Out There

The Negligent Handshake?

A lawyer in Florida is suing another lawyer, a (former?) friend, for shaking his hand too hard at a birthday party. George Vallario Jr., age 76, says Peter Lindley’s negligent handshake caused severe and lasting pain.

The complaint, filed in 2015, alleges that Lindley, in his early 60s, “grabbed the plaintiff’s right hand without any reason, provocation or warning of any kind, with such ferocity, force, strength, and violence, that the plaintiff immediately shouted out and was in severe pain.”

Settlement negotiations failed, and the case is headed for a trial. The trial was postponed while Lindley, the defendant, underwent a hip replacement.

Source: Palm Beach Sun Sentinel; Palm Beach County court records

By the Numbers

40%

The percentage of college admissions officials who review applicants’ social media accounts, according to Harper’s Magazine.

A Wisconsin law, the Social Media Protection Act, prohibits educational institutions from requesting or requiring students or prospective students to disclose or grant access to personal internet accounts as a condition of admission or enrollment, including social media accounts. But that doesn’t mean admissions officers cannot troll for “public” information, such as social media pages that are not “private.”

In addition, an educational institution could require access to a device, account, or service that is supplied or paid for by the institution.

On the Radar

A Kansas Conundrum

Kansas law establishes a joint committee on special claims against the state consisting of three members from the state house of representatives and three from the state senate. One of the senators must be a licensed lawyer.

Conundrum: For the first time since 1861, there are no lawyers in the Kansas Senate, according to the Wall Street Journal. Thus, the joint committee cannot comply with the law.

“We will no doubt have to introduce legislation to repeal it,” one senator told the WSJ, which noted that “lawyers still flourish in some statehouses” but “compared with decades ago, fewer are roaming legislatures’ marble hallways.”

“The proportion of lawyers in the U.S. House of Representatives has waned to under 40% in recent years from around 60% during World War II,” reporter Jacob Gershman noted.

In Wisconsin, the number of lawyer-legislators has declined in recent years. Currently, there are 12 attorneys in the Assembly (eight Democrats, four Republicans) and two in the Senate (both Democrats).

Tech Tip

Simple Lists: There’s an App for That

When your brain is full, turn to list apps. Good to-do list apps can help with task and project management. They often come with useful integrations, sharing options, complex list management features, and more. 

But when Tison Rhine, State Bar of Wisconsin practice management advisor, wants to quickly and easily make a note, turning on his phone and clicking several times makes him just want to use pen and paper. When paper isn’t around, however, he uses the app Clear ($4.99 for iOS). It is simple, quick, and colorful – and it fulfills what he really wants out of a list app.

Quotable

“It won’t be too long before I’ll be at a conference where lawyers will be told to steer clear of Facebook because of hoaxes and fake news. Big mistake.”

– Kevin O’Keefe, CEO and founder of LexBlog, and former Wisconsin lawyer, helps lawyers develop business through blogging and social media. He says that less than 1 percent of news and information on Facebook is fake.

He notes that Facebook has almost 2 billion users and that 44 percent of Americans get their news from this social network. “If you’re not sharing information and commentary on Facebook, you’re missing a huge opportunity,” O’Keefe wrote on his own blog, Real Lawyers Have Blogs.

Did You Know?

Law Profs Sue President Trump

Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe and law school dean Erwin Chemerinsky (U.C., Irvine) are among the lawyers who filed a lawsuit against President Donald J. Trump last month, the first business day after his inauguration.

The law professors filed the lawsuit on behalf of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). It alleges that Trump’s business interests “are creating countless conflicts of interest, as well as unprecedented influence by foreign governments, and have resulted and will further result in numerous violations of Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution, the ‘Foreign Emoluments Clause.’”

The Foreign Emoluments Clause says “no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, Office or Title of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”

However, other law professors say CREW lacks standing.

Source: Law Newz; National Law Journal