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Foundational Scrutiny of Forensic Custody Opinions
It has been this author's experience, while assisting attorneys with the task of challenging custody opinions that either didn't fit with their client's interests or that appeared incongruent with a child's needs, that sometimes a critical step in the process is missed due to superficial cross-examination. Consequently, an important opportunity to educate the court is missed.
Cross-examining attorneys dealing with an adverse evaluator as a witness will attack such deficiencies as bias in the evaluation process, failure to contact certain collateral sources, or the choice by an evaluator not to conduct a home visit (all important factors to address). However, attorneys often fail to go at the actual empirical foundation underpinning the business of forensic experts selecting and recommending which parent should get custody and what the custody and visitation schedule should be.
While a meaningful list of academics and practitioners have asserted over the past several decades that psychologists and psychiatrists have an insufficient basis for making custody recommendations and that the practice of offering them should cease on ethical and evidentiary grounds, the deficiencies in the field are seldom amplified by lawyers in their cross examinations of custody evaluators. Evaluators are seldom challenged, with any depth, to make clear for the court that they in fact know what they say they know.
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Major Differences In UK, U.S. Copyright Laws
This article highlights how copyright law in the United Kingdom differs from U.S. copyright law, and points out differences that may be crucial to entertainment and media businesses familiar with U.S law that are interested in operating in the United Kingdom or under UK law. The article also briefly addresses contrasts in UK and U.S. trademark law.
The Article 8 Opt In
The Article 8 opt-in election adds an additional layer of complexity to the already labyrinthine rules governing perfection of security interests under the UCC. A lender that is unaware of the nuances created by the opt in (may find its security interest vulnerable to being primed by another party that has taken steps to perfect in a superior manner under the circumstances.
Strategy vs. Tactics: Two Sides of a Difficult Coin
With each successive large-scale cyber attack, it is slowly becoming clear that ransomware attacks are targeting the critical infrastructure of the most powerful country on the planet. Understanding the strategy, and tactics of our opponents, as well as the strategy and the tactics we implement as a response are vital to victory.
Legal Possession: What Does It Mean?
Possession of real property is a matter of physical fact. Having the right or legal entitlement to possession is not "possession," possession is "the fact of having or holding property in one's power." That power means having physical dominion and control over the property.
The Anti-Assignment Override Provisions
UCC Sections 9406(d) and 9408(a) are one of the most powerful, yet least understood, sections of the Uniform Commercial Code. On their face, they appear to override anti-assignment provisions in agreements that would limit the grant of a security interest. But do these sections really work?