John Whaite, a high-flying law graduate, has become officially the UK's best baker, and decided not to become a lawyer. Hurrah. This week Whaite won the Great British Bakeoff, the UK's runaway hit TV show of the year. And in doing so, has spared himself a career of document wrangling and coffee procurement as a City solicitor.

John was the surprise winner of the GBBO, beating Brendan "slightly creepy" Lynch and Jamie "tank top" Morton. His showstopper bake, a heaven and hell-themed chiffon cake*, was described by judges as "perfect". If you have several hours to spare, here's the recipe.

Whilst fiming the ten week knockout series, Whaite was also polishing off his legal studies at Manchester University, graduating with a first. With such impressive academic credentials - and endless cake-based extra-curricular activities - Whaite would have been snapped up by a big firm. Sadly for the profession, Whaite, who had previously done a vacation scheme at Eversheds, plans to go and do something more interesting with his life. He'll be avoiding the horrors of the LPC and heading to Paris' Cordon Bleu cookery school.

John Whaite: a baker, not a lawyer

Baking is all the rage within the legal fraternity, and amongst others Hogan Lovells is reknowned for its annual cake sale. According to RollOnFriday readers, the legal world's very best baked treats come from Wragges, perennial winners of the "Best Biscuits" category in Firm of the Year. And if there's any more of that Mars Bar cake available, we'd be happy to receive it.

* Non-fans of the Bake Off should know that a chiffon cake is one baked with vegetable oil, rather than butter

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No-one at RollOnFriday has been invited to the FT Innovative Lawyer Awards for a few years (not since some nameless troll at RoF Towers wrote this, anyway).

So we're reduced to wild guesses as to which firm might take home the perspex. Which we all enjoy doing.

Fortunately, results from previous years make this a not impossible task.




Last year, Allen & Overy won one of the main awards. Hoorah for Allen & Overy. Those guys are THE BEST. You can watch some videos from the night - and check out the event's sponsors - here.

2011 was generally quite an exciting year. Legal outsourcing types and efficiency wonks Integreon were major sponsors. And it was their "strategic partner" CMS Cameron McKenna which won the award for law firm efficiency. Who would believe it. Really. Who would.

And this is all before we go back to 2010, and Eversheds brochure-gate.

Coincimental.


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I met a lawyer at a party last night. We talked of RoF old and new, of the sadness within the profession, of what the future held. And he reminded me of a story which had appeared on the site way back in the mists of the Noughties, when I was still a trainee. Remembering it well, I felt a sudden urge to read it again.

As the RoF Archives are largely closed to prying eyes (we don't generally like reminding lawyers of their indiscretions ad infinitum), I had to dig this out specially. Here it is, reserved a place high up in the pantheon of the most buttock-tightening departure emails ever sent. Enjoy.

Charming farewell email from Ashurst lawyer
                        
The following finely-judged email was sent this week by a lawyer who's moving from Ashurst to Sullivan & Cromwell on qualification. He sent it to a very large chunk of the firm, including many of the senior partners.

We're sure he'll be missed terribly.

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Almost everyone will have seen this morning's news that a charming chap in Southampton has effectively been allowed to excuse himself from jury service - an almost impossible task - by telling the judge that he's not just a homophobe, but a racist too. Excellent.

A recap for those who've spent the morning deep in due diligence: a juror, selected from the long-list to serve, wrote to the judge, stating that he was a homophobe and a racist, and therefore could not be expected to fairly assist in the prosecution of justice.* And it worked; he's been dropped.

I guess under the circumstances, there's not very much any judge could say. If you tell someone you're a racist and a homophobe, it's a brave person to call your bluff. Actually, I reckon people who happily label themselves racist homophobes as matter of public record (the letter was read out in court) are probably pretty likely to be racist homophobes. There's not much wiggle room for the judge, really. And so the juror was struck off. But not before Judge Gary Burrell threatened him with contempt of court - because he couldn't be sure whether the lovely man was telling the truth. Was he genuinely a racist homophobe? Or was he just pretending to be a racist homophobe to escape jury service?

That latter option sounds pretty nuclear. Can jury service really be that bad? You get paid, don't you? You probably even get sandwiches.

People tell me that jury service is a bind, and I'm sure plenty of us have heard horror stories of unengaged jurors, snap verdicts, deliberate failures to listen to any evident and the like. There is absolutely no way I'd ever want to put myself in front of a panel of twelve of my peers. The general public is an odd mix of Henman Hill and Jeremy Kyle. Chumps. I'm not sure I trust the general public with my fate.

But there's a genuine concern here. I reckon that from tomorrow onwards lots of judges will be getting scrawled notes from jurors, attempting a similar trick to get out of sitting in a courtroom between 10 and 4 for a couple of days. In this case, the guy sounds - despite his racism and homphobia - reasonably coherent. He can, at least, write a sentence (clearly that doesn't excuse homophobic or racist views, but it's a start). All change tomorrow: the notes will read "i h8 [insert racial group] pliss don make me do jurie fanks".


* According to report, his letter said: "I strongly believe that it would be a serious injustice to the legal system to select me for jury service. I hold extreme prejudices against homosexuals and black/foreign people and couldn’t possibly be impartial if either appeared in court. Therefore it would not be in the court’s interest to have me a juror."

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...we'd get tired of looking at each other. So said Groove Armada. So imagine how bored of each other the staff at Legal Solutions Partnership must be. Managing partner John Holtom is a handsome looking chap, beaming at the camera and flashing his pearly whites, as, creepily, is operations director and doppleganger Paul Haddon.

There's a sort of androgynous feel to the firm, too, as both strategic business partner Catherine Hudson and case manager partner Neelam Afzal are pulling exactly the same pose. All very odd.




Spotted something bonkers, piss-poor or otherwise noteworthy? Please do send it in; we won't tell on you.


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