Feed: The Risk Manager from Sands Anderson - AggScore: 50.0

Influential Women of Virginia

---

Tomorrow, May 10,  Virginia Lawyers Weekly will recognize a couple of dozen women selected as the 2012 class of Influential Women of Virginia. This is the fourth edition of their statewide recognition and the second straight year another of our lawyers is included. We’d like to give a hearty “Hoorah” to Ann Neil Cosby, who won [...]

Dealing with Mechanics’ Liens

---

Henry Spalding, an attorney in the Sands Anderson Risk Management Group, recently published the following article in the Virginia Homebuilder’s Newsletter: Filing and enforcing a mechanic’s lien can be a strong and effective way to minimize risk of lack of payment for work done on a project. Creditors, including general contractors, subcontractors and materials suppliers, routinely assert liens [...]

Codified Evidence Rules Pass Virginia Legislature

---

Huzzah! The codified Rules of Evidence has passed the Virginia’s legislature after some late opposition from four Senators. The Sands Anderson Risk Manager blog first reported on the proposed rules back in October. In a comment to that article, attorney and then-President of Sands Anderson Pierce Rucker noted, “We certainly have [Sands Anderson's] own Bunky Miller to thank, and many of his colleagues [...]

The Western District permits evidence of future lost earning capacity of a minor

---

An interesting article by Sarah Warren Beverly, a Sands Anderson litigation attorney, analyzing a recent federal court decision from Judge Jones that addresses a minor’s ability to claim loss of earning capacity as a component of damages: The plaintiff bears the burden to prove his or her damages with “reasonable certainty.” Gwaltney v. Reed, 196 Va. 505, 507, 84 [...]

DRI Recognizes Delano Victory

---

THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN OUR WEB SITE DESCRIBES LEGAL MATTERS HANDLED IN THE PAST BY OUR ATTORNEYS. OF COURSE, THE RESULTS WE HAVE ACHIEVED DEPEND UPON A VARIETY OF FACTORS UNIQUE TO EACH MATTER. BECAUSE EACH MATTER IS DIFFERENT, OUR PAST RESULTS CANNOT PREDICT OR GUARANTEE A SIMILAR RESULT IN THE FUTURE. The Voice, the house [...]

Is Sandberg’s Ambition Gap for Women Really a Likeability Gap?

---

Bloomberg Businessweek posted an interesting video featuring Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook, Inc. talking about how women don’t identify themselves as “ambitious” and don’t seek leadership roles in business organizations. Check it out here. She analyzes what creates this “ambition gap” that prevents women from becoming CEOs or seeking other leadership roles. Part of [...]

Feds Hang Up on Commercial Drivers

---

Karen Elliot, a Sands Anderson attorney specializing in employment law, recently published the following article addressing new rules prohibiting commercial motor vehicle drivers from using hand-held mobile devices while driving.  We thought this article would be of particular interest to our Risk Manager readers: In a continued effort to reduce accidents from distracted driving, the federal [...]

Successfully Defending a Lawsuit

---

Successfully Defending a Lawsuit By Henry Spalding, Esq. Anyone who has been a defendant in a lawsuit will tell you that the process is expensive, time consuming and stressful. I have spent the past twenty years defending businesses and individuals in courts throughout Virginia and can attest to the emotional and financial toll which a [...]

Veterans Legal Services Month

---

I am so excited to see that the Lewis B. Puller Jr. Veterans Benefits Clinic started by my friend and colleague Stacey-Rae Simcox at William and Mary Law School has inspired others around the state to do more for Virginia’s veterans. In fact, this Veterans Day, the Virginia Bar Association is really working to get [...]

Bar Issues Opinion That Indemnification As Condition of Settlement Is Unethical

---

The Virginia State Bar’s Standing Committee in Legal Ethics recently issued a legal ethics opinion declaring it unethical for plaintiff’s lawyers to agree to indemnify a defendant and/or his insurer for any third party lien claim against settlement proceeds received by the plaintiff. The Standing Committee has opined that it is likewise unethical for the [...]

Litigation Funding: Justice or High-Stakes Gambling?

---

Sands Anderson Risk Management Group Leader Terrence Graves wrote the following article for the DRI: Litigation Funding Equals Big Money. The article was inspired by this recent Wall Street Journal article “Funds Spring Up to Invest in High-Stakes Litigation.” (This article is available to subscribers, or those who sign up for a two week free trial. You [...]

Codified Rules of Virginia Evidence on the Horizon?

---

This encouraging news certainly brightened my day as a practicing Virginia litigator:  Virginia Lawyer’s Weekly has posted an article indicating movement to codify Virginia Rules of Evidence.  Virginia has long considered codification of its rules of evidence, but previously, the proposed rules never made it past Virginia’s Supreme Court. As discussed in the Virginia Lawyer’s [...]

Why I Hate “And/Or” and You Should Too

---

Amen to Ted Tjaden for writing this article about why “and/or” should never be used in legal writing.  Although I know that “and/or” has its place – it certainly is economical – that place is not in well-crafted discovery requests. Too often I see it when the drafter of the document simply failed to really think about [...]

SURVIVING A DPOR COMPLAINT

---

Here is a recent article written by Henry Spalding, a Sands Anderson litigation attorney, for the Home Builders Association of Richmond newsletter. As a lawyer representing homebuilders and general contractors, I am sometimes asked to assist them in responding to complaints filed against them by dissatisfied homeowners with the Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation [...]

Delano Win Gets National Attention

---

The Voice, the house organ of the Defense Research Institute (DRI), the national organization for members of the defense Bar, put out a nice writeup of Chip Delano’s ERISA case of Mullins v. AT&T Corp.. You can download the whole article right here. We’re pleased both for Chip’s results for our client and that he was [...]