By Sean F. Herrmann Recently, in Calobrisi v. Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc, No. 15-1331 (4th Cir. Aug. 23, 2016), the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals specified certain types of evidence that district courts must, at a minimum, consider when ruling on summary judgment motions. It held that the trial court erred when it granted summary […]
By Catherine Peglow Have you ever wondered how our CLE programs get their names? “The Alimony Tour – Not Starring John Cleese” was the name of the 2015 Family Law Section Annual Meeting CLE in Asheville. Now, I’m a Monty Python fan, but a clever name like that can present some problems when you consider […]
By Drew Erteschik and J.M. Durnovich Introduction Most of us left law school with the understanding that so-called “economic liberty” challenges to state regulations will generally fail under rational basis review. That area of the law, however, has changed dramatically. This article looks at the change in three parts: The first part offers a […]
By Jonathan Wall Noncompetition agreements (“non-competes”) present thorny issues. In most cases, you have a former employee who has signed a black-and-white contract prohibiting him or her from engaging in certain employment, and the employee goes and does the one thing that the contract specifically prohibits. Not that long ago, most judges would view the […]
By Travis Nicholson EEOC has implemented new procedures to be followed in all of our offices for the submission and release of position statements. The procedures apply to EEOC requests for position statements to employers made after Jan. 1, 2016. The purpose of the new procedures is to advance investigations by facilitating more pertinent information […]
By Camille Stell Over the last few weeks, Lawyers Mutual has received multiple reports of North Carolina attorneys who were targeted by scammers attempting to divert seller closing proceeds following real estate transactions. Unfortunately, several of these attacks were successful and hundreds of thousands of dollars were stolen and are very unlikely to be recovered. […]
By Robert M. Ward I am honored to serve as chair for the 2016-2017 term. Let me begin by thanking Trey Allen for his outstanding job as our chair during the 2015-2016 term. Under Trey’s leadership we had a budget carryover, which was put to good use by Law Related Education. Additionally, as reported in […]
By Jessica E. Leaven As I was preparing my first comments as chair, this tune kept coming to my mind. “To everything – turn, turn, turn – there is a season – turn, turn, turn.” Maybe it’s because the summer is ending and the kids are going back to school. Or maybe it’s because it’s […]
By Grant B. Osborne Ulysses Everett McGill (previously imprisoned for practicing law without a license and about to be hanged): “It ain’t the law!” Sheriff Cooley: “The law? The law is a human institution.” — “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?” (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2001) How much time have you spent reading Chapter 84 of the North […]
By Danae C. Woodward Collaborative practice is a relatively new alternative dispute resolution process which has been adopted by family law practitioners throughout the United States and in many other countries. Collaborative law practice was developed in 1990 by a Minnesota family law attorney, Stuart Webb, who proposed this new dispute resolution practice to the Honorable […]