Want to get this daily news briefing by email? Here's the sign-up. 

|

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

JUDGE'S TRIAL – At times choking back tears, a California judge took the stand in his own disciplinary trial Thursday and denied allegations that he sexually harassed dozens of women over nearly two decades. Amanda Bronstand reports that Justice Jeffrey Johnson called some of the women's accounts outright lies and described them as the product of long-held racial stereotypes of African American men. "I'm at risk of losing my job because someone's saying I'm talking about the color and size of my penis. It's insulting," he said. Among the allegations he denies are those by Victoria Chaney, a fellow judge on the appeals court in L.A., who said Johnson propositioned her. The hearing that began on Aug. 5 before the Commission on Judicial Performance at the California State Bar Court is expected to last a month.

ALL RISE - This fall, nine "brave souls," undeterred by a 7:30 a.m. class start time, will be the first students in the new University of Pennsylvania Law School's appellate advocacy clinic, Marcia Coyle writes. Co-led by DLA Piper appellate advocacy partner Ilana Eisenstein, the clinic joins a growing, prestigious community of law school Supreme Court and appellate litigation clinics. Eisenstein, a former federal prosecutor and assistant to the U.S. solicitor general, will share leadership duties with Penn Law professor Jean Galbraith, a former clerk to the late Justice John Paul Stevens.

FLAGGED – New York's "red flag" gun law, set to take effect tomorrow, will require judges in each county of the state to evaluate whether people should be temporarily suspended from owning or buying a gun based on their potential risk of harming themselves or others. Dan M. Clark reports that the law has gained national attention as federal lawmakers considered, in recent weeks, replicating the idea on a national level as a response to recent mass shootings. New York joins 15 other states with similar measures, most of which were enacted after the mass shooting at a high school Parkland, Florida, last year.

|

EDITOR'S PICKS

Ex-Trademark Law Guru at Amazon Launches IP Boutique

Weedmaps Changes Advertising Policy Before Class Action Is Filed

|

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING

GOING LOCAL – Big Law leaders in South Korea are making formerly rare lateral moves to local law firms there. John Kang reports on a number of lateral jumps among top lawyers from firms like Simpson Thacher, Paul Hastings and McDermott as prominent Korean firms have begun operating more like international firms by extending their reach globally.

|

WHAT YOU SAID

"There's a whole range of stuff that Republican administrations engage in all the time, and you don't see the law firms challenging it, but what's going on here, like the census case, is so beyond the pale. That's why you're seeing lawyers stand up and do this."

—  NEAL KATYAL, PARTNER AT HOGAN LOVELLS AND FORMER ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL, ON LAWYERS CHALLENGING TRUMP ADMINISTRATION POLICIES ON A PRO BONO BASIS, AND SPECIFICALLY ON THE TRAVEL BAN CASES.