entitled to protection from workplace discrimination under Title VII, and (2) whether transgender patients are entitled to gender-affirming surgery under the Equal Protection Clause. For more, see part II.A.3 of Judge Richardson’s dissent—which argues that while Bostock has “implications” for Equal Protection doctrine, it does not require ruling for the plaintiffs. (Judges Steven Agee and Allison Rushing opted out of this part of the dissent—if I had to guess, probably because they didn’t want to concede even this much about Bostock’s relevance.)

Other decisions and dispositions worth noting (with thanks to John Ross of Short Circuit for some of these):

• There was lots of en banc activity last week. In In re Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation Derivative Litigation, the en banc Third Circuit unanimously held that the decision to dismiss a derivative action for failure to plead demand futility should be reviewed de novo. Overruling its prior precedent applying an abuse of discretion standard, the court fell in line with the First, Second, Seventh, Eighth, and Tenth Circuits, as well as several state supreme courts.

• I have to confess that I’m not super-interested in qualified immunity—at least not until the Supreme Court decides to revisit its precedents. But Judge Andrew Oldham’s opinion in Hughes v. Garcia, involving allegations of pretty outrageous police conduct, is worth a read. (Seriously.)

• The Ninth Circuit issued not one, but two en banc rulings. In United States v. Lucas, it unanimously held that the preponderance of the evidence standard applies when making factual findings under the advisory Sentencing Guidelines. In United States v. Anderson, the court held, by a 6-5 vote, that “an officer’s failure to comply with governing administrative procedures is relevant in assessing the officer’s motivation for conducting an inventory search” under the Fourth Amendment.

• Judge Richard Jones (W.D. Wash.) sentenced Changpeng Zhao aka “CZ,” founder and former chief executive of the Binance cryptocurrency exchange, to only four months in prison—far short of the three years requested by prosecutors. Judge Jones said CZ’s conduct “does not warrant a 36-month sentence,” praised him as “a dedicated family man and a giving person,” and commended his “staggering accomplishment” in building Binance. Congratulations to William Burck of Quinn Emanuel on securing an excellent result for his client. [5/6/2024, 1:35 p.m.: Congrats also to Quinn Emanuel’s co-counsel at Latham & Watkins, including Doug Yatter, Benjamin Naftalis, Eric Volkman, and Savannah Burgoyne.]

• In BMC Software, Inc. v. IBM Corp., the Fifth Circuit reversed a district-court judgment awarding more than $1.6 billion (!) in contract and fraudulent-inducement damages to BMC. Kudos to IBM’s counsel: Paul Clement, Erin Murphy, and Andrew Lawrence of Clement & Murphy, and Paul Yetter, Connie Pfeiffer, and Reagan Simpson of Yetter Coleman.

Litigation of the Week: C.S. v. The Trustees of Columbia University.

One of last week’s biggest stories in non-legal (or perhaps I should say illegal) news was the occupation of Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall by pro-Palestinian protesters. On Tuesday night, after almost 24 hours of occupation, the building had to be cleared by the New York Police Department (NYPD)—specifically, officers clad in riot gear—who arrested dozens of demonstrators. At least 25 percent of the arrestees had no connection to Columbia, according to the NYPD.

The takeover of Hamilton Hall was the culmination of chaos at Columbia. But the situation on campus was out of control even before the occupation—at least according to the class-action complaint filed on Monday in C.S. v. The Trustees of Columbia University.

Lead plaintiff “C.S.” is a Jewish student in her second year at Columbia. The 22-page complaint describes “verbal threats, physical intimidation, and even assaults” that she and other Jewish students have endured on campus since April 18, when protesters established the so-called “Gaza Solidarity Encampment.” The suit has a single count for breach of contract, alleging that by “allowing the above described hateful, menacing, and violent behavior, and failing to enforce [campus safety and nondiscrimination] policies, Columbia has failed to provide a safe educational environment and therefore breached its contractual obligations.”

The complaint was filed by a team of lawyers from Edelson PC, one of the nation’s top firms for high-impact, plaintiff-side lawsuits—specifically, founder and CEO Jay Edelson and partners Ari Scharg, David Mindell, and Rafey Balabanian—joined by another prominent plaintiffs’ lawyer, Brooklyn-based Carrie Goldberg. I wasn’t surprised to see the lawsuit was filed by Edelson, which previously took a stand against antisemitism by withdrawing from on-campus interviewing at Harvard Law School (in the wake of former Harvard president Claudine Gay’s ill-fated congressional testimony on the topic).

And I wasn’t surprised to see that Columbia hired superlitigator Roberta Kaplan to defend itself in this matter (as well as an earlier lawsuit alleging the university fostered an “antisemitic hostile educational environment”). One of Columbia Law’s most celebrated graduates, Robbie Kaplan is a go-to lawyer for the university in its most high-profile cases. Her hiring suggests that the university sees these suits as serious; you don’t hire Kaplan Hecker & Fink to fight frivolous litigation.

Pro-Palestinian protesters, at Columbia and elsewhere, invoke the First Amendment in defense of their actions. But as noted by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), the nation’s foremost defender of free speech on campus, “Occupying a campus building, blocking students from attending classes, and vandalizing property is not protected by the First Amendment, full stop.” Or as former Yale Law School dean Robert Post, a free-speech expert, told Law.com, the First Amendment isn’t the most relevant analytical framework: “The subject is the maintenance of the university community and its educational mission, and I think First Amendment rights are subordinate to that.”

The students who protested a dinner at Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky’s home claimed it was their First Amendment right to protest at a private home. But they didn’t grapple with, say, the niceties of First Amendment forum analysis, as I did in this lengthy Twitter thread. Nor did they discuss time, place, and manner restrictions, which were helpfully reviewed by Sarah Isgur and David French on a recent episode of Advisory Opinions.

How do protesters respond to their critics? One longtime activist shared a few thoughts with me (and I’d love to hear from others—if you’re a pro-Palestinian demonstrator, please reach out). In light of the sheer scope and scale of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, in which many of them have lost loved ones, focusing on protest tactics and First Amendment law is ridiculous, even offensive. As for my suggestion that activists take the long view and “rise up through the system,” so they can bring about social change from positions of power, they simply don’t have that luxury—as the death toll in Gaza increases by the day.

In other litigation news:

• The biggest developments in the Trump hush-money trial were (1) Justice Juan Merchan holding Trump in contempt and fining him $9,000 for violations of the gag order, and (2) former Trump aide Hope Hicks appearing as a prosecution witness. Please allow me to enjoy a relatively Trump-free week in legal news by letting me leave it at that. (Okay, fine: if you’re hankering for more, especially on the gag-order ruling, I refer you to Josh Barro and Ken White of Serious Trouble or Jesse Wegman of the New York Times—who quipped of the $9,000 that “[y]ou could call it hush money, except it’s unlikely to shut Trump up.”)

• Senator Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and his wife Nadine have some company: Representative Henry Cuellar (D-Tex.) and his wife Imelda became the second U.S. lawmaker-spouse couple to be indicted on bribery charges within the last year. The indictment alleges that in exchange for promises by Representative Cuellar to advance the interests of foreign benefactors, an oil company controlled by the Azerbaijan government and a bank headquartered in Mexico paid the Cuellars $600,000. #GoldBarsOrItDidntHappen

Deal of the Week: Viking’s $1.5 billion IPO.

Cruises are very polarizing. My parents love them, and novelist Gary Shteyngart… does not. But there’s no disputing that cruises are big business. The industry is rebounding post-pandemic, and last year, some cruise lines enjoyed record-breaking revenues and a return to full-year profitability.

For another sign of the cruising industry’s return to health, consider the $1.5 billion initial public offering of Viking Holdings Ltd., the private-equity-backed operator of high-end river, ocean, and expedition cruises. The size of the IPO was increased several times before terms were finalized, and on its first day of trading, Viking stock climbed by almost 9 percent. Congrats to the law firms: Skadden Arps for Viking, and Latham & Watkins for the underwriters.

Meanwhile, on the M&A front:

• UMB Financial Corp., advised by Davis Polk, agreed to pay $2 billion in all-stock deal for Heartland Financial USA Inc., advised by Wachtell Lipton.

• L’Occitane International SA announced its receipt of a $6.4 billion take-private offer from a Skadden-advised investor group led by Austrian billionaire Reinold Geiger—L’Occitane’s chairman, executive director, and former CEO.

• In what the Wall Street Journal describes as “the latest twist in one of the messiest deal dramas in recent memory,” Sony Pictures and Apollo Global Management teamed up to submit an all-cash, $26 billion offer for Paramount Global. The offer will be weighed by a special committee of Paramount’s independent directors, advised by Cravath Swaine & Moore (which just moved into new digs, joining seemingly every other Biglaw firm in Manhattan West/Hudson Yards).

Law Firm of the Week: A&O Shearman.

There’s been a lot of empirical research into whether mergers and acquisitions are good for businesses and shareholders. Are mergers good for law firms? (I’m referring here to law firms that go through mergers themselves; M&A in corporate America is definitely great for the Biglaw firms that bank billions from handling these deals.)

Some Biglaw mergers—including several transatlantic ones, like the deals that created DLA Piper and Hogan Lovells—have been successful (if we define “success” as giving rise to multibillion-dollar firms that have endured for years post-merger). But boy Dewey know of some clunkers!

Last week, the merger of London-founded Allen & Overy and New York-founded Shearman & Sterling took effect. Say hello to A&O Shearman—which boasts nearly 4,000 lawyers, 800 partners, and $3.5 billion in revenue, per Patrick Smith and Jack Womack of Law.com. It’s the first combination of major U.S. and U.K. firms in more than a decade, as noted by Mahira Dayal of Bloomberg Law. (In case you were curious, “Shearman” is pronounced like “Sherman”—not SHEER-min or SHEER-man.)

A&O Shearman will be led by Khalid Garousha and Adam Hakki, co-chairs of the executive committee and board, and managing partner Hervé Ekué. Garousha and Ekué come from the Allen & Overy side, reflecting A&O’s dominant position.

What does the future hold for A&O Shearman? As leading law firm consultant Bruce MacEwen told Law.com, the deal “looks very sensible and potentially powerful” on paper. “The challenge will be integrating the U.S. offices ASAP under a unified, one-firm firm brand. Any whiffs of ‘legacy’ Shearman or ‘legacy’ A&O will be a bad sign.”

From the perspective of Shearman & Sterling, though, I’d already consider this transaction a success. In the months leading up to the merger announcement, Shearman was hemorrhaging partners, including rainmakers and practice-group leaders, at a rapid clip. I’m not sure if it would still be around today if A&O hadn’t come to the rescue.

Shearman & Sterling was founded in 1873. In 1876, it was joined on the scene by Stroock & Stroock & Lavan—which dissolved in October 2023, the same month the A&O Shearman merger was announced. So congratulations to Adam Hakki for managing to save his firm via merger—a feat that’s far harder than it looks.²

Moves of the Week: Simpson Thacher and Blank Rome launching in Boston.

You know what’s also polarizing? Boston. Some people view it as one of America’s best smaller cities, while others (like my husband Zach) view it as an also-ran and has-been of a town (with the nation’s worst-behaved sports fans).

But you know who loves Boston? Biglaw firms.

On Wednesday, Philadelphia-founded Blank Rome announced the launch of a Boston office. It will be anchored by 25 lawyers lured over from Boston-based Burns & Levinson, including incoming office co-chairs Josef Volman, who focuses on middle-market M&A, and Frank Segall, an expert in cannabis law. Dope times.

On the same day, Simpson Thacher unveiled its plan to open in Beantown later this year. Anchoring the office will be Kenneth Burdon, a Chambers-ranked partner in registered funds who joins from Skadden Arps, and Nathan Somogie, who will move up from New York to return to his hometown.

Both moves come a week after Paul Hastings announced its Boston launch, fueled by the hiring of Alexander Temel, a Chambers-ranked partner in private-equity M&A, and William Schwab, who worked with Temel during their time at Sidley Austin. Temel will serve as global co-chair of private equity at Paul Hastings.

Other notable news on the talent front:

• Also in Boston, Kirkland & Ellis hired James Donohue, Chambers-ranked in fund formation, as a share aka equity partner (ka-ching). Also joining Donohue in jumping from Goodwin to K&E are Mirela Hristova in D.C., Michelle Kim in New York, and Joseph Baron in Houston.

• What’s going on at Goodwin? After spending only about a year there, asset-management partner Audra A. Cohen decamped for Fried Frank.

• Paul, Weiss hired New York-based corporate partner Maria-Leticia Ossa Daza to lead its new Latin America group. She joins from Willkie Farr & Gallagher, where she founded and led the LatAm practice.

• For its part, Willkie picked up private-equity partner Thomas McCaffrey from Akin Gump in Houston, where he focused on the energy sector.

Job of the Week: an opportunity for a transportation-law partner.

Lateral Link is handling the search for a transportation-law partner to take the helm of a national firm’s esteemed trucking-defense litigation practice in Southern California. A wealth of experience in navigating complex trucking-accident and personal-injury cases will be instrumental in managing a diverse caseload to ensure exceptional client outcomes. Beyond overseeing cases, the role involves guiding and mentoring a team of legal professionals to foster their growth and development. This highly respected firm offers robust support for partners, including a strong financial foundation, progressive alternative-fee arrangements, and a collaborative culture that values idea-sharing and mutual support. If you’re ready to make a lasting impact and propel your career forward, contact Lauren Smith at lsmith@laterallink.com for more.

We’ve reached the end of the road for this edition of Judicial Notice. Thanks to ShareFile for sponsoring, and thanks to all of you for reading. I wish everyone a great week ahead—and to those of you who are here with me on the East Coast, stay dry.

1. I consider Judge Roger Gregory to be a Clinton appointee (as does the Washington Post). Judge Gregory was selected by President Clinton, who placed him on the Fourth Circuit as a recess appointment; President Bush later included Judge Gregory in his first batch of appeals court nominees, in what the New York Times described as “a gesture of conciliation.” In his votes and opinions, Judge Gregory is a liberal—after all, he wrote the majority opinion here—so he walks, swims, and quacks like a duck.

2. This is especially true in the age of so-called “mass lateral hires.” When a firm starts running into trouble, shrewd leaders of rival shops, like Miguel Zaldivar of Hogan Lovells or Jami McKeon of Morgan Lewis, show up and start recruiting the productive partners of the troubled firm, en masse. This lets firms like Hogan Lovells and Morgan Lewis cherry-pick the most talented partners and their clients—often at a “discount,” because the partners are panicked—while leaving less-productive partners, plus all the liabilities (like leases), with the firm in the death spiral.

Why buy a cow suffering from bird flu when you can get the milk—apparently safe, after you pasteurize it—for free?

---

Thanks for reading Original Jurisdiction, and thanks to my paid subscribers for making this publication possible. Subscribers get (1) access to Judicial Notice, my time-saving weekly roundup of the most notable news in the legal world; (2) additional stories reserved for paid subscribers; (3) transcripts of podcast interviews; and (4) the ability to comment on posts. You can email me at davidlat@substack.com with questions or comments, and you can share this post or subscribe using the buttons below.