Legislation and lawsuits challenging the traditional notions of alimony ' such as how long it should be paid and by whom ' are popping up across the nation. At issue is whether judges have too much discretion in deciding how much alimony should be paid, for how long, and whether they unfairly favor ex-wives.
Many same-sex couples made the trip to Massachusetts (for the short time that that state allowed them to) or to Canada to take their vows. Now, New York's courts are gradually building up a string of cases to answer the question that hung so ominously over those out-of-jurisdiction marriages: Would they be recognized here? And the answer, so far, is, 'Yes.'
Part One of this article discussed preparing for a settlement conference. The conclusion herein covers the conference and post-conference.
A Manhattan appellate court refused to relinquish jurisdiction over a custody case in which a mother fled with her 5-year-old son to Italy because she thought she was not getting a fair hearing in a New York Family Court. In an unusual ruling in late December 2007, the Appellate Division, First Department, reversed the conclusion of Manhattan Family Court that the case belonged in the Italian courts.
Family lawyers with cases involving application of Section 105(c) of the UCCJEA need to marshal Internet and other resources to determine whether the child custody law of a foreign jurisdiction violates a child's fundamental right to safety and protection. Although Section 105(c) does not provide a broad exception to the otherwise stringent standards of the UCCJEA, in cases where a child's welfare is threatened by deferral of jurisdiction to a foreign tribunal or enforcement of a foreign order, a trial court can invoke Section 105(c) to circumvent application of the UCCJEA's rigorous jurisdictional and enforcement provisions.
A Review of "The Little Black Book on Law Firm Marketing and Business Development.
Today, marketing and business development professionals need to understand law firm finance and economics. Likewise, law firm chief financial officers need a better understanding and appreciation of marketing strategies. The success of your firm will depend on how well these two disciplines work together.
It's not a secret that a strong summer associate program is essential to attracting and retaining talent. This article provides an overview of some easy steps for creating an effective program.
Few firms evaluate the long-term growth of competitive intelligence (CI) in firm business development, and even fewer have sought to build systematically on current efforts to create an intelligence function that can predict opportunities. This article seeks to illustrate how a law firm can build a robust intelligence function ' gathering both competitive and business intelligence ' that will provide the greatest strategic benefit over the short and long terms.
For today's young lawyers, that notion belongs to a different era, one that seems as far away as the New Deal and Tammany Hall. But it really wasn't all that long ago that this concept was the anchor of law firm life, a covenant that provided stability and security for the firm's members.
