ABA Journal

I wonder if in discovery she requested the car service records of all the other partners. I’m sure she wasn’t the only one abusing the program.

By Joe on 2012 05 16, 1:56 pm CDT

She used the Skadden car service hundreds of times for personal errands and commuting and billed it to clients??!!  Sounds like billing fraud as opposed to mere violations of Skadden car service policy.

Why are clients being charged for personal errands and commuting by Skadden attorneys?

Strange defense of her conduct.  Like saying, “I have bilked my clients for years and no one said anything until now.  So that clearly cannot be the real reason I was fired.”

By Steve on 2012 05 18, 8:45 am CDT

I know this doesn’t play well with my European Socialist identity, but I do believe that employers should be allowed to decide who works for them.

Call my a hypocrite.

By Tom Youngjohn on 2012 05 18, 3:43 pm CDT

call “me”, omg.

By Tom Youngjohn on 2012 05 18, 3:44 pm CDT

Don’t blame her for falsely billing clients for her use of the car—she was driven to do it. Any further discussion would be fruitless—just spinning our wheels. (Does that pun deserve a rim shot?)

By NOW JERRY BROWN on 2012 05 18, 4:30 pm CDT

Guess it’s time to re-tire this subject (after all, we don’t want to drive it into the ground.)

By NOW JERRY BROWN on 2012 05 18, 4:31 pm CDT

“Gordon had said she needed to use the car service because of a back injury that made commuting uncomfortable.”

God forbid that she pay for her own cab every now and then for personal appointments.  (Skadden is at the southern edge of Times Square, an area where cabs are plentiful.)  I have heard of other Skadden Associates pitching a fit when the firm makes them pay for their own cab to firm events.

My employer does not pay for diddly sqaut in terms of travel, but from what I understand of firm car service policies, they’re used as a perk to encourage putting in late hours as trains get scarce in the wee hours of the morning and safety can sometimes also be an issue late at night.  Unless Gordon’s back injury was work related, the chances are that she was not entitled to 24/7 car service.

By Esq. on 2012 05 18, 4:58 pm CDT

You know how to address the problem obesity in the US? Let employers fire employees for any or no reason whatsoever. Employees would respect their employers more, the rich could still have a workable class system they could live with, and, in something less than a hundred years, the United States would relearn the importance of looking presentable and professional when going to work. The French never lost this priority, even as they guillotined their own bloated rich.

What I want to know is how did America get so bloated?

By Tom Youngjohn on 2012 05 18, 5:44 pm CDT

You know, less than half a day had passed before I began questioning my theory that a libertarian approach to employer/employee relationships would actually solve obesity, so I came back just to discredit myself. But dang, I like what I wrote.

By Tom Youngjohn on 2012 05 20, 12:59 pm CDT

The moral of the story is - don’t do anything that your employer can use as an excuse to fire you.  To me, it does sound like Rita may have had a viable case on the age discrimination.  But since she was abusing the car service policy, the Firm had a legitimate excuse to fire her.  Rita might have to prove that many of the other employees also violated the car service policy in order for her to be successful on her case.

By Amy on 2012 05 21, 4:58 pm CDT