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March 03, 2018
Ah, Zürich.
Mann, Joyce, Jung, Wagner and Einstein each lived here in District 1. Zürich, first established as a Roman customs post, and now a truly global city, also claims a living and breathing Tina Turner, unless she left since my last visit four years ago. Not Paris-beautiful or London-exciting, but solid, reliably Western-style commercial, and nearly too North American by the year 2000.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:07 AM | Comments (0)
March 02, 2018
Happy 250th, Daniel Hull Sr.
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Daniel E. Hull Sr. Born & died in Middlebrook, Augusta County, Virginia.
(March 2, 1768 - January 11, 1854)
Posted by JD Hull at 08:03 PM | Comments (0)
March 01, 2018
P&G’s Big John
Near the end of his career, 2 younger P&G exec friends spotted him leaving work on the down escalator about 4:00 PM on a weekday. This happened:
“Jesus, John, this is P&G. Headquarters. Half-day for you?”
“Hi guys. I would have left a lot earlier but I feel asleep at my desk.”
John Daniel Hull III
May 17, 1928 - December 27, 2012
Posted by JD Hull at 09:20 AM | Comments (0)
February 28, 2018
Millennials. Don’t you just love ‘em?
Every time a GenY employee is sacked I get stirrings.
Posted by JD Hull at 03:38 PM | Comments (0)
February 26, 2018
On The Twitters Today...
Good Morning, American Comrade Workers.
America has been in business 229 years.
What specific Ideas are we allowed to discuss today?
What specific Words are we permitted to use?
Who has The List?
Posted by JD Hull at 09:34 AM | Comments (0)
February 25, 2018
No. 513 of Things Long Divorced Slightly Amoral American Lawyers Know.
513. If you're the praying sort, all prayers are good enough. No prayer is imperfect.
--Holden Oliver, 1987
Posted by JD Hull at 12:42 AM | Comments (0)
Redux: Southern District: “Slick Lawyer Answers to Lazy Lawyer Interrogatories”
"The Lawyers", circa 1855, Honoré Daumier (1808-1879)
Our new associate. Nice guy, smart guy, and I really liked him--I still do. I always make it a point to take his cab whenever I'm in Flint.
Written discovery practice shouldn't be a joke. Not that long ago, in Manhattan's fabled Southern District, a fed-up federal judge, throwing up his hands during arguments by lawyers on a motion to compel discovery responses, referred to certain answers to interrogatories in the dispute as "slick lawyer answers to lazy lawyer interrogatories".
We do feel his pain. Feel free to color this all quite silly, and annoying, if you want--but we love and respect written discovery during the pretrial process in American federal courts.
In our firm, for a brief period of time, a fundamentally talented second year associate with the makings of a very good trial lawyer worked in our Pittsburgh office, after having spent one year at another firm.
One day, he complained to me that we were putting too much thought and effort into a set of interrogatories under Rule 33, Fed. R. Civ. P. So naturally I listened very carefully.
The new hire very patiently, calmly and slowly--so I could digest a great truth he'd discovered--explained to me that the exercise of serving interrogatories and other written discovery upon counsel for plaintiff was a "routine" and primarily "a way for lawyers to bill time so they could make money".
Nothing more, he said.
He was certain and even adamant about it, too. Nice guy, smart guy, and I really liked him--I still do. Shortly after that conversation, he left our firm. Did he quit or get fired? It does not matter. But it was a very good development for us when he left.
Complex and hard-fought civil cases really do turn in large measure on the quality and honesty of the discovery questions and requests, including deposition questions, and the responses to them. And well-thought out and strategically-timed written discovery is the best way there is to prepare great depositions--and get ready for trial.
Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)