Minnesota Lawyer articles from February 2002

Minnesota Lawyer archives from February 2002

MN Legal Briefs: February 4, 2002.(Timothy A. Little opened by Tim Little)(Mark W. Peterson relocates and opens new company Mark W. Peterson & Associates)(Halleland Lewis Nilan Sipkins & Johnson promotes Brian Johnson)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter Tim Little, formerly a partner with Courtney, LaCourse and Little, P.A., in Duluth announces the opening of the Law Office of Timothy A. Little, P.A. Little will practice primarily in the area of...

Nonprofit inmate assistance program up and running in Minnesota.(Innocence Project)(All District Legal Education)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The Innocence Project a nonprofit corporation that will provide pro bono investigative assistance to inmates who claim actual innocence is officially up and running in Minnesota. An executive director was hired...

MN Supreme Court clarifies 'announce' clause.
February 4, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter With the U.S. Supreme poised to decide the constitutionality of Minnesotas ethical rule prohibiting judicial candidates from announcing their political views, the Minnesota Supreme Court has issued an...

Remarks by Gov. Mario Cuomo at 'Attorneys of the Year' Event.(Column)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Mario Cuomo On Jan. 31, 2002, former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo delivered the keynote address at Minnesota Lawyers dinner event honoring 10 Attorneys of the Year. The following is the pre-prepared written text for his remarks. ***...

As legislative session opens, courts anxiously prepare for budget debate.
February 4, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Legislators filed into the Capitol last week to open what could be one of its most contentious sessions in years. Facing a $1.96 billion budget deficit, the legislators have the difficult task of deciding how the pain...

Cross-motions waived wait for custody modification.
February 4, 2002... Byline: Mark Cohen Even though less than six months had passed after the entry of a custody decree, a mother and fathers cross-motions to modify custody constituted their agreement in writing to waive the two-year waiting period on...

Gov. Cuomo speaks at 'Attorney of the Year' Event.(Brief Article)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter Gov. Mario Cuomo last week provided the keynote address at Minnesota Lawyers Attorneys of the Year awards dinner. The event was held at the Radisson Hotel in downtown Minneapolis. Hundreds of members...

MN Supreme Court reviews employee misconduct cases.(Tilseth v. Midwest Lumber Co.)(Chin v. Little Six, Inc.)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Marshall Tanick Its rare for the Minnesota Supreme Court to review unemployment compensation decisions. The high court usually adjudicates an appeal from a final determination of the Department of Economic Security only once every...

Local atty. elected nation's 1st Hmong legislator.(Mee Moua)(Brief Article)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter St. Paul voters elected the nations first Hmong legislator last week, sending St. Paul lawyer Mee Moua to the Minnesota Senate. With 51 percent of the ballots, Moua, 32, defeated four fellow DFLers...

Employer's insurance no bar to UIM claim.(underinsured motorist)
February 4, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Where a business-automobile liability insurer paid a claim on behalf of its insureds employee without admitting that it was responsible for coverage, the policy should not be considered in determining whether the...

MN Legal Briefs: February 11, 2002.(Minnesota)(Brief Article)
February 11, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter Carolyn Guy will now be practicing at the firm of Carolyn Guy, L.L.C. in the Lumber Exchange Building in Minneapolis. She will continue to focus her practice in the areas of employment law,...

Anti-terrorism bill off to a fast start in Minnesota House.(Minnesota Anti-Terrorism Act of 2002)
February 11, 2002... Byline: Ember Reichgott Junge The 36-page "Minnesota Anti-Terrorism Act of 2002," H.F. 2622, began moving in the state House of Representatives last week, when the House Civil Law Committee approved a scaled-back version of the bill. ...

Disqualifying law firm from representing client was error, rules MN Court of Appeals.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore A District Court judge incorrectly applied Rule 1.10(b) of the Minnesota Rules of Professional Conduct to disqualify a law firm from representing a client, the Court of Appeals has ruled. In so ruling, the court...

Immunity is applied to drowning in city pond by MN Court of Appeals.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Recreational-use immunity protected the city of Morris from a wrongful death claim by the mother of a 13-year-old child who drowned in a municipal swimming pond, the Court of Appeals has held. The court declined...

Commentary: Attys. must learn to be a 'coach' to their clients.(Attorneys)
February 11, 2002... Byline: Neil Hamilton Clients come to an attorney with an exceptionally broad spectrum of problems involving relationships with others ranging from the most simple to the most complex issues in any area of law. My last column emphasized...

ABA reports progress on the diversity front.(American Bar Association)
February 11, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter The American Bar Association (ABA) is making strides in representing broader racial and ethnic segments of the legal profession, and in advancing members of diverse groups into its leadership. That...

Bar groups seek to broaden Canon 2 judicial restrictions.(Lavender Bar Association)
February 11, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The Minnesota State Bar Association (MSBA) is seeking to change the rule that regulates judges participation in discriminatory organizations. The proposed amendment is to Canon 2, which prohibits judges from being...

Here secret taping is legal, except for most lawyers.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Marshall Tanick Surreptitious tape recording of conversations is a practice that has increased substantially in recent years. Its growth is attributable to several factors, including readily available, undetectable and effective...

Deportation shouldn't be a sentencing factor.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones A District Court judge erred in considering the immigration status and possible deportation of two defendants in sentencing them to prison rather than probation, the Court of Appeals has ruled. It was error for the...

Bar mobilizes to fight against funding cuts for courts, Legal Aid.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter The Minnesota State Bar Association (MSBA) is marshalling its forces to fight state budget cuts proposed by Gov. Jesse Ventura that threaten some of the advances we have made in the last few years in...

Whistleblower plaintiffs are entitled to a trial by jury.
February 11, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Plaintiffs who bring retaliatory discharge claims strictly for money damages under the states Whistleblower Act and Occupational Safety and Health Act are entitled to a jury trial, the Supreme Court has ruled. The...

Atty. ethics rules meet anti-discrimination laws.
February 18, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The Minnesota State Bar Association recently provided legal practitioners with a crash course on the interplay of the lawyers professional responsibility rules and local, state and federal anti-discrimination laws....

Minnesota lawmakers begin deliberating on the budget of the judiciary.
February 18, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones The House and Senate began their deliberations on the judiciary's budget last week with proposals that illustrate the chasm between the sides in the budget debate. Under the Senate proposal, there would be no...

MN Court of Appeals rules client must pay lawyer bill despite fee award.(Minnesota)(Brodsky v. Ponto)
February 18, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The fact that attorney fees were imposed on an opposing party as a sanction did not relieve the client from her contractual obligation to pay those fees, the Court of Appeals has ruled. The attorney in the case...

Commentary: Letter written regarding articles on atty. ethics.(Letter to the Editor)
February 18, 2002... Byline: William Wernz To the Editor: I am writing regarding three recent Minnesota Lawyer articles on attorney ethics. First, Marshall Tanick's Feb. 11, 2002, article on secret taping ("Here secret taping is legal, except for most...

Commentary: Advantages of NY Stock Exchange's ADR programs.(New York)(Alternative Dispute Resolution )
February 18, 2002... Byline: James Eccleston Like a sailboat alongside a tanker ship, New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) arbitration and mediation programs continue to coexist with competing programs at the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD)....

District Court can't compel city to arbitrate, rules MN Court of Appeals.(Minnesota)(Lueth v. City of Glencoe)
February 18, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones The District Court has subject-matter jurisdiction to determine whether a written contract provision requires that a police officer's case against a city arising out of his termination be submitted to arbitration...

Hennepin County Property Court: Placing the emphasis on the community.
February 18, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore A couple of years ago, the Hennepin County District Court created a special calendar to hear cases generated by County Attorney Amy Klobuchar's community prosecution initiative, spawning what has become known as the...

Minnesota Supreme Court called on to decide truck ownership.(Solum, American National General Insurance Co. v.)
February 18, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones The Minnesota Supreme Court has been called upon to decide whether it was appropriate for a trial judge to admit extrinsic evidence that the title owner of a vehicle was not the true owner. At issue in the ownership...

Home to Stay task force helps defrauded families keep homes.
February 18, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones The Home to Stay task force, a volunteer effort by the law firm of Faegre & Benson, the Family Housing Fund, Habitat for Humanity, and other entities, recently celebrated its success to date in helping families...

Commentary: Recent appellate cases reject interference claims.(Northwest Lighting, Inc. v. Viking Electric Supply, Inc., 2002 WL 77072 (Minn. Ct. App. Jan. 22, 2002))(Northwest Lighting, Inc.)(Viking Electric Supply, Inc.,)(Mathis v. Liu, 2002 WL 59262)
February 18, 2002... Byline: Marshall Tanick The doctrine of interference with business or contractual relations is a malleable concept, often stretched to cover many different kinds of transgressions. Its elasticity, however, does not necessarily mean that...

Black history month exhibit running at law school.(Brief Article)
February 18, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter The Black Law Students Association at William Mitchell College of Law is sponsoring a black history month exhibit of photographs of Minneapolis-St. Paul and Chicago blues musicians by Del Bey. ...

Courts cuts would be modest under Minnesota legislative proposal.
February 25, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones A compromise budget plan submitted by key lawmakers to the Legislature last Thursday included some relatively modest cuts in the courts' budget. At press time, the budget proposal which was on the fast track and...

MN Supreme Court Justice is documentary subject.
February 25, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Alan Page was the subject of a film documentary broadcast last week on ESPN. The film, entitled "Black Star Risen: The Alan Page Story," is a profile of Page's...

Author brings to life story of Minnesota's first black lawyer.(Interview)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Paul D. Nelson is the author of a recently released book on Minnesota's first African-American attorney: "Frederick L. McGhee: A Life on the Color Line, 1861-1912." Nelson is a resident of St. Paul, where he...

Property damage case before MN Supreme Court results in punitive award.(Correction Notice)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore ***** CORRECTION: In last week's Verdict & Settlements, the law firm that represented the plaintiffs in the case of Jensen v. Walsh was incorrectly identified. The plaintiffs' attorneys were Brian N. Toder and...

Commercial code may not preclude negligence claim, rules MN Court of Appeals.
February 25, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The fact that the Uniform Commercial Code (U.C.C.) applied to a sales contract did not necessarily require the dismissal of a plaintiff's related negligence claim, the Court of Appeals has ruled. The plaintiff...

Criminal corporate liability ruling reversed by MN Court of Appeals.(State v. Compassionate Home Care, Inc)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones Where a home-care corporation was charged with criminal neglect of a vulnerable adult under Minn. Stat. sec. 609.233, the trial court judge should have instructed the jury about the evidentiary basis for corporate...

Commentary: Disability discrimination decisions dominate docket.
February 25, 2002... Byline: Marshall Tanick Still reeling from a recent ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court that severely curtails the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), advocates for the disabled are awaiting a trio of other difficult ADA cases that remain...

Commentary: Minnesota's first African-American woman lawyer.(Lena Olive Smith)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Ann Juergens Editor's Note: The following is excerpted from "Lena Olive Smith: A Minnesota Civil Rights Pioneer," which was originally printed in the William Mitchell Law Review in 2001. The author of the article is Ann Juergens,...

Ramsey County District judge enjoys new role.(George Stephenson)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Michelle Lore The recent appointment of George Stephenson to the Ramsey County District Court bench probably didn't come as a surprise to the people who know him. However, if he had listened to his high school guidance counselor,...

St. Thomas breaks ground on School of Law building.(Brief Article)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Minnesota Lawyer Staff Reporter The University of St. Thomas broke ground on Thursday, Feb. 21, on a $33 million School of Law building, near Harmon Place and 12th Street in downtown Minneapolis. The five-level building will...

A look at Minnesota's first African-American lawyer.(Fredrick L. McGhee: A Life on the Color Line, 1861-1912)(Book Review)
February 25, 2002... Byline: Barbara Jones In writing on Minnesota's first African-American attorney, Frederick McGhee, former St. Paul attorney Paul D. Nelson found a new best friend. Nelson meticulously researched the turn of the century lawyer's career...