What Can be Won by Avoiding Litigation? By using the litigation-derived adversarial process as a template to educate and a resource for better decision-making, writes Paul Leiman, owners may well find that litigation itself can be avoided. Find out how.
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How to Maintain Independence and Professionalism in a Complex and Changing Niche As divorce laws change, attorneys increasingly rely on financial experts such as business appraisers and forensic accountants. In this article, Robert D. Feder discusses the role of a financial analyst in the context of matrimonial law. He also covers some of the potential pitfalls of the trade.
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Understand the Critical Distinction Between a “Testifying Expert” and a “Consulting Expert.” Brad Eldridge and Rebekah Smith explain how the requirements for a “testifying expert” in litigation work vary considerably from those for a “consulting expert.” Learn more about this distinction and find out how consultants can develop a checklist of best practices for courtroom preparation.
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The Best Experts Increase Odds of Winning by Devising Strategy, Guiding Discovery, and Enhancing the Quality of Daubert Challenges Donald M. May at Claims Journal explains how the best expert witnesses increase odds of winning by devising strategy, guiding discovery, and enhancing the quality of Daubert challenges. Here are the sort of queries—about specific topical expertise, testimony record, exclusion history, and overall expert witness income—that experts should expect before being hired for top cases.
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In United States v. David A. Taylor IRS Lays Down the Law The Wills, Trusts, and Estates Prof blog reports on a recent case demonstrating that if a fiduciary has a duty to pay a claim of the government before paying a debt—or they may be personally liable for the unpaid claims of the government! Here are some of the case details: David J. Tyler and Paula I. Tyler were a married couple who held real property on Cricket Lane in Pennsylvania as tenants by the entirety. The IRS issued deficiencies for their income taxes from 1992-1998. On August 20,…
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Weeding out Junk Science? Or Scaring Off Competent Experts? Are Daubert challenges really weeding out “junk science” and “pseudoscience” in the courtroom, or could it be that they are actually scaring off good, competent experts? Given the numbers alone, one can’t help but wonder. Bullseye, a Legal Blog on Expert Topics, reports on a new study that examines the question. Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1999 decision in Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, which established that the criteria set forth in Daubert applied to other types of expert testimony – not just that of a scientific nature – the number of Daubert challenges has risen sharply. While…
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How Divorce Can Affect Business Valuation Stanley Morganstern at the Ohio Family Law Observer reports that recent case in Ohio illustrates the difficulty of valuing business assets in a divorce. Courts should avoid “double dipping,” or counting a business’ income toward valuation and spousal support. Instead, judges are to separate current and future income from the business’ material assets before making the calculation. I previously discussed the issue of “double dipping” as it primarily pertained to the property nature and income component of retirement plans. As I mentioned, the issue is also relevant to business interests, particularly small business entities. The marital…
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Small Firm Innovation Wins ABA Journal Most Popular Site in Legal Practice Management Category Small Firm Innovation, a blog dedicated to first person accounts of small firm success, won the ABA Journal’s Blawg100 competition for most popular blog in the Legal Practice Management (LPM) category. The ABA announcement reports: In the wake of the financial crisis and a rapidly shifting legal landscape, Small Firm Innovation launched in April of 2011 during the ABA’s legal technology showcase, ABA TECHSHOW. A resource by, and for, solo and small firm lawyers, the site focuses on two specific areas: the business side of running…
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Apple’s ‘bogus’ patents will ‘strangle’ Android: Google So reports Asher Moses this month in The Advertiser: Google’s chief legal officer has launched a blistering attack on competitors, including Apple, for attempting to stifle innovation by using “bogus patents” to target Google’s Android partners including Samsung. David Drummond, who is also Google’s senior vice-president, wrote in an explosive blog post that the patent wars were pushing up the prices of Android smartphones and tablets. This was part of a “hostile, organised campaign” being waged by Apple, Microsoft and others to “strangle” Android, which Google provides free of charge. His remarks come…
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Dueling Documentaries You’ve maybe read about the pro-trial lawyer documentary out recently from HBO called “Hot Coffee” in The Atlantic. (The title “Hot Coffee” refers to the famed McDonalds case of a few years back, when a woman was awarded some $3M+ by a jury for overly-hot coffee spilled on her by McDonalds.) Now there’s “Injustice,” which asks, “What do you have to do to earn a billion dollars in lawyer’s fees?” Steve Forbes calls it a “Must-See.” The State Bar of Michigan notes the arrival of both on its blog: Trial lawyers feeling the love from the HBO documentary “Hot Coffee” might want…
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Have you had a chance to check out the Guard Series™ insurance policies? Since claims against BV practices and properly credentialed professionals have historically been quite rare, these policies are deeply discounted. NACVA and Primus Assurance Group (PAG) announced the policies’ availability last fall, and since then PAG has built out its web site with lots of detail: Providing Professional Peace of Mind Professional Errors and Omissions Liability Insurance is critical for valuation analysts and litigation support professionals in today’s litigious environment. That is why the National Association of Certified Valuation Analysts (NACVA) and Primus Assurance have tailored an…
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The Wall Street Journal Law Blog says big regulatory changes are under way: “Dodd-Frank is Sarbanes-Oxley on steroids. It’s an exponentially greater volume of regulation,” says Margaret Tahyar, a Davis Polk partner. The “sheer number of rules still in the pipeline makes it almost inevitable agencies will miss an increasing number of deadlines over the next year.” The Dodd-Frank law has 849 pages, compared with 66 pages in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, a 2002 law that overhauled accounting rules following the Enron scandal. The landmark Glass-Steagall Act, which created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and barriers between commercial and investment banking…