My friend Jason Pizer had the launch of the third edition of his book this week, and I went along and enjoyed the company of VCAT's Acting President John Bowman, Deputy President Marilyn Harbison, and Justice Chris Maxwell, President of the Court of Appeal.  It's the VCAT equivalent of Williams, the looseleaf 'Bible' of [...]

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The New York Law Journal has an interesting piece about liability exposures of in-house counsel. All sounds a bit foreign to Australian ears, but maybe it won't in a few years' time. Here are two examples:
SHAREHOLDER CLASS ACTIONS
Several shareholder class actions were commenced against a financial institution alleging breach of fiduciary duties, violations of Rule [...]

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Such a result is a rare turn up for the books. It would be an interesting exercise to think when a client last won compensation after a hearing down there. What's more, the American client didn't bother with representation, didn't come to Australia for the hearing, and still won based on a statutory declaration he [...]

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22 July Update: what may be the first ever legal blog, and without doubt one of the best, Overlawyered has  a link to the arbitrator's ruling, and links to some old posts dealing with the interlocutory stages of the case. And here's Law.com's article.
Houston plaintiff lawyer John O'Quinn has been ordered to repay clients $40 [...]

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The barrister garb costs more than $1,500 to buy if you take up the mega-discount the merchants of these things provide to baby barros. Normally, the wig itself costs $1,350. I shelled out for some at around 4.45 p.m. on 30 June 2007. Now the English have abolished wigs for civil and family trials (some [...]

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Let's see if I can prompt any of you out of your commentless indolence with a question: what is the right thing to do when a self-represented man with self-evident psychosis characterised by florid delusions of a type which no sane person could possibly have sues your client? A friend of mine was appalled that [...]

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Here's an interesting case about lawyers, incapacitated clients, paternalism, and the right to be represented. An Alzheimers affected woman hired a beak to oppose a guardianship application brought by her brother. The court appointed another lawyer to act for her, suspecting that the man she professed to want to marry had in fact [...]

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A lawyer failed to show up for court one day. Then he appeared to explain: injured his ankle that morning. The judge said 'Take him away' and he went to jail, just like that. Now, for some reason, the judge is under investigation. They do everything bigger and better over there. Her Worship Pat O'Shane's [...]

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Update, 13 November: Clayton Utz's take on the case here.
Here's a long Sydney Morning Herald article about the latest big Chinese wall case, this time not in the context of a law firm, but of Citigroup, an investment bank. Here's The Age's shorter version. The case is ASIC v Citigroup Global Markets Australia [...]

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In the Citigroup Case referred to in the next post, Justice Jacobsen summarised the law relating to fiduciary duties. I have reproduced the whole of the relevant passage, which includes a restatement of the law (at [297]ff) relating to solicitors' fiduciary duties to give prospective clients full disclosure about the disadvantages of time costing if [...]

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