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When the North Carolina General Assembly passed the Racial Justice Act in 2009, it guaranteed that no individual would be put to death because of racial bias within the states justice system. Since then, theres been a battle in the North Carolina legislature to repeal it. Whats behind this debate? Some say clogged courts and unfounded claims by death row inmates. Attorneys and co-hosts Bob Ambrogi and J. Craig Williams, along with Cassandra Stubbs, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Capital Punishment Project and James E. Coleman Jr., the John S. Bradway Professor of Law at Duke University Law School and Co-director of Duke’s Wrongful Convictions Clinic, take a look inside the issues. They explore the great debate, the repeal and what this means for inmates on death row.

Good clients are essential to any growing business. As a lawyer, what is the best way to manage your clients? In this June edition of New Solo, host Attorney Kyle R. Guelcher, a solo practitioner from Springfield, MA and Chair of the Young Lawyers Division of the Massachusetts Bar Association is joined by solo attorney, Paul E. Mawn, Principal at The Law Office of Paul E. Mawn Jr., out of Newington, CT, to talk about how to conduct an initial client meeting, discuss fees with potential clients and how to best communicate with existing clients.

There is a nice little article in the newest Chronicle of Higher Education reporting on a conference meeting for university general counsel. The thing I liked about this brief little article was the insight it gave me about the job of a university general counsel. They have to keep the interests of the institution in mind, because that is their client, not the various individual employees who might be speaking with them. And that must be a bit confusing for new GCs, and certainly can be for their colleagues — as is pointed out in the article. There are so many layers of hierarchy at a university, and the individuals at those levels shift and change over time, though not usually very quickly.

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Medicare compliance is as important after the settlement as it is at the time of the settlement. On this edition of Ringler Radio, host Larry Cohen welcomes co-host Angus Kennedy and guest, Hany Abdelsayed, Director of Business Development at Rising Financial Solutions, to take a look at Medicare Set-Asides in worker’s compensation cases. Larry, Angus and Hany discuss the role of a professional administrator, the options individuals have when self-administering their own MSA’s and the importance of Medicare compliance.

The New York Times Economix Blog reports today on the number of lawyers passing the bar per state, compared to the number of openings for lawyers in existing firms, and whether that amounted to a surplus or shortage. They created a nifty chart, including hourly wages for the 2009 bars. They conclude that the most over-lawyered states, in order:

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Robert Morse, at ” writes that US News and World Report may change the way it computes the percent of students employed at graduation and 9 months after for rankings purposes, following the ABA’s shift in its requirements for law schools filling out annual questionnaires. The Morse Code refers to the blog, Law School Transparency for reporting on the ABA changes to the rules on reporting post-graduation employment in a clear manner. Read the rest of this entry »

Robert Half Legal’s executive director, Charles Volkert, and Michael Gibeault, vice president, discuss key findings from Future Law Office, the company’s annual research program that examines important developments in the legal field.

Lorette S.J. Weldon highlights the challenges her organization has encountered in its use of SharePoint to manage information through a client-matter-based-interface for attorneys, product management marketing and the library.

One of the FBIs Ten Most Wanted and infamous Boston gangster, James “Whitey” Bulger, is captured. Now the epic legal case begins. Attorney and co-host J. Craig Williams is joined by guests, F. Lee Bailey, famed defense attorney and best-selling author, Dan Rea, long-time TV and radio journalist and lawyer from Boston and David E. Frank, Managing Editor from Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly, to get inside this incredible story and unfolding legal case. They discuss the prosecutions case against 81-year old Whitey Bulger and his long-time girlfriend, Catherine Greig, who eluded capture for more than 16 years, as well as the type of defense we should expect to see and the ultimate fate of the notorious crime boss.

Few battlegrounds have been as bloody as the grounds on which proportionality in e-discovery are fought. On Digital Detectives, co-hosts Sharon D. Nelson, Esq., President of Sensei Enterprises, Inc. and John W. Simek, Vice President of Sensei Enterprises take a look at proportionality from across the pond. Sharon and John explore proportionality in the UK, the six proportionality principles from the Sedona Conference, the history of proportionality in the federal rules and recent rumblings in the courts.