Brooklyn Bar Association CLE

In the next two months, the Brooklyn Bar Association will host a series of educational programs and events for legal practitioners and law students. Among the events sponsored by the BBA are these which will take place at the BBA’s offices at 123 Remsen Street:

On-Line Legal Research - Using the West Key Digest System March 23, 2009 (1:00-2:00pm) and Using Lexis April 6, 2009 (1:00-2:00pm) Brooklyn Supreme Court Senior Law Librarian, Jacqueline Cantwell will cover the basics of online research from signing on, retrieving a case when you have a citation or party name, how to update by Keycite and Shepard’s, tables of authorities, retrieving New York Code sections, and e-mailing and printing cases.

Traffic Violations Update - March 25, 2009 (6:00-8:00pm) The program will feature leading figures in this area, Hon. John L. Araujo, senior administrative law judge, New York state Dept. of Motor Vehicles; Hon. Stephen Borkan, a supervising administrative law judge; Karen Friedman, President of the Association of Motor Vehicle Trial Attorneys; Jeffrey Levine, whose practice focuses on handling chemical test refusal hearings and Michael Beer, an attorney who defends clients against traffic violation charges. The agenda promises to cover the prima facie elements and defenses to common traffic violations such as speeding, seatbelts, cell phone violations and others. Participants will learn about chemical test refusal hearings and see a demonstration of the type of laser gun used by police.

Electronic Filing in New York State Courts - April 20, 2009 (6:00-8:00pm) Jeff Carucci, the Statewide Coordinator for E-Filing and Chris Gibson, the Case Management Coordinator for the E-Filing Resource Center will lead this overview of the E-Filing program in NYS Courts. They will demonstrate in detail how the e-filing software works and the benefits it offers to users.

Ethics in Litigation Financing - April 28, 2009 (5:30-7:30pm) Former BLS Prof. Anthony Sebok will present a course on legal ethics and client counseling in the area of legal finance; current New York law concerning the legality of non-recourse funding under Judiciary Law §489; the NY rules of professional conduct; the history of champerty (a prohibition against the sale of a party's interest in a lawsuit) and maintenance (intermeddling of an uninterested party to encourage a lawsuit) in English and American common law; and the policy reasons that have led the NY courts and legislature to permit non-recourse funding of litigation.