Low grade dispute 

2/13/13

By Caitlin Tremblay 

Why just complain about a bad grade when filing a $1.3 million lawsuit is an option? Student Megan Thode has sued Lehigh University in Pennsylvania for a C+ she got in a class, claiming breach of contract. The civil trial began Monday before Northampton County Judge Emil Giordano, according to The Morning Call.

Thode claims that the C+ ruined her dream of becoming a state-certified counsel or and was part of an effort to force her to leave the degree program. The school and its attorneys say the suit is unfounded.

For Thode to continue to the next course of field work, she needed a B. Instead, Thode says she earned a C+ because her professor gave her a zero in classroom participation. She claims he was unhappy with her after she and three other students complained about being forced to find other internships halfway through the semester. She also says her teacher was biased against her for advocating for LGBT rights.

The school says Thode showed unprofessional behavior in class, used foul language and had an outburst which ended in her crying.

The school's attorneys said that if the judge changed Thode's grade, he might be the first court in history to do so. Giordano's thoughts on the case so far? "I've practiced law for longer than I'd like to (admit), and I've never seen something like this," he said.

Right man for the job? 

2/13/13

By Anna Louie Sussman 

In his quest for bipartisanship, President Barack Obama has appointed a "puzzling" figure to the voting commission he announced in his State of the Union address Tuesday night, writes Ari Berman in the left-leaning magazine The Nation.

Benjamin Ginsberg, a senior Republican lawyer who served as national counsel for both of the George W. Bush-Dick Cheney campaigns, as well for Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential run, will co-chair the voting commission with Bob Bauer, a senior attorney from Obama's campaign.

Berman notes that Ginsberg led the vote recall effort for George W. Bush in 2000. Four years later, he was forced to resign from the Bush campaign because of his role advising the Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth, the political group criticized for misrepresenting the military service of rival candidate John Kerry. In 2006, Ginsberg was clear about his party's position on voting rights when he spoke to an audience at Duke Law School. "Just like really with the Voting Rights Act, Republicans have some fundamental philosophical difficulties with the whole notion of Equal Protection," he said.

"In 2012, (Ginsberg) was counsel to the Romney campaign when it absurdly claimed that the Obama campaign was trying to suppress military voters by pushing for early voting for all Ohioans," Berman writes. "Does that sound like the kind of guy you want leading a 'non-partisan' voting commission?"

Matchless.com 

2/13/13

By Anna Louie Sussman

Lying about one's weight on a dating profile won't land anyone in court, but lies about marital status or having children can impact divorce or custody cases, the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers reports.

In a new survey, 59 percent of divorce attorneys report seeing an increase in online dating profile information being used as evidence in court. The most common evidentiary item was "relationship status" and a primary source of some 64 percent of respondents was Match.com.

"Dating website users can often face temptation to embellish some personal information on profiles, but this lack of honesty could prove costly for someone in the middle of a divorce or child custody case," said Alton Abramowitz, president of the 1600-member academy. "Identifying yourself as single when you are not, or listing that you have no children when you are actually a parent, can represent some key pieces of evidence against you during the divorce process."

Attorneys wanted 

2/13/13

By Anna Louie Sussman 

Legal jobs might be scarce in many parts of the country, but rural South Dakota is so hungry for lawyers that state lawmakers have introduced a bill offering financial incentives to any who set up practice in certain underserved areas, the Rapid City Journal reports.

The problem seems to be that young lawyers in particular fear they'll miss out on the salaries and mentorship that come from practicing in a bigger city. The bill, if passed, would create a four-year pilot program to reimburse recent law school grads the cost of tuition and to offer financial incentives for practicing attorneys who agree to work in rural areas.

The costs of the program would be divided between the state and the participating counties.

The shortage of lawyers means some counties are wholly lawyerless and rely on attorneys from other counties, who commute on a regular basis. In criminal cases with court-appointed defense, the prohibitive costs and distance of travel make it hard for lawyers to see their clients before court appearances.

"We have enough attorneys in this state, but they're all condensed into basically four counties," South Dakota Supreme Court Justice David Gilbertson said.

The state's Senate Judiciary Committee voted 7-0 to send the bill to the appropriations committee, although a hearing is not yet scheduled.

Affirmative action 

2/13/13

By Ted Botha 

As the U.S. Supreme Court considers whether to allow colleges to take race into account in their admissions policies, Brazil has made affirmative action the centerpiece of a new education law, says the Christian Science Monitor.

Brazil's new Law of Social Quotas, which received near unanimous support from lawmakers in August, states that public universities must reserve half of their spots for underprivileged students. The system has been in experimental stages at some of the country's universities for the past decade and will be phased in over the next four years.

"With its new law, Brazil has gone the furthest in the Americas in attempting race-based equality," says the Monitor. "Not only is the law a state-mandated program, it also attempts to open up the traditional bastions of the elite to all."

Public universities in Brazil are free and are among the best schools in the country, but they are often filled with middle- and upper-class families who could afford tuition at private elementary and secondary schools that prepare their children for college, according to the paper. Meanwhile, students from public high schools usually have to attend private, often inferior, universities.

The impact of the law will be widest on Afro-Brazilians, who make up more than half the nation's population.

"Brazil wants its leadership to truly reflect its constituents," says Tanya Hernandez, a professor at Fordham University School of Law in New York. "(Brazil believes) the way to have full democracy is to have everyone included, and properly educated."

Summary Judgments for February 12

Summary Judgments for February 11

Summary Judgments for February 8

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