...Sticking it into the Junior Partner...
The Junior Partner (JP) at the first Law Firm I first joined didn't like me. Part of it was just chemistry...yanno...ever walked up to a stranger, and didn't like her, even though she looked fine? We humans do have senses that we don't understand. I once left the County Law Library, even though there were cases I wanted to locate and read, just because of the way I was feeling. A few hours later, a gunman was in the Law Library, no one was injured, the Cops talked him down. (He wasn't one of my clients...my clients usually just carried knives. They would show them to me, and I would open a certain drawer, and show them mine.)
Anyway, I took an instinctive dislike of the JP, and the feeling was mutual, I believe. I was handed nice assignments by the Senior Partner, and won many motions and assisted him in complex trials. The JP didn't like me being successful, even though I was making money for the Firm, and instructed the Secretaries to assign me every 'shit job' that came up. So, in the morning, I would drive for an hour to a remote Courthouse, and try to collect $683 from some poor person for a large Insurance Company. I would drive back, maybe with $23 in the file. If I had stayed in my office, I could have billed almost $2,000 for what I was capable of.
The JP had his "Lap Dog" LD...that he favored. The LD just sat in on depositions, and dictated reports to the Insurance Companies...and billed $90 per hour.
One day, the LD came to me, and asked me to help him with a case. I nodded, and listened to what he said, and asked to be able to read the file. He left it in my office, and I spent the morning going through it, organizing it, and reading it. It was a complex business dispute, and I saw a way...TO CUT THE LEGS OUT OF THE OTHER SIDE!!! I spoke to the LD, explaining what I saw, but he wasn't understanding what I was pointing out. I just said, "OK, I will prepare the Motion for Summary Judgement". If granted, our client would be out of the case.
I stayed late, a few evenings, and into the morning hours, preparing the motion. My H was used to me doing that. And got the damn thing written out, and dictated it, and gathered and marked the exhibits. I revised it a few times, after reading it, and then approved the final papers. The signature at the bottom of the pages, was the damn LD. I had not been authorized to work on the file.
He filed it, and it WAS GRANTED!!!
At a meeting of the Firm, the damn JP was crowing about how brilliant the LD was, and saying that all of the new attorneys should study the Motion, and learn from it. I sat, silent, and STARED at the LD. He squirmed, and said, "P------- prepared it."
The JP calmed down, and said...
..."Just a simple motion, LD probably prepared it during his lunch break."
I laughed my ass off driving home, and began making plans to leave the Firm.
((This is a true tale of my life...
))
