GC Impact Player: Toyota Motor North America GC Sandra Phillips Rogers

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As general counsel of one of the country’s largest automakers, Sandra Phillips Rogers oversees very busy legal happenings every day, yet she always sets aside time for her passion: making the legal profession more diverse.

At Toyota Motor North America Inc., Rogers has already built a diverse team of lawyers in her legal department. Her quest does not end there: She requires outside law firms to staff her matters with diverse lawyers, and to influence the wider legal profession, she spends a significant amount of time speaking at conferences about her efforts at Toyota.

“As lawyers, we have a responsibility to be good stewards of the profession, and I absolutely and fundamentally believe as a legal profession we have got to be diverse and inclusive for the same reasons it’s important to Toyota. I think to be the best lawyers we can be, to deliver the best legal advice we can, to be good representatives and stewards of the community, we have got to reflect the communities in which we work,” said Rogers, who also cofounded the University of Texas School of Law’s Center for Women in the Law and co-chaired the center’s 2017 Women’s Power Summit on Law and Leadership, an invitation-only event of very powerful female lawyers.

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Published in Texas Lawyer magazine’s August 2017 issue.

PDF: GC Impact Player Toyota Motor North America GC Sandra Phillips Rogers _ Texas Lawyer

ABA Fines, Publicly Censures Law School

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Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law was publicly censured and must pay $15,000 for not complying with an American Bar Association standard that prohibits schools from discriminating against faculty members.

In the public censure, the ABA’s Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar also found Thurgood Marshall Law violated an ABA standard requiring schools to file complete, accurate, and not misleading information to the ABA each year. In a second matter, the ABA section ordered remedial actions that raise questions about the school’s legal education program, academic support for students and its admissions practices.

James Douglas, interim dean of Thurgood Marshall Law, denied that there is sex discrimination or sexual harassment happening at the school.

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Published on TexasLawyer.com on July 21, 2017.

PDF: ABA Fines Publicly Censures Law School for Noncompliance With Anti Discrimination Standard _ Texas Lawyer

‘I Spent Every Cent I Had on Cocaine’: Lawyer’s Struggle Revealed

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In his dark days, Dallas lawyer Brian Cuban would snort lines of cocaine in his law firm’s bathroom to keep going, masking the hangover from his night spent drugging and drinking.

In recovery for 10 years for substance use disorders, bulimia, depression and other mental health issues, Cuban, who worked as a solo and of counsel at small firms, stopped practicing law in 2007 and devoted his life to writing and public speaking around the country to help others with drug and alcohol addiction. His new book “The Addicted Lawyer: Tales of the Bar, Booze, Blow and Redemption,” goes into extreme detail about problems that started in college, progressed throughout his legal career and led to recovery.

We interviewed Cuban—who graduated in 1986 from University of Pittsburgh School of Law and whose billionaire brother Mark Cuban owns the NBA team the Dallas Mavericks—about his addiction and recovery. Here are his answers, edited for clarity and brevity.

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Published on Law.com on July 17, 2017.

PDF: ‘I Spent Every Cent I Had on Cocaine’_ Lawyer’s Struggle Revealed _ Law

This Big Law Partner’s Hobby Is Sew Cool

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She’s a Big Law litigator by profession, but in her personal time, Sidley Austin partner Paige Montgomery of Dallas pieces together a hobby that provides serenity for her and comfort for those in need.

Quilting has enabled Montgomery, 40, to slow her pace of life to a meditative crawl—and she has left behind piles of beautiful quilts in the process, while touching the lives of family, Big Law colleagues, and even strangers in need as far away as Costa Rica.

“In our work, we have investigations and cases and those things have intermediate deadlines, but they don’t have quite the same sense, ‘It’s done,’ that you get with a finished quilt,” Montgomery said. “I’m a better-rounded person than I was before I started doing it. It lets me express parts of my personality that otherwise wouldn’t come out.”

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Published on Law.com on July 6, 2017.

PDF: This Big Law Partner’s Hobby Is Sew Cool _ Law

A Look at the Current Texas Legal Job Market

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Not to be Debbie Downer, but numbers don’t lie—the legal job market in Texas isn’t getting better yet. However, data shows that law schools in Texas might have adjusted to the bum job market by declining enrollment, leading to fewer law graduates and new lawyers finding jobs.

The number of law school graduates in Texas has dropped by 10 percent over the past five years, and yet the employment and unemployment rates have barely wavered. This has led to 11 percent fewer grads finding jobs in 2016 compared to 2012.

Texas Lawyer analyzed five years of data that the nine Texas law schools submitted to the American Bar Association Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar. The data shows law grads’ employment status within nine months of graduation, and the sectors where the employed grads went to work.

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Published in Texas Lawyer magazine’s July 2017 issue.

PDF: A Look at the Current Texas Legal Job Market _ Texas Lawyer

Film About Women Leaving Law Airs Nationwide Starting Next Month

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Millions of people across the country will soon better understand the struggles that women lawyers face every day to succeed in the legal profession.

Starting in July, more than 260 public television stations across the country will begin showing the documentary “Balancing the Scales,” a film by Georgia lawyer and filmmaker Sharon Rowen. American Public Media is distributing the film to affiliates in all the major markets, including New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Miami and Atlanta. Stations are allowed to play the show any time over the next two years.

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Published on Law.com on June 26, 2017.

PDF: Film About Women Leaving Law Airs Nationwide Starting Next Month _ Law

As Army’s Top Lawyer, Flora Darpino Is No Shrinking Violet

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Flora Darpino learned as a little girl she would have to strive her hardest, just to be equal.

As she nears retirement from a 30-year career as a military lawyer, it’s clear that the lieutenant general took that lesson to heart. More than being equal, she became a shining example to female soldiers and the first woman in the nation’s 242-year history to serve as the judge advocate general of the U.S. Army.

Darpino, 56, said her drive to work her hardest stemmed from the prejudice she and her family faced as Italian-Americans living mainly in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

“Every generation had to be better than the generation before them, and we always had to work harder and be better than people around us to be considered equal,” Darpino recalled that her father would say.

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Published on Law.com on June 16, 2017.

PDF: As Army’s Top Lawyer, Flora Darpino Is No Shrinking Violet _ Law

Accreditation Decision Reached for UNT Law

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There are now 10 accredited law schools in Texas.

UNT Dallas College of Law has won provisional accreditation from the American Bar Association Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar, said UNT Law Dean Royal Furgeson. Students will be overjoyed at the good news because graduating from an accredited law school opens up an entire world of job possibilities, he said.

“There are so many jobs—law firm jobs, public service jobs, state, local and federal jobs—that require graduation from an accredited law school,” said Furgeson. “It’s been hanging over their heads. You go to law school to get a job, and this is going to open up every opportunity for them. I’m so happy for them and pleased for them.”

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Published on TexasLawyer.com on June 6, 2017.

PDF: Accreditation Decision Reached for UNT Law _ Texas Lawyer

Former Judge Kevin Fine Resigns Law License As Part of Plea Deal in Drug Case

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In a public fall from grace, former district judge Kevin Fine has resigned his law license in an attorney discipline case as one condition of a plea deal in a felony drug case. But he’s still facing a second drug charge and he’s incarcerated in Kerr County as it winds its way through the court system.

Fine, a Boerne lawyer who has said in the past that he struggled with drug addiction, was already on probation with the State Bar of Texas for mismanaging a client’s money, and his resignation came in a second matter that involved similar financial misconduct. He also faced two criminal cases in Kerr and Kendall Counties for attempted possession of a controlled substance in penalty group 1, in an amount between 4 and 200 grams.

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Published on TexasLawyer.com on June 2, 2017.

PDF: Former Judge Kevin Fine Resigns Law License As Part of Plea Deal in Drug Case _ Texas Lawyer

Tips to Help Stressed-Out Law Students Unclinch

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Many law graduates feel burned out. It’s challenging finding motivation to clear one of the biggest hurdles between them and their careers—passing the bar exam.

During bar preparation this summer, law grads are isolated and their anxiety runs high, creating an experience that noticeably impacts their mental health, according to Chris Ritter, staff attorney with the Texas Lawyers’ Assistance Program, which helps law students, lawyers and judges who struggle with mental health and substance abuse issues.

Texas Lawyer asked Ritter—who wrote a white paper of 10 tips to help law students find relief from stress, mental health and substance use issues—some questions about how law graduates, while studying for the bar, can take action to remain happy and healthy. Here are his answers, edited for style and length.

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Published in Texas Lawyer magazine’s June 2017 issue.

PDF: Tips to Help Stressed Out Law Students Unclinch _ Texas Lawyer