Michigan Lawyers Weekly articles from January 2009

Michigan Lawyers Weekly archives from January 2009

Attorneys grapple with how to serve employer clients if federal pro-union law passes.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg David McNelvin's client is going to court in Canada this February to fight a union organization attempt. In the client's corner is an unlikely player: a company employee who signed a pro-union petition. The...

Majoring in history: after rejecting the conventional, law firm goes back to school.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Douglas J. Levy Practice Profile After nearly 20 years of working together in the legal profession, Gary D. Sharp and William E. Osantowski thought going into real estate would be a great venture. They didn't need to quit...

Michigan Court of Appeals ruling threatens enforceability of terror clauses in trusts.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. By extrapolating from the public policy in a statute restricting no-contest clauses in wills, the Michigan Court of Appeals has taken much of the terror out of such "terror clauses" when they appear in trusts....

Former mayor of Detroit Kwame M. Kilpatrick's lawyer calls grievance official's statements untrue.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. The former mayor of Detroit, Kwame M. Kilpatrick, has accused the Grievance Administrator of making inaccurate statements in a brief opposing Kilpatrick's petition to set aside his law license revocation. In...

Michigan Court of Appeals: Jury must decide whether black ice danger is open and obvious.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. Michigan Court of Appeals The Michigan Court of Appeals' decision to have a jury decide whether black ice was an open and obvious hazard is going to lead to the filing of more premises-liability lawsuits,...

Michigan Lawyers in the News: January 5, 2009.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Appointments Andrey Tomkiw of Tomkiw Dalton, PLC, was named chairman of the Royal Oak Development and Permitting Task Force. Ryan Wilson of Fraser Trebilcock Davis & Dunlap, P.C. was assigned...

Being cheap and being reasonable are two different things.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Ed Poll LawBiz Coach's Corner With today's tough economic conditions, chances are few lawyers at any size firm are considering an increase in their fees. This is, of course, a matter of economics. The seller of any service must...

Verdicts & Settlements January 5, 2009: City reaches settlement with man cleared of murder.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff In this civil lawsuit, plaintiff Matthew Ditzhazy claimed he was unlawfully arrested, maliciously prosecuted and falsely imprisoned after being charged with murder in connection with the Jan. 28, 2005,...

Verdicts & Settlements January 5, 2009: Source of driver's debilitating headaches argued.
January 5, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff On March 13, 2006, 51-year-old plaintiff Donnie Fuller's automobile was rear-ended by defendant Richard Birkett's automobile at a red light. Fuller did not seek medical treatment at the scene, but...

New FMLA rules curb abuse, open the door to fire unreliable workers.(Family Medical Leave Act)
January 12, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Employers frustrated by loose restrictions in the federal Family Medical Leave Act have only a few days to wait for relief. Under existing FMLA regulations, many employers say, employees were missing work and...

Leaving home: local firms look outside Michigan's borders to expand.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Michigan's economy is forcing some law firms to look outside the state for expansion and growth. And in some cases, national economic uncertainty is forcing out-of-state clients to look toward Michigan for legal...

Diane M. Hathaway sworn in as Michigan Supreme Court's 104th justice.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. Huntington Woods attorney Michael J. Kingsley stepped to the podium in the packed Michigan Supreme Court courtroom to speak about his wife, Diane M. Hathaway, the court's newest justice. To the jurists,...

Marilyn Kelly named new Michigan Supreme Court chief justice.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. In a vote that signals the days of a splintered Michigan Supreme Court are far from over, a 4-3 majority chose Marilyn Kelly to serve as chief justice for the next two years. In a public administrative...

On duty in Iraq, Detroit attorney toiled to assure Abu Ghraib wouldn't happen again.(Interview)
January 12, 2009... Byline: Douglas J. Levy His heart was in Detroit, his bunk in Iraq, but during Jeffrey S. Kopp's nearly 9-month tour in the war zone, his legal focus was on Geneva, Switzerland. Kopp, an Army reservist and labor-and-employment attorney...

Michigan Supreme Court: The 'narrative against interest' exception to hearsay rule.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. The Michigan Supreme Court has ruled Michigan's "statement against interest" exception to the hearsay rule extends to statements that aren't actually against interest. That's despite the fact that justices of...

Michigan Lawyers in the News: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Elections Hubbard Law Firm, P.C. elected Michael G. Woodworth as president and CEO, Andria M. Ditschman as vice president, and Peter Teholiz as treasurer/secretary. Ronald A. King of Clark...

Michigan Attorney Discipline Board Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Notice Of Reprimand (By Consent) Case No. 08-104-JC Notice Issued: Dec. 22, 2008 Stephen D. Becker, P 56244, Mt. Clemens, Michigan, by the Attorney Discipline Board Tri-County Hearing...

Michigan Attorney General Opinions: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Administrative Law MDEQ Operational Memoranda - APA The operational memoranda developed by the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality to provide direction to staff, guidance to the...

Michigan Court Of Appeals Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Criminal Law Search Warrant - Blood Alcohol Test The trial court erred by suppressing the blood alcohol test results of a drunken driving suspect after finding that the arresting officer's...

Michigan Court Of Appeals Unpublished Civil Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Arbitration Motion To Compel - Incomplete Policy The trial court incorrectly granted plaintiff's motion to compel his insurer (Allstate) to arbitrate his no-fault claim. The Allstate...

Michigan Court Of Appeals Unpublished Criminal Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff 'Miranda' Pre- And Post-'Miranda' Statements - Properly Suppressed The trial court correctly suppressed defendant's pre-Miranda statement, in which he admitted that he lived at the residence....

Michigan Supreme Court Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Criminal Law Jury Service - Convicted Felon Defendant's conviction of first-degree criminal sexual conduct was not flawed by the fact that one of the jurors had been convicted of a similar...

U.S. Court of Appeals 6th Circuit Case Summaries: January 12, 2009.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Michigan Lawyers Weekly Staff Arbitration Award - Modification The federal district court correctly refused to add attorney fees and additional interest to increase plaintiffs' $1.6 million arbitration award. Further, the...

Take care of time, and it will take care of you.
January 12, 2009... Byline: Ed Poll LawBiz Coach's Corner Abraham Lincoln is often attributed as having said that time and advice are a lawyer's stock in trade. The client receives advice; the lawyer expends time to provide it. But there are two...

Michigan Supreme Court lays out 'serious impairment' analysis in multiple-accident cases.
January 19, 2009... Byline: Todd C. Berg, Esq. The Michigan Supreme Court is specifying what plaintiffs must prove in "serious impairment of body function" cases that involve multiple car accidents and pre-existing injuries. In its four-page order in...

Seeking someone to blame: as real estate deals fail, more losers sue lawyers.(Michigan)
January 19, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Emerging trends As real estate deals turn disastrous, investors on the losing side are trying to take down their lawyers in the wreckage. Such legal malpractice suits are becoming common as the real estate...

Chief judge makes federal courthouse in Michigan chief priority.
January 19, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg For 50 years, the chief judges who have presided over Detroit's federal court have known that the building housing the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan was outdated, dysfunctional and unsafe....

Safe-harbor provision in new e-discovery Mich. Court Rules protects against inadvertent data.
January 19, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Newly adopted Michigan Court Rules on e-discovery could put an end to long attorney fights over the existence of long-lost e-mails. Parties who inadvertently destroy electronically stored information are...

Genesse County settles reverse-discrimination suit after two Court of Appeals losses.(Michigan)
January 19, 2009... Byline: Douglas J. Levy Verdicts & Settlements Plus Based on his 27 years of civil practice, Glen N. Lenhoff said "It's very unusual, in a single-plaintiff case, to get two reversals on summary disposition." If that's so, then the...

As 'terror trial' judge takes on chief judge duties in Mich., he reflects on career, judicial style.
January 19, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg If you want to learn about newly appointed Chief Judge Gerald E. Rosen, a Google search is only going to tell part of his story. Page after page, what the search engine produces is news stories dating back to 2003...

Do you realize how much you're billing, and when it's collected?
January 19, 2009... Byline: Ed Poll LawBiz Coach's Corner One of the hallmarks of the law is that lawyers often use specialized terms for common-sense ideas. A good example of this is the realization rate. Realization is simply the percentage of what...

Watch your language: Federal Court won't rule on Michigan's rules of attorney conduct.
January 26, 2009... Byline: Edward Wesoloski, Esq. 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals A subjective fear of being disciplined for violating the "courtesy and civility" provisions of the Michigan Rules of Professional Conduct does not give attorneys standing...

Client interest in flat-fee billing remains flat.(Michigan)
January 26, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Mark A. Davis sometimes is puzzled by the uproar over flat-fee billing. Truth is, the CEO and president of Royal Oak-based Howard & Howard says the firm has offered alternatives to hourly billing for years, and his...

New Michigan Court of Appeals judges have broad 'appeal'.
January 26, 2009... Byline: Douglas J. Levy For some attorneys, an opportunity to run for an open circuit court judge seat is reason to get excited. In Ypsilanti attorney Douglas B. Shapiro's case, it almost derailed his career-long dream - before...

Slaying the dragon: Farmington Hills attorney represents employees today, employers tomorrow.(Interview)
January 26, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Raymond J. Sterling speaks kindly, almost sympathetically, of his peers, those labor and employment attorneys who passionately and decisively choose sides. He understands their singular focus. He too once...

When facts support an affirmative defense, use it to win an otherwise hopeless case.
January 26, 2009... Byline: Neil V. Madden The typical defense in a criminal case usually centers on an attacklike cross-examination of police officers. It generally goes as follows: Q. And you didn't see anything exchange hands, right? A. Well,...

Witnesses demand as much preparation as your client does.
January 26, 2009... Byline: Nora Lockwood Tooher Lawyers have gotten lazy when it comes to witness preparation, contends Stephen D. Susman, a leading trial lawyer and partner at Susman Godrey in Houston. "Most people can be taught to be good witnesses,...

Let's not go to the videotape.
January 26, 2009... Byline: the Hon. Dennis M. Sweeney Not long ago, I tried a jury trial in a personal injury case where each side had two medical experts. By agreement, both sides had taken the sworn testimony of the experts prior to trial, which they...

Eaton County prosecutor's cutting-edge ways in court blend technology with efficiency.(Michigan)
January 26, 2009... Byline: Douglas J. Levy The defense table at a recent preliminary examination at Eaton County Courthouse in Charlotte was scattered with the predictable materials: a Pendaflex folder, a three-ring binder, a steno pad, loose papers,...

Do you understand?(ways to help jurors better understand the expert's testimony)
January 26, 2009... Byline: Richard Gabriel An attorney spends years with a case, poring over the minutiae of every document and witness response. An expert spends years receiving board certifications, conducting research and writing peer reviewed papers. ...

Don't let a credit line become a noose.
January 26, 2009... Byline: Ed Poll LawBiz Coach's Corner I have warned about the dangers of law firms paying staff salaries and even partnership draws by using their bank lines of credit. In a credit-line arrangement, the firm borrows and repays at will...

6th Circuit's 'Fieger' ruling allows confusion over permissible speech to continue, say specialists.(Fieger v. Michigan Supreme Court)
January 26, 2009... Byline: Carol Lundberg Lawyers who have been waiting to see the federal appeals court declare unconstitutional two rules that limit what lawyers say and do are still waiting. In its 2-1 opinion, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals didn't...