The Legal Intelligencer Blog

Where Are All the Women- and Minority-Owned Firms??

By Jaime Bochet

Of the Legal Staff

Every year, The Legal Intelligencer publishes a magazine called "PALaw: Annual Report on the Legal Profession," which provides hard data and analysis on PA's legal landscape, including our Managing Partners Survey (an anonymous survey currently accessible online at www.tlisurvey.com, password palaw),  and the 100 Largest Law Firms in PA.

One of the key sections we're looking to improve is the "Women- and Minority-Owned Firms." We believe there are a number of such firms that go unreported, and we want to collect more data and list more firms.

Maybe you're a woman who started her own solo or small firm, or you know someone who did. Maybe you work for a minority attorney who runs his or her own firm. Maybe you have a friend who knows someone ... see where I'm going with this? We want to include those firms, and it will help them to get their names out there and in front of the thousands of lawyers who use the PaLAW all year. 

And being included couldn't be easier. All you have to do is get in touch with me by e-mail or phone, and fill out a simple, one-page survey. That's it. And no, we don't charge anyone to be included in the magazine. 

In addition to giving greater exposure to the firms in the magazine, we'll get to know these firms better. This creates opportunities for them to be called for comment on stories we're working on, and to pitch articles for the paper and our special supplements.

I hope that you'll take a moment to get in touch with me, or tell someone else to give me a call. We want to know you're out there, and we want to make sure you're getting the recognition you deserve. Call me at 215-557-2368, or e-mail me now!

This is Progress? Low Percentage of Fortune 500 Female GCs Is Up Slightly

By Jaime Bochet

Of the Legal Staff

 

It is not news to anyone that finding a female attorney in the corner office of a law firm is still a very rare occurrence. A story that appeared in The Legal earlier this week – examining the challenges faced by female leaders of Pennsylvania mid-sized law firms– included the sobering statistics, which we will trot out for you one more time, in case you’ve forgotten:

 

“The latest ‘National Survey on Retention and Promotion of Women in Law Firms,’ published by the National Association of Women Lawyers in 2009, found that only 6 percent of managing partners are women, up only 1 percent from the first survey published in 2006.

 

“A review of the 2009 PALaw magazine, a Legal affiliate, shows that only eight of the 100 largest firms in Pennsylvania have a woman in either a firmwide or office management position.”

 

(For those of us who never completed calculus, that’s 0.8 percent.)

 

Growth in those statistics has been halted for about 15 years, according to industry experts, and the concern is that the numbers will remain stagnant in law firms. This is especially concerning when you consider the fact that just about half (and in some years, more than half) of law school graduates are women – they just aren’t getting to the top.

 

But good news can be found in an unexpected place – the Fortune 500 list. According to a new article in Corporate Counsel magazine, a Legal affiliate, “female in-house lawyers … are regaining ground in general counsel posts at top U.S. companies.”

 

The article goes on to quote a recent Minority Corporate Counsel Association survey that shows “the number of Fortune 500 female GCs increased to the highest level ever this year, now sitting at 94.”

 

Ninety-four. Out of 500. (For the non-math folks again, that’s 18.8 percent.) That might sound like a low number, but in the legal world - and indeed, in corporate America – it’s actually big progress. In 2008, the number was 92, and then it sank to 85 in 2009 because of “the profit-quashing doldrums of the financial crisis.”

 

But that 18.8 percent takes on a whole new glow when compared to that 6 percent, NAWL’s female managing partners number. And it shines even brighter next to Pennsylvania’s percentage of female legal leaders: 0.8.

 

According to the article, “the MCAA stressed that those numbers are still a far cry from what the group would like to report. ‘We want the [GC] population to reflect the ratio of women graduating from law school,’ said [MCCA Executive Director Veta] Richardson.”

 

We’d like to see more progress too, especially close to home. Pennsylvania still has a long way to go to catch up with these numbers, but perhaps seeing is believing. Maybe the more female attorneys we see occupying those corner offices, the more we’ll believe it’s possible for others to get there too.

Back to School Means Thinking Ahead to 2011

By Jaime Bochet
Of the Legal Staff

It’s hard to believe that “Back to School” days are now upon us, but the summer is indeed drawing to a close. But there seems to be good news for law students heading back to campuses, especially those hoping to land a summer associate gig for 2011.

The Legal’s sister publication, the New York Law Journal, has an article today called “Law Schools See Signs of Better Job Opportunities for Students.” According to the piece, “The annual ritual of on-campus interviews for positions as summer associates kicks off Thursday at Columbia Law School with its early interview program, which runs until Aug. 17. And in an encouraging sign for the legal job market, Columbia Law reports that the number of interviews law firms have agreed to conduct with second-year students has increased by 8 percent to 8,780.”

This seems to be the trend across many law schools, brought on by increased optimism from law firms looking to get their summer classes back to normal levels. As I blogged previously, in response to our own “New Associates” survey conducted earlier in the summer, “Of the 20 firms that responded to the survey, 15 plan to have summers next year – including Ballard Spahr. The remaining five responded that they’re unsure – but nobody said, ‘No, definitely not.’”

Several of those firms had cut their classes – or, in Ballard Spahr’s case, their entire summer program – in order to stay afloat during the down economy, but the interview rates are yet another signal that optimism might be coming back into fashion this fall. 

But you may want to hold off on popping the champagne corks just yet. The NYLJ article also reports, “That recruiting has not returned to the highs of a few years ago is a reflection of business conditions. A recent report by consulting firm Hildebrandt Baker Robbins found that demand for law firm services nationwide was flat in the second quarter compared to a year earlier and was down 1 percent in New York City. Firms for the third straight quarter also reduced attorney head count, with a 1.6 percent drop nationally, the report said.

“‘We’re definitely seeing more optimistic outlooks from firms, and I think people have a fairly good handle on a recovery going forward,’ said Sharon Weinberg, managing director of J.P. Morgan’s law firm group. ‘But I don't think anyone thinks we're going back to the glory days.’”

To the law students out there, the best advice seems to be this: polish off your interview skills and spread out your bids. There’s no autumn chill in the air just yet, but at the end of interview season, you don’t want to be left out in the cold.

Tips for Lawyers From Legal Marketing Experts Part 5: Ethics of Marketing and Public Relations

Back in March of this year, I started a series of postings from the Legal Marketing Association’s national conference.

During the conference, I had the pleasure to present, along with various colleagues, during the Just JDs: Business Development Strategies for Lawyers program for marketing-oriented lawyers and law firm administrators at firms of all sizes, organized by Ross Fishman. For most of the recaps, I have shared my Twitter feed from the programs. For the "Ethics of Law Firm Marketing and Public Relations" program, for which I presented along with John Hellerman, I’m going to share various tips from our presentation (as I was not Tweeting and speaking at the same time).

There is a difference between law firm marketing and law firm public relations, but they both equal communications.

There are many ethical considerations of law firm communications.

Start with learning the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct, if they apply in your state. The main ABA Rules that are implicated in law firm communications include:

Rule 3.6 Trial Publicity

Rule 4.2 Communication with Person Represented by Counsel

Rule 4.3 Dealing with Unrepresented Person

Rule 7.1 Communication Concerning a Lawyer's Services

Rule 7.2 Advertising

Rule 7.3 Direct Contact with Prospective Clients

Rule 7.4 Communication of Fields of Practice and Specialization

Rule 7.5 Firm Names and Letterhead

Rule 8.5 Disciplinary Authority; Choice of Law

Legal Communication Do's:

Establish policies and compliance procedures

Adhere to rules of all states where you do business or seek clients

Keep records/copies

Steer clear of testimonials

Avoid subjectivity

Incorporate all necessary language

Use disclaimers

Legal Communication Don'ts:

Overtly solicit business

Give legal advice

Use subjective language referring to attorney or firm

Create unjustified expectations

Compare attorneys or firms

Talk about pending cases (material prejudice)

Ignore your state’s rules of conduct or multi-jurisdictional considerations

It is important to understand what news really is. Here are some rules to follow:

Proximity: Does the news affect the outlet’s audience?

Impact: How much does the news affect the outlet’s audience? More impact = Higher news value

Uniqueness: Is the news different from the ordinary? More unusual = Great news potential

Timeliness: How current is the news?

Prominence: Who is involved?

Conflict: Tension = News

The principles of a great news story include:

Remember your reporter’s audience

Tell a story

Simplicity (not too long — get to the core ASAP)

Unexpectedness

Concreteness (explain ideas in terms of sensory information, paint a picture)

Credibility (statistics, proof, quotes from experts)

Emotions (elicit feeling from your reader, listener or viewer)

If you are interested in legal marketing and social media, I also encourage you to check out experts across the country including: Heather Morse Milligan(The Legal Water Cooler blogger) who shares a great perspective from the LMA conference; Jayne Navarre, Rebecca Wissler, Lindsay Griffiths, Laura Gutierrez, Nancy Myrland,Lance Godard, Gail Lamarche, and Lydia Bednerik.

To learn how the use of Twitter shaped my conference experience, you can also read The PR Lawyer blog: Confessions from a Social Networker: How Twitter Shaped My #LMA10 Experience.

Stay tuned for future posts on law firm business development, marketing, public relations, and measuring return on investment, or ROI.

Gina F. Rubel, Esq.,

is the owner of Furia Rubel Communications, Inc., a public relations and marketing agencywith a niche in legal communications. A former Philadelphia trial attorney and public relations expert, Gina is the author of Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers. Gina and her PR and marketing firm have won numerous awards for legal communications, public relations, media relations, strategic planning, corporate philanthropy and leadership. She maintains a blog at www.ThePRLawyer.com, is a regular contributor to The Legal Intelligencer Blog and blogs for The Huffington Post. You can find her on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/ginafuriarubelor follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ginarubel. For more information, go to www.FuriaRubel.com.

You’ve heard of the FBI’s National Sex Offender Registry. How about the National Sexual Harassment Registry?!?

By Eric B. Meyer

EBossWatch, a group claiming to help people avoid hostile work environments and workplace bullying, launched what it calls the “National Sexual Harassment Registry,” on July 14.  The Registry, found here, is being billed as “a database and search tool for conducting searches to obtain information about people who have been accused of sexual harassment in the workplace.”

The database is searchable by name or company. Users can submit “tips” on “bad bosses” via e-mail.

[This posting is for informational purposes and should not be construed or interpreted as either legal advice on any matter or as in any way creating an attorney/client relationship]

Eric B. Meyer is a member of the labor and employment group at Dilworth Paxson LLP. Readers can contact Meyer via e-mail and follow him on Twitter.

How Facebook Can Make or Break Your Case

By Eric B. Meyer

Facebook has over 400 million active users.

Twitter users are recording an average of 55 million tweets a day.

If an employee files suit against your client, what are the odds the employee uses social media? I’d say they’re pretty good. Just imagine missing the Facebook post:

“I’ll do whatever it takes to get back at my employer.”

The first thing I do after I receive a copy of an employee-filed complaint — before I read the complaint — is check the plaintiff-employee out on Facebook and other social networking sites.

I print any information that employee has made publicly available. I save any pictures the employee has published online and I send a list of the employee’s friends to my employer-client to cross-check against a list of current and former employees. I do this because, generally, a Facebook user will allow friends greater access to online content.

Why do I want this information? Because many social media users do not filter what they publish online — they find social media cathartic. So, for every couple of banal “I’m going to the movies with John tonight” online posts, you’ll find an “I just had the worst day in the office because…” post.

Don’t believe me? Check out this, this, this and this blog post from Delaware labor and employment attorney Molly DiBianca, who writes about how a waitress lost her job for a complaint made on Facebook.

What if the plaintiff restricts Facebook access?
Not to fear. That’s what discovery is for.

Recently, in EEOC v. Simply Storage Management, a federal court permitted an employer to obtain discovery of an employee’s social networking activity that, through privacy settings, the employee had made “private” and not available to the general public.

That makes sense, right? I have yet to see a “tweet” or a Facebook status update appear on a privilege log.

So, as part of discovery, an employer should consider requesting:

All online profiles, postings, messages (including, without limitation, tweets, replies, retweets, direct messages, status updates, wall comments, groups joined, activity streams and blog entries), photographs, videos, and online communications that:

1. refer or relate to the allegations set forth in the complaint;

2. refer or relate to any facts or defenses raised in the answer;

3. reveal, refer or relate to any emotion, feeling or mental state; or

4. reveal, refer or relate to events that could reasonably be expected to produce a significant emotion, feeling or mental state.

If that doesn’t work, bring out the big guns: subpoenas and spoliation.

If the responding employee no longer has access to responsive information, then go right to the source with a subpoena. To guide you, here is a list of Internet Service Provider mailing addresses for service of subpoenas. (Just be prepared to pay some hefty fees, such as those Facebook charges for processing a third-party subpoena). And make sure you obtain a written consent (such as this one  from LinkedIn) from the employee. As labor and employment attorney John Hyman explains in a recent blog post, many social networking sites use the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2701 et seq., to aggressively protect the privacy of user content. 

Suppose, however, the subpoena to the social networking website fails; try the plaintiff’s online friends. Each Facebook user has a “Wall.”  Facebook users can post content, like photos, videos, and notes, to their own wall and, usually, to a friend’s wall. Facebook’s “Wall-to-Wall” feature allows you to see the history of Wall posts between two people. You can imagine, then, how this could come in handy during the course of litigation. Many Facebook users communicate Wall-to-Wall much as they would face-to-face.

If all else fails and you know that the plaintiff-employee is a Facebook user who has published online content relevant to the litigation, then you may have a good spoliation argument. Recently, Judge Shira A. Scheindlin of the Southern District of New York sanctioned 13 plaintiffs who failed to act diligently and search thoroughly at the time they reasonably anticipated litigation. According to Scheindlin, a recognized leader in e-discovery jurisprudence, writing in Pension Comm. of Univ. of Montreal Pension Plan v. Bank of Am. Secs., LLC.

[T]he courts have a right to expect that litigants and counsel will take the necessary steps to ensure that relevant records are preserved when litigation is reasonably anticipated, and that such records are collected, reviewed, and produced to the opposing party.

It’s 2010 and the way we communicate has changed dramatically.

Get with the times.

If your client is sued by an individual and you are not harnessing the power of social media as part of your litigation strategy, you’re making a BIG mistake.

Eric B. Meyer  is a member of the Labor and Employment Group at Dilworth Paxson LLP. Readers can contact Mr. Meyer via e-mail and follow him on Twitter. [This posting is for informational purposes and should not be construed or interpreted as either legal advice on any matter or as in any way creating an attorney/client relationship]

"Lawyers on the Fast Track" — Nominations Open June 1

 Once a year, the Pennsylvania legal community comes together to celebrate the "next generation" of great attorneys —The Legal Intelligencer's Lawyers on the Fast Track. But before they can be honored, they have to be nominated — by YOU!

From June 1 to July 9, the nominations window will be open for you to nominate the most impressive attorney(s) you know under the age of 40. Official nomination forms will be available for download on The Legal's Web site, as well as by request via e-mail to the attention of Jaime Bochet at [email protected].

The only parameters are the nominee must base his or her practice in Pennsylvania, and they cannot have received this honor in the past. Otherwise, anyone who has a completed nomination form submitted on their behalf may be considered.

Completed nomination forms will be evaluated by an impartial judging panel, made up of prominent members of the Pennsylvania legal community. Those nominees receiving the highest composite scores from all the panelists will be our 2010 Lawyers on the Fast Track.

The full list of honorees will be be announced in August and profiles of them will be featured in a special supplement to The Legal, published in September. They will also be honored at a celebration dinner in October.

So watch The Legal's Web site or e-mail Jaime Bochet to request a nomination form beginning June 1. Don’t let a deserving member of the profession go unrecognized — nominate them to be a Lawyer on the Fast Track.

Hear From the Media: Podcast

On April 22, 2010, I moderated a fantastic panel that addressed How and when to share your opinion with the press.

The Philadelphia Bar Association has shared the program as a podcast on their website. 

Listen in and hear from:

-Bernard Dagenais, Editor, Philadelphia Business Journal

-Hank Grezlak, Associate Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, The Legal Intelligencer

-Lisa Hostein, Executive Editor, Jewish Exponent

-Guy Petroziello, Editorial Page Editor, Bucks County Courier Times

-Irv Randolph, Managing Editor, The Philadelphia Tribune

To hear what these journalists had to say about lawyers and the media, click on this link http://www.philadelphiabar.org/page/Podcasts_Speaker_Programs?appNum=4 and then the program name.

Gina F. Rubel, Esq.,is the owner of Furia Rubel Communications, Inc., a public relations and marketing agency with a niche in legal communications. A former Philadelphia trial attorney and public relations expert, Gina is the author of Everyday Public Relations for Lawyers. Gina and her agency have won numerous awards for legal communications,PR, media relations, strategic planning, corporate philanthropy, websites, marketing and leadership. She maintains a blog at www.ThePRLawyer.com, is a regular contributor to The Legal Intelligencer Blog and blogs for The Huffington Post. You can find her on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/ginafuriarubel or follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ginarubel.  For more information, go to www.FuriaRubel.com.

To friend or Not to Friend – Social Media for Lawyers Part 4: Twitter for Lawyers

Twitter is one of the fastest growing social networks on the Web. Recent statistics show that there are more that six million Twitter users and in the average day, there are more than 225 million tweets. In fact, Twitter turned down a $ 500 million buyout offer from Facebook even though their current business model is not income generating and VCs already have $55 million invested.

What is Twitter anyway?

Twitter is a social service for people to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of 140-character answers to one simple question: What are you doing? The idea is to have a conversation with the people you follow and those who follow you. The term “follow” is used similar to “friend” on Facebook and “contacts” on Linkedin.

Twitter is considered a micro-blog and it uses its own brand of language. A Twitter user is also known as a twitter-er, twitterer or tweeter. And when you want to reference a twitterer in a tweet, you prefaced their “handle” with an @ symbol. So, my “handle” on Twitter is ginarubel but if someone tweets to me on Twitter, it will say @ginarubel.

A tweet is either a noun -- a message sent on Twitter -- or a verb -- the act of posting a message on Twitter. The people who tweet in general are considered tweople. And when you post something already tweeted by another twitterer, it is called a retweet or, for short, “RT”.  When you contact someone directly through Twitter it is called a direct message or DM. And when you want to host, participate in, group, filter and track a conversation you use a hashtag. (Hm, I wonder why it is not called a twashtag.) The twitterer creates a hashtag simply by prefixing a word with a hash symbol (#). Example: #hashtag. You can then track the conversation real-time at http://www.hashtags.org/.

 And the six-plus million Twitter users as a whole are known as the twitosphere or twittersphere. For a more extensive list of Twitter language, go to the Twitter Dictionary, read Mashable’s 66 Twitter Terms You Don’t Need to Know and follow @twittonary. For every day Twitter tips, follow @Twitter_Tips.

 To tweet or not to tweet?

As a public relations practitioner and lawyer, I do not believe all attorneys should spend time posting on Twitter. It is certainly a useful tool and an excellent way to expand your network, build your reputation, comment on legal issues and trends, and establish a relationship with members of the media and other thought leaders. It is also an excellent tool for you to research public opinion on many different topics.

On the other hand, everything you post is up for public scrutiny, you must be careful not to provide legal advice, and you must follow the Rules of Professional Conduct. Tweets used for marketing cannot directly solicit business, cannot be false or misleading, cannot omit necessary facts (tough to do in 140 characters), cannot compare one lawyer to another, cannot contain subjective claims and cannot create unjustified expectations.

And as I’ve suggested in previous posts, all law firms should be adopting social media policies for these very reasons and to protect their firm brands.

Do lawyers actually use Twitter?

Although Twitter is still a very new phenomenon, it is growing rapidly. Lawyers actually do use Twitter. In fact, there is a comprehensive collection of lawyers and legal marketers on Twitter at LexTweet  which, as of this week has nearly 3,000 users in its "community." ﾠ

I spoke with Julie A. Schaefer, founder and president of You Manage Law, who said, “It is all in the results. Our colleagues are seeing them in the form of direct referrals and new business opportunities.”

What do the experts say about Twitter for lawyers?

In order to get a broad spectrum of opinions, I posted the following tweet on Twitter and DM’d a few of my tweople: “I'm writing an article on Twitter for Lawyers. What do you think? Should attorneys tweet? Why? Why not? Consider your A permission to quote.” (A stands for answer in my 140-character post.)

Here’s what I received in response:

Paul Gillin, a long-time technology journalist, aka @pgillin said, “Great way to promote expertise by commenting on timely legal topics. Any smart lawyer should know the bounds of what to say.”

Russell Thomas of Earned Relevance, aka @3rddeadline said, “They should Tweet to crowd source, listen, and exist at the edge of the business news cycle.”

Lance Godard of Are Your Writing This Down, aka @lancegodard said, “Lawyers should be on Twitter and should use it to communicate with clients.”  Lance sited two blog posts:  Aren’t You on Twitter Yet? and Shouldn't lawyers be tweevangelizing to clients?

In a comment to Lance’s post, Doug Cornelius, the Chief Compliance Officer at a Beacon Capital Partners, LLC, and Compliance Building blogger opined that “there many be some over-enthusiasm for Twitter as a client development tool for lawyers.” He said, “I think there is a big variation depending on your practice. Chris Brogan gets lots of clients through Twitter because that is the nature of his business. He is a social media consultant. Kevin O'Keefe gets lots of business through Twitter because he is in the social media business. I am a big fan of Twitter. But I am less sold on evangelizing it to clients.”

Laure Fitton, owner of Pistachio Consulting and a leading Twitter expert, aka @Pistachio, said, “Twitter is just a new channel to communicate that has significant additional value over old channels. Twitter is socially networked, it is mobile and it keeps you in contact with a lot of people and a lot of ideas in a very fast, fluid way.” She said, “Twitter is a tremendous way to circulate ideas, to listen and learn, to demonstrate thought leadership and to build a powerful network. It also has astonishing SEO value. Used well, it is a powerful tool for building reputation, leadership, trust and influence.” I encourage you to take a look at Pistachio’s Twitter for Lawyers reading list.

Others in my social network that I communicated with about Twitter for lawyers shared additional thoughts.

Cherry Manuel, a marketing consultant shared what she called a “compelling audio clip regarding Social Media, Twitter and Law Firms.” The clip is from Lawyer2Lawyer sponsored by Law.com, hosted by Bob Ambrogi and Craig Williams in a conversation with legal marketing professionals, Heather Milligan and Brian Carter on social networking. If you do nothing else, listen to this audio clip. It is an excellent resource on social media for lawyers.

Francis Pileggi of FoxRothschild said, “I am still learning the benefits as a lawyer of LinkedIn and Facebook and Twitter as an adjunct to my blog, but so far they play a supplemental role to my writing at Delaware Litigation.”

Matthew Homann, founder of LexThink and author of the [non]billable hour blog said, “Twitter can be a tremendous resource for not only connecting with potential clients, but connecting with their influencers. Twitter, with effective use of search, is also better adapted to a lawyer's busy schedule.” Check out Matt’s blog: Ten Tweets About Twitter.

How can lawyers use Twitter?

The great thing about the Internet and social media is that there is no need to reinvent the wheel. If you type a question into a search engine, chances are, someone has already answered it. Chris Winfiled, the President and Co-Founder of 10e20, presented “What is Twitter and How Can I Use It?” at LegalTech along with Kevin O’Keefe and Matthew Homann. I encourage you to check it out.

As to how lawyers can use Twitter, my advice is that you need to determine if your target audiences, including clients, prospective clients, referral sources and the media, are using Twitter. If you find that they are, then this may be a very useful tool to incorporate into your business development practices. As with any communications, engage wisely. Allocate 10 to 15 minutes per day. Follow others. Listen. Learn. Then engage. To review a more detailed list of considerations lawyers should take when participating in social media, read Part 1 of this series.

In Part 5 of To friend or Not to Friend – Social Media for Lawyers, I will talk about the ins and outs of YouTube. Stay tuned to The Legal Intelligencer’s Lawyers and the Media blog.

Gina F. Rubel Esq. is president and CEO of Furia Rubel Communications Inc.

 

Lawyer Reprimanded for Fashion Choice

Recently, in a Milwaukee County courthouse, state prosecutor Warren Zier was reprimanded by Judge William Sosnay for wearing an ascot to court. His rebuke has garnered media attention from the Wall Street Journal to the Chicago Sun-Times.

The ascot is a wide cravat of patterned silk cloth which, in England, was traditionally gray and only worn with formal morning wear, to weddings or England’s Royal Ascot races, where it gets its name. Early examples of men wearing “neck-cloths” are found on Trajan’s column (113 A.D.) and on China’s “Terracotta Army” (221 B.C.). In the U.S., the ascot was commonly worn for business in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the Milwaukee County courthouse issued a rule last April ordering that “men will wear coats and ties and women will wear dresses, suits or pantsuits.” So when Zier wore an ascot to court, Sosnay had something to say.

Sosnay, who is described by the Journal-Sentinel as a “pompadoured judge long known as a fastidious dresser,” objected, saying “Zier’s sartorial choice bordered on “contempt.”

Perhaps the ascot is coming back as a fashion statement – perhaps not. I wonder what Cojo would say…. But I doubt media attention was the goal when attorney Zier dressed for his court appearance that day.

Gina F. Rubel, Esq.
Furia Rubel Communications, Inc.
www.furiarubel.com