Law Firms

An Irish-American law firm retained as production counsel for hit movie Borat is expected to defend the film’s makers against a $30 million legal suit filed by two Romanian villagers. They claim they were lured into appearing in the film under false pretences. The Manhattan firm of Smith Dornan Dehn came to prominence when it […]

Fiji’s army head, who is threatening a coup against the government, says the sooner the military acts the better. In a TV interview, Cmdr Frank Bainimarama said the army would “find ways” to make Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase resign if he refused to do so. He said he planned to appoint an interim civilian administration

The investigation into the poisoning of Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former Russian K.G.B. operative, will likely broaden in coming days, Britain’s highest ranking law enforcement officer said today, and news reports said British counterterrorism officers were planning to fly to Moscow to interview witnesses. Mr. Litvinenko died Nov. 23 of radiation poisoning, and a radioactive

It seems a no-brainer that copying a DVD movie and reselling it should be illegal. But how about copying it to your iPod? Or, if you’re a professor, copying snippets of “Citizen Kane” to illustrate a point in your class? Well, the answer is “No, you can’t” on the iPod. But academics can freely capture

The Business of Law, previewed exclusively in this week’s print edition of the NBR, lifts the lid on the secretive world of lawfirm profits,giving an overview of who is doing well and who isn’t, measured against crucial indicators such as the ratio of partners to solicitors. Chapman Tripp tops the league tables of lawfirms by

The accounting firm KPMG asked a federal appeals panel yesterday to rule that a district judge could not compel the firm to pay the legal fees of former executives facing criminal charges in a tax-shelter fraud investigation. Appearing before a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, a lawyer

New York’s top judicial officials outlined a plan today to begin revamping the state’s 300-year old system of town and village courts, which have been criticized for decades as outmoded, unsupervised and unfair. The plan, announced here by the state’s chief judge, Judith S. Kaye, included some measures that critics of the courts have been

New Zealand’s anti-smacking bill looks certain to be passed by Parliament in a slightly weakened form. The NZ Herald has confirmed claims by the bill’s sponsor, Green MP Sue Bradford, that she has enough votes to ensure it will become law. The bill will change the Crimes Act to remove the defence of “reasonable force”