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stingray1381 posted:Not trying to be a dick, but I would love to see some actual job postings that reflect these numbers. The DA and PD numbers you note are particularly unbelieveable. At my PD office, starting is $83k. DA is the same, of course. I was surprised when I heard, too. srsly fucked around with this message at 15:23 on May 10, 2010 |
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prussian advisor posted:Uhh, where is this? California also? Yeah. Although nm says it's even higher now. I dunno about that. It's still a bunch of money for a pretty damned fun job. I am 3-0 in my last three trials. 
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May 10, 2010 15:25
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nm posted:My source for $88k was you. Maybe it is $83k and I misheard. It's still a buttload of money for a very rewarding job. I might have said $88k. I know it's one of the two. Don't care enough to find out which one it is.
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May 11, 2010 05:56
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nm posted:So I have another 148 (resisting arrest/order of police officer) I had one with a guy who is physically disabled. When talking to cops, he was not aggressive, but sounding a bit crazy. Cops decide to 5150 and ask him to get on his knees so they can cuff him. As he's explaining that he is physically unable to lower himself onto his knees they shoot him with a Taser. Two Sheriff's deputies, no allegations of threatening or aggressive movements or speech, and the first physical contact is a Taser shot to the chest. Conferencing the case with a judge, I started with "If anybody acted criminally here, it was the cops." That conversation didn't last too long. Keep in mind that the above description isn't how my client explained what happened to me. No, it's precisely how the police report reads. PC 148 is the most bullshit charge I have to deal with.
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May 16, 2010 03:46
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nm posted:We;ve been doing pretty good, last few weeks: Now 4-0 in last 4 trials. Get crackin' buddy.
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May 16, 2010 22:22
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More Summer Associate advice: Be nice to the staff. They are one big crazy gossip machine. And you are very likely sharing secretaries and paralegals with folks on the hiring committee. And a story about a 2L summer being "right on the law" and it helping to save his rear end: I fell flat on my face four days into my summer position. I said something in an email that was taken the wrong way by a senior associate and that person didn't talk to me about it. That person was on the hiring committee. That person did however talk to my associate mentor about it. I was seen as being rude, having a bad attitude, not knowing my place, etc., all rolled into one. Whoops. My associate mentor didn't talk to me about it either though. I didn't find out about it until my mid-summer review. I was wondering why that associate and the people he/she worked with a lot were being cool to me. Know I knew. I talked to my partner mentor about what to do to fix the situation. I went back through my e-mails and found the one I though had offended the associate. And I can see how it did. I went and talked to the associate the same afternoon as my review, apologized, and explained. The next week bigshot partner who that associate works with very regularly e-mails me out of the blue and says he/she is assigning me and a first-year an MSJ. I do my portion of the MSJ, but as I am doing it I think of a jurisdictional defense. I run the jurisdictional defense by bigshot partner and he/she says no that will not work because of x y and z. I tell him/her I want to look into it more and offer to write a memo and sample motion arguing this defense. Now this work was in addition to the stuff I had actually volunteered for. So I was working quite a bit. I pulled an all-nighter 3 days in, right before I'd said I would have it ready for bigshot partner. And I was right. The jurisdictional defense was absolutely colorable, even winnable. And it would potentially save our client lots of money by not having to submit to full discovery prior to jurisdiction being decided. At my summer-end review, they brought up the thing where I offended the senior associate again, heard that I had handled it, and they talked a lot about the work I did for bigshot partner. They were impressed. They used superlatives. They kept coming back to my review from him/her. It was a strong review. I got the job. It probably wouldn't have happened if I hadn't screwed up in the first place. srsly fucked around with this message at 03:53 on May 23, 2010 |
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May 23, 2010 03:49
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sigmachiev posted:What was the funnest summer associate activity you did? Weekend retreat to a coastal resort. They put each of us up in $500 suites and, as Hookars said, it was just a drunken good time. The hiring partner got wasted and led us in pouring water on a young female associate. She got me back good.
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May 25, 2010 08:05
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Vander posted:Serious question: When a cop pulls someone over, is it a question of law or fact as to whether it is a Terry stop? OMG a question that is easy due to my current line of work. It's a mixed question of law and fact. http://docs.justia.com/cases/supreme/517/690.pdf Syllabus posted:The ultimate questions of reasonable suspicion to stop and probable cause to make a warrantless search should be reviewed de novo. The principal components of either inquiry are (1) a determination of the historical facts leading up to the stop or search, and (2) a decision on the mixed question of law and fact whether the historical facts, viewed from the standpoint of an objectively reasonable police officer, amount to reasonable suspicion or to probable cause. Ornelas et al. v. United States, 517 U.S. 690 (1996) mixed question of law and fact means: quote:[T]he historical facts are admitted or established, the rule of law is undisputed, and the issue is whether the facts satisfy the [relevant] statutory [or constitutional] standard, or to put it another way, whether the rule of law as applied to the established facts is or is not violated. Pullman-Standard v. Swint, 456 U.S. 273, 289, n. 19 (1982). srsly fucked around with this message at 02:13 on May 26, 2010 |
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May 26, 2010 02:00
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The Warp posted:She thinks that you guys are just saying that she won't have a house by the beach or a cushy corporate firm, but I don't think she understands that it's more dire than that. I graduated from Davis. I have many, many friends who have been unable to find legal employment. Others are killing themselves for it. My buddy graduated middle of the class, and started at a PI/Administrative Defense firm. He was basically an errand boy running all over Northern California working 80 hours a week for less than $40,000/year. No joke. He recently moved to Fresno to work insurance defense instead. Same hours, slightly better pay, but less time sitting in his car. He spends his days doing doc review and dreaming up ways to screw over hurt people. And he lives in loving Fresno. I don't see how your gf can think we're all trying to trick her when there are several articles from mainstream news publications over the last year talking about how lovely the legal job market is. And those articles routinely interview people from (no offense) "real" law schools to illustrate how bad stuff is, not the two diploma mills she's looking at. She is 21. 21. 21. If going to law school right now involves taking on any debt at all, she needs to stay far far away. There will still be law schools around willing to take her money for a diploma when she is 23, or 26, or whenever. She needs to get into a better school, live a little, and not jump into law school when the economy is still in limbo. She sounds a ton like she wants to go NOW because she doesn't know what else she'd do with herself. Getting a minimum wage job that has the slightest bit of fulfilling attributes is a better idea than law school right now. Did she not see today's ATL post? http://abovethelaw.com/2010/05/10-an-hour-for-a-j-d/
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May 28, 2010 07:21
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Five in a row... booyah. It's fun being smart and poo poo and being up against newbie DA's. I mean... I'm a newbie too but Christ they forget to ask the most basic questions. Favorite line from closing. (after DA says my client made a mistake and he was irresponsible and the jury can't just let him off the hook). "This IS a case about a mistake. Not a mistake that Mr. Jones made though, but a mistake that Officer Smith made. And y'know, no officer wants to arrest an innocent person. I'm not saying Officer Smith arrests innocent people on a regular basis. But it happens. And you know what? That's okay. Because this is America! We have this (gestures around the courtroom at all the participants) for precisely that reason -- to correct mistakes like the completely understandable one officer Smith made that night. So members of the jury, don't think for a moment that if you vote "not guilty" you're letting Mr. Jones off the hook. No, you're letting Officer Smith off the hook! And if he knew all the facts in this case, he'd thank you for that." Jury deliberates for 20 minutes and asks for full readback of Officer Smith's testimony. Officer Smith's testimony leaves no room for doubt as to the guilt of my client. 15 minutes after readback they return a not guilty verdict. Gun case too. Crap this job feels great when you're winning... srsly fucked around with this message at 08:20 on Jul 5, 2010 |
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Jul 5, 2010 08:17
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methamphetamine posted:I'm having a really hard time trying to decide between Boalt and Columbia as a transfer. Boalt would be cheaper as I am in-state, and I want to practice in California. On the other hand I feel the greed for lay prestige making me want to go to Columbia instead. Is this a good idea? I'm kinda late in replying, but... If you want to practice in California, go to Boalt. loving duh. There's is no added prestige as to Columbia over Boalt in California. Among laypeople or lawyers. The only prestige bump you'll get is when you're vacationing or visiting friends on the East coast. This is a no-brainer.
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Jul 12, 2010 06:16
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Oakdale posted:grad school for Agricultural Economics. Clearly you should go to UC Davis. Maybe nm and I will still be in the area, miserable and jobless. We will welcome your sensible company.
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Jul 16, 2010 02:03
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Mookie posted:Davis has Murderburger, home of the Aggie Annihilator and, fittingly, of an actual murder. My ex worked there for several months. The owner is loving nuts and will hire just about anybody willing to work and put up with his abuse. There was some homeless guy he hired who slept in a trailer thing in the parking lot and showered with the garden hose in the morning before work. But the food is damned good.
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Jul 19, 2010 05:47
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TheMadMilkman posted:By the way, if law school doesn't kill all the relationships in your life, your first job will. Bingo. Made it through law school and the bar exam unscathed. Wife left three months into first lawyer-job. 9 years down the drain in three months. Rock on.
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Aug 11, 2010 02:25
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fougera posted:any advice for callback interviews? You should know this by now, but: Firm has already decided you are smart enough to work for them. Callback is about if you are cool enough to work for them. Or as one partner put it to me, "Could I stand to be stuck in an airport in Cleveland for 12 straight hours with this person?" Maybe some rear end in a top hat associate will ask you a substantive legal question. That happened to me. Once. gently caress that guy. Be cool, show an interest in the firm and the people interviewing you. Be prepared to talk about your interests or outside hobbies. The ideal callback interview should feel like you just met several new people in succession at a frat party and successfully shot the poo poo with each of them. Questions you ask should be stuff like "How does summer work get assigned around here?" Or "What's you're favorite experience from working here at the firm in the last year?" Or "What programs does the firm have in place for associate development?" or some poo poo like that. No mushy questions about work-life balance. Be expected to be asked about who else you have callbacks with. Come up with a convincing lie that makes you sound desirable if the real answer is "You're my only hope."
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Aug 26, 2010 02:53
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Clerkship with Federal Magistrate Judge. Worth it or no? How much does it pay?
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Oct 16, 2010 01:12
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Vander posted:Is it in the town/ city/ district you want to practice in? Yes. I guess when I ask "is it worth it" I mean, is it worth it in terms of long-term career stuff to go clerk with a Federal Magistrate rather than going straight into biglaw?
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Oct 16, 2010 03:53
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nm posted:Wanna start a lovely crim defense firm in norcal with me? If I flunk out of biglaw I'll come back and join you. I've got 6 complete acquittals this year. It's like I'm good at this or something.
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Nov 7, 2010 17:35
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nm posted:You bastard. One more month. I've only beat one DUI. I've taken down, in one form or another, every non-DUI I've tried. We should get together some time. It's criminal that we haven't gotten together to trade war stories.
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Nov 8, 2010 20:51
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Sulecrist posted:-How bad/competitive is northern California? If I work in DA's offices both 1L and 2L summers out there, will I probably still be fenced out by local competition and the state's penuriousness? Here's how the Sacramento DA's office works. Talking with people, it appears to be the model for several other DA's offices in the state as well. I haven't heard a ton, but I haven't heard of anybody who's doing it any differently: Post-bar, you get a temporary job. It certainly helps if you worked in the office while you were a student. This job lasts a maximum of one year. It pays about $40k. This job entails discovery work, briefing, subpoenas, etc. If you're lucky, you will get to argue a couple motions to supress, speedy trial motions, or restitution hearings. If you're really really lucky you may get to try a misdemeanor case or two. I tried a case against a post-bar a couple months ago. It was spectacular. The work is nigh indistinguishable from what you'd do with a 2L or 3L externship for the office. When hiring time rolls around, the DA's office will entertain outside applicants but will also cherrypick from their favorite temp employees. Sacramento hires almost exclusively from those who have already worked there. Larger offices interview tons of people, with about a 30 to 1 applicant to job opening ratio currently. Orange County recently interviewed for openings at over a 10 to 1 ratio. One of the positions went to a temp employee from Sacramento. Budget issues have meant a slowdown in hiring, as have the economy overall (less natural attrition). But the DA's office is generally one of the last things to be cut. Turnover at a DA's office is generally decent. My impression is that DAs leaving to go into private defense is actually more common than PDs leaving to go into private defense. For an added bizareness, in Sacramento the PDs and the DAs not only belong to the same union (extremely common) but also share a rehire list (very unusual). Our PD's office laid off attorneys earlier this year. For any permanent hiring the DA wants to do for the next 2 years, they would first have to offer those positions to the laid-off PDs... srsly fucked around with this message at 20:38 on Nov 10, 2010 |
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Nov 10, 2010 20:32
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gvibes posted:You're a diversity candidate from Yale? You should be applying to every firm in the country regardless of whether they say they have a 1L diversity program. Try to go make bank for a couple summers and then get a clerkship out of school and then head to the government.
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Nov 10, 2010 21:39
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nm posted:Actually, the Sac DAs office works like no one gets hired because no money. Ever. Truth: They made one full-time hire this year that I am aware of. Several last year though. Agree with what you said on don't be a DA though. Before you get to lock up bad people for the rest of their lives you have to ruin the lives of countless dozens of ordinary and down on their luck folks. You'll be forced to think of everybody who may have broken any law in any way ever so slightly as the scum of the earth who needs to be taught a lesson in pain and suffering... as if that hasn't already been their life. You will have no discretion of your own. If you show a hint of being anything less than a complete rear end in a top hat they will fire you. Or if you've passed probation, they will send you to DA Siberia trying paper cases with no chance that you'll ever supervise somebody else.
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Nov 11, 2010 01:42
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TheAttackSlug posted:You can be Let's get one thing straight buddy: prosecutors don't bulldoze arguments. State Court judges bulldoze arguments. Harmless error and deferential standards of review are a crutch for screwing over defendants. Harmless error is one of the biggest laughers to me at this point. Talking to juries after trials can be amazingly entertaining and infuriating. They can tend to ignore huge things and latch on to the most inane crap in the world. For some appellate judge to say "Oh it's harmless errors cuz it wouldn't make a difference to reasonable jurors" is an absolute joke. What passes for a reasonable juror is quite frequently an insane person who merely pays lip service to following the law, or draws completely bizarre inferences (And yes, that can cut both ways).
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Nov 11, 2010 05:08
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with all your classmates who haven't convicted anyone or bulldozed a real attorney's argument as to why nobody should hear about those drugs in his client's car.
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nm posted:This is why my 273.5 with a black eye became a 243(e)(1). WTH? Clearly they agreed he battered her but she got the black eye somewhere else. Or despite the jury instruction, a black eye just doesn't feellike a "traumatic condition." I like the drink after drive or no drive cases where the dude blows like a 0.34% BAC and they convict on the A and acquit on the B. I've seen two of those this year. It makes me want to slam my face into a wall. (For those of you not practicing criminal law in CA, A is "driving under the influence" and B is "driving at or above a .08") The Sac DA hired a fulltime ADA from it's temp workers in July. County budget went final on a Friday, PD layoffs were effective on Monday. They hired her on Saturday. She started last December after the bar as a temp. She went to Hastings. Yes, I am headed to biglaw. I am done with criminal defense work in less than a month. Perhaps forever. Perhaps just until I flunk out of biglaw and come back to the valley and open shop with you. srsly fucked around with this message at 06:50 on Nov 11, 2010 |
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Nov 11, 2010 06:46
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Don'tgonojobsdiealone story hits locally. I went to school with this girl and she worked in our office. http://www.news10.net/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=106260&catid=2&GID=xbnknwelvYtY8la8feObgB/op4Knf9dkvCl1RlW1CGQ%3D Link includes 4 minute video news story. quote:Volunteer attorneys fill in for Sacramento public defender after budget cuts
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Nov 17, 2010 18:40
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Soothing Vapors posted:My prelaw advisor has invited me back to my undergrad to give a talk to his prelaw dumbs about law school and the law school experience. I have 15 minutes plus a guided question/answer session to fill. I'm doing one of these on Saturday. I'm planning a slightly more intellectual/slightly less suicidal approach than you. But the message will be the same. I'm gonna close it by pointing at the pre-law advisor and shouting "And if she's told you anything different, she's a LIAR!"
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Nov 19, 2010 04:28
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CmdrSmirnoff posted:No don't. poo poo you're right. But see I have a year of trial experience and a biglaw job and stuff. I am most likely exactly what they aspire to be. Except they won't be me. Cuz I was loving lucky... and I am loving brilliant. And if they are at some event where I talk to them after they've taken a mock LSAT they are not brilliant. Cuz christ I would not have wasted my time with that sort of poo poo (and didn't). What do I do instead? I am dead serious here... I owe nothing to anybody and there are more or less no repercussions to my actions on Saturday. I mean, I won't be invited back but I am moving anyhow. I did one of these for the BUSINESS club last year and talked about how lovely things were and drew the graph of the bimodal salary distribution and two students who had never before considered law school said they were signing up for an LSAT class. Spectacular fail.
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Nov 19, 2010 05:27
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mushi posted:I love this poo poo. The law schools are so loving cold about it and do not wait even a goddamn year before sending poo poo your way. So you know how when you graduate they wanna give you something as you walk across the stage, but your diplomas aren't ready yet? At my graduation they handed us pretty little scrolls tied in ribbon. You get back to your seat and open the thing up and it's a goddamned welcome letter to the alumni association, replete with explanation as to why giving is so very important and instructions on how you can make your first donation as an alum. Yes, our school hit us up for money literally the moment we graduated.
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Nov 28, 2010 17:33
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qwertyman posted:Apparently I can do worse on this than the average person and still be good enough This statement will be true for virtually any exam that has a pass rate higher than 50% unless there's a seriously funky score distribution divorcing the average from the median.
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Dec 7, 2010 00:14
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newberstein posted:So I just got home from the LSAT. I have a problem because I did really well on both logical reasoning sections, okay on the reading comprehensions section, amazing on one logic game section, but absolutely terrible on the other logic games section. Basically, I will have a 7-10 point swing in my raw score depending on which section is experimental (I obviously hope the LG section is experimental). Everyone I talked to after the test felt that the logic game I did poorly on was ridiculously hard as well. Is it typically the case that if one section is harder than usual it is the experimental section? If everybody had the section it was likely not experimental. But here you go: You had two logic game sections. Most likely, one was before the break (Sections 1-3). One was after the break (section 4 or 5). The one before the break was experimental, guaranteed. If you bombed the one after the break cancel your score. If you bombed the one before the break, you're all good. The experimental section is always one of the first 3.
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Dec 12, 2010 00:54
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newberstein posted:Bombed the one after the break. No point to cancel my score though because the next LSAT is after the application deadline of most law schools. Might as well see if I can get in anywhere with my URM status and if not, retake it in a year This is insane. If you know you bombed an entire section you need to cancel. Yeah, you might get in somewhere with your URM status but not nearly the places you could with your URM status + a good LSAT score. If you're likely gonna need to retake next year, go ahead and give yourself TWO shots to take it next year. You're already late in the admissions cycle. If you're gonna go to law school despite all the warnings and naysayers, do it right. One of the things we SCREAM at people in this thread about is the mindset of people fresh out of school (or otherwise) that think it's the end of the world if they have to wait a year to go to law school. Don't be a moron. You're young. Where you go to law school matters for the rest of your life. Not that 30 years from now anybody's gonna give a real poo poo about where you went, but where you are at 30 years from now will be very possibly determined by where you go. Wait a year. Take again in June and October if need be. Don't be a moron.
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Dec 12, 2010 07:09
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Feces Starship posted:You're not boned, Holland, but you will asymptotically approach boned if you begin waiting another week. Use the time before school starts next Tuesday and just get it done. I waited until March to look and got offered a paying job at the local power company because the GC there was a procrastinator like me and didn't advertise the job until everybody else already had something lined up. I turned it down to volunteer at the city attorney's office because I am dumb and a masochist.
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Jan 13, 2011 13:11
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Tomorrow begins week 3 in biglaw. Talked to my fellow initiates and they all had the same new year's resolution: make it a year without getting fired/laid off.
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Jan 18, 2011 08:27
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nm posted:Have you bought a helicopter yet? No, but I did change myself to the "Standard" student loan repayment plan. Baller.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:17
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Devoz posted:A good University technology transfer office might not be the worst idea if you are desperate. Not saying causation, but both of the students in my class who got Summer gigs at our tech transfer office ended up with biglaw IP jobs. EFF is bigname too but you've got less than a week to apply: http://www.eff.org/about/opportunities/interns Edit: It sounds suspiciously like you're at Davis. That's a tough tech transfer office to get into with a CS degree as they are much heavier into biosci related stuff. You should apply nonetheless. It's a paid position too, unless something has changed. srsly fucked around with this message at 05:02 on Jan 26, 2011 |
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Jan 26, 2011 04:55
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drat Phantom posted:Thanks for all the ideas! As mrtoodles suspects, I'm currently at Davis. I'm more interested in litigation and licensing than prosecution. The career services office at Berkeley puts together a really good list of companies that hire legal interns, complete with details and contact info, how/when to apply. To my recollection both Cisco and Sun had decent programs when I was in school. But there's a ton of companies I had never heard of or never would have thought of. If you have any connections at Berkeley, see if you can get your hands on that list. Also, you need to go to the SFIPLA job fair this summer. That is how I got my biglaw patent litigation job (I went to Davis too). The Loyola Chicago one is a total crapshoot if you're not coming from a T14. I had not the greatest grades ever my 1L year and I still got 8 interviews and 2 offers from the SFIPLA fair -- You're really only competing against the other 5 NorCal schools and a lot of firms take it as an opportunity to check out the talent from schools they don't do OCI at, i.e. Davis. The SFIPLA job fair is open only to SFIPLA student members, so go sign up right now. And the sign-up deadline is strangely early if I recall.. like in May or June. The fair usually takes place before your 1L Summer is even over. A lot of my classmates interested in IP law didn't go because they "didn't know about it" or were "just gonna do the one in Chicago". I think that turned out to be a serious mistake. I had a summer offer at my first choice firm Thursday of the first week of OCI. People who had better grades than me are still unemployed.
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Jan 26, 2011 05:28
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If you're gonna be the worst rapper ever, don't link it to your professional career as a fledgling solo attorney. This is so awful. I went to school with this guy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZoI7g99i5E Dunning-Kruger in FULL effect. And yeah, I'm sure he seriously meant and thinks it to be good. (Thinks he coulda been a pro with the right break). The sad thing is he's losing out on "normal" folks who want a lawyer by tossing around motherfucker and human being like candy off a parade float. And he's losing out on his target audience by sucking balls. srsly fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Jan 26, 2011 |
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Jan 26, 2011 19:00
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Cross examination is ok for the analogy. But re-cross should probably be re-direct. And the pictures for the two should be swapped.
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Jan 31, 2011 22:11
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China, obv.
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Feb 3, 2011 22:19
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Baruch Obamawitz posted:
These are fantastic. I very much enjoy the numerous strips highlighting Bear Lawyer's obvious alcoholism. So realistic. srsly fucked around with this message at 18:33 on Feb 8, 2011 |
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Feb 8, 2011 18:22
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