One of my favourite animals is the white Bengal Tiger. I am no expert but there is a real majesty and suppressed fury in these magnificent beasts. I am ambivalent about zoos in general but I was privileged to see a number of these animals on a night safari at Singapore Zoo and, as I… Read More »
Latin phrases used to be an important part of a lawyer’s armoury, if only to confuse those without a classical education into believing that a mundane set of words must be important because of the solemnity with which they were intoned. Doubtless this also justified instructing a lawyer and a fee as the ordinary person… Read More »
The world of e-discovery is full of surprises. After leaving private practice I never dreamed that I would be transported to the snowy steppes of Russia. This is a bit of an exaggeration, I admit, but I found myself recently at a reception in the Reform Club given by the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce. Standing,… Read More »
A recent article in the Economist [Ungreasing the Wheels, 19th November] caught my eye. The article confirms what we have been seeing in cases referred to us over the past few months, namely that the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act is providing litigation lawyers with a staggering amount of work. For those of you not… Read More »
The county of Middlesex was the ancient home of the Middel Saxons. Originally it covered an area stretching from the western edge of Essex to include such ancient foundations like the City of London, through to Westminster Abbey and out to more modern “cathedrals” like Heathrow. On the edge of what used to be known… Read More »
US law firm, Fulbright & Jaworski, has offices all around the world in places as disparate as Dubai, Munich, Riyadh, Hong Kong, London and Beijing. This is the 6th year that the firm has polled corporate law departments on the state of global litigation and the results confirm not only that there is an upswing… Read More »
Continuing last month’s seasonal theme (Mirror, mirror on the wall 19th November), I was delighted to see that there is a website dedicated to all things panto called www.its-behind-you.com Fairy godmothers and magic lamps do not feature much, I suspect, in the setting up of vehicles to provide outside funding to litigants who cannot afford to fund… Read More »
Unusually for me, I found myself recently on a bus in a queue at road works at a bridge overlooking a swollen River Ouse on my way to London. I should explain that I do not always travel to London this way. On the day in question I fell foul of one of those increasingly… Read More »
Legal Week of 12th November published an article by Craig Earnshaw and Nick Athanasi of FTI Consulting entitled E-discovery Demystified The authors asked whether e-discovery technology was too far out of their comfort zones for lawyers despite its potential to save time money and effort. They set out to demonstrate that the process of electronic… Read More »
“May you live in interesting times” is reputedly the English version or paraphrase of an ancient Chinese curse. Whatever its origin, the saying crops up in a variety of differing situations including a speech by Robert F Kennedy in 1966, a letter from Austen Chamberlain to a member of the US House of Representatives and… Read More »