Rackspace GC is Tired of 'Giving Money to a Protection Racket'
Alan Schoenbaum is fed up with patent trolls and he’s not going to take it any more. The San Antonio tech GC vows to fight the patent assertion entities.
Federal Civil Jury Trials Decline to New Lows
Federal Appeals Judge Pat Higginbotham warned lawyers and federal judges in 1997 that civil jury trials were headed to extinction. Most lawyers and judges scoffed. After all, no state in the country trusted citizen juries to resolve personal and business disputes more than Texas. During the 16 years since Judge Higginbotham’s warning, civil jury trials have plummeted to historic 40 year lows. “The reduction in jury trials isn’t about the empty courthouse," Judge Higginbotham says. "it is about the alienation of the people from the process. The jury system is about governance.”
Rape Victim Claims Police, Prosecutor Used Her as "Sexual Bait"
The Fifth Circuit federal appeals court is examining the case of a teenage rape victim who claims the police and prosecutor in her case knew she was being sexually assaulted and raped but didn't intervene because they needed more evidence to ensure a conviction. The victim has sued the officials claiming they violated her substantive due process rights, but the state says the law enforcement officials are protected by sovereign immunity.
The Mentor: Jim Coleman Turns 90
Jim Coleman has tried of hundreds of jury trials over six decades of practicing law. He has defended huge corporations, including Oscar Wyatt’s Coastal States in 1972 in a multi-billion-dollar trial. Scores of lawyers in trouble have called him for help. He fired clients when he learned they hid evidence from the court and when they refused to allow women lawyers at his firm work on their case. Simply put, no lawyer has influenced the legal profession or lawyers more. On Thursday, Coleman turns 90. “I know my clock is running down,” he says. This is Jim Coleman's story.
INTA Floods Dallas with 9,000 Trademark Experts
For Alcon Labs Assistant GC Sheldon Pontaoe and AT&T Trademarks Attorney David Cho, the International Trademark Association annual meeting has been a chance to meet face to face with colleagues from across the globe and to discuss the latest legal trends, including product counterfeiting.
INTA Co-Chair Purvi Patel: Addicted to Madonna – From Pinstripes to Trademarks
Since she was a child, Purvi Patel has been fascinated with Madonna. She once told her mother she wanted to be a lawyer and wear a pinstripe suit – like Madonna, albeit the pop queen had added the iconic Jean Paul Gaultier conical corset to her business attire. Patel continues to admire the pop star’s art, ambition and branding efforts. And, not surprisingly, the partner who chairs Haynes and Boone’s Trademark Practice Group has purchased a new pinstripe suit to welcome thousands to Dallas in early May for the International Trademark Association’s annual meeting.
Federal Circuit Upholds $345 million Versata IP Verdict
Winning a $345 million jury verdict is difficult. Keeping such a large judgment on appeal is even harder. McKool Smith has done both for its Austin-based client Versata Software.
Special Prosecutor: Contempt Proceedings against Watkins Threaten all Texas DA's
Permitting criminal defendants to pierce prosecutorial privilege in advance of their trials would undermine justice. DA's, like all attorneys, must be free to form opinions, evaluate cases, and communicate freely with colleagues without fearing that their mental thought processes will be revealed to the other side.
Texas Civil Jury Trials Continue Decline
The number of civil jury trials in Texas district courts hit a four decade low in 2012. Only 1,202 civil disputes were decided by state district juries in 2012 - one-third the number from just 15 years ago. While plaintiff’s lawyers have cried foul for more than a decade, lawyers representing businesses are increasingly sounding the alarm. "I have advised my business clients who have a rock solid case that we should file the lawsuit in another state,” says Adam Schiffer.
West Fertilizer Explosion Lawsuits Coming
The death and destruction caused by the explosion at the West Fertilizer Plant is likely to cost the owners of the plant, its insurance carriers and the makers and operators of the equipment storing the anhydrous ammonia hundreds of millions of dollars in legal compensatory damages, according to lawyers who are following the case closely. The first lawsuits are expected to be filed next week.
GCs Added to Expanded Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee
Texas’ two U.S. Senators have named a 35-member commission to review and evaluate candidates interested in filling six open federal district judgeships and two openings on the federal circuit court of appeals. The Federal Judicial Evaluations Committee, appointed by Senators John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, is stacked with high-profile Texas lawyers from the state’s largest and most prestigious law firms. New on the list, however, are four corporate general counsels, including chief legal officers or lawyers-turned-executives at JC Penney, Apache Corporation, Pride and Goldcrest Investments and Valley Baptist Health Systems. The panel will advise the two senators regarding the qualifications of federal judicial candidates nominated by President Obama for federal judicial positions that are currently open or become open during the next four years.
EDTX Takes Over Fed Inquiry into Dallas DA Watkins
The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas and the FBI have officially opened an active federal criminal investigation into Dallas District Attorney Craig Watkins regarding his decision to seek mortgage fraud charges against oil heir Al Hill III in 2010. Lawyers with knowledge of the inquiry describe the federal investigation as “extremely serious.” Legal experts provide their insight.