Based on the percentage of graduates who joined the largest 100 firms in America, the list featured Berkeley, Stanford, USC, UCLA, UC Irvine, UC Hastings, Santa Clara University, and UC Davis.
John is experienced in litigation and transactions, and will speak at our Federal Court Boot Camp in Chicago on April 6, 2018.
We are happy to have John speak for us again. He was on the Chicago panels for our Advanced Litigation Techniques seminar, and our 7th and 8th Annual Federal Court Boot Camps. Attendees appreciated his effective use of personal experiences in the cases presented.
John has served in senior positions as both in-house and outside counsel. This potent combination has instilled in John a broad appreciation for how to best partner with clients to achieve their objectives.
Before joining Momkus McCluskey, John spent over eight years as General Counsel and Deputy General Counsel of a publicly-traded property and casualty insurance holding company. While in-house, John oversaw a number of high-stakes litigation matters and guided the company through several large M&A and financing transactions. John also served as the company’s Privacy and Chief Compliance Officer, charged with ensuring compliance with SEC and NASDAQ regulations, state insurance laws, Gramm-Leach-Bliley and other requirements. John has substantial experience providing practical legal and business advice to clients on a variety of substantive issues.
Prior to working in-house, John was a litigation partner with a large international law firm where he gained first and second chair trial experience in commercial, securities, employment, products liability and other complex litigation matters. John has considerable experience conducting internal investigations and has also represented clients responding to subpoenas and investigations by government agencies. John was also a partner with an entrepreneurial litigation boutique in Chicago.
In addition to his litigation practice, John provides insurance regulatory and corporate transactional services. Before pursuing a career in law, John attended the United States Naval Academy and served for five years as a surface warfare officer.
Guests will enjoy dishes representing different Chicago neighborhoods, conceived and prepared by members of the Kendall College Competition Club. The event will also feature an appealing selection of local beers, regional wines and hometown spirits. Guests will vote for their favorite dish and crown the evening’s top chef.
Purchase your early bird tickets now for only $90 ($100 after March 9)!
In the case Goldman v. Breitbart News Network, LLC, District Judge Katherine Forrest stated that using embedded content from another website still leaves the user liable to claims of copyright infringement.
Judge Forrest said, “Having carefully considered the embedding issue, this Court concludes, for the reasons discussed below, that when defendants caused the embedded Tweets to appear on their websites, their actions violated plaintiff’s exclusive display right; the fact that the image was hosted on a server owned and operated by an unrelated third party (Twitter) does not shield them from this result.”
United States District Court of the Southern District of New York. Goldman v. Breitbart News Network, LLC. 15 Feb. 2018, www.eff.org/files/2018/02/15/goldman_v_breitbart_-_opinion.pdf.
Brown appointed judges to the following counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, El Dorado, Humboldt, Los Angeles, Orange, Plumas, Riverside, San Diego, Santa Cruz, Shasta and Sonoma.
Lauriann is an experienced probate litigator and estate planner who will speak at our Professional Fiduciaries: The Nuts and Bolts seminar in Los Angeles on March 9, 2018.
Lauriann first spoke for us last year at the Probate Litigation seminar. Attendees praised her excellent insight, humor, and engaging presentation.
Lauriann has been practicing all phases of probate law and litigation for the past 20 years. Her experience includes conservatorships, guardianships, trusts, and probate estates in Los Angeles, Orange and Riverside Counties. She was named a Southern California Super Lawyer in Trust and Estate Litigation for six consecutive years, from 2012 through 2018. In 2016, Best Lawyers listed Lauriann as one of “The Best Lawyers in America” in Litigation. National Advocates recently named Lauriann as a member of the Top 100 of Wills, Trust, and Estates Lawyers.
Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin have been around for years, however, lately they’ve been a hot topic in the news and among attorneys.
This blog post from Jennifer Post, of Thompson Coburn, sheds some light on the issue. Jennifer will be speaking at our Cryptocurrencies, Blockchain & Initial Coin Offerings seminar in June 2018.
Virtual currencies remain largely unregulated, as well as the activities which support them (exchanges, wallets, etc). However, due to sudden interest from investors and the creation of several new cryptocurrencies, state lawmakers are beginning to consider how they should regulate these activities.
California has introduced the Virtual Currency Act (A.B. 1123), which would require those involved in a “virtual currency business” in California to first register with the state’s Commissioner of Business Oversight. A.B. 1123 defines a “virtual currency business” as any business “maintaining full custody or control of virtual currency in this state on behalf of others.”
Learn more by reading Jennifer’s post and at our upcoming Cryptocurrencies, Blockchain & Initial Coin Offerings seminar in June 2018.
Good news for Tinder users over the age of 30. Tinder – the swipe one way or the other if you are interested in someone (or not) dating app – just got smacked for charging older customers more than those under thirty for Tinder’s premium services.
We just found this blurb Winston & Strawn attorney Ryan P. Glove on the new California Lawyers Association’s Advertising law related Blog and wanted to pass it along:
A California Court of Appeals recently found that Tinder’s practice of charging users over the age of 30 an additional $10 for premium services violates the Unruh Civil Rights Act and the Unfair Competition Law. The court rejected Tinder’s argument that its pricing model was not discriminatory because it based pricing on market research which shows that users under 30 have less means to pay for premium services and therefore require a discount. Although certain age-based pricing structures have been upheld in the past, the appellate court held that Tinder’s pricing model is discriminatory because it employs an “arbitrary, class-based, generalization about older users’ incomes as a basis for charging them more than younger users,” and Tinder did not provide compelling public policy justifications for the alleged discriminatory pricing.
Our latest Featured Speakers are Ian Samson and Paul Traina of Stalwart Law Group!
Ian Samson is an experienced litigator and trial lawyer who will speak at our upcoming Mastering the Deposition seminar in Los Angeles, on February 23rd, 2018.
Ian first spoke for us back in 2016 for Federal Court Boot Camp and has been a repeat speaker for both federal and superior court boot camps since. Seminar attendees rave about his insight, clear examples, and knowledgeability.
Ian represents clients in catastrophic injury matters, whistleblower litigation, class actions, professional liability cases, and commercial litigation. Innovative, tireless, and always willing to go the extra mile for his clients, he has gone toe-to-toe with some of the most highly-regarded law firms in the nation.
Equally comfortable arguing a specific point of law to a federal court judge as he is explaining the big picture to a state court jury, he uses every aspect of his experience to get the best possible result for his clients. Ian is a member of the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles, Consumer Attorneys of California, and Public Justice.
And Paul Traina, an experienced, fiercely competitive litigator and trial lawyer, will also speak at our upcoming Mastering the Deposition seminar.
Paul first spoke for us a while back at our Wage & Hour Class Action seminar, and has returned to speak at many of our litigation related seminars year after year, due to his great evaluations.
Paul has practiced law for the past 25 years. He spent his first five years representing automobile manufacturers and insurance companies, and the last twenty years representing consumers on a pure contingency basis. Paul has obtained verdicts and recoveries for his clients totaling over 3 billion dollars. He has, and continues to represent clients in matters involving catastrophic injuries, defective products, whistleblower litigation, class actions, professional liability cases, and business/commercial litigation.
Paul is a frequent guest lecturer at Loyola Law School’s Trial Advocacy Class. He has lectured around the country about class actions, conflicts of interest, opening and closing arguments, and direct and cross examinations of both lay and expert witnesses. Paul is a member of the Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles and Consumer Attorneys of California.
Nearly half of all prospective lawyers who took the California Bar Exam in July passed this year. 49.6% of test-takers passed the exam, up from 43% last year, which was the lowest pass rate in about 30 years, according to The Recorder. 62% of first-time applicants and 28% of repeat applicants passed the exam.
In total, 8,545 people took the exam and 63.2% were first-time applicants. The July 2017 exam was the first time the test has been administered in a two-day format. Exams are held in February and July each year.
A pass list from the exam was published on the CA Bar’s website yesterday. More detailed statistics about examination results will be available in approximately three weeks. If you’d like more information about the passage rates and statistics of this year’s exam, please CLICK HERE to see the published results from the California Bar.
Congratulations to the 4,236 applicants who passed the exam this year!!
