Assistant U.S. Attorney’s Affair with FBI Agent Results in Bar Suspension

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A federal prosecutor who had a secret romance with a married FBI agent has been barred from practicing law for six months after the Louisiana Supreme Court found she committed professional misconduct.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mignonne Griffing of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Louisiana in Shreveport failed to tell her bosses or defense counsel in two high-profile public corruption cases about her love interests with the FBI agent, who testified in her cases. When the affair came to light, she was dishonest or misled then-U.S. Attorney Stephanie Finley about the relationship, according to court documents in the attorney disciplinary case.

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PDF: Assistant U.S. Attorney_s Affair with FBI Agent Results in Bar Suspension _ Law

At Law Schools, Rowdy Protests Provide Teachable Moments

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Since February, when violent protests canceled a speech by provocative writer Milo Yiannopoulos at the University of California, Berkeley, colleges and universities nationwide have faced criticism for caving to opposition by canceling events.

Law schools have not escaped the clashes. The nationwide free-speech-on-campus debate took root at three law schools this fall as protesters opposed speakers or events, prompting widely different responses from schools.

Those reactions from law school administrators provide examples of best and worst practices in the free-speech realm, and they come at a time when First Amendment advocates say it’s more important than ever for law schools to be role models in upholding free speech.

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PDF: At Law Schools, Rowdy Protests Provide Teachable Moments _ Law

High Drama Comes to University of Miami Law School Clinic

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Theater and law school might not seem like a perfect fit, but one legal clinic is relying on a theatrical approach to teaching about attorney-client interviewing techniques.

Early in the school year, before University of Miami School of Law students ever see a client in the school’s Health Rights Clinic, they participate in an intense training exercise dubbed Forum Theater.

It involves students who’ve already worked in the clinic who assume roles in a play about an attorney-client intake interview. The actors play the roles of lawyer, client, translator or other helper, and a “joker” who facilitates the actor-audience collaboration. The incoming clinic students in the audience who want to change the story line can yell “stop” and replace an actor on stage when they see something gone awry for the “client” in the interaction.

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PDF: High Drama Comes to University of Miami Law School Clinic _ Daily Business Review

Call Her the Constable of Cryptocurrency

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Once upon a time there was a hero who took down the corrupt French Maid, who had manipulated and stolen from the Dread Pirate Roberts on The Silk Road.

It sounds like the plot line of a swashbuckler movie, but actually, it’s part of the tale of Kathryn Haun’s rise as a federal prosecutor who helped lay the groundwork for the government to capture cryptocurrency criminals.

Right now, the value of just one bitcoin is hovering around $5,000, leading to rampant media coverage, pushing digital currency lexicon into the mainstream. But wide adoption depends much on the safety and security of the new technology, which is often compared to the Wild West.

Haun, first as a federal prosecutor and now as a bespoke legal consultant for emerging technology companies, has contributed much to beefing up security in the industry. In the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California, she was the first digital currency coordinator. She handled cases that taught prosecutors to work through challenges in convicting cryptocurrency criminals, and sent loud-and-clear messages to digital currency companies to increase financial safeguards.

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PDF: Call Her the Constable of Cryptocurrency

 

It’s a New Day in State Bar of Texas Presidential Politics

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The State Bar of Texas has suspended a gaggle of election guidelines that restricted the way that candidates could campaign for votes.

The move recognizes a growing trend for candidates to run for president-elect by gathering lawyers’ signatures on a petition—in addition to a bar subcommittee picking two candidates. State bar leaders are also acknowledging that the election guidelines were likely unconstitutional restrictions on free speech and campaign spending.

“It’s a pretty radical change, but it’s a reflection of the times that we live in right now,” said State Bar President Tom Vick Jr. “The idea is to level the playing field for everyone who wants to run and make it clear that all lawyers are entitled to do what they want to do and support the candidate they want to support.”

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PDF: It s a New Day in State Bar of Texas Presidential Politics _ Texas Lawyer

U. of North Texas’ First and Only Law School Dean Retiring

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For the second time, Royal Furgeson Jr. is voluntarily retiring from a high-profile public service job that others might choose to keep for decades—or even for life.

“You always want to leave a little too early, not a little too late,” said the retired U.S. District Judge, who announced on Monday that he’s also retiring as the founding dean of the University of North Texas Dallas College of Law. He’ll remain at work until June 30, 2018, so he can see students graduate, log five years as dean and give the school time for a national search for a new dean. Afterwards, Furgeson plans to volunteer to help the school with fundraising and finding jobs for students, while he also dabbles in mediating, arbitrating, consulting and working as an expert witness.

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PDF: U. of North Texas_ First and Only Law School Dean Retiring _ Law

UC Law Schools Orchestrate 2-Day Civil Rights Conference

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Four California law schools have launched a conference to prepare lawyers to protect the civil rights of vulnerable people, a service they see as increasingly necessary in the Age of Trump.

The four University of California law schools—Berkeley School of Law, UCLA School of Law, UC Davis School of Law, and UC Irvine School of Law—have created the new conference, “Civil Rights in the 21st Century,” as a call to students and young lawyers to public service law work in areas ranging from immigration to water rights to police accountability.

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PDF: UC Law Schools Orchestrate 2 Day Civil Rights Conference _ The Recorder

Nixon Peabody’s On-Site Incubator a Boost for LGBT Entrepreneurs

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Many law firms support LGBT equality by donating money or doing cases pro bono. But one firm has taken it to a higher level—16 stories, to be exact.

Nixon Peabody has donated 2,300 square feet of its 16th floor San Francisco office and partnered with StartOut, a nonprofit LGBT business accelerator, to launch the StartOut Growth Lab. The firm’s lawyers provide free legal advice and give critical information on business know-how to the seven LGBT-owned businesses they nurture.

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PDF: Nixon Peabody’s On-Site Incubator a Boost for LGBT Entrepreneurs _ Law

‘Dreamer’ Law Students in Turmoil over DACA Uncertainty

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Heartbroken. Disappointed. Stunned. Law students who took a shot at becoming lawyers with the help of an Obama-era immigration program say that’s how they feel after the news that President Donald Trump could rescind the program.

Among the estimated 800,000 undocumented immigrants who are recipients of Deferred Action for Children Arrivals, or DACA, are law students across the country. The program, created by President Barack Obama in 2012, protects children of undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. before their 16th birthday. Under DACA, they can get work permits, deferrals from deportation and other benefits in this country.

Exactly how many law students are protected by DACA is unclear, but a recent survey of 1,608 DACA program participants conducted by Harvard University’s National UnDACAmented Research Project found that 42 percent expect to obtain a master’s degree, a professional degree or a law degree. Michael A. Olivas, an immigration law professor at the University of Houston, has predicted that likely dozens of undocumented immigrants will want to enter state bar associations in coming years.

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PDF: ‘Dreamer_ Law Students in Turmoil over DACA Uncertainty _ Law

 

SMU Law Embraces Innovative Flash Mentoring

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No other law school in Texas has something like Mustang Exchange, Baylor University comes closest with its Baylor Mentor Network, but it’s universitywide, rather than law school specific. Mustang Exchange is even unparalleled among law schools across the nation, said Abby Ruth, SMU Dedman’s director of alumni relations. In most mentoring programs, law schools take students’ information and match them with one mentor for a whole year. Instead, Mustang Exchange puts the power of finding mentors into the hands of students and allows them to choose as many mentors as they wish. The format of Mustang Exchange—running on private social networking software called Chronus—fits hand-in-glove with a generation of law students who grew up on Facebook and Twitter.

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PDF: SMU Law Embraces Innovative Flash Mentoring _ Texas Lawyer