Judicial Notice (12.25.21): Going, Going, Gone
A Harvard professor going to prison, a Biglaw firm going remote, and other legal news from the week that was.
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Merry Christmas (if applicable). I hope that you and your families are enjoying the holiday season, wherever and however you might be spending it.
On our end, Zach and Harlan and I went to my cousin’s on Christmas Eve and my aunt’s on Christmas Day (family photo on my Instagram feed). I had a minor Covid-19 scare recently, so we’re being cautious—as are so many families, with the rapid rise of the Omicron variant. We stick to small gatherings with family, and we test ourselves before each get-together.1
I had a quiet but productive week. I published an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times about President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees, and I appeared on two podcasts:
Dissed. On the Pacific Legal Foundation’s (excellent) podcast all about dissents, I discussed the landmark Second Amendment case of D.C. v. Heller with Anastasia Boden and Elizabeth Slattery. I was in good company—the other guests were former U.S. solicitor general Paul Clement, Clark Neily of the Cato Institute, and Professor Adam Winkler of UCLA Law—so this episode is worth a listen.
Movers, Shakers, and Rainmakers. On the latest episode of the Biglaw-focused podcast that I co-host with Zach Sandberg of Lateral Link, we tackled this question: what we do we talk about when we talk about law firm culture?
Now, on to the news (such as it was, in the days leading up to Christmas).
Lawyers of the Week: attorneys aiding Afghan women judges.
Christmas is a traditional time for thinking of the less fortunate—and how we might be able to aid them. With this year drawing to a close, it’s a good time to think about what we did this year to help others, as well as what we could do in the coming year.
On that note, I’d like to recognize the many lawyers who are working with the International Association of Women Judges (IAWJ) to help women judges fleeing Afghanistan. With the Taliban back in power, Afghan female judges “are in imminent danger,” as Anne Geraghty Helms, director of U.S. pro bono at DLA Piper, told Karen Sloan of Reuters. “We’ve heard of judges who have been split from their families, who have been receiving death threats, who are being targeted simply because they’re women."
DLA Piper has been coordinating with the IAWJ on resettling some 250 female judges. For handling the cases of individual judges, DLA is getting help from dozens of lawyers at three other firms: Debevoise & Plimpton, Fried Frank, and Vinson & Elkins. Thanks and kudos to them for this important work.
In memoriam: C. Christopher Brown, a longtime public-interest lawyer and professor at the University of Maryland School of Law, who passed away at age 80 from complications from Parkinson’s Disease. May he rest in peace.
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