We’ve said it before: we’re not sure if American Apparel chief executive Dov Charney is a force for good in the world, but given his company’s stream of high-profile (and often bizarre) legal woes, he’s a Law Blog’s best friend.

The latest problem concerns not movie stars or titillating allegations, but the hot-button issue of immigration. American Apparel will lay off more than a quarter of its factory work force in Los Angeles amid a probe by U.S. immigration authorities.

In early July, the company announced that it had been notified by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that 1,600 of it is 5,600 factory employees, who are largely Hispanic immigrants, might be in the U.S. illegally. An American Apparel spokeswoman said that about 1,500 workers would be terminated in coming weeks.

In a letter to employees in English and Spanish, Charney said he was “deeply saddened” that the company has to shed workers who have been at the company for several years. Charney, a champion of immigration reform, promised to give the workers priority for jobs when “you are able to get your immigration papers in order.”

On July 1, Department of Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano announced that ICE, a unit of her agency, had begun audits of 652 companies as part of a new strategy to focus immigration enforcement on employers. That number has since grown, according to ICE officials. By specifically targeting employers, the agency is reversing its tactics during the Bush administration, when it relied on high-profile raids at factories. The raids rounded up hundreds of workers but rarely resulted in penalties for the companies.

American Apparel is likely to face thousands of dollars in penalties for hiring workers who weren’t eligible to be employed. The government has said fines may exceed $800 per employee.

As we have studiously noted, ratings firms have gotten sued left and right by investors who claim the firms issued misleading opinions about mortgage-backed securities and were partly to blame for the financial crisis. (Here’s one post on the rash of litigation against ratings firms and another noting that the SEC chief favors lowering the barriers to suing ratings firms.)

Ratings firms often have cloaked themselves in the Constitution, claiming that their ratings are mere opinions protected by the First Amendment. And courts in the past have held that investors can not sue on the alleged grounds that ratings are too high or too low, unless, that is, plaintiffs can also show that particular ratings were issued with “actual malice.”

But on Wednesday, Manhattan federal Judge Shira Scheindlin dealt a blow to ratings firms, rejecting a free-speech defense asserted by Moody’s Investors Services and Standard & Poor’s. See the opinion here.

The suit alleges the two ratings services issued misleading ratings to a $5.86 billion investment vehicle that collapsed in 2007. Scheindlin acknowledged that ratings typically are “matters of public concern,” protected by the First Amendment from liability. However, the protection doesn’t apply, she wrote, “where a rating agency has disseminated their ratings to a select group of investors rather than to the public at large,” as the plaintiffs in the case alleged.

The ruling is one of the first to interpret whether the First Amendment applies to ratings of certain securities, such as mortgage-backed securities, which tend to be rated as discrete issuances for investors as opposed to more general ratings of corporate bonds.

“Her decision breaks new ground on the issue of whether the First Amendment applies to ratings of privately offered securities,” says New York attorney David Grais.

“The court’s ruling on the First Amendment was based purely on plaintiffs’ allegations, and we are hopeful the court will review the issue once the true facts are before it,” said Michael Adler, a Moody’s spokesperson.

And S& P spokesman noted the court dismissed all but one of the plaintiffs’ 11 claims. “We are confident that we will prevail on the remaining claim,” he said.

Voters in Maine Will Decide Fate of Same-Sex Marriage Law

Election officials announced Wednesday that opponents of the state’s same-sex marriage law had gathered more than enough voters’ signatures to put the issue to a vote in November, setting the stage for a furious, two-month campaign that will determine whether the number of states allowing the nuptials shrinks to five.

Maine’s law, passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor in May, was supposed to go into effect on Sept. 12. Meanwhile, the secretary of state’s office was verifying the number of signatures. With the signatures validated, Gov. John Baldacci, a Democrat, signed a formal proclamation on Wednesday putting the law to a statewide vote on Nov. 3.

Maine became the fifth state to allow same-sex marriage when Mr. Baldacci signed the bill on May 6, and New Hampshire became the sixth when Gov. John Lynch, also a Democrat, signed a bill less than a month later. New Hampshire’s law goes into effect on Jan. 1.

Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts and Vermont also allow same-sex couples to marry.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/us/03maine.html

So earlier this morning we got word, yet again, that the European Commission doesn’t exactly like the looks of another merger between two U.S.-based companies. The unlucky souls: software maker Oracle Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc.

According to this WSJ story, the EC earlier today opened an in-depth antitrust investigation into Oracle’s planned purchase of Sun, citing “serious concerns” that the deal will stymie competition in the database market. Click here and here for further coverage from the Financial Times and the New York Times, respectively.

For now, a little background: Oracle makes databases and other software for large corporations, while Sun makes computer servers. But Sun also owns the widely-used MySQL open-source database program. As MySQL develops, it is expected to become a bigger competitor in the software market, the commission said, adding it will investigate Oracle’s plans to develop MySQL during the probe.

Said Neelie Kroes, the EU’s competition commissioner: “In the current economic context, all companies are looking for cost-effective IT solutions, and systems based on open-source software are increasingly emerging as viable alternatives to proprietary solutions,” she said. “The commission has to ensure that such alternatives would continue to be available.”

The probe gives the commission four more months to decide whether it will require concessions from Oracle in order to allow the deal, which was cleared last month by the U.S. Department of Justice. Oracle’s planned takeover was announced back in April.

For a little more information, we checked in with John Briggs, the co-chair of Axinn, Veltrop & Harkrider’s antitrust practice. Briggs called the EC’s announcement “surprising,” partly because the antitrust laws at issue are relatively congruent in both the U.S. and Europe, and partly because he expected Kroes-and-crew’s position to follow that of Christine Varney, her counterpart at the Department of Justice.

Given today’s ruling, Briggs says, he’s “not sure if he’s more surprised by the fact that Kroes announced a stepped-up investigation or that Varney didn’t put up more of a fight.”

Briggs added, though, that the discrepancy could owe, at least in part, to the fact that the EU puts a bit more credence in complaints from competitors. “We don’t exactly know who said what to whom,” adds Briggs, “but that could be part of what’s going on here.”

So far, in 2009, the EC trust-busters have not been altogether kind to U.S.-based companies. In May, it slammed Intel with a $1.45 billion fine for allegedly monopolistic behavior. Also in May, word broke that European Union regulators are pursuing a new round of sanctions against the Microsoft for the way it bundles its Web browser with its Windows software.

The economy of the last 16 months has forced law firms to rethink a lot of their old ways of doing things vis-a-vis their associates. Firms have reconsidered salary structures, embraced new training techniques and reshaped evaluation processes. They’ve also, of course, taken the axe to hundreds upon hundreds of the equity-less masses.

But one thing they haven’t changed: whom they hire. Firms have tinkered with the formula at the margins, but they still largely flock to the top national schools and top schools in their area, and look to snatch up the students on law review and with the best grades — categories which often share a lot of overlap. If anything, given a reduction in hiring needs, the firms have become even more discerning with their hiring over the months.

But is this strategy — going for the best and brightest at the most gilded institutions — a mistake? The authors of a recent study think so.

Ronit Dinovitzer, a sociology professor at the University of Toronto, and Bryan Garth, the dean of the Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles, tracked the careers of a sample of 5,000 lawyers who began practice in 2000.

Their findings were two-fold. First, as described in the September issue of the American Lawyer (link not available), they found that “new lawyers working for firms of more than 250 lawyers are less satisfied with their jobs than their counterparts in smaller firms.” Um, okay. Frankly, were this all they found, we wouldn’t be writing about their study at all.

But they also found this: “that graduates of the most selective schools are the less satisfied with their jobs at large firms, while graduates of less selective schools are relatively more satisfied.”

The rationale behind the finding is interesting. Write the authors:

Why are elite graduates dissatisfied with these jobs? Part of the answer is that graduates of elite law schools are groomed to expect success . . . . [The] data shows that the graduates of elite law schools come to the job market with different career expectations than graduates of nonelite schools. Among other things, they are more likely to have considered careers in business consulting or investment banking. . . . Interviews with lawyers in this group reveal that they do not want to work the long hours generally required at law firms, and they especially do not want to put in those hours patiently for ten years to compete for the partnership prize. This is a relatively privileged group that expects to do well in life. For them, the corporate law firm apprenticeship is something to put on a resume and move on.

On the other hand, write Dinovitzer and Garth:

Students from less selective schools have a different disposition. They know they had to work harder simply to attain those positions, and they realize that their options are more limited. . . . Thus, for a segment of students from the lower echelons of the law school heirarchy, the large corporate law firm job is a coveted reward for hard work and is not to be squandered. . . .

The conclusion to all this, write the authors, isn’t one that too many law firms are likely to run out and adopt: hire more lawyers from nonelite schools.

The obvious point is to hire more law graduates from outside the elite law schools. Because of their backgrounds, they will be hungrier and more willing to make the sacrifices necessary to gain access to partnerships. . . . [L]aw firms are always going to need driven young lawyers who are committed to doing what it takes to make partner. We suggest that they are most likely to find these sorts of lawyers outside the elite law schools.”

LBers, any thoughts? We think the proposal makes some intuitive sense. But of course, there’s an argument that getting the one brilliant kid from Stanford or Yale who works her tail off and becomes a rainmaking partner is worth putting up with all the others who don’t want to put in the work to become partner. And you might not get that stream of superstars (even if it’s only one or two per year) by hiring at fourth-tier schools. We’re not sure. Any thoughts?

How strange, bumpy and unpredictable the fallout of the stock-options backdating situation has been. We’ve had gigantic class-action settlements, big derivative-suit deals, lawsuits dismissed, SEC suits, and overturned convictions. Give us a backdating allegation, and we’ll give you about a dozen precedents for how it all might play out.

The latest: James Treacy, a former executive at Monster Worldwide, was sentenced to two years in prison following his conviction this year for fraud in a scheme to improperly backdate millions of dollars in stock-option awards at the online job-search company. Click here for the AP story and here for our Law Blog post from May on Treacy’s conviction.

Manhattan federal judge Jed Rakoff sentenced Treacy to 24 months in prison. Treacy also was ordered to pay $6.3 million in restitution and $6.3 million in forfeiture.

A jury convicted Treacy of conspiracy and securities fraud in May. Prosecutors alleged at trial that he reaped more than $24 million in a scheme in which he, Andrew J. McKelvey, Monster’s founder and ex-chief executive, and others “gamed the system” in order to make millions of dollars off stock options from the company.

Prosecutors claimed that six of eight option awards to Treacy were improperly backdated, covering 450,000 stock options. The government alleged Treacy had at least two opportunities to stop the backdating scheme, but chose not to.

The backdating situation at Monster has proven a bit more damaging than it has at other companies. Andrew J. McKelvey, Monster Worldwide’s founder, in early 2008 entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors in which he admitted, along with others, to routinely selecting “prices for stock-options grants based on historical dates when Monster’s stock price had closed at, or near, a low point, resulting in grants of in-the-money stock options” between 1997 through 2003. McKelvey died in late November of pancreatic cancer.

Myron F. Olesnyckyj, Monster’s former general counsel, pleaded guilty in 2007 to criminal charges in connection with the alleged backdating and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

In July 2008, Monster agreed to settle a shareholder class-action over backdating for $47.5 million. Suffice it to say it’s been a monster of a problem for the company. (Insert groan here.)

Anyone out there, by chance, looking for things to do in Philadelphia this weekend? The Phillies are out of town, but you could go see Alice in Chains at the Theater of Living Arts on Saturday, check out the Star Trek exhibit at the Franklin Museum, or get all gaga over Dada at the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Duchamp exhibit.

But if law and politics is your bag (and we know that you know that it is), you might be intrigued enough to take a flyer on The Gonzales Cantata, a concert opera about Alberto Gonzales’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearings.

Here’s the deal: The Gonzales Cantata, playing at this year’s Philadelphia Fringe Festival, is a 40-minute choral work based on the hearings that punctuated the U.S. attorney-dismissal scandal back in 2007. (Actually, every word sung is from the transcript of the hearings.) Click here for WSJ reporter Evan Perez’s story on the hearings, which links to a whole trove of other goodies. (Scroll to the bottom of the post to watch a video clip of the Cantata. Other clips can be found through the show’s very cleverly designed Web site.)

Even after looking over the Cantata’s Web site, we still had questions. Who did this? Why the Gonzales hearings? And for the love of Giuseppe Verdi, why an opera?

So we called up the name on the Web site, and a woman named Melissa Dunphy answered. Not only, it turns out, does Dunphy, 29, handle press inquiries but she thought up and wrote the Gonzales Cantata while an undergraduate at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. We took it from there.

Hi Melissa, we hear a bit of an accent there. Are you British?

Hi. No, I’m actually Australian. I moved to the U.S. six years ago and got very interested in U.S. politics. Part of it was the culture shock of coming from a country that mostly sits left of the spectrum from where the U.S. sits.

And something about the Gonzales hearings drew you in?

In 2007, I heard the audio of the hearings and just thought they were electrifying. The part that initially grabbed me was when I heard Arlen Specter basically yells at Gonzales, asking him ‘Did you prepare for these press conferences?’ I heard that on the radio and thought it was so dramatic and unlike anything I’d ever heard. I came here in 2003, and until the Gonzales hearings, I really hadn’t heard a Republican attack another Republican. This was the first time I’d heard that, and my first instinct was to dramatize it.

Really? Why?

Part of my impetus was that as much as I disagreed with some of the well-publicized mistakes Gonzales made, I really started to feel sorry for the guy, listening to him struggle his way through the questioning. So I wrote the piece as an exploration of someone who’s having a hard time arguing his way out of a situation. I think had Dick Cheney or Don Rumsfeld been put in the same situation, they could have acquitted themselves much better. But Gonzales, it appeared to me, didn’t have wit or the foresight about him to wriggle his way out of it.

Now, you’ve played with gender in your casting of the show. The men are played by women and vice versa. How come?

Frankly, it sort of annoyed me that only one member of the Senate Judiciary Committee — Dianne Feinstein — is female, and thought that casting the men as women would draw attention to that.

But another big part of it, to be honest, is that there are more female opera singers than male opera singers. So Feinstein is played by a male tenor. Gonzales, Specter and [Patrick] Leahy are all sopranos. Orrin Hatch is an alto.

Huh. Why’s Hatch an alto?

Well, if you watch the hearings, you’ll see that Hatch is one of the only people to have almost comforted Gonzales throughout. It really sticks out, both in clips of the hearings and in the transcript. Everyone else was attacking Gonzales, but Hatch was very comforting, almost motherly. He’s the one who says to Gonzales “I don’t think there’s any proof that you lied.”

So I wrote him a very comforting aria. It’s called “I think We All Can Agree.”

Do you consider the show one big political statement?

No. Not at all. This is not a partisan piece. I’ve had both Republicans and Democrats come to the show and remark that it really wasn’t about party politics. It’s about a man who made some mistakes and is facing the music. It’s also an exploration of how a man could so brazenly politicize the Department of Justice without really standing up for the reasons he went into politics in the first place.

The show has lots of humor, but there are some reflective moments also. I see Gonzales as a tragic figure who’s also simultaneously irredeemable.

But I’d imagine the show is predominantly funny, right?

Right. I’m mostly just making fun of the political system generally. Senate Judiciary Committee hearings are just inherently funny. I watched the Sotomayor hearings and found them just as bizarre. They’re so mannered and there’s so much grandstanding, I just find something inherently funny about them. Add a bunch of beautiful young women singing the words of these senators, and it brings an extra absurdity to it.

So when did you write this?

I wrote it during my time at West Chester University, in Pennsylvania, when I was a bachelor’s student. I just finished my degree.

Now what?

I’m starting a PhD program at Penn in music composition in a few weeks. I’m also an actor — theater is a big part of my life — but opera is my thing. I want my next opera to be set in space. I just love the idea of a bunch of people dressed as aliens singing opera.

And did you ever try to give word to Gonzales about this?

Well, I sent a copy of the recording to him at Texas Tech, but I haven’t heard anything. I did, however, have a conversation with John Ashcroft about it. I called to get permission to do an arrangement of his song, “Where the Eagles Soar,” as sort of a companion piece. But he denied permission. [Editor's note: A spokesman for Ashcroft told us, with a bit of a laugh, that the two had "artistic differences."]

Well, best of luck with it.

Thanks!

Dan Slater, our longtime Blogger-in-Chief, wrote an interesting item today on the New York Times’s DealBook blog about the sorry state of legal education and the sorrier state of those who incur law-school debt.

After recounting the industry’s well-known travails, Slater takes aim at the American Bar Association, “which continues to approve law schools with impunity and with no end in site.

Slater laments the fact that, even in the throes of one of the worst industry downturns in history, matriculation rates continue to rise unchecked at law schools, with close to 50,000 enrollees at the 200 ABA-approved law schools.

Worse, to lure students, some law schools offer a deceptive view of the likelihood that their graduated will land top-paying jobs. Slater points a finger at employment statistics posted on the Web sites of three low-ranked law schools in New York City. All three advertise that 45 to 60 percent of their 2008 graduates who reported salary information are making a median salary of $150,000 to $160,000, a statistic that Slater finds somewhat dubious.

Ultimately, however, Slater serves up the sternest language for students themselves:

“But will next year’s round of applicants heed the signals?” he writes, with that characteristic Slater panache. And then this, which deserves its own set-off block-quote:

Or, like Gatsby’s revelers, will they simply push on at an ever greater clip, boats against the current, toward that green light in the ivory tower and the promising future that, quite literally, recedes before them? After all, there will always be the possibility, however faint, of Big Law money and white-shoe prestige — those powerful tonics for every new batch of wandering liberal arts graduates.

Will it ever change? Perhaps not. “I don’t know if we can take it for granted that a 22-year-old knows what it means to borrow $100,000,” Nora V. Demleitner, the dean of Hofstra Law School, told Slater. “They look at the $100,000 in loans, and then they look at the $160,000 salary. And they think, ‘Well, that’s not so bad.’”

We write this post with somewhat heavy hearts, LBers, as we realize that, barring something unforseen, it could be a long time before we write anything again about Marc Dreier.

Marc Dreier, who a year ago was still hobnobbing with celebrities and entertaining on his yacht, is on his way to Federal Correctional Institution Sandstone (pictured), a low-security prison about 70 miles southwest of Duluth, Minn. It is here that Dreier will serve his 20-year fraud sentence. Click here for the story, from the New York Law Journal.

According to Alan Ellis’s Federal Prison Guidebook, inmates are primarily housed in two-man “cubicle-dormitories.” Far be it from us to venture a guess as to how Dreier will spend his time up there, but he’ll have recreational opportunities. According to Ellis’s guidebook:

The Recreation Department offers intramural or extramural sports, a music room, a weight room, pool tables, and ping-pong tables. The hobby craft center offers leather craft, painting, and stained glass.

So he’s got that going for him, which is nice.

And apparently Dreier’s lawyers agree. Ross Kramer, an associate of Gerald Shargel, Dreier’s defense attorney, told the New York Law Journal that Sandstone seemed “like a fine place for Dreier to be.”

Lobbyists representing police, trial lawyers and firefighters have violated New York's ban on gifts, the state commission that monitors lobbying and ethics laws said Tuesday.

The Commission on Public Integrity said the New York Association of Police Benevolent Associations, the state Trial Lawyers Association and the Uniformed Firefighters Association spent too much on free food and refreshments at banquets for lawmakers.

The groups are allowed to offer a settlement or go to a hearing to address the charges.

"The (Trial Lawyers) Association has been in discussions to reach a resolution of this issue with the commission, which it believes will include payment of a $250 fine," said Alex Navarro-McKay, a spokesman for the group.

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Watchdog: Police, firefighters break NY lobby law - Forbes.com

Well, that didn’t take long.

The morning’s papers were practically giddy with Monday’s news of Disney’s $4 billion acquisition of Marvel Entertainment (if for no other reason, they got to splash cool comic-book art up on their pages). Disney paid a hefty premium for they parent company of Spidey, X-Men, and the Incredible hulk — about 29 percent, according to the WSJ. Leading the deal: Dewey & LeBoeuf’s Mort Pierce for Disney (who, legend has it, bills 3300 hours, at least when the times are good); Paul Hastings’s Carl Sanchez for Marvel.

But now, no sooner than the ink has dried on the deal, comes a lawsuit. According to Bloomberg, a Marvel shareholder sued in the Delaware Chancery Court alleging that Marvel directors failed to conduct an appropriate sales process. The plaintiff, shareholder Christine Vlatos, is seeking a court order barring the deal as well as unspecified damages. (Complaint not available.) Marvel did not immediately return a call to Bloomberg.

So what might Ms. Vlatos have to prove in order to hold up the deal? We checked in with Eric Chiapinelli, the dean of the law school at Creighton University, an expert on the law of corporations, and a very solid member of the LB Bow Tie club.

“It sounds like a Revlon claim,” said Chiapinelli, referring to the 1986 Delaware Supreme Court decision Revlon v. MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings. “Under Revlon, directors have a duty to try to get the best price for their shareholders. They don’t have to get the best price, necessarily, just an obligation to try to get the best price.”

So what, exactly, does that mean? Chiapinelli says the Delaware Supreme Court has been “very careful” not to make a checklist of what directors have to do in order to show that they tried to get the best price. “It’s very loose. It seems they don’t want to make directors jump through a whole bunch of administrative red tape, on the one hand, and provide too easy a safe-harbor on the other.”

Do plaintiffs ever win these types of suits? “Not very often,” says Chiapinelli. But, he adds, if the pleadings are sufficient, sometimes a court can order a defendant to turn over “books and records.” And that, he adds, “can help a lawsuit along.”

As they say at the end of comic books. . . stay tuned.

Laws or technicalities? Judge to decide R-71 challenge

Is a requirement that people who sign referendum petitions be registered Washington voters when they sign an important tenet of state law or a "hyper-technicality?"

That's one of the questions a King County Superior Court judge must answer as she decides whether to grant an injunction keeping Referendum 71 off the November ballot. R-71 would give voters a chance to overturn the state's new "everything but marriage" same-sex domestic partnership law.

On Monday the secretary of state's office said the referendum had enough valid signatures to make the ballot. At almost the same time, attorneys were arguing before Judge Julie Spector about the signature-gathering process. Spector said she would issue her ruling Wednesday morning, the same day the secretary of state is expected to officially certify R-71 for the ballot.

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Laws or technicalities? Judge to decide R-71 challenge

In late June, President Barack Obama signed The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act into law. The law will allow the federal government broad authority over tobacco products and will also allow regulators to control cigarette packaging and marketing as well as how much nicotine—the addictive component in cigarettes—is added in tobacco products, explained the Washington Post previously.

Now, some tobacco companies—R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company and Lorillard Inc.—are included in a group that just filed a federal lawsuit to block some of the provisions of the law, claiming it violates their rights to free speech under the U.S. constitution, reported Reuters. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco is an arm or Reynolds American Inc., the maker of Camel and Winston brand cigarettes; Lorillard sells Newport cigarettes, said Reuters. Marlboro cigarettes are manufactured by the largest American tobacco company, Altria Group Inc., which is not involved in the lawsuit and supports the law, reported Reuters.

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Tobacco Company Sues Over New Law

In some ways, Massachusetts seemed to come up with a perfect solution to a two-fold problem: deferred law-firm associates and an understaffed judiciary. The solution: lawyers whose law-firm start dates were pushed back but were still being paid a stipend by their firms could go work judicial clerkships for the year at no cost to the state judiciary. The students would get good experience, the firms would ultimately get fledgling lawyers who’d seen the inside of a courtroom, and the state judiciary, well, free labor! Click here for our June post on the proposal for the program.

Just one glitch: it may well be unethical.

According to an article in the Boston Globe, the state judiciary has abandoned the program. Robert A. Mulligan, chief justice for administration and management of the trial courts, scuttled the proposal after receiving a written opinion he had sought from the state ethics commission.

According to the Globe, the commission did not provide a “definitive ruling.’’ But after Mulligan received the letter, which was not made public, he reportedly spoke to a few of the chief justices who head trial-court departments and shelved the plan.

We’re not sure exactly what was unethical about the program. But according to the Globe, some legal specialists had said an arrangement that involves a law firm paying a judicial employee raised thorny ethical questions; firms that donate lawyers to the courts might appear to be currying favor or expect preferential treatment.

The judiciary had 105 full-time clerks in June. But as a result of budget cuts, it will have about 75 full-time clerks and about a dozen part-time ones, not enough, it seems, the keep the wheels of justice well oiled.

Suffolk Superior Court Judge Carol S. Ball, who heads a committee that screens prospective law clerks, said the smaller contingent will make it hard for judges to do their jobs.

“I just got off the bench, and I’ve got a stack of research and writing to do,’’ Ball said late yesterday afternoon. “When am I going to do that? You might as well take away our books.’’

LBers, not only can you rely on us to deliver the legal news, but we can also dish out the celebrity news like the best of ‘em.

Like this: Did you know that Paris Hilton recently abandoned her trademark exclamation “That’s Hot!” for “That’s Huge!” We can barely believe it either, but it’s like totally true! Watch it here if you don’t believe us.

We’re of half a mind to end this post right now, but, alas, there’s a legal hook to this all-too-important Paris Hilton news which, in our minds, gives new meaning to the phrase “intellectual property”: The Ninth Circuit earlier today made a ruling in a lawsuit concerning Hilton’s use of the phrase “That’s Hot!” A three-judge panel ruled that Hilton could proceed with her lawsuit against greeting-card maker Hallmark in which she alleges Hallmark misappropriated her picture as well as her use of the “That’s Hot!” saying. Click here for the Reuters story, here for the opinion, written by judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain.

Before Hilton made her big switch to “That’s Huge!,” she reportedly used to say “That’s Hot!” all the time on her show The Simple Life. In at least one episode of the show, Hilton worked at a Sonic fast-food restaurant and, yes, made that very quip. The Hallmark card at issue, according to the Reuters story, showed:

Hilton’s face superimposed on a cartoon of a waitress serving a plate of food to a restaurant customer.

Hilton tells the customer, “Don’t touch that, it’s hot.” The customer asks, “What’s hot?” Hilton responds, “That’s hot.” The inside of the card reads “Have a smokin’ hot birthday.”

We have no idea how much Hallmark made on this, uh, incredibly clever card, but it’ll now have to defend itself at trial. The Ninth Circuit upheld the lower court’s denial of Hallmark’s motion to dismiss Hilton’s right-of-publicity claim, ruling that the card was not sufficiently “transformative” as to deserve automatic protection simply because the setting was different and the phrase “that’s hot” referred to the temperature of a plate of food.

Wrote O’Scannlain: “the basic setting is the same: we see Paris Hilton, born to privilege, working as a waitress.” He concluded that Hilton “has at least some probability of prevailing on the merits before a trier of fact” and kicked the suit back to the lower court.

Lincoln Bandlow, a lawyer at Lathrop & Gage in Los Angeles representing Hallmark, told Reuters that “the analysis of the First Amendment defense is incorrect. It will leave a lot of speakers subjected to meritless right of publicity claims.”

Brent Blakely, a lawyer for Hilton, was not available for comment. But his Web site is unlike any law-firm site we’ve seen, featuring shots of surfers, a bullfighter and, yes, a bikini-clad woman.

We know we’ve done quite a bit in recent weeks about former AG Alberto Gonzales (here and here). And we know that you know that he’s moved down to Lubbock to take a one-year teaching position in the political-science department at Texas Tech. So we’ll forgive you if you view this post with an initial dose of skepticism: After all, you might be thinking: What’s left to say about the guy?

But we strongly suggest you take a look today at this interview with the Bush administration’s former top lawyer. It’s as extensive an interview as we’ve seen since he stepped down from his position in late 2007. While the conversation starts out focused on Lubbock — and the course he’s slated to start teaching soon — it quickly veers into his career as AG.

For starters: his description of his course made us want to run down to Lubbock and sign up:

I’m going to talk a lot about how does the White House actually work, how does legislation … really get passed, how does it work between the executive branch and the legislative branch. And how do you get ready for a Supreme Court nomination, how do you pick a nominee, how do you prepare that nominee, how do you get that nominee confirmed? We’re going to look at issues obviously related to the war on terrorism and some of the big issues that this president still confronts, like what do you do with Guantanamo, what do you do about long-term detention. So those are all issues that we’re going to be looking at. And maybe these are issues that, I have to say, will be covered in other courses by other professors around the country, but I dare say very few are going to have the same level of insight, the direct hands-on involvement that I can bring to the students.

Pretty cool, wethinks.

And for all those looking for a little more on the U.S. attorney scandal, Gonzales gives as comprehensive an answer as we can remember him giving.

The other thing I would want your readers to understand is over the course of four years and eight years, there is a great deal of turnover. And, certainly, more than seven or eight U.S. Attorneys leave or are asked to leave quietly during that period of time. What is unusual, I will concede, is the fact that there was a group that was asked to leave at one time. But the fact that seven or eight might have been asked to leave is not unusual during the course of four years or eight years. It happens, because unfortunately from time to time, individuals in those positions just aren’t doing their job. And from time to time they do something that is wrong. And from time to time, a president may simply want to make a change. He may want to have someone else in that position, which is perfectly appropriate. So during the course of four years or eight years changes occur in U.S. Attorneys’ offices. That happens in most positions.

But it doesn’t stop there. Gonzales talks fairly extensively on the Geneva Convention, the definition of torture, and the protests that his arrival in Lubbock have sparked. Good stuff.

Correction: An earlier version of this post stated that Gonzales will be teaching in the law school at Texas Tech.

[ In criminal justice systems, parole is the supervised release of a prisoner before the completion of his/her sentence. This differs from amnesty or commutation of sentence in that parolees are still considered to be serving their sentences, and may be returned to prison if they violate the conditions of their parole. A specific type of parole is medical parole or compassionate release which is the release of prisoners on medical or humanitarian grounds. Conditions of parole often include things such as obeying the law, refraining from drug and alcohol use, avoiding contact with the parolee's victims, obtaining employment, and maintaining required contacts with a parole officer. ]

Talk about strange timing.

The California State Assembly had settled on Monday — today — to vote over a bill that would help cut the state’s big budget deficit by $1.2 billion by reducing the state prison population through an early parole program. The program could reduce the state prison population by 27,000. The state’s Senate already gave the bill a thumb’s up.

Then, on Friday, broke news of the bizarro case of Phillip Garrido (pictured). For those who aren’t up to speed on the Garrido story, run — don’t walk — to your nearest Internet cafe. In a sentence, Garrido, a parolee and registered sex offender, was accused on Friday of abducting an 11-year-old and holding her hostage for 18 years. Click here for Friday’s LAT story on the case.

According to a story out in Monday’s NYT, some corrections reform advocates in Sacramento and politicians are worried that the fallout from the Garrido case could have a big effect on the Assembly bill.

“This demonstrates the problems that we’re going to have if we release thousands of prisoners into our local communities,” State Senator Tom Harman, a Republican from Huntington Beach, told The Sacramento Bee.

According to the NYT story, many of Harman’s colleagues had expressed fears on the impact of the early-release program, but the Garrido case is amping up the anxiety.

“If we let someone out early, and that man commits a crime, the Assembly members are worried that that will come back to haunt them like the old famous Willie Horton ads,” said a prominent state politician, who asked not to be identified because of concerns about undermining legislative negotiations.

But Scott Kernan, a deputy secretary of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, told the NYT that a man who had committed crimes like those that sent Garrido to prison initially would never have been released early from prison under the proposed law. In fact, the bill would have made it possible to supervise sex offenders like Garrido even more closely.

Driving laws toughen in Texas - especially for teens

Buckle your seat belts – it could be a bumpy Tuesday as new driving laws go into effect that will toughen the rules of the road, especially for teenagers.

Foremost, you will need to climb into the back and pull those buckles out from between the seat cushions. For the first time in Texas, all passengers will be required to wear a seat belt – not just those in the front seat or younger than 15.

While you're back there, secure a car seat for any child younger than 8. Currently, only children 4 and younger have to be in a safety seat.

And if you want to talk about these changes, don't do it on a hand-held cellphone in an active school zone. As of Tuesday, cellphones in school zones will be banned statewide.

The new state laws will definitely change some behavior, but "there's nothing too onerous," said Rep. Joe Pickett, the El Paso Democrat who leads the House Transportation Committee.

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Driving laws toughen in Texas - especially for teens | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Breaking News for Dallas-Fort Worth | Dallas Morning News

Federal judge rules landmark program unconstitutional

Lawmakers who were instrumental in adopting the state's landmark 2005 campaign-financing law expressed disappointment Friday after a federal judge said it creates unconstitutional obstacles to minor-party candidates seeking office.

They said that the General Assembly may have to consider another special legislative session to fix the law, which was scheduled to finance its first gubernatorial campaign next year.

"I believe it is constitutional," said Rep. Christopher L. Caruso, D-Bridgeport, who was co-chairman in 2005 of the committee that endorsed the taxpayer-financing system. "That's when the Legislature really began the process of cleaning up the electoral system in our state."

Sen. Gayle S. Slossberg, D-Milford, co-chairwoman of the Government Administration & Elections Committee, said it's crucial the state keep special-interest money out of races for the General Assembly and constitutional offices, including secretary of the state, attorney general, treasurer and comptroller.

"This is a very telling decision, something we need to look at carefully," Slossberg said Friday. "We have the time to really look at it in depth and make sure we make good decisions going forward."

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal vowed to appeal U.S. District Court Judge Stefan R. Underhill's ruling, which could kill the state's $37 million system of taxpayer-financed races for the General Assembly and top-of-the-ticket statewide races.

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Judge rules state campaign finance law unconstitutional - The Connecticut Post Online

Adam Goldstein AKA “DJ AM” was recently found dead in his New York City Apartment. Goldstein recently survived a plane crash in South Carolina that killed four people. Ted Kennedy-- the only Kennedy brother not to be assassinated-- just died of a brain tumor at age 77. His funeral is on nearly every channel as I write this. The most popular movie this weekend is The Final Destination, a movie where the villain is death itself. We literally can’t escape death this weekend.

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DJ AM, Teddy Kennedy and Michael Jackson: Law and the Final Destination