Final Post

Hi everyone,

As my final days as a high school student are inching closer with the end of my internship and research project, I would like to say thank you to everyone who followed along on this journey! I hope that it was both educational and entertaining. I have linked my presentation slides to this blog post so you can see my main conclusions from this project.

My presentation will be on May 7th at the Jewish Community Center in Scottsdale.
I hope to see you all there,
Isabelle

Final Presentation Slides

Family Law

I apologize in advance for the short blog post.

Last Monday, a Superior Court judge and former attorney at Dickinson Wright offered to let me watch his trial and see his office/talk to him. This was the first time I went downtown to the courthouse alone! I had to find which court building it was (I definitely did not park by the right one) and then I had to find the judge's office and buzz him. This whole process was honestly pretty nerve raking.

However, when I got there the judge was meeting with the attorneys from the trial and they actually came to an agreement right before the trial started. So the trial basically got cancelled and all I got to see was  the two parties agree to their new contract under oath so it would be binding/enforceable by the court. This was a child custody case in which the mother wanted to relocate the kids to Minnesota, but the father did not want them to move. What happened is that the kids are relocating with the mother, but they made a contract for visitation to guarantee that the father gets to see his kids.

Anyways, I was supposed to go back for a different trial on Thursday, but I got very sick and was unable to go to my internship for the rest of the week.

Thanks for reading!

Bankrupcy

Yesterday I took a trip to Arizona Bankruptcy Court with an attorney, Katie, from the firm!

This was a hearing in front of Judge Ballinger, not a trial.
The case was all very complicated so I'm not even going to try to explain it, but for basics:
- A lady (Katie's client) invested money in a property, but was not given the second position power she was promised.
-There was lying involved where after the company filed for bankruptcy, the manager made a new one with the same name (LLC vs Corp.) and claimed it was the same company.

This was very interesting, but I was pretty confused since there were so many aspects to the situation at hand. However, I saw quite a few attorneys get yelled at by the Judge. It was pretty funny. It shows how different judges really do make a difference in how you should present your case. Katie told me that the attorney she was going against was really experienced and bills at about $600 an hour!!

After the hearing was over, Katie (who used to be a clerk at the courtroom) took me to the back area. I got to meet some clerks and assistants and see their offices and talk to them about their job! All the clerks seemed to really enjoy their jobs! I also got to meet Judge Sala and see his chambers that connect to the courtroom!

On Monday, a judge who used to work at the firm has offered to show me around the court and let me sit in on his trial. I can't wait to experience this and tell you all about it!

Mediation

Last week I got to experience part of a mediation!

Mediation: "intervention in a dispute in order to solve it"

Basically, the two parties in the dispute came to the firm with their lawyers (not necessarily from Dickinson Wright who was hired to do the mediation). The parties (there ended up being about 20 people there total) are placed in different rooms and the mediator (an attorney) goes from room to room trying to negotiate for them and settle at least some aspects of the dispute. I cannot give specific details of the case since it is all confidential unlike a trial. The mediator is a completely neutral party (the Switzerland of the case) that just tries to make the two sides agree. This is very similar to an arbitration. The difference is that an arbitrator acts as a judge and makes a decision if the parties do not agree. If a dispute is not settles in mediation it often moves on to arbitration before trial if it comes to that. I thought that this was very interesting and that being a mediator would be difficult. Personally, I think it would be hard for me to stay neutral, especially if I agree with one side more than the other on the matter.

Anyways, I never thought I would say that it is hard for me to watch a lot of TV, but it is proving very difficult. I am way behind on my shows and am thinking about watching less than 4. Furthermore, the shows are proving less important to this project than I thought they would be.

I am going to a fascinating bankruptcy hearing tomorrow and can't wait to tell you all about it!

Until next time,
Isabelle

Trial Preparation

Today I learned a little bit about trial preparation. Although trial is not very common as most cases settle before they reach trial, attorneys still have to prepare in advance.

So for a basic overview:

-The plaintiff sends exhibits/evidence to defense along with a general outline of their argument.
-There are usually hundreds of exhibits
-This outline is basically just witnesses/expert witnesses, evidence they plan on using, etc.
-All exhibits/evidence must provided to the defense and court beforehand and be approved
-The defense then goes through all the exhibits to make sure that they are correct -- mainly that nothing has been deleted or edited by the other side. In the case they were prepping for they found that something had been redacted(deleted) from one of the exhibits.
-They (the defense) then go through the strong and weak points of their case and make a general outline.

Some tips I learned about trial:
-You should try to schedule your witnesses  close to the weekends and/or the end of the case. This allows the jury to more easily remember those witnesses when making their decision or thinking about the case over the weekend break.
-Courtroom software is very useful. It makes it much easier and more organized when trying to show a piece of paper/exhibit. When I went to trial, I remember that in the closing statements I saw, the attorney did not use software and was kind of fumbling around with papers and pointing to things with his pen. So I think that software really makes all the difference.

Side note:
-I'm very interested in the Jury selection process of trials and am hoping that I can experience this in one of the upcoming trials.


Thanks for reading!

What is a Paralegal?

I have had a really tough time writing my blog post for this past week! I honestly did not do much at my internship this week, as nothing too interesting was going on. As I was thinking of what to write about since I had no cool story, I realized that I get the most communication with one of the paralegals at the office.

Going into my SRP, I found myself asking "What exactly is a Paralegal?" I knew that they helped out the attorneys, but I did not know much other than that -- so I am here to tell you. A paralegal, by definition, is a person trained in subsidiary legal matters but not fully qualified as an attorney. No, a paralegal is not a secretary for attorneys - these completely separate, but both important jobs.

Basically, paralegals often do documentation, research, and writing for the lawyers that they work for. For example, they have to write audit response letters for their attorneys clients. These are letters saying how much they company owes in legal fees, and how much they have paid already for the year. One of the main things that I have learned about being a paralegal is that you have to be organized. They usually put everything in labeled binders to be easily found an accessible. Paralegals have many responsibilities that are incredibly vital to the success of the attorneys they work for.

Speaking of binders, one project I had over the week was to help tear all of the papers from a case that settled out of the binders to be shredded. This case, which I believe began in 2010, had at least 1.5 million pieces of paper in it held in huge 5 inch binders (don't quote me on that). In the end 12 trash bins were filled with papers to be shredded (I only filled about one and a half alone). This took up quite a bit of time.

Update on the TV show front:
I should be moving on to watching some of my other shows so I don't run out of time, but I am seriously hooked on suits! I definitely recommend this show! It is pretty dramatic compared to real life and the amount of time they spend in court is way exaggerated, but I find it truly entertaining. Also, I think it does a good job of displaying the difficulty of working in the legal field and how much time work takes up, especially for someone just entering the field.

On a side note, I have decided that in order to gain one more perspective into the media and the legal field, I am going to read a book or two about law. My first choice is John Grisham's "The Pelican Brief." I will write a review/comparison when I have finished it.

Thanks for reading! Talk to you soon.

Some Photos from the Court of Appeals

The Blue Velvet Cushions!

Week 5

Spring Break

The Court of Appeals

It's only my fourth week on site and I have already been able to witness and experience such cool things! Yesterday I got to go to an argument at the Court of Appeals, which was definitely my favorite thing I've done so far. 

Approaching the appellate court building (which is not by the other court buildings?), you can already see that it is much nicer than the lower courts. When I walked into the empty courtroom, I was immediately impressed and intimidated. It was huge! And on top of its size, it was beautiful. The "best" part was that instead of the hard, uncomfortable wooden benches for the audience (mainly me) to sit in, there were benches with very soft blue velvet cushions. 

 An appearance in the appellate court comes about when the losing party from the lower court actions wishes to get that decision overturned. It is not a trial, but rather each side gets 20 minutes to make their argument (the plaintiff can reserve time for rebuttal) in front of three judges.

The most striking thing to me during this time was that the judges truly questioned and argued with the attorneys during their time. During the plaintiff's first argument, the judges really lay into him, making me think that they were leaning away from this argument. However, during the other side, they did the exact same. The judges truly seemed fair in questioning each side equally and not necessarily showing which side they were more in agreement with. 

Comparison to TV:

First off, I do not think that I have ever seen an appellate court case on TV But, other than that, the most noticeable difference that I saw was that in TV shows the judges never have the papers and find out new information during the arguments, often asking counsel to approach and show them a copy of the paper. This is very wrong. In real life, copies of all papers and evidence being used must be submitted to the judge(s) ahead of time.  Furthermore, the judge(s) reads and goes over these papers before the argument or trial.

Thanks for following along with my blog!

Losing Trust

Last Friday I was able to attend an oral argument with one of the estate attorneys here at Dickinson Wright.  

Oral arguments are spoken to a judge or appellate court by a lawyer (or parties when representing themselves) of the legal reasons why they should prevail. Oral argument at the appellate level accompanies written briefs, which also advance the argument of each party in the legal dispute. Oral arguments can also occur during motion practice when one of the parties presents a motion to the court for consideration before trial, such as when the case is to be dismissed on a point of law, or when summary judgment may lie because there are no factual issues in dispute.

The case was about a dispute over a trust where one of the 20 beneficiaries of the trust refused to sign the accounting and filed against the trustee (a bank), stating that he was not informed and was mistreated by the bank. He said that he thought that the most recent list of items and recipients of them did not reflect his late fathers true wishes, and was trying to prove this to the judge. 

In this case, the attorney from the firm was defending the trustee/bank. He filed for a summary judgement. In law, a summary judgment (also judgment as a matter of law) is a judgment entered by a court for one party and against another party summarily, i.e., without a full trial. Such a judgment may be issued on the merits of an entire case, or on discrete issues in that case. Each side got a limited amount of time to make their case about why the judge should rule in their favor. 

What was interesting about this case was that first, the other side was representing himself which I honestly did not know you could do. This made it difficult for the other parties involved as he did not really know the rules and procedures of the court. The judge was surprisingly patient with him, explaining what would happen in court that day, but I think she got slightly annoyed at one point. Another thing, that struck me as different from the media, was that he was not actually present in court, but rather made his argument to the judge and other attorneys over the phone. Thirdly, there were three parties there which, so far, I have never seen in a show. Typically in a show, we see the standard two sides (attorney and client) in the courtroom. The other party in this case was another beneficiary of the trust,  who disagreed with the man who was fighting the distribution of the assets. 

In the end, the judge ruled right on the spot in favor of the trustee, This was very surprising as usually it takes a while before finding out the result of a case. Anyways, it was very fun to go down to the old courthouse!

Thanks for reading!

The Courtroom

I have been told constantly over the three days that I have been here that I am going to be bored out of my mind for 10 weeks because all lawyers ever do is sit at their desks and get coffee. There are no "smoking gun" pieces of evidence, and they do not argue in front of a judge everyday (much less a jury). And yes, at times I have been a little bored already, but it has mostly been very interesting.

Yesterday I got to see the jury instructions and closing statements of a trial. It was a trial involving medical malpractice in which a patient died and his mother was going against the company owning the healthcare facility. The mother was asking for money in compensation for the grief, suffering, and loss of companionship she experienced as a result of the death of her son. In order for the verdict to be in favor of the mother, the plaintiff's attorney must provide sufficient evidence that the man died as a direct result of the company (such as improperly trained staff).

The first hour or so that I witnessed was used by the lawyers on the two sides arguing over what instructions to give the jury on making their decision in front of the judge. I was told that the judge was very patient, unlike most judges who will scream and shout if the paperwork is not in on time.

After this was successfully resolved, the jury was brought in. First they were read the jury instructions and then a lawyer from each side got to give their closing statements - the final argument by an attorney on behalf of his/her client after all evidence has been produced for both sides

The first difference I noticed from TV shows during this trial is that closing statements are not the precise, emotional two minute long statements that you see on the shows. I only got to see some of the plaintiffs (about 15 minutes) closing statement before I had to leave. The attorney began by talking about  Dante's Inferno and accusing the healthcare company for being in the 7th layer of Hell because they betrayed the trust of the man looking for medical help. He then went on to go into depth of the jury instructions, trying to show the jury how they could come to a verdict in his favor based on these instructions. Although I did not see the whole thing (and none of the defense), I got the general idea of how closing statements work. One thing I noticed that seemed pretty consistent between real life and the media, is that no one wants to have jury duty. All the jurors seemed very bored, and the guy in the front even kept making annoyed faces!

Overall, it was a very interesting experience to see what it is like to actually argue in front of a judge and jury. I am very interested in seeing how the jury selection process works (as I was surprised that the majority of jurors on this case were women) and I am hoping that I can experience it in a possibly upcoming trial in March. I hope you all are enjoying reading about my experiences! 

         

My First Day

Today was my first day to "work" at the firm. Being unfamiliar with the downtown area (and my exit from the 202 being closed), I got lost about 5 times before I managed to make it into the office, somehow still on time. As soon as I walked into the 24-level high rise, smack dab off of Central, I was intimidated. The lobby was very large, spacious, and pretty empty. There was a man cleaning the main door, which I was later told was actually a statue.

When I got off of the elevator on the 14th floor, this was what I saw. The beautiful view of the Phoenix skyline (and the popcorn machine in the kitchen) told me that I was going to have a wonderful time here over the next two weeks.



After I met with my onsite mentor (and was told I had my own paralegal office!), he took me around to meet every lawyer on the 12th, 13th, and 14th floors. There were many different types of lawyers that I got to meet from divorce to construction to wrongful death. Everybody was kind and welcoming, offering to bring me along to any interesting things that they had going on. I'm even going to court to watch the closing statements of a trial tomorrow! Apparently, I am very lucky that I get to experience a trail, as the majority of cases settle before they reach the courtroom.

After that, I spent the next 2 or so hours helping the paralegal that I share an office with to put new file numbers on old files. Although this was not the most exciting task, I am very excited to be able to work here for the next 10 weeks and incredibly grateful to all the lawyers here at Dickinson Wright for giving me this wonderful opportunity. 

Introduction

Hello all and welcome to my blog!

This blog is dedicated to my Senior Research Project that I am conducting during my final trimester of high school. I am very excited for this opportunity and I hope you are just as excited to go on this journey with me.

The summer before tenth grade I started watching the TV show “Suits.” I found the show incredibly interesting so I decided to take the intro to law class at school as my elective sophomore year. Although the class was different than I expected, it really piqued my interest in law. Since then, I have continued to watch TV shows about lawyers, but also news broadcasts and articles about important court cases. Through these different forms of media, I have discovered that the way attorneys are viewed in real life varies from in fictional stories. I have even spoken to many lawyers who tell me law school in not what you imagine it to be, and definitely not what it seems like in “Legally Blonde.” Yet despite all of this, I have come to realize I do not truly know what a lawyer does on a regular day at work, and I would really love to find out.

This is where my project comes in. The main question behind my project is what lawyers do on a day to day basis and how this compares to the portrayal of their lives in the media (TV).

I will be interning at Dickinson Wright law firm for 10 weeks starting in February. Throughout my time spent working at my internship, I will watch 4 specific TV shows: “Suits,” “Law and Order,” “LA Law,”  and “Boston Legal.” I will also shadow and interview lawyers working the specific field from the show to see the similarities and differences between real life and fiction. I will also be able to get their opinion on the dramatization and the stereotypes of the field of law created by the media. I am going to be reporting my findings on this blog every week.

I am very excited for the hands on experience that I will be gaining from completing this project! I think that it is a wonderful opportunity for me to discover if the law field is the right path for me that I might wish to go down during my college education and future career plans.

I hope you follow along!