Legal Profession Commons^™

The Ethics Of Effective Advocacy For Children In Abuse And Neglect Proceedings, Suparna Malempati

Suparna Malempati

This article addresses ethical dilemmas lawyers face when representing children in abuse and neglect proceedings in juvenile court. Children in such cases need traditional advocacy in order to protect their legal rights and effectuate just outcomes. Lawyers who represent children have an ethical obligation to perform this function as advocates for their clients and not merely as guardians ad litem who make paternalistic recommendations about the best interests of children. The requirement that lawyers disregard their role as advocates for the role of guardians ad litem circumvents the ethical rules that govern lawyers and fails to adequately and effectively safeguard ...

Bargaining In The Shadow Of Big Data, Dru Stevenson, Nicholas J. Wagoner

Dru Stevenson

Attorney bargaining has traditionally taken place in the shadow of trial, as litigants alter their pretrial behavior—including their willingness to negotiate a settlement—based on their forecast of the outcome at trial and associated costs. Lawyers bargaining in the shadow of trial have traditionally relied on their knowledge of precedent, intuition, and previous interactions with the presiding judge and opposing counsel to forecast trial outcomes and litigation costs. Today, however, technology for leveraging legal data is moving the practice of law into the shadow of the trends and patterns observable in aggregated litigation data. In this Article, we describe ...

Vol. 46, No. 07 (March 3, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Vol. 46, No. 06 (February 24, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Chinese Courts' Role In Financial Reform: On The First "Vam Agreement" Case In China, Siyi Huang

Siyi Huang

Traditional belief is that courts in authoritarian regimes are only passive institutions and their authority and influence are extremely limited. Despite the conventional wisdom, it’s been noticed that Chinese courts have played a crucial role in China’s financial reform. Drawing on insights from the judgments of three Chinese courts at different levels on the first “value adjustment mechanism” case in China, this article attempts to explore the functional techniques and decision-making process of Chinese courts. The analysis of the court’ judgments suggests that Chinese courts have performed a policy-making function in deciding controversial economic cases, by transcending social ...

Two Figures In The Picture: How An Old Legal Practice Might Solve The Puzzle Of Lost Punitive Damages In Legal Malpractice, John M. Bickers

John M. Bickers

When lawyers err, clients must pay the price. If a lawyer’s action, or inaction, prevents a client from succeeding in a lawsuit, the lawyer must pay the amount necessary to make the client whole. But what does it mean to make the client whole? A puzzle appears when a finder of fact in a legal malpractice case determines that punitive damages in the original lawsuit were appropriate. Punitive damages are not meant to restore the client to her original position. By definition, they are meant to punish the original defendant for the egregiousness of his conduct. The plaintiff receives ...

Vol. 46, No. 05 (February 17, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Tell Us A Story, But Don't Make It A Good One: Resolving The Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories And Federal Rule Of Evidence 403, Cathren Page

Cathren Page

Abstract: Tell Us a Story, But Don’t Make It A Good One: Resolving the Confusion Regarding Emotional Stories and Federal Rule of Evidence 403

by Cathren Koehlert-Page

Courts need to reword their opinions regarding Rule 403 to address the tension between the advice to tell an emotionally evocative story at trial and the notion that evidence can be excluded if it is too emotional.

In the murder mystery Mystic River, Dave Boyle is kidnapped in the beginning. The audience feels empathy for Dave who as an adult becomes one of the main suspects in the murder of his friend ...

Legal Aid In The 1920s: Whither Law Reform, Mark Spiegel

Mark Spiegel

Legal Aid In the 1920’s: Whither Law Reform.

Mark Spiegel

This Article looks at legal aid during the 1920s to see what happened to the aspiration toward law reform (or preventive law) that was expressed in the period 1900-1920. Conventional wisdom has it that legal aid until the 1960s was largely devoted to individual cases and that it was not until the advent of federally-funded legal services that law reform and social change became part of the delivery of legal services to the poor. However, some scholars, including myself, have questioned this conventional wisdom. Expanding on that work, I ...

The Case For Forgiveness In Legal Disputes, Eileen Barker

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

The article offers information on the education and understanding of forgiveness, which assists lawyers and mediators in supporting their clients in the area of forgiveness. It discusses two types of forgiveness relevant to legal disputes including bilateral forgiveness and unilateral forgiveness, and briefs common misconceptions about forgiveness. It analyzes that the essence of forgiveness is the giving up of resentment, anger, and hatred.

Apology, Forgiveness, Reconciliation & Therapeutic Jurisprudence, Susan Daicoff

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

The article offers information on the definition of the apology, forgiveness, and reconciliation processes. It discusses the relationship between these concepts and explains the benefits of practical use of apology, forgiveness, and reconciliation in the law. It informs that these concepts provide an effective healing to dispute or conflicts between individuals, groups, or institutions.

Vol. 46, No. 04 (February 10, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Vol. 46, No. 03 (February 3, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Promoting Equitable Law School Admissions Through Legal Challenges To The Lsat, Al Alston

Al Alston

No abstract provided.

The Good Fight: The Egocentric Bias, The Aversion To Cognitive Dissonance, And The American Criminal Law, Daniel S. Medwed

School of Law Faculty Publications

The phrase “cognitive bias” often has negative connotations. It is something to be overcome, thwarted, or, at best, circumvented. In this essay, I suggest that two interrelated cognitive biases—the egocentric bias and the aversion to cognitive dissonance—might instead serve as potential assets for a criminal law practitioner in persuading her constituencies.

Confronting The Peppercorn Settlement In Merger Litigation: An Empirical Analysis And A Proposal For Reform, Steven M. Davidoff, Jill Fisch, Sean J. Griffith

Faculty Scholarship

Shareholder litigation challenging corporate mergers is ubiquitous, with the likelihood of a shareholder suit exceeding 90%. The value of this litigation, however, is questionable. The vast majority of merger cases settle for nothing more than supplemental disclosures in the merger proxy statement. The attorneys that bring these lawsuits are compensated for their efforts with a court-awarded fee. This leads critics to charge that merger litigation benefits only the lawyers who bring the claims, not the shareholders they represent. In response, defenders of merger litigation argue that the lawsuits serve a useful oversight function and that the improved disclosures that result ...

Vol. 46, No. 02 (January 27, 2014)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Legal Writing - What's Next? Real-World, Persuasion Pedagogy From Day One—It’S Not What You Offer; It’S What You Require – Part Ii (In A Three-Part Series), Adam Lamparello, Charles Maclean

Adam Lamparello

This essay (part two of a three-part series) strives to begin a collaborative discussion with legal writing, clinical, and doctrinal faculty about what “change” in legal education should mean. In Part I, the authors rolled out a blueprint for transformative change in legal writing pedagogy, which includes: (1) more required skills courses that mirror the actual practice of law; (2) a three-year program that includes up to four writing credits in every semester; and (3) increased collaboration between legal writing professors and doctrinal faculty. In this essay, we get more specific, and propose a three-year legal writing curriculum that builds ...

"What Did You Say?": Semantic Polysemy In California Juvenile Dependency Dispute Resolution, Kelly X. Ranasinghe

Kelly X Ranasinghe

Non-adversarial resolution of dependency cases is a statutorily mandated practice in California. Practitioners in California Juvenile Dependency courts attempt to settle cases without litigation, relying instead on negotiation between the various parties using informal discourse. This discourse utilizes polysemous dependency terms affecting the contextual understanding of statements by creating underlying ambiguity. The ambiguity of these terms creates communicative interference by engendering misunderstanding, lack of specificity and other communication problems. By recognizing polysemous qualities of core terms used in dependency discourse, practitioners can communicate more effectively and efficiently when resolving cases.

Etnografía De La Corrupción En Estudios De Abogados De Lima, Daniel Quiñonez

Daniel Quiñonez Oré

El presente ensayo constituye un estudio preliminar de las prácticas corruptas que se realizan en los estudios de abogados, en donde se podrán apreciar que la corrupción convive con la práctica jurídica, a tal punto que en algunos casos aquella se encuentra naturalizada y normalizada en la práctica del Derecho.