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A Hawaii attorney convicted of licking a client’s ear got a bit of a tongue-lashing in court last week. “Quite frankly, these are the actions of a dirty old man,” the judge in Lihue, on the island of Kauai, said about attorney Lawrence McCreery’s unwanted harassment of a client, the local Garden Island newspaper reports. Though McCreery, 64, got licked in court, he vows to appeal, claiming his objectionable ear-licking never took place....

Five more states have recently joined the ranks of requiring identification to vote at polling places: Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota, and Texas. Though federal law has always required first-time voters to show a photo ID, states have not always had the same requirement. However, in the past decade, states have increasingly passed legislation requiring some form of identification, whether it be a government issued photo ID, a utility bill, or merely a signed affidavit....

Resolutions are crap, right? Who actually follows through on those things? Me. I do. Five out of ten, so far. Goal-setting is important. With an eighty-hour work week, it can be hard to see anything past the next day’s motions, the next week’s hearings, and the next client’s drama. Resolutions are your reminder of the long game. Maybe you knock them all out. Maybe you only follow through on a few....

You’re fed up and burnt out. You’re ready to finally pursue the passions you let slide when you became a lawyer. It’s time for a career change. But where should you go from here? What are some of the best non-law jobs for lawyers? Here are our top seven alternative career tips, from the FindLaw archives. Super-star novelist? Sure. Pastry chef? Why not. Stock broker? Crime reporter? Academic? Check. Check. And check....

Association of Civilian Technicians, Inc. v. US, No. 09-5153, concerned an Administrative Procedure Act action challenging the U.S.’s policy and practice of refusing to order reinstatement of National Guardsmen and correction of state National Guard records and related relief. The court of appeals affirmed summary judgment for defendant, on the ground that the U.S.’s interpretation of its authority was consistent with the Militia Clause and the statutory scheme and represented a reasoned judgment about its role regarding reinstatements of discharged members of the state National Guard....

Doggie alcoholism – it’s a problem. In fact, it’s such a major concern in the U.K. that a British court has barred a man from owning a dog for 3 years. Prosecutors hauled Matthew Cox in front of a judge this week on charges of failing to ensure animal welfare. Police found Max, his Labrador puppy, stumbling around town on August 22. He had drunk a vodka-heavy Coke. Max didn’t resist arrest, but he continued to stagger and fall over while police took him to an emergency veterinarian, reports the Associated Press....

Suits against restaurants happen all the time. Usually the offending meal gets someone really ill, or worse. Lawsuits on the proper way to eat food are less common. Never say never when it comes to FindLaw’s Legally Weird, though. A Miami doctor is suing the restaurant that served him an artichoke for failure to warn how to properly eat the vegetable. Arturo Carvajal filed suit against a restaurant group on a theory of negligence for failing to train table servers about the “proper method for consuming an artichoke....

A woman in Pennsylvania faces two separate DUI charges stemming from a single day. She picked up the second intoxicated driving charge after paying for a ride to her car from the scene of the first. Michele Leonard, 43, was pulled over for intoxicated driving on Saturday afternoon at 5 p.m., according to reports from the Associated Press and Huffington Post. About an hour later, she crashed into a shed. When the shed owner tried to take away her car keys, Leonard told him, “I can’t get another DUI today....

Ear candlers, such as popstar Jessica Simpson, may want to find another way to treat their earwax issues. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a lawsuit brought by ear candle advocates against the FDA, finding that the candle advocates lacked a cause of action. The court held that the Holistic Candles and Consumers Association failed to state a legitimate claim under the Administrative Procedures Act, which prevented them from suing the FDA for urging ear candle makers to stop promoting them as medical treatments....

A Florida literacy teacher is behind bars for a bizarre exorcism ritual in which she allegedly cut and burned teenagers to rid them of demons. Danielle Harkins, 35, taught reading and writing skills at the Lealman and Asian Neighborhood Family Center in St. Petersburg, Fla. But an off-campus extra-curricular activity last Saturday got her arrested, the Tampa Bay Times reports. Harkins allegedly met with seven former students, all of Asian heritage, around a small bonfire near the St....

New York Jets wide receiver Braylon Edwards is back in the headlines, though not for the reasons that one would hope for. First his coach blasted him for getting what he called a “selfish” play, when he taunted an opponent after scoring a touchdown. Then, Tuesday, Edwards was pulled over at 5:15 a.m. with four people in his car, in Manhattan for having excessively tinted windows on his SUV. Police officers smelled alcohol and suspected that Edwards was drunk, according to Paul Browne of the NYPD....

Halloween is here and so begins a fresh season of spooky lawsuits. The most recent Halloween lawsuit seems rather prosaic when compared to suits of previous years. Speaking of suits, did you know that there’s a kid’s costume being sold that claims to make the wearer invisible? An Arizona law firm has taken it on themselves to be the flag bearer in an effort to ban the “I’m Invisible” full length body suit found at many online retailers....

In an Americans with Disabilities Act action claiming that defendant refused to accommodate plaintiff’s disability and then terminated his employment, summary judgment for defendant is affirmed where no reasonable jury could find that plaintiff was disabled when he was refused accommodation and discharged. Read Lytes v. D.C. Water & Sewer Auth., No. 08-7002 Appellate Information Argued February 10, 2009 Decided July 21, 2009 Judges Opinion by Judge Ginsburg Counsel For Appellant:...

In a marital dissolution action involving a discovery dispute over child custody, wife’s petition for mandate, challenging a trial court’s granting of the husband’s motion to quash wife’s subpoenas of medical records on the ground that the documents were protected by the physician-patient privilege, is granted in part and denied in part where: 1) the trial court abused its discretion by quashing the subpoena to a doctor where the statements were made in the wife’s presence and therefore not protected by the privilege; 2) the husband’s claim that his medical records are protected by his constitutional right to privacy is rejected as this right is not absolute and his privacy interests are outweighed by the state’s compelling interest in protecting the child’s best interests; and 3) the trial court did not abuse its discretion with respect to quashing the subpoena to a subsequent doctor because the documents sought by the wife were privileged....

Thomas M. Cooley Law School has a reputation problem. No, it’s not about the latest accreditation issue or its open-door-to-anybody policy. Those have been problems for years. It’s about Michael Cohen, its most famous graduate right now. That has turned Cooley into “the worst law school in America.” The Cohen Problem Cohen – President Trump’s attorney/fixer – is in a very bright spotlight. The FBI raided his office for possible evidence of campaign financing violations, if not collusion in the Russia affair....

New Jersey has approved a prominent resident’s “ATHE1ST” license plate, clearing up a snafu in which the application had been denied for being “offensive.” After David Silverman, president of American Atheists Inc., was refused his “offensive” vanity plate, he took to Twitter, calling the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission’s (MVC) actions “outrageously discriminatory,” reports CBS New York. Public outcry may have been the reason for the quick turnaround, but can states actually outlaw certain vanity plates?...

A New Jersey woman was proud of a vanity license plate that had become her calling card. Wherever she would go, people knew her thanks to the word “BIOCH” on her license plate. The term, slang for b**ch, was a joke that according to the owner, was well received around her town of Manville, New Jersey. The owner, Kim Romano, had the BIOCH personalized plate on her convertible for four years and never had any trouble, besides being pulled over on occasion because police believed it was a fake....

According to Prof. Derek Muller of Pepperdine University’s School of Law, 10 percent of law school enrollment is in one of the variety of non-J.D. programs. For non-lawyer types, this means that 1 in 10 students in law school have no intent to eventually become a lawyer. There has been a very steady increase in the number of students attending law school in the non-J.D. programs. What should we make of all of this?...

Residents of Dallas, Texas, are about to be graced with yet another disaster-piece created by Daniel Edwards, the artist who saw fit to sculpt a nude Britney Spears giving birth on a bearskin rug. This time, he’s created a nude Justin Bieber statue, placing the teen heartthrob next to his also very-nude girlfriend, Selena Gomez. Though the Biebs’ underage nether-regions are covered by a very patriotic maple leaf, this statue may very well be child porn....

Full disclaimer: On Campus Interviews are almost certainly a complete waste of your time, unless you are either the editor of the Law Review, or are on the magna cum laude path. But, you can always take these tips and apply anywhere and everywhere else. Then again, I may be a bit jaded. My school, which required a horse, two camels, and three days of travel to reach from any major metropolitan area, had a bit of a tough time during the Great Recession, OCI-wise....