All family lawyers know that a custody trial is about what is best for the children. Parents may think they understand this, but often do not "own" the concept because they are so obsessed with their own problems. The hurt and anger over what has happened clouds their thinking. Facing the possibility of part-time parenting or substantially reduced parenting time, they have difficulty focusing on what is best for the children. This is not to imply that the parents do not care about their children's needs, but getting them to express their concerns for their children instead of using court time to vent, tattle, bicker and complain, is often a formidable task.

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In an era when identity theft causes millions of dollars in losses, many clients are properly expressing fears about disclosing their credit card numbers, checking account information, Social Security Numbers and other sensitive financial data during required financial disclosure proceedings. While some clients balk about disclosing personal financial data, other clients actually refuse to cooperate with even standard divorce disclosure proceedings.

The chart below summarizes hourly rates used by federal courts throughout New York State in recent attorneys' fees awards made in various types of employment cases. In addition to the name of the case, citation, judge making the award and federal district, the chart shows the name of the firm or other entity receiving the award and the hourly rates awarded to the lead counsel (LC), a partner or principal in the firm (P), associates (A), and paralegals (PL). Hourly rates for travel time are excluded, but ordinarily are awarded at a rate equal to one half the attorneys' awarded hourly rate.

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Your ethics questions answered by the expert.

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The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, like the state in which its San Francisco courthouse sits, has a mind of its own. Its contrariness, however, has also made it perennially the circuit court that the United States Supreme Court loves to overturn most. On the highly combustible topic of arbitration of statutory claims, however, the full Ninth Circuit beat the Supreme Court to the punch and overruled itself by holding that employers may require the arbitration of statutory claims.

Recent decisions of interest to your practice.

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It seems to me that the employment setting has become, to a remarkable degree, a kind of civics classroom in which our citizenry is introduced to and schooled in the promise of a diverse people living in harmony. Anti-harassment policies, diversity goals, EEO training are all classes in the curriculum of an enlightened citizenry. The unenlightened often cross our path on the road to their biased actions in the workplace.

Consider the following situation: an employee anticipates that his employment is about to be terminated, for what he believes to be discriminatory or otherwise unlawful reasons. After consulting with an attorney, he decides to tape-record conversations with his supervisors, in the hopes of recording a "smoking gun" comment. A short time later, the employee is terminated, and he later commences litigation in federal court against his employer. In that lawsuit, is the employer entitled to obtain copies of the tape recordings through discovery, or are the recordings protected as work product because they were made in anticipation of litigation? If the recordings are discoverable, is the employee nonetheless entitled to withhold producing them until after his supervisor has been deposed?