How To Know If You’re a Small-Town Lawyer

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While many law students crave the riches and prestige of Biglaw, small-town lawyering is where the real action is at. But how do you know if you really are a small-town lawyer?

The answer came to me courtesy of former student Jim Jackson, who practices tort law in Arkansas (and generously says he was inspired to pursue that area after taking my Torts and Products Liability courses at the UALR School of Law).  He shared a quiz of sorts compiled by a friend named Michael who practices in Crossett, Arkansas. Crossett, on the Louisiana border,  is the county seat and has a population of about six thousand. It’s the very definition or small-town, rural law practice.

Michael’s small-town lawyer test (posted on a trial lawyer’s listserv) consists of a summary of various cases he handled in 2021 (I took the liberty of editing punctuation):

Hi all,

As we begin 2022 I thought I would take a moment and reflect back on some of my more memorable cases as a small town lawyer. So, without further ado …

You might be a small town lawyer if:

1. You have ever had to explain to a client that your “dignity” would not allow you to have a hearing to determine who gets the “Texas Instrument” calculator.

2. You have ever filed a petition seeking an “emergency order of custody” for a goat, because the husband had announced his intentions of having a barbeque, featuring your client’s beloved pet, Marvin.

3. You have ever settled a divorce case by virtue of an agreement with opposing counsel that the attorneys would pitch in $100 each and buy the horse since the parties could not agree on who was going to be awarded the horse.

4. You have ever been involved in a hearing for order of protection that began when the spouse/wife declared to your client that she was going to “take his two pet service squirrels and turn them into owl shit as soon as he left the house!!!!” … and that’s when the fight started.

5. You have ever defended “your secretary” in district court for delivering an “ass” whipping to her ex-boyfriend’s current girl friend in the middle of the Walmart parking lot.  Sigh. Unfortunately, the camera footage pretty well eliminated any hope of a defense. On the bright side, it was a hell of a video.

6. You have ever defended a man in district court over a battery charge that all began with a simple misunderstanding following the girlfriend’s announcement of her pregnancy.

My client took what he deemed to be the “high road” and promptly declared, “Well if it’s mine, I will help support it.” His view on this being that was an appropriate offer under the circumstances. To say that the young lady did not take his offer in the spirit with which it was intended would be a gross understatement. The best way to describe her response would be to say it was “volcanic.”

My 6-foot-tall, 250-pound client was chased out of the house in his boxers by an irate and irrational 5-foot-3, 135 pound female wielding a Ginsu kitchen knife. He lost the tip of his thumb in the scramble and had to sneak back later to get his clothes off the roof of the neighbor’s house (apparently his keys, wallet and cell phone were all in the clothes).

My argument to the court was that he had already suffered a punishment worse than anything the court could impose on him and we should let it go on a “time served” basis. The judge took the matter under advisement.

We are still awaiting a ruling. It has been 7 months.

May your 2022 be as much fun as 2021 was for me.

May you remember it’s not always about how much money we make. Sometimes it’s about how much of a difference we make in the lives of our clients who have trusted us with their problems in their times of need.

It is a blessing and an honor to be able to practice law.

Okay, Biglaw associates. The billable-hour clock is ticking. Time to get back to reviewing documents and doing due diligence. Me, I’m heading to Crossett for some excitement!

Experts Predict the Job Market in 20 Legal Specialties

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Law students spend too much time reading cases and too little time thinking or learning about what kind of legal job would be the best fit for them. In the cover story for the Fall 2021 issue of The National Jurist Magazine, I and my co-authors of Law Jobs: The Complete Guide (West Academic Publishing 2019) seek to predict the job market in 20 legal specialties.

Read 20 Hottest Law Jobs for the Next Decade

Worthwhile reading for all law students. But it’s not enough. Your goal in choosing a legal career isn’t just to find a job, but find one that fits your values, personality, and overall goals in life. Is money the most important thing to you? Autonomy? Work-life balance? In more than six hundred pages, Law Jobs covers in detail the pros and cons of every major legal career type. Only by knowing these, will you be in a position to find your dream job. Check it out.

Meanwhile, enjoy reading our predictions for twenty legal specialties for the next decade!

What is this Graphic Warning Sign Trying to Say?

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Can you figure out all the things this sign is trying to tell you?

Pictorial or graphic warning and instruction signs and labels are intended to be universally understood. That’s why they exist. There are roughly 6,500 different languages on this planet and space limitations, among other concerns, limit the ability to use multiple languages to explain warnings and instructions.

Many product makers and public space operators do use multiple languages in their warnings, but they generally stick to a few top choices, usually selected by anticipated regional audiences. Dual English and Spanish warnings, for example, are common in the U.S.

The problem is that it’s difficult to convey warnings or instructions using only graphics. I don’t recall how this sign came to me, but let’s use it as an example. My first reaction looking at it is it’s too complicated and no one’s going to notice or pay attention to it in the first place.

Studying it, let’s try to guess what it is trying to convey to people:

  1. Don’t touch anyone (or maybe just women or geishas)?
  2. Don’t sit?
  3. Don’t lean?
  4. Don’t smoke.
  5. Don’t eat.
  6. Don’t litter.
  7. Don’t take selfies?

Sounds like a fun place! But they left off, “Don’t breathe,” “Don’t blink,” “Don’t come here.”

Wacky Sign: “No Campaign Materials or Clothing Allowed”

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Let’s face it, even for the most dedicated voters, standing in line waiting to vote can be boring, unless you happened to be at this polling station in Arkansas. You may think of Arkansas as a conservative state, but if this wacky sign is any indication, they are having some wild times over there.

 

p.s. I’m convinced many if not most “wacky signs” that get circulated these days are fake, but as I recall, this one was posted by an Arkansas friend who took the photo at the polling station.

The Grammar Judge Strikes Again

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I have a judge friend who’s a stickler for grammar. Today, she sent this little gem along:

If you ever doubted the importance of the correct placement of prepositional phrases to the meaning of a sentence … The following is drawn from a motion sent to me today:

“More significantly, the Husband attempted to drive a vehicle with the minor children in a clearly intoxicated state ….”

Oh my, let’s hope not!

Suffocation Warning to Tiny Tots

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Suffocation warning for the tiniest of tots.

If you take a close look at them, nearly all plastic bags in the U.S. contain a suffocation warning. In fact, it’s difficult to find plastic bags without such a warning.

Because most adults presumably know not to put plastic bags over their heads, these warnings are aimed primarily at people with children, especially babies. Because children, and especially babies can’t or don’t read warnings, the warnings are directed at their caretakers.

The risk of suffocation from a plastic bag seems like an obvious risk and there is no duty to warn of obvious risks under U.S. products liability law. But with the cost of a warning and the downsides of including one both being quite low, most product makers take a “might as well include one” approach.

It’s a sensible approach, but was it really necessary to include this large suffocation warning sticker on a bag this small?

 

 

Silly Product Warning: Don’t Pick Up Broken Glass with Bare Hands

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As a professor of tort and products liability law, I appreciate that manufacturers often feel the need to warn consumers of obvious risks, even though products liability law does not impose a duty to warn of obvious risks.

First, it’s safer from a liability standpoint for the product maker/seller because it avoids the possibility that a jury might, in hindsight after an injury, disagree as to whether a particular risk was obvious. Moreover, warning of obvious risks serves a re-enforcement/reminder function.

The downside of being inundated with warnings of obvious risks is the “dilution effect.” When consumers are bombarded with warnings of risks that are patently obvious, it dilutes the impact of the warnings that really matter.

Case in point: Do we really need a verbal and pictorial warning that people should not pick up broken glass with their bare hands? … Probably, because we’ve all done it.

Man Shows Up for Divorce Hearing Bare-Chested and in a Bathing Suit

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An important rule for young lawyers to know is that it’s essential to counsel clients to wear appropriate attire to court hearings.

Sometimes clients will come to court, for example, without wearing a suit or tie, but only in Zoom land, and possibly Florida, would a client show up bare-chested and wearing only a bathing suit.

A Florida judge friend received an abject apology from an attorney after her client “showed up” for his final divorce hearing (via Zoom) so attired. The lawyer assured the judge that they always go over with clients the appropriate attire for court hearings.

To her credit, the judge took it all in stride, responding to the attorney with this email (names omitted). The bolded part is pretty funny:

Ms. [deleted]:

I appreciate your emailed note, apologizing that your client was not properly attired for his Zoom dissolution of marriage hearing. Please be assured that I am entirely confident that you advise clients what to wear for their dissolution of marriage hearings. I am aware that some clients, especially those under stress in family law cases, simply do not hear or register the instructions.

Of course, given Mr. [deleted]’s attire (swim trunks, bare chest, and – I can’t remember which – either flip flops or bare feet) and location (beach), I’m not sure I would classify him as terribly stressed….

Have a good weekend!

[Judge ——-]

Hey, it is Florida, after all.

Boogie Board Guaranteed to be Unsafe (If You Try Hard Enough)

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We love wacky product warnings at lawhaha.com, but as a Torts and Products Liability professor, I’ve never been a fan of product sellers trying to be funny in their product warnings or instructions. See, for example, here, here, and here.

But I concede that these “Guarantees” for a foam boogie board are pretty cute, including that it is guaranteed “to be unsafe in some way if you really work at it.”

Warning: Do Not Use Kitty Litter as Traction Aid

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This is one of those warnings that may sound silly, but really isn’t. I wouldn’t be surprised if a whole lot of people have tried to use kitty litter as a traction aid for icy walkways:

Do not use this product as a traction aid because product becomes slippery and slick when wet.

I ding the seller one point for being redundant because “slippery” and “slick” are the same thing, but not a bad warning.

I have a bigger problem with the instructional photos. Does people really need illustrations to show how to pour cat litter?