The Minnesota House of Representatives Public Information Service has information on  2010 legislation and specifically on laws with August 1 effective dates. The 2010 Session Laws are now online. See index and Table 1 (Session Laws Amended, Repealed, Etc.) and Table 2 (Statutes New, Amended or Repealed).

We’ve blogged previously about the changes to landlord tenant law, and we’ve been busy revising some of practicelaw’s Guardianship and Conservatorship forms to insure their compliance with legislation effective August 1. The outline of those changes will be posted on Monday.

Also, the most recent edition of MSBA’s Bench and Bar, has an article detailing the 2010 legislative action.  For another take on those pieces of legislation effective Sunday, see the Pine City Community Blog.

So read up to stay up-to-date. And don’t forget to enjoy a piece of raspberry cream pie.

© Nancy Hupp for Practice Blawg, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: conservatorship, guardianship, New Laws

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Here’s the catch, though: we only have a prepublication version available, which means that we are doing the last bits of editing and formatting. But it is far enough along that we wanted to give it out to those interested, particularly those of you attending SoloSmall. So, stop by our table on Monday or Tuesday, chat a bit, and make sure you request the new client trust accounting guide (other guides are already on practicelaw here).

Membership in the MSBA is not required to grab the prepublication version. But, if you are a MSBA member, you can  request the final version as well, and we will e-mail it out to you when it is released. Or you could just check back here when we announce its availability on practicelaw.

We hope to see a number of you in Duluth next week.

© Gregory Luce for Practice Blawg, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: IOLTA, Trust Accounting

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• drafting a document on one monitor while completing online legal research on the other monitor (thus allowing me to cut and paste from applicable cases);
• comparing two documents to find inconsistencies or similarities. Without the need to toggle back and forth on a typical one monitor set up, I get a clear and quick picture of both documents and how they may be different;
• checking and composing web-based e-mail on one screen while surfing the web for research or reference on another browser on the other screen.

I’m considering how we can produce an upcoming session that demonstrates how to set up dual monitors (hint: it’s easy peasy) and how best to work with them. It’s not the easiest thing to demonstrate at an OTC session that we typically hold at a local pub or coffee shop. But it is under serious consideration. In the meantime, consider these resources to get you into the world of dual monitor efficiency:

• a Wikipedia entry that gives you general background on what it calls “multi-monitor” (yep, some people don’t stop at two monitors);
• a PC World video that demonstrates how to set up a dual screen environment, even what you may need in the form of a video card (though most decent computers today should come with two connections for monitors)
• though somewhat dated, a New York Times article on the virtues of a second screen;

Believe me, there are lots of resources out there on this issue and a simple Google search that contains the words “multiple monitor” and the name of your operating system (e.g,. Windows Vista) should get you plenty of advice on how to set something up. But, if we can figure out how best to haul our hardware out to a future session, we’ll be there to demonstrate how best to do it.

© Gregory Luce for Practice Blawg, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Dual Monitors, Efficiency

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When you perform a keyword search on Fastcase, Forecite goes the extra mile and identifies seminal cases that can easily be missed by ordinary keyword searches.

Consider this example.

Let’s say you were researching the Miranda Doctrine under the Fifth Amendment. Can you imagine concluding your research without reading the Supreme Court’s seminal decision, Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966)? We can’t either. The trouble is, if you search for “Miranda doctrine” using most legal research engines, the Miranda decision will not be in your search results, because those words do not appear anywhere in the decision.

This is where Forecite comes in. Run the same search on Fastcase, and Forecite has you covered.

I tried it out on a search I usually do to show members how to use the service, typing in “covenants and habitability and landlord and tenant” (you can tell I’m a former landlord tenant attorney). It returned the usual suspects but also recognized and let me know that two of my results cited a decision from another jurisdiction. Pretty slick, particularly as it allowed me to trace more easily the origins of what later became an important legal precedent in Minnesota.

I then tried a different search involving the latent discovery of a construction defect and the impact on a statutory home warranty claim (a complicated field, I might add), and got three additional suggested cases that were not returned by my search terms. What was cool about it was that the cases generally involved entirely different areas of law (one was medmal, the other legal malpractice) but they did give me fuel to consider when determining how the discovery rule affects the statute of limitations for certain claims. Not bad. If you start using this service in Fastcase (it appears automatically in keyword searches), let us know how it’s working for you.

© Gregory Luce for Practice Blawg, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Fastcase, Forecite

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I read the local blotter religiously and am embarrassed to say it often makes me laugh. Right at the outset, I want to be clear that I know crime isn’t funny. But I am a devotee of peoples’ stories and not only read the blotter, but read Police were called to Wal-mart … because two women were arguing after one of them did not yield the right of way to the other woman’s shopping cart.obituaries as well. I’d like to claim that I am interested in the human condition but I really think I just like to ponder what makes people tick. Sometimes they make me appreciate my own life or they give me a chance to live vicariously. Really, there is something cathartic in walking over to a guy irritating you and slapping him with a raw steak. Read on.

In addition to my own collection, I’ve got friends and relatives who, once aware of my habit, send me snippets from other places. Here are some of my favorites, grouped loosely by their appeal.

Food (and related items)

“According to police reports, the argument was over spaghetti…”

“Police were called to … where two adult brothers were fighting over a McDonald’s double cheeseburger…”

“A man told police his apartment was burglarized, with a suspect taking 150 CDs, a TV, a pair of shoes, two gaming systems, a guitar, two amplifiers, a subwoofer, four pairs of sunglasses, 2 Bob Marley plaques, an autographed football and 12 video games, worth more than $5,500. The unknown suspect also ate the victim’s Doritos.” (emphasis added)

“A caller…reported that a neighbor came over to use the bathroom and when leaving took some paper plates.”

Last but not least, how about the woman who, after her boyfriend refused a slice of bread and demanded a dinner roll, slapped him in the face with a raw steak. That’s love.

Indecision

Speaking of loved ones, sometimes you just need some space. Or not.

“A woman … called police to report a man missing. She had told the man to leave and not return, then changed her mind.”

“An officer received a complaint from a woman who said her mother had arrived for Christmas and was now refusing to leave.”

The rationale

While in law school, I had a student practice license which allowed me to represent the State of Illinois in traffic court. I am here to tell you that there is no limit to the stories an accused will relate to get out of a ticket. I still pine for the incredible rationales proffered by the criminal. Similarly, the blotter doesn’t disappoint.

“Police were called to Wal-mart… because two women were arguing after one of them did not yield the right of way to the other woman’s shopping cart.”

“A man playing disc golf in a park…allegedly cut down a mature tree with a chain saw to retrieve his disc.”

But my favorite is this guy; note the careful parsing of words. He must have been a terrific teenager, a real credit to the age group.

“A man with no shirt and a cowboy hat was in a parking lot …twirling flaming sticks around the parked cars. An officer arrived and… spoke to a man matching the description and he said he was not twirling flaming sticks, but they were flaming balls on the end of chains..,” (emphasis added)

Oh, well then, if they were just flaming balls…

Last week, I stumbled upon a jurisdictional matter, a treat for my lawyerly mind.

“A man came to the police station to report the theft of his wallet. But the theft did not occur in Apple Valley — it happened while he was on a train in France. He said he ‘didn’t have time to report it to police while in France.’ “

As write this, I’m about to leave on vacation. My goal? Relax. Read. Sail. Bike. Canoe. Not check email. Spend time with family. And last but not least, find some good blotter items in papers along the journey. But not appear in any.

© Nancy Hupp for Practice Blawg, 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Crime, Humor, Police

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