As clients insist that their deals are wrapped up and managing partners demand everything that moves is billed, it's the perfect time for a canter through the legal year that was.
January
2015 began with controversy when a Clifford Chance trainee decided that the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attack was the ideal time to film himself berating "kuffars" and moderate Muslims for allowing their minds to be "colonised" by the West.
Causing almost as much consternation, RollOnFriday revealed that the Food Standards Agency had awarded White & Case a hygiene rating of one out of five (it has since earned full marks). Things returned to normal later in the month, apart from that time a man took a public poo at court and the Inner Temple Debating Society recorded a 'special' Beach Boys cover.
Meanwhile, Dentons merged with Dacheng in China to create a globe-spanning monster, Norton Rose Fulbright got ripped off and a husband sent a furious email to all of Slater & Gordon about one of their colleagues: his cheating wife.
February
February also had its share of candid behaviour. A graduate recruitment officer at Trowers & Hamlins told a candidate not to bother applying for a training contract, before admitting that she was drunk. A judge bollocked a 13-year-old girl. And a barrister claimed that paralytically drunk women can consent to sex in a provocative blog, titled "She was gagging for it".
There was also subterfuge and intrigue. BLP was caught manipulating its trainee figures, while HFW and Penningtons Manches were discovered to have suspiciously similar diverse employees. Tom Cruise would have got to the bottom of it, if he hadn't been so busy jumping through windows in chambers.
March
While a Hogan Lovells partner played himself in House of Cards, another RollOnFriday legend was more Game of Thrones as she bit a pensioner, spat on her mum and finally got struck off for defrauding the Law Society.
In trainee news, sweeping changes resulted in the first paralegals qualifying as solicitors without completing training contracts, while the SRA made a contentious withdrawal from the graduate recruitment code. Commenting obliquely on the decision, a law graduate started a big fire, then couldn't wee it out.
One of 2014's characters re-emerged, as Lord 'Harry Potter' Harley received a drubbing from a judge for his medals and ribbons. Two other lawyers joined him in hot water: a £23,000 fare dodger turned out to be an ex-Herbert Smith man, and a young Gibson Dunn partner was found to have deliberately misled court in an extraordinary saga involving doctored photographs and a grenade launcher.
Meanwhile, up in Manchester, a firm was spotted giving a misleading impression of its offices, in the second most-read story of the year.
Tip Off ROF
January
2015 began with controversy when a Clifford Chance trainee decided that the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attack was the ideal time to film himself berating "kuffars" and moderate Muslims for allowing their minds to be "colonised" by the West.
Causing almost as much consternation, RollOnFriday revealed that the Food Standards Agency had awarded White & Case a hygiene rating of one out of five (it has since earned full marks). Things returned to normal later in the month, apart from that time a man took a public poo at court and the Inner Temple Debating Society recorded a 'special' Beach Boys cover.
Meanwhile, Dentons merged with Dacheng in China to create a globe-spanning monster, Norton Rose Fulbright got ripped off and a husband sent a furious email to all of Slater & Gordon about one of their colleagues: his cheating wife.
February
February also had its share of candid behaviour. A graduate recruitment officer at Trowers & Hamlins told a candidate not to bother applying for a training contract, before admitting that she was drunk. A judge bollocked a 13-year-old girl. And a barrister claimed that paralytically drunk women can consent to sex in a provocative blog, titled "She was gagging for it".
There was also subterfuge and intrigue. BLP was caught manipulating its trainee figures, while HFW and Penningtons Manches were discovered to have suspiciously similar diverse employees. Tom Cruise would have got to the bottom of it, if he hadn't been so busy jumping through windows in chambers.
March
While a Hogan Lovells partner played himself in House of Cards, another RollOnFriday legend was more Game of Thrones as she bit a pensioner, spat on her mum and finally got struck off for defrauding the Law Society.
In trainee news, sweeping changes resulted in the first paralegals qualifying as solicitors without completing training contracts, while the SRA made a contentious withdrawal from the graduate recruitment code. Commenting obliquely on the decision, a law graduate started a big fire, then couldn't wee it out.
One of 2014's characters re-emerged, as Lord 'Harry Potter' Harley received a drubbing from a judge for his medals and ribbons. Two other lawyers joined him in hot water: a £23,000 fare dodger turned out to be an ex-Herbert Smith man, and a young Gibson Dunn partner was found to have deliberately misled court in an extraordinary saga involving doctored photographs and a grenade launcher.
Meanwhile, up in Manchester, a firm was spotted giving a misleading impression of its offices, in the second most-read story of the year.
 |
In a law firm? Rate it in the RollOnFriday Firm of the Year survey In-house? Spill, take the In-House survey. |