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5 ways to do more pro bono in 2021 Looking Ahead to 2021   The most rewarding work ABA President Patricia Lee Refo has done has been pro bono. “Big and small, and that is the beauty and the power of the ABA’s pro bono offerings,” she says. “We offer bite-size opportunities like Free Legal Answers that take a small amount of time and make a huge difference in someone’s life. We also offer opportunities that are slightly larger that might be more appropriate for a team of lawyers in a larger firm to undertake together. “The point is, whatever practice setting you’re in, the ABA o...

Meet 14 ABA members who inspired us in 2020 Year in Review     Throughout the year, the ABA Journal profiles exceptional ABA members in its Members Who Inspire series. In 2020, we featured attorneys from across the country whose important and influential work includes using visual storytelling for legal advocacy, bringing attention to the crisis of missing and murdered indigenous women, and combating racial injustice and inequity. LaToya Bell, an assistant public defender in Houston County in Georgia, handles as many as 200 to 250 cases involving misdemeanors and traffic offenses in state c...

Legal departments cut outside spending, focus on managers and specialists, study shows   Image from Shutterstock. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed more legal departments to cut spending on outside counsel, according to a new report from global research and advisory firm Gartner Inc. For its 2021 State of the Legal Function report, Gartner surveyed 126 leaders of global legal departments this summer and found that 57% of their spending was staying in-house in 2020, compared to the 50.2% shown in its 2018 report. When these leaders needed to hire outside counsel, litigation comprised about 39...

2 more federal judges are confirmed amid COVID-19 relief package negotiations   Image from Shutterstock.com. Two more federal judges were confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Thursday, as lawmakers rush to reach a deal on COVID-19 relief and government funding packages. In his push to change the makeup of the nation’s courts, President Donald Trump nominated Charles Edward Atchley Jr., assistant U.S. attorney for the District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee, and Zachary Somers, former chief investigative counsel for Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee. With their confirmat...

Former prosecutor faces felony misconduct charges related to alleged inappropriate relationship   Image from Shutterstock.com. A former Michigan state prosecutor will be charged with two counts of felony misconduct in office after allegedly engaging in an inappropriate relationship with a victim in a criminal sexual conduct case. Brian Kolodziej, an assistant attorney general who was hired in September 2018 to prosecute sexual assault cases, was placed on administrative leave and then resigned in fall 2019 after details of the reported relationship surfaced. The attorney general’s office l...