Legal Writing

Whatley Watch II

It’s just great to see that the firm of McAfee & Taft is following my advice. It’s just too bad they don’t have the wherewithal to pay for it.

Oh well . . . what the heck. Sometimes I do things for the fun of it.

I began this discussion (here) by noting that Nathan Whatley either 1) doesn’t bother to read what his firm writes about him, or 2) doesn’t care what his firm writes about him.

Whatever his motive, Whatley demonstrates a failure to apply due diligence. He lets his image and his good name be attached to an announcement suffering a very noticeable error.

Let’s take one more look at the announcement that inspired this discussion, which has been altered since I brought it to the attention of many more than required.

It used to say:

McAfee & Taft labor and employment attorney Nathan Whatley authored a Q&A for The Oklahoman . . . .

It now says:

McAfee & Taft labor and employment attorney Nathan Whatley was recently interviewed by The Oklahoman . . . .

The new version sounds much better (it’s kind of silly for someone to interview himself), but the old version is more accurate.

Now consider this line from the announcement:

If the internship does not qualify under the labor rules, Whatley said that the employer would have to pay the intern back wages for minimum wage and any overtime worked, as well as unpaid state and federal taxes.

There’s a big problem in the logic of this statement, and that problem is this: it says what Whatley said in the past depends upon some condition in the present.

Of course, we know what was meant:

Whatley said that if the internship does not qualify under the labor rules, then . . . .

We also know this: when a law firm makes mistake after mistake in its promotional materials and its attorneys don’t notice them or don’t bother to fix them, it’s a warning to potential clients: Beware! The attorneys don’t apply due diligence in all they do (despite what they say).

That’s it for now. But tune in later. We’ll be keeping an eye on Whatley . . . .

Full post as published by Set in Style on June 08, 2010 (boomark / email).