According to one of the British tabloids, looks like Lindsay Lohan will be released from jail soon, having likely served not more than 9 days of a 90 day sentence imposed last week for her for violations of the terms of the probation she was serving for various prior offenses, including charges for drunk driving and possession of cocaine. I know many will express outrage that the mediocre actress will serve so little time. Frankly, I am not particularly concerned. Whatever her prior offenses, Lohan didn’t kill anyone, she didn’t hurt anyone (except maybe herself). The girl doesn’t need to serve a lengthy jail sentence. She needs help. And the government needs to spend its resources pursuing real criminals who have committed real crimes. Guys like Roger Clemens.

During last night’s installment of celebrity apprentice, that’s what Sharon Osborne told Trump when he asked her why she was so emotional during the boardroom confrontation at the end of which Osborne was fired. It happens that the charity for which Osborne was playing was very personal to her, and thus her plea that it wasn’t just business to her. Setting aside the obvious – that all of the players on the NBC show are competing to benefit causes that are in some way important to them personally – Osborne hit on what is, or ought to be, a deeper truth for all of us who are engaged in serving clients or customers. Business SHOULD BE personal. We should identify with our clients’ needs as keenly as we do with our own. We should engage with them on a level where their success matters as much as our own, and where we feel it as sharply as they do when they fall short. As Tom Peters might say, its all about empathy. I don’t mean to suggest that you become so involved with your clients’ issues that you lose objectivity or the ability to provide clear headed analysis. But if you can’ empathize, and don’t understand where the customer is coming from, your advice or service will be at least somewhat lacking. We all should strive to make our clients needs as personal to us as Sharon has her charitable works.

On this weekend’s installment of C-SPAN’s “America and the Courts” Justice Antonin Scalia spoke to and took questions from a group of high school students from Virginia (you can view the program at this link for a limited period of time). I highly recommend that you take a look if you have any interest in the Supreme Court. 

http://abajournal.com/images/blawgs/covers/Neukom.jpgFormer Microsoft general counsel Bill Neukom has assumed the presidency of the American Bar Association. Might we hope that, under Mr. Neukom’s leadership, the ABA might perhaps be more attuned to the interests and needs of enterprise?

The New Jersey Law Journal reports that a New Jersey appellate court has held that attorneys cannot be held liable for malicious prosecution even when their client pursued the underlying litigation for an improper purpose unless the attorneys pursued the case for an improper purpose of their own. In Pennsylvania cases for abuse of process are typically filed pursuant to a statutory provision known as the Dragonetti Act. Court decisions applying the Act are more or less consistent with the New Jersey decision. In Pennsylvania, to prevail in such a claim, the plaintiff must show that the underlying case was pursued in bad faith, both objectively and subjectively. In other words, the lawyer cannot be liable for abuse of process unless he or she held the subjective belief that the case lacked merit or had an improper purpose for pursuing the matter. The New Jersey case is significant, however, because it would appear to go a step further in that the court held that the lawyer can be insulated from liability even where he knows that the case is weak, and where the client has an improper purpose so long as the lawyer does not have an improper purpose of his own (although it would seem to me that litigating an acknowledged weak or baseless case for a client with malicious intent maybe ought to qualify). It will be interesting to see if this holding finds wider application or if its just an outlier.

It appears that the senior class president at Rutgers University will not be allowed to graduate with her class. University administrators appparently took a dim view of her part time job burgling her fellow students. Maybe she can claim that she stole from her schoolmates because she suffered from ,ow self-esteem caused by Don Imus. Stupider defenses have been asserted.

The title pretty much says itm all. 45 days in the slammer for Paris. Read about it here. Or wait for the TV movie.

Looks like Paris may be spending some time soon as a guest of the state:

Paris Hilton should be jailed for 45 days for violating terms of her probation for an alcohol-related reckless driving conviction, city prosecutors say. In documents filed April 30th in Superior Court, prosecutors said they also want Hilton to be required to stay away from alcohol for 90 days and wear a monitoring device that will chart whether she complies.

The recommendation will be reviewed by a judge when Hilton appears for a probation violation hearing on Friday.

Hilton pleaded no contest in January to reckless driving stemming from a Sept. 7 arrest in Hollywood. She was sentenced to 36 months probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.

She was pulled over by California Highway Patrol on Jan. 15. Officers informed Hilton she was driving on a suspended license and she signed a document acknowledging she was not to drive, according to court papers. She was pulled over by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies on Feb. 27 for speeding and driving without her headlights, at which time she was charged with violating her probation.

Hilton’s spokesman, Elliot Mintz, said at the time that she wasn’t aware her license was suspended.

Prosecutors say by signing the document Hilton knew she was not allowed to drive. They also note that as of April 17 she had yet to enroll in the alcohol education program.

“These violations demonstrate Hilton’s disregard for the vehicle laws of this state as well as for the conditions of her probation,” the court filing said. “This court should … include imprisonment as a condition of reinstating her probation.”

Source: Associated Press

So says former Survivor contestant Richard Hatch, who is doing 51 months as a guest of the federal government on a tax evasion conviction. I guess no one let Hatch in on the little secret that prison life totally sucks. Maybe that would have made him think twice about not paying taxes on his “Survivor” winnings. Then again, it was clear that the guy was a jerk on the show. Based on details about his life that came out about him after he won “Survivor,” it would appear that he’s a jerk in real life, too. Jerks don’t usually do well anywhere – in or out of prison.