The ‘suck my dick’ case

Summary A drunken male barrister approached a seated female assistant clerk whom he did not know at a dinner at a barristers’ clerks conference, lightly pushed her head downwards towards the table and away from his person and said to her in her colleagues’ presence ‘suck my dick’, moments after greeting another barrister on the clerk’s floor, his friend, at the table by sticking his middle finger out, grabbing the other barrister’s head and pulling it to and from his crotch. Continue reading “The ‘suck my dick’ case”

Direct and vicarious liability of bodies corporate for conduct of natural persons

A woman sued a Melbourne school for injuries and distress occasioned by its headmistress’s sexual abuse of her as a girl.  Represented by Lennon Mazzeo solicitors’ Nick Mazzeo, Dyson Hore-Lacy QC and David Seeman, she obtained judgment from Justice Rush of the Supreme Court of Victoria for $1.25 million, a substantial proportion of which was for exemplary damages.  The exemplary damages were awarded in part because as soon as persons at or associated with the highest levels of governance at the school decided there was substance to complaints of abuse by the headmistress, they arranged and paid for her to fly most hastily to Israel on a one-way ticket instead of reporting the claims to the police and allowing local justice to take its course.

Justice Rush provided an instructive summary about when a body corporate itself may be said to have acted through a person and when it is only vicariously liable for the actions of a person acting, for example, as the company’s employee.  It is set out below.  The application of that law to the facts followed at paras [95] to [118], and resulted in a finding that the school had sexually abused the girl.  See Erlich v Leifer [2015] VSC 499. Continue reading “Direct and vicarious liability of bodies corporate for conduct of natural persons”

What happens if you root your matrimonial client’s wife?

America’s excellent Professional Responsibility Blog, to which I have added a link in my blogroll, is published by Professor Alberto Bernabe of Chicago.  He has gathered together the answers, in America at least.  In the latest eruption of lust in connection with legal practice, which involved only an attempt, the Indiana Supreme Court just told the attorney to take a break for 90 days.  Despite the fact, that is, that his retainer by the husband was in relation to matrimonial disputes with the wife. The Professor’s latest contribution to the ever-enjoyable debate about sex with clients is here.  The Texans are all angst-riddled about whether to prohibit the practice.  The Professor also recently published another in his series of ‘How Not to Practice Law‘: ‘Ask Client to Pay Fees with Drugs‘.