Judge Spotlight
new phrase: “I’m sorry your honor,
but”, or, “I don’t mean to upset you,
your honor, but”, or “with apologies,”
but scrap “with all due respect.”
14. What do you think are the most
important attributes of a successful
bankruptcy practitioner?
Creativity, flexibility, good people skills.
The more senior you get in practice, the
less what you do has to do with what
the law is because you either know that
or you have an associate to research it
for you. And the facts are what they are
and you can’t change that. So your job
as a bankruptcy practitioner is to take
whatever the law is, and whatever the
facts are and to manipulate the humans
through it in a rational, and hopefully
cost effective way. So I think listening
to your client and listening to the other
side is critical. I think your reputation is
important -- a reputation for saying what
you mean and meaning what you say.
People should be able to rely on the
fact that, when you promise something,
you are going to do it, and, ideally, that
you have a good read on where your
client is coming from so that you can
accurately predict what he or she will or
won’t be willing to do. And good writing
skills are always important.
15. What common mistakes do you
see practitioners make and what
remedies would you suggest?
Well, you’ve got to have good
calendaring system, some good way
of managing what’s going on with
your cases, and adequate staffing. I
understand there is a reason you want
to practice on your own, and that it is
very hard to afford someone to work
for you, but cases require attention and
require time. There are some lawyers
that do a great job of bringing in the
work but do a terrible job staffing and
actually working their cases. So if you
happen to be one of those fortunate
people who can bring the work in, don’t
bring in more than you can actually do
because the cases are going to tank
and you are not going to do anyone any
favors. They should call someone like
you. That’s what you’re there for, right?
(Thanks for the plug Your Honor).
This is a total pet peeve and this only
comes up in trial, but I tell everybody
this at every pre-trial conference. I do
most of my evidentiary hearings with
direct testimony by declaration and then
have attorneys bring their witnesses
for live cross examination. The direct
testimony declarations come in with
the exhibits attached to them because
you need to lay a foundation for the
exhibits to come in. What I don’t want
to have happen is for people to come in
with their exhibits books and tab their
exhibits as one thing, and when they
filed their declarations, they tabbed
their exhibits as something entirely
different. So we spend two hours at
a trial going through what exhibit is
what. Pick a letter or number -- and I
have instructions in my trial procedures
as to who uses letters and who uses
numbers -- but assign one letter or
number to the exhibit and whenever
you use it, call it that. I don’t care if you
give me a declaration that has exhibits
A, F, B, Q in that order. I don’t care as
long as every time I look at exhibit Q, it
is always exhibit Q, and not a different
document. This seems really basic but
it is a constant problem.
16. What are your goals for Central
District California?
To find out what our goals are. I mean,
clearly I want us to keep functioning
effectively and serving the public well
in a diminishing resource environment,
and so that’s kind of the overarching
goal - to do a good job no matter what
obstacles may be thrown in our path.
But, other than that, in terms of what
needs to be done or what isn’t working,
I don’t know what the problems are that
need to be fixed yet. I’m out there trying
to find out. I encourage people to tell
National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys
Spring 2015
me if there is H