In December I wrote about the apology a Maricopa County Sheriff’s Detention Officer was ordered to give after taking some papers from the defense attorney’s file in open court.  To refresh your recollection, the Detention Officer refused to apologize for conduct he thought was appropriate, so the Judge held him in contempt of court and ordered him to … Continue reading Appellate Arguments – the Sheriff’s Detention Officer and His Refusal to Apologize →

The University of Oregon School of Law is pleased to host this year’s installment of the ADR Works-in-Progress Conference.  We’ll be gathering in Eugene, Oregon, October 15-16, 2010. Lots more information soon.  (No, Andrea, no details yet on precisely which local wines we’ll be serving.) For now, please mark the dates on your calendars and … Continue reading 2010 Works-In-Progress, October in Oregon →

Today, AT&T filed a petition for certiorari in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, raising the question “[w]hether the FAA preempts States from conditioning the enforcement of an arbitration agreement on the availability of particular procedures–here, class-wide arbitration–when those procedures are not necessary to ensure that the parties to the arbitration agreement are able to vindicate … Continue reading Cert Petition Filed Raising FAA Preemption — Concepcion →

Surely there are fewer better proxies for legitimacy than to be the target of The Onion. http://www.theonion.com/content/news/saints_colts_hoping_to_resolve —— Saints, Colts Hoping To Resolve Super Bowl Through Diplomacy JANUARY 29, 2010 | ONION SPORTS MIAMI—Team officials from the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts emerged from a tense, 12-hour negotiating session Thursday and told reporters that, … Continue reading Football, Diplomacy, and The Onion →

A document was recently submitted to the ABA House of Delegates in support of the Uniform Collaborative Law Act. The letter was signed by about fifty prominent law professors and deans nationwide (along with some riff-raff from Oregon). If I could figure out how to attach it to this post, or if I could find … Continue reading Educators for the UCLA (no, not that UCLA) →

The Harvard Negotiation Law Review’s 2010 Symposium, the Negotiation Within, is scheduled for Saturday February 27, 2010 at the Harvard Law School.  As you might anticipate, the focus is inward directed on issues such as identity and senses of self.  The line up of speakers is first rate (of course) and should lead to some interesting … Continue reading Harvard Negotiation Law Review Symposium – The Negotiation Within →

Every year the ABA’s DR Section announces two major awards, the D’Almeberte/Raven Award and the Lawyer as Problem Solver Award.  The awards will be presented at the ABA DR Section’s annual conference in San Francisco.  Below is a little about each award and the winner of each award.  Congratulations to all.   And, it’s always a pleasure when a … Continue reading ABA DR Section Announces Awards →

I was listening to a great story this morning on NPR which described an interesting experiment.  In his book How We Decide, and in a recent Wall Street Journal article, Jonah Lehrer writes about an experiment by Stanford University professor Baba Shiv, who collected several dozen undergraduates and divided them into two groups. In the WSJ … Continue reading Chocolate Cake v. Fruit–Or Why Get Emotional During “Rational” Negotiations →

Virginia State Senator Emmet Hanger recently introduced a bill in the Virginia Senate which would give formal structure to restorative justice programs in Virginia by specifically recognizing that a court can order an offender into a “court-approved restorative justice program.”  The direct link to the bill is:  http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?101+ful+SB679  The bill also specifically recognizes that victim … Continue reading Restorative Justice Bill Introduced in Virginia’s Senate →