Piggy Swooney

Tom,

Don't leave Paul Weiss's "Piggy Swooney" (her nickname at work is "Pig") off your radar. She single-handedly turns one of NYC's worst document reviews into even more of a hellish experience. Her PMS-like outbursts, constant surveillance, encouragement of paralegal snitching, and snide e-mail "reminders" make working with her all the more unbearable. In my opinion, "Piggy Swooney" ranks right up there with Anita and Lily.

Big Owl Is Back

Apparently, not only does the Kirkland owl stare down at you from glass-encased cubicles, but now it appears as if the Kirkland owl has been accused of spying on the private telephone calls of certain employees:

www.legalweek.com/Company/454/Navigation/18/Articles/1023650/Kirkland+in+legal+dispute+after+ex-staffer+pursues+mobile+phone+intercept.html

Let's Get Ready To Humble

The App. Div., 2d Dep't has some very spiffy PDF files available for the three decisions discussed yesterday, in case you happen to like attaching such spiffy-looking documents to your motion papers (or if you're Skip Short, Esq. and deservedly want to frame them): A.B. Med. Servs., PLLC v Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03636 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007); A.B. Med. Servs., PLLC v GEICO Cas. Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03635 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007); and New York Univ. Hosp. Rusk Inst. v Government Employees Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03671 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007).

I also can't wait to see who throws the next punch in the battle royale occurring in the comments section of my previous post. Can anyone top a slapdown from David M. Barshay, Esq.? I'm thinking it will take another named partner. Then again, the looming spectre of Skip Short, and the results he got in the aforementioned cases, may provide the ultimate trump card...

Hell: Experiencing Intermittent Flurries

Three highly important decisions were put out today by the Appellate Division, Second Department: A.B. Med. Servs., PLLC v Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03636 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007); A.B. Med. Servs., PLLC v GEICO Cas. Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03635 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007); and New York Univ. Hosp. Rusk Inst. v Government Employees Ins. Co., 2007 NY Slip Op 03671 (App. Div., 2d Dep't, 2007). These decisions reverse (both specifically and in practical terms) a host of Appellate Term, Second Department cases whereby it was held that a no-fault denial of claim form (NF-10) would be legally insufficient if it merely stated that said denial was based upon the results of a peer review or IME. That is, if a denial were based upon the results of a peer review or IME, the Appellate Term repeatedly held that a carrier had to issue a denial that either attached the peer/IME report or otherwise included the medical rationale of said report.

The Appellate Division's decision from today in A.B. Med. Servs., PLLC v Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. sets out the thrust of their reversal of the Appellate Term:

"To the extent the Appellate Term's order may be understood to require an insurer denying a claim for first-party no-fault benefits on the ground of lack of medical justification to include a medical rationale in its denial of claim form, we agree with the defendant that the court erred. The applicable regulations provide that if a no-fault claim is denied in whole or in part based on a medical examination or peer review report requested by the insurer, then the insurer shall release a copy of that report to, among others, the applicant or its attorney, upon written request (see 11 NYCRR 65-3.8[b][4]). Had it been the intent of the Department of Insurance to require the carrier to set forth a medical rationale in the prescribed denial of claim form (see NYS Form N-F 10; 11 NYCRR 65-3.4[c][11]), it would have so provided."

This is a seismic change with a level of force far beyond the Richter Scale in the realm of no-fault medical necessity litigation and arbitrations. It also solidifies a trend by the Appellate Division to pull back the reins on some of the more "creative" Appellate Term decisions.

I expect to see a legion of defense attorneys waving these decisions around in court tomorrow...

Cardozo Law Grad. Jumps Off Empire State Building

According to his registration profile, Moshe Kanovsky was previously an associate at the small firm of Lawrence, Krause & Associates. As demonstrated by a recent job posting, the pay at this firm was just awful:

Attorney: Krause & Associates, 67 Wall Street, New York, NY, 10005. Plaintiff personal injury firm, $35,000. Cover letter, resume and writing sample.

Add this abysmal salary to the fact that many Cardozo students are now graduating law school with over 150k worth of student loan debt at 8% interest, and you can see how someone could so easily be pushed over the edge.

As someone on the autoadmit board, so aptly put it:

"Dude, picture yourself in six figure debt and busting your ass for 2200-2400 in billables only to pull a salary of 35k -- in NYC, no less. That is bound to give anyone issues."

"Now the state bar and ABA will hold a bunch of stupid conferences and meetings and shit where NOTHING will be decided and of course NOTHING will change and the ABA will of oourse continue to accredit more and more TTT schools."

www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=612983&mc=53&forum_id=2

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A lawyer has leaped to his death from a 69th-floor office at New York's Empire State Building, severing a leg that crashed to the sidewalk in front of horrified onlookers.

Cops raced to the 102-story landmark just before 3pm local time on Friday after several witnesses called 911 to report a body part on the ground. A police source identified the dead man as Moshe Kanovsky, 31, of Brooklyn.

"I cried and got sick to my stomach," said Theresa Colon, 46, a tourist from Virginia who was accompanied by her 11-year-old daughter and 16-year-old niece. "I pray he knew who God was."

The left leg, severed below the knee, was bare except for a gray and black sock. Police said the rest of Kanovsky's body was found intact on a 30th-floor landing.

Investigators questioned employees at Levine & Blit, a personal injury practice, and at Ashok Karmaker. Both law firms share a suite on the 69th floor where Kanovsky "did odds-and-ends work" for Karmaker.

It wasn't immediately clear what prompted Kanovsky's suicide.

"He was interviewing a client," said a man who works in the suite. "He just got up, opened the window and jumped."

A police source said that Kanovsky met with the client in one room and jumped from another.

At least 30 people have jumped from the Empire State Building since it opened in 1931. Before Kanovsky, Dovid Abramowitz, 21, was the last to die. He leaped from the 66th floor on February 2, 2006, after buying a ticket to the 86th-floor observation deck.

AP

"LILY" and the "EGGMAN" -- Hughes Hubbard Dungeon Masters

4/3/07 -- HH associate provides a further description of Lily:

Hahaha. I laughed out loud when I saw this thread! I actually saw "Lily" today at the office.

For those who don't know, "Lily" is not her actual name. Her real name rhymes with Lily and I will use this psuedonym to protect the guilty.

Anyone at HH knows who she is. She is a grotesque 300 lbs, and her physical deformities are utterly beyond description. Her best friend is a bag of cheetos, and her fat, mangled fingers are often coated with their orange powder. She drives her slaves (this is the slang for "managing" temps or "contract attorneys") offsite in a basement in New Jersey. I believe there may be windows, but I have not been there myself to verify this fact.

Lily does maintain a presence in the New York office, rather unfortunately, and we see her rear her ugly head from time to time. Probably just taking orders from some non-equity partner in charge of the firm's various doc review projects. The sole purpose of this woman's existence is to squeeze every last drop of efficiency out of each slave, and to make their miserable lives as horrible as possible, all for $35/hour.

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"Lily" the (17th?) year associate who "manages" the contract attorneys is a fat, nasty monster. "Lily" once ripped a cellphone out of someone's hand at the offsite location. "Lily" also fired people on the spot for having newspapers at their "desks" and wanted to take away garbage cans as a way to make the space cleaner (someone needs to retake the logic games portion of the LSAT). "Lily" takes it upon herself to impose cost-cutting measures which only serve to undermine efficiency and work product quality. She has brought about a state of affairs whereby overtime is treated like the holy grail and the miserly meal allowance and tickets to ride in cars with maniac drivers are glimmering mirages in a desert. Meanwhile, newspapers reveal that the client has set aside billions of dollars in legal fees and that the firm has matched associate salary hikes to remain competitive. Translation: "Lily" is a woman getting paid over $200,000 / year to sit on her ass and who is trying to cheat contract attorneys out of every penny.

Speaking of bathrooms, in lockstep with Paul, Weiss, the temps working at the offsite location have to sign in and out to use the bathroom. An attorney at that space was driven to smearing his feces on the wall of the men's room there. "Lily" surmised that the substance was actually chocolate. The temps kept in the dungeon of the firm's main office have to use grimy hall passes to the bathroom. The ceiling of the men's room crashed down into a stall and was left in that state for a week. All of the toilets regurgitate waste in the same manner of the firm's work product-billing system. The floor beneath the bathrooms is rotting, and the stench invades the air. One time, they refilled the soap dispensers with flourscent pink gummy goop. People of the same and opposite gender were indeed followed to the bathroom by the ex-communicated on-site coordinator. At one point, the temps were told they would have to deduct bathroom breaks from their paychecks. No wonder people are driven to smearing feces on the walls . . .

As for "Egg Man," this man is so physically repulsive that his image is excluded from the firm's website. Physicality aside, the man is a dick. His former law school classmates remember him running up to professors to tell on students who hadn't done the reading for the day. These tactics are still employed in his capacity of slave-driver at HHR. Anyone arriving at the site a minute late must report to him. Although he occupies hallways and door frames like a clogged artery, his step is feather-light. He loves to stealthily sneak into the workroom and "catch" the temps under his tutelage engaged in non-work behaviors. He pits coworkers against each other and tries to convert some into snitches; however, often the tattletale gets the axe along with the troublemaker. He doesn't seem to do any billable legal work apart from taking up space bumbling around and stuttering instructions about the doc review. He always has a sinister expression on his face, belying the myth that fat people are supposed to be jolly. In fact, he may be getting his "jollies" from putting temps on edge through his espionage and witch hunt tactics. He is single-handely responsible for many of the progressively worsening conditions on the project. In the year since his hiring (more likely than not accomplished by means of nepotism), he has engaged in a Reign of Terror. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity!