The following are highlights from the KCBA Board of Trustees meeting held on February 15, convened by KCBA President Tahmina Watson.

Have you ever found yourself late in the afternoon sitting in a conference room when the mediator walks in only to tell you that your latest offer is getting no traction with the other side? You’re still so far apart it feels less and less likely the case will settle. Nothing you’ve communicated to the mediator has moved the needle to a point where you or your client are encouraged to make any big moves. According to the mediator, your opponent believes a jury will believe that your client has testified untruthfully, and his credibility is now a central issue. You respond that any misstatements are minor, inconsequential to liability or the alleged damages. You may even ask the mediator, “so what?” Maybe this is just that one in a hundred case that will go to trial. You’re confident a jury will see these misstatements as you do, a distraction. But to put a painful point on it, the mediator tells you she doesn’t like your chances with a jury. She warns there is risk ahead.

Our firm was recently contacted by a company about a problem many businesses face at the moment: It had run out of cash. The company operates in a business sector which was impacted by difficulties specific to that industry, along with challenges caused by the pandemic and the unwillingness of the owners to keep funding losses. They wanted to discuss a wind-down plan.

The saying goes, “he who represents himself has a fool for a client.”1 So often, clients (and sometimes their trial attorneys) are under the misconception that if the opposing party chooses to represent themselves in an appeal, it will be easy sailing. In my experience, nothing can be further from the truth, especially if the opposing party chooses to represent themselves as the appellant.

Some attorneys file lawsuits against real estate brokers and firms without fully understanding the intricacies of the real estate brokerage industry. So here are some tips from an unlikely source, a real estate broker.

Neal Black’s roots in Pacific Northwest’s forests run deep. Fittingly, his favorite adage is “Society grows great when people plant trees under whose shade they know they’ll never sit.” Neal has spent a lifetime in law and policy, learning to see the forests, see the trees, and plant new ones.

On March 17, this Jewish boy from Brooklyn raises a glass to his old Irish boss, Stephen Martin Reilly. After a brief (right out of law school) stint as a junior prosecutor in San Francisco, the prospect of taking another bar exam, and looking for a job in another state, where I knew no one, except the graduate student at UW I was dating, didn’t sit well with my friends and family. But I was young and smitten by the lass. So off I went, with my cockatiel Baretta1 perched inside a shoe box on my lap, flying to Seattle.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been in the news lately. What implications does it have for mediation? Will you be able to settle cases more efficiently and get a better result with “big data” at your fingertips? Maybe.

The KCBA Labor & Employment Law Section is proud to present the 56th Annual Pacific Coast Labor & Employment Law Conference at the Seattle Convention Center on April 27–28, 2023. The Conference is typically the largest labor and employment law conference in the Pacific Northwest, welcoming around 300 attendees who average 14+ years of experience representing employees, unions, management, or government agencies in labor and employment matters.

When Socrates asked us to explain what justice is I blushed. Not from embarrassment, thank you very much, but from exasperation. Anyone familiar with the real world understands justice is the advantage of the stronger. In fact, injustice on a grand scale often appears stronger, freer, and more masterly than justice. And while Socrates may imagine examples of justice in the form of wise rule, the refutation is incomplete. This is because Socrates is nothing more than the doubt inside your soul. It knows nothing but how to make you squirm.