The VLW Blog

The judicial nominations committee of the Virginia State Bar announced its endorsements for seats on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals at the VSB’s Executive Committee meeting at Stratford Hall yesterday and this morning.
Committee chair Joe Condo, VSB President Karen Gould and several others met with Sens. John Warner and Jim Webb earlier [...]

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Ray Diaz and Ed O’Connell, both experienced community association lawyers, have left Vienna-based Rees, Broome & Diaz to join Whiteford Taylor & Preston. The latter firm, with its home base in Baltimore, has over 155 lawyers in five offices throughout Maryland, DC and Virginia.
Both men will staff WTP’s new Northern Virginia office, which will [...]

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What happens when a speaker leaves a voice-mail message for an attorney, whose recording device doesn’t shut off?
The message left on the machine can come into evidence in a real estate case, according to Loudoun County Circuit Judge Thomas D. Horne. In Pacific Century Development & Realty Inc. v. Wheatland Farms LLC (VLW 005-8-197), a [...]

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Two Virginia Supreme Court justices, two federal judges and two law professors are among the Virginia Bar Association’s recommendations for two vacancies on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Virginia Sen. Jim Webb asked bar groups earlier this year to submit recommendations for the vacancies created by the senior status of Judge H. Emory Widener [...]

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The news of Monday’s shootings at Virginia Tech was horrific and unsettling and unfathomable. Our thoughts are with the families and friends of the victims, and with all who have been affected. The support for the school from all corners of the commonwealth and of the nation has been strong and resounding. Much has been [...]

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Roger Creager, outgoing chair of the amicus curiae committee for the Virginia Trial Lawyers Association, touted a 75 percent “lifetime win rate” for the association in the 43 appellate cases heard since 1992 in which the VTLA filed a friend-of-the-court brief. In those cases, the majority of which have been in the Supreme Court of [...]

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Ray Morrogh, the longtime deputy prosecutor in Fairfax who hopes to succeed his retiring boss, Bob Horan, filed as expected for the local Democratic nomination for commonwealth’s attorney. But he’ll have an opponent this fall: Arlington assistant commonwealth’s attorney Patrick McDade will seek the GOP nod for Fairfax commonwealth’s attorney, reports the Washington Post.
With [...]

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The Supreme Court of Virginia approved on Friday the assessment of a $25 fee on all active members of the Virginia State Bar to support the Clients’ Protection Fund.
The approval had been expected because the VSB Council had recommended the measure and the General Assembly had adopted enabling legislation earlier this year. The assessment will [...]

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The personal injury firm of Allen, Allen, Allen & Allen has named Douglas A. Barry president.
As its name indicates, the Allen firm is a family shop and Barry is the first president who is not a family member. Founded in 1910, the Richmond-based firm has the largest personal injury practice in the state.
Barry, 49, joined [...]

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The Ted Dalton Chapter of the American Inn of Court has given its annual Roger Groot Professionalism Award to M. Caldwell Butler, the former congressman and longtime Roanoke lawyer.
Butler is best known for the political courage he displayed as a relatively new Republican member of Congress in supporting the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon [...]

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