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Albany Lawyer Blog

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Last Entry: November 21, 2009 at 10:52:00

Traffic Lawyer Directory Statistics

Posted on November 21, 2009
Noticed an interesting set of statistics about our directory of traffic lawyers just now. The image below shows the number of visits to the various pages within the directory. Click on the image to enlarge it. The stats are for the last October 21 to November 20...

Out-of-state tickets and Massachussetts drivers

Posted on November 18, 2009
Prospective clients frequently ask how their NY ticket will affect them in their home state. Since it's next door, we get this question a lot from Massachusetts drivers. One of the best places to get the answer to this question is your state's DMV. In Massachusetts it is known as the RMV - Registry of Motor Vehicles...

Texas speeding and traffic fines and points

Posted on November 18, 2009
Searching the web for something else, we came across the image below. It describes the fine and point schedule for Texas traffic tickets. If you click on it, it should enlarge.Looks like on the high end, it's almost $500 for a very high speed in a work zone with workers present...

NY Tickets and NJ Insurance

Posted on October 27, 2009
We spoke recently with a NJ insurance agent. He had received a ticket in NY which was an 1110a. This was a "road-side writedown" where the cop was giving him a break from a speed. The agent told us that an 1110a would increase insurance rates by as much $900 per year for three years...

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The Supreme Court on the DWI Exception to the Constitution

Posted on October 22, 2009
The Supreme Court decided not to hear an appeal on a drunk driving case that was dismissed. Virginia's highest court threw out the conviction in Harris v. Commonwealth (a pdf file). It found that the stop was unconstitutional - based only on an anonymous tip...

Speeding Ticket Story: A Tough Situation

Posted on October 18, 2009
Most of our speeding ticket cases are straightforward. We get hired, get all the information in order, contact the court and prosecutor, negotiate a reduction to something less, and let the client know the result and what they need to do. There's more to it than that, but that's the essence...

The Ghost of Altamont

Posted on October 16, 2009
Halloween is coming up, so it's time for a ghost story:

DWI Story: Listening to the Radio While Intoxicated

Posted on October 09, 2009
For a new kick, I'm starting a series of stories about past cases I've handled. This one's a DWI story, from a few years ago. As part of my pattern for stories about cases, some elements will be fictionalized mainly to protect the client. In this case there was a trial, so the truth is really a matter of public record, though practically it would be difficult to find the record if you don't know

Albany Lawyer Ages

Posted on August 26, 2009
I guess it had to happen after I turned 40 a few years ago. I'm really starting to notice the aging process.Examples: We attended an intern's "Kegs on a Deck" party. Some attendees did "keg stands". This is a handstand (supported by others) on top of a keg while drinking from the tap...

The Wedding Photo Story

Posted on August 26, 2009
Yes, the Albany Lawyer has a wedding photo story. This has been one of my favorite stories for the past six years, and I finally get to tell it. Some details have been changed to protect the innocent and perhaps the guilty too.Back in 2003 there was a wedding...

A Good Lawyer: Why Experience Matters

Posted on August 23, 2009
A conversation with a law student led to something coalescing in my mind about good lawyers. Experience matters when you hire a lawyer. I'm biased, but I think trial experience is critical. Of course it's most important when you need a trial lawyer. Even for other kinds of law, it can still matter...

Joel Dykstra

Posted on August 22, 2009
Interesting website I happened upon - it's about a guy from South Dakota who ran for the US Senate: Joel Dykstra. Love the name - we were big Lenny Dykstra fans back in the 90s when he played for the Mets. The two are probably not related, though the name suggests they have Dutch ancestry...

San Bernardino Superior Court

Posted on August 18, 2009
Not sure why, but it seems like a lot of people are searching for the San Bernardino Superior Court. Maybe it's because of the corruption scandal in the Assessor's office: LA Times story. But we think they just write a lot of speeding tickets in the traffic court...

NY DWI, Crawford and Melendez-Diaz

Posted on July 30, 2009
It looks like NY DWI cases will become more interesting in light of Melendez-Diaz (129 S.Ct. 2527), which just came down from the Supreme Court in late June. That case follows on the 2004 Crawford (541 US 36, 124 S.Ct. 1354) decision on the Confrontation Clause in the Sixth Amendment...

Do Points Transfer? Out-of-state tickets are not that simple ...

Posted on July 22, 2009
This is one of the most common question we get: Do points transfer? Or: "Will the points transfer to my home state?"The short and misleading answer is No. The points themselves do not transfer to other states.So what does happen? In most situations, the state where you got the ticket will report any conviction to your home state...

Short URLs

Posted on July 01, 2009
Making life easier for phone calls with clients. We registered a new domain name: rlaw1.com. It's quicker to tell them that than redlichlaw.com. And the rlaw1.com domain just redirects to our traffic page.

Garage Party - A Fun Way to Reduce DWI

Posted on June 28, 2009
We had a garage party last night. With all the DWI cases I handle where people had a few drinks and then drove home, this idea came to me. Wouldn't it be nice if you could go somewhere, have a few drinks, and not worry about driving home?There's more to this...

Guest Blogger

Posted on June 24, 2009
Happy to have a guest blogger on our blog. My associate David Cooper is now contributing. His first blog post is on suspended licenses.

Suspended License: Why you should care and act quickly

Posted on June 23, 2009
Why should you care? If you are driving in New York State and you have forgotten to answer a ticket or never heard back from the court you may be suspended. If your license or privilege to drive (for out-of-state drivers) in New York is suspended and you are stopped while driving in New York, there is a very good chance you will be charged with a crime, known as Aggravated Unlicensed Operation in

Why shouldn't I hire a lawyer to beat my ticket?

Posted on June 11, 2009
Saw something on the web that got me laughing. Back in '05 I did a post about lawyer marketing on the web. I critiqued some websites that claimed to help people with their tickets.Well, someone from speedticketbeaters -dot- com tried to post a comment on that old blog post...

Drunk Driving articles in the Wall Street Journal

Posted on June 11, 2009
Two good articles in the Wall Street Journal this week.Yesterday there was a discussion of drunk driver data by The Numbers Guy - Carl Bialik. It talks about statistics on the risks of driving at varying blood-alcohol content (BAC) levels. Bialik briefly mentions flaws in breath testing...

County Court update

Posted on June 09, 2009
A new milestone for our court directory - we now have 6000 courts in our database - see below.There's about 1500 in NY; 240 in CA; about 200 in the New England states (MA, CT, RI, VT and NH - we haven't done Maine yet); 600 in NJ; 168 in FL; GA has 500 and we're still adding more; 132 in Illinois; nearly 300 between MD, VA and DC; 220 in NC; roughly 600 apiece in Ohio and PA; and there's

New York Speeding Ticket - Piece by Piece

Posted on June 08, 2009
We added a new page to our website with a breakdown of a typical New York speeding ticket. Please post any comments or suggestions on this blog post.

Lawyer Websites and Spelling

Posted on June 05, 2009
I was just looking at a lawyer website and it some animated graphics. Below is an image I clipped from the animation.Maybe it's just me, but I think clients are a bit less likely to hire a lawyer who spells poorly. Click on the image below and it should enlarge a bit and be easier to read...

Advanta and Credit Card Woes

Posted on May 26, 2009
We've been using an Advanta MasterCard for our business for several years now. So today I get an e-mail that they're canceling all their credit card accounts - in four days. Thanks for giving me time to get a new card.Apparently we have not been like their typical customer...

Dyslexic SEO with Flash

Posted on May 22, 2009
If you don't find this funny, you don't get SEO.And if that doesn't persuade you, this is from one of their sites:Apparently optimizing for misspellings. Or Mineloa is an fff'ing long Hawaiian island.On the bright side, the lawyer probably ended up paying them $19...

Traffic Court: New Milestones

Posted on May 21, 2009
New milestones for our traffic court website. As shown below, over 150K visits in the last 31 days, and over 130K unique visitors. For those unfamiliar with our stats, the peaks are Mondays and the valleys are weekends.Moreno Valley Court in California is the busiest on the site, with over 1400 pageviews in that 31-day stretch...

GPS, Privacy, and the NY Court of Appeals

Posted on May 20, 2009
Great decision by the New York Court of Appeals, in the case of People v. Weaver. Police, without a warrant, placed a GPS tracking device on the underside of the defendant's car - for 65 days. They later used the GPS evidence against him in a criminal trial where he was convicted...

Me, Rudy Giuliani, and some other guy

Posted on May 12, 2009
Here's a picture for ya!I'm kidding about the "some other guy" in the title. That's Peter King, a congressman thought to be a candidate for US Senate in 2010.The Rudy thing is funny. I have been critical in the past of him: Rudy Giuliani and Ron Paul...

Hate Lawyers?

Posted on May 07, 2009
Just stumbled on an article by Andrew Fischer on LewRockwell.com. It's one of those "hate lawyers" stories. Normally I like what I see on that site, and I'd probably agree with a lot of Fischer's other articles, but I have to rip this one apart. Quotes from the article are in italics...

M

Posted on May 06, 2009

Albany Lawyer Gets Rear-Ended

Posted on May 01, 2009
There's some kind of irony or poetic justice in this. I got rear-ended yesterday. Stopped at a traffic light, and an SUV behind me bumped my car. Even though my kids were in the car, it's easy to laugh about it because the damage seems so minimal. There's a crack in the top of the rear bumper...

Nicole Black: On the Cutting Edge

Posted on April 28, 2009
For those who are interested in following lawyers on the cutting edge of technology, Nicole Black is it. In addition to being a well respected criminal defense lawyer, she is a whiz at various technology issues. Her main website is Nicole Black, Esq., and she is also one of the most followed lawyers on Twitter: Niki Black - Twitter...

Traffic Court News

Posted on April 27, 2009
So here's the latest with our directory of traffic courts. For starters, the directory now covers all or part of 19 states, the District of Columbia, and even a few in Toronto. We've completed Illinois and North Carolina, and are almost done with Maryland and Georgia...

Google Similar Images: Andrew Cuomo and ... is that Jamie Lynn Spears?

Posted on April 22, 2009
Saw Google Similar Images mentioned on Twitter. Was goofing around. Disappointed that there were none for my images. But here's the link to what happens with an Andrew Cuomo photo. Image below in case the results change.And while I'm disappointed that I'm not famous enough to merit similar image treatment, neither does Kirsten Gillibrand, and she's a US Senator.

Phil Steck

Posted on April 20, 2009
I got a letter from Phil Steck. An image is below and I think if you click on it you get a bigger version.I love this line: "Please cease and desist from using philsteck.com without my permission."Mr. Steck - I don't need your permission. You let your own domain name lapse...

Bad web marketing: Fidelity HR/Payroll

Posted on April 14, 2009
Something caught my eye yesterday in the Wall Street Journal. It was an ad for Fidelity's HR/Payroll service. We use an online payroll service now. I'm happy with it, but I've always liked Fidelity and figured it might be a better option because of the potential linkage with retirement accounts...

Ian Tomlinson: Are Police The Good Guys?

Posted on April 09, 2009
Troubling story from London:So often today police are offered as the solution to this problem or the other. Could be drugs, DWI, or the latest - sexting. We need to remember that police are far from perfect. This video is a reminder.With drugs, we keep arresting more and more people, and stuffing our prisons, despite overwhelming evidence that treatment is more effective...

Red Light Cameras Increase Accidents

Posted on April 02, 2009
In a previous post I mentioned that New York was set to add speed cameras to our highways. That has apparently disappeared from the budget.The budget does have a substantial increase in red light cameras. They say it's not for the revenue but rather for safety...

Breath Test Videos

Posted on March 31, 2009
Saw these great breath test videos on YouTube. I mentioned them on my other blog recently, but thought they deserved their own post. For those who believe in the Breathalyzer, these videos will give you something to think about.The first video demonstrates the problem of mouth alcohol...

DWI Consequences: Travel to Canada

Posted on March 29, 2009
DWI lawyers frequently get clients who just want the case over with. We lawyers can usually get the charge reduced to DWAI. Then everything's hunky-dory, right?Here's a sobering lesson from a client who took a DWAI:is there ANY WAY to get this charge changed to something else?? i cross the canadian border A LOT for work, and every time i cross i have to pay $200 canadian, and risk not getting in

Google Analytics by Day of Week

Posted on March 29, 2009
The two images below show web traffic to our county court site and to my Albany restaurant review blog. They come from Google Analytics. Very helpful for monitoring our websites.What stands out about this is the difference in traffic by day of the week...

Strip-searching a 13-year-old?

Posted on March 24, 2009
This New York Times article about a school strip-searching a 13-year-old girl pretty much says it all. The Supreme Court will decide soon on it. This does not sound like the America I was raised to believe in. Would you want your school to do this to your kid?

Albany Lawyer on TV again -- Video Link

Posted on March 20, 2009
Thanks to Liz Bishop for interviewing me about DWI and DWAI cases. The video is here.You can also read my blog post about it on my other blog: Stop Wasting Money on DWI.

Albany Lawyer in the Newspaper

Posted on March 19, 2009
Well, I'm in the paper again.It motivated me to do a blog post on my Stop Wasting Money blog about DWI.I included some great videos, so check it out!Here's the Times Union article.

Power of the Mainstream Media

Posted on March 15, 2009
One of my local-interest websites was mentioned in the Times Union twice recently. The graph below shows the effect of that on website traffic.The two spikes, each about 150 visits, constitute about one third of total traffic to the site during that period...

Albany Lawyer on TV!!

Posted on March 13, 2009
I was on NewsChannel 13 last night. I don't see the video online, but here's the story:Tough Times Keeping Lawyers BusyThanks to Abigail Bleck for doing the story and for including me. I'm flattered.The story relates to at least a few of my past blog posts:Recession, Crime and LawyersCriminal Defense Lawyer ThoughtsandThe Surcharge Tax Increase

Great story on FL traffic courts

Posted on March 12, 2009
Below is a great TV expose on a dubious Florida traffic court practice.

HP Customer Service By Chat

Posted on March 08, 2009
My mom has been having problems with her new printer/fax/scanner/phone. So after messing around with it I decided to try to get an RMA from HP. They have a feature where you can "chat" with someone online. I think it said you get instant customer service...

Mid-forties

Posted on March 06, 2009
The Albany Lawyer will shortly enter his mid-forties. Oh, that's me. Maybe age causes you to talk about yourself in the third-person. Remember Bob Dole? If not, you're either very young or really getting old.Anyway, so far the 40s aren't going so badly...

Ken Runion, Domain Names, Cybersquatting, and the Law

Posted on March 05, 2009

A Visit to Massachusetts Traffic Court

Posted on March 04, 2009

The Tom Spargo Witchhunt

Posted on March 02, 2009

Google Analytics Quirk

Posted on March 02, 2009

Dan Abrams and the Presumption of Innocence

Posted on February 28, 2009

How NOT to handle a speeding ticket

Posted on February 27, 2009

Dan from Expert Village

Posted on February 22, 2009
I just thought this was funny. If you want advice on getting out of a speeding ticket, check out Dan from Expert Village. I'm not saying you should follow the advice, keep in mind. Use your own judgment on this.

Delaware Traffic Courts

Posted on February 21, 2009
I got motivated today and added the State of Delaware to our traffic court directory. There are only three counties with a total of about maybe 20 courts. If you get a ticket in Delaware, check out the Delaware county courts.

Breezes Curacao

Posted on February 18, 2009
We took a recent trip to Curacao. It was quite an experience.Fairly short flight from Miami, maybe 2 � hours. We stayed at Breezes Curacao, an all-inclusive resort. I describe the experience including a number of complaints below, but I should start out by noting that it seems pretty inexpensive...

Ken Runion of Guilderland

Posted on February 09, 2009
Cool new website up for those interested in Guilderland. The infamous Ken Runion is now discussed in detail in a website about him. Quality stuff.

Traffic Court - New Milestones

Posted on February 04, 2009
Our traffic court site has cleared some new hurdles. We not only surpassed 100,000 visits in 31 days. We've hit 130K visits, and over 114,000 unique visitors. We also cleared 300,000 pageviews. These numbers are one day short of a peak -- going a day forward we'll lose a Sunday and pick up a Wednesday - an extra 5K visits and 12K pageviews.

Albany DWI "Blanket Patrol"

Posted on February 03, 2009
Big news in Albany - this past weekend had a "blanket patrol" per Capital News 9.Nice bit from the story - 944 traffic stops and 21 "drunk driving" arrests. If I've got this right, they interrupted the lives of about 1100 people (figuring 1.2 people per car) to make 21 arrests...

NY DWI: Why low BAC cases should be fought

Posted on February 01, 2009
I got a call the other day from a prospective DWI client. His BAC was 0.16. It's already difficult in Albany to negotiate a reduction with a BAC that high. But it's worse than that. He had a previous DUI offense 3 years earlier and his lawyer pled him to a DWAI...

Drug policy blog

Posted on February 01, 2009
Just a pointer to a great: drug policy reform blog. I've been involved with ReconsiDer for many years and am a big fan.

Interesting cross-examination by a prosecutor

Posted on January 31, 2009
The video below shows inappropriate conduct for a prosecutor, or any attorney, in a courtroom, and I'd say the same for the judge. The witness is Stacy Castor in Syracuse. Read more about it at the Syracuse Post-Standard. You think a defense lawyer would be allowed to scream at a cop like this?

Traffic/Criminal Lawyers Club Update

Posted on January 21, 2009
The Traffic and Criminal Lawyers Club is up and running. We are approaching 30 members. I've put together a draft user guide and posted it on my firm website: Traffic/Criminal Lawyer Club User Guide. This is a large file in "pdf" format. It describes how to join and how to use the club features...

Hiring Is Harder Than Firing

Posted on January 19, 2009
We're currently in the process of hiring a new associate. Since I started this firm, nearly 6 years ago now, I've hired several people and fired some. Based on my experience so far, I have to say that firing people is much easier than hiring them. That may sound harsh, but it's true...

Weird Analytics

Posted on January 14, 2009
Something weird on Google Analytics just now. This blog had nearly 300 visits in the past two days from a single keyword phrase search from Yahoo. The search was for "funny speeding ticket excuses".Ordinarily I'd figure it was some kind of glitch on one computer somewhere...

Traffic Lawyers Club - Free!!

Posted on January 13, 2009
Our traffic lawyer club is up and running. This is a feature on our traffic court website.Membership in the club is for lawyers only and it's FREE. We are going to verify that those who register are lawyers.If you're a lawyer who handles some cases in traffic court or local criminal court, please register on the site...

Traffic Court 2008

Posted on January 08, 2009
2008 was a good year for our traffic court website. Here are some numbers:Almost 900,000 visits (897K)Over 700K unique visitors (different people using the website)Over 2 million pageviewsThe site's homepage was viewed over 220,000 times by over 150,000 people...

Oklahoma Playing Dirty

Posted on January 08, 2009
Just a quick hit on the Florida-Oklahoma game. Oklahoma is playing dirty. There was a horse-collar tackle on a FL running back (#3) - no call and it took him out of the game. A wicked facemask on Demps (FL #2) as he neared the end zone - called but just a nasty facemask...

Attorney Ethics and Jurisdiction

Posted on January 06, 2009
Here's an interesting ethics question that came up in our practice. We have gotten a number of cases dismissed on "geographic jurisdiction" under Article 20 of the CPL. In short, our client is charged in a town, but it turns out that the location where the incident occurred is clearly in a different town...

Speeding ticket and DWI data

Posted on January 03, 2009
Interesting data on the web about speeding tickets on the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle website. There's another data set on DWI: RocDocs DWI.Now, I say the data is interesting. Partly that's because it doesn't look accurate to me. For example it appears there are more DWI arrests in Albany County than in the Bronx...

Here's an article in the Times

Posted on January 01, 2009
Here's an article in the Times Union. Albany County couldn't get a program together to provide free bus rides home for New Years Eve drinkers. For various reasons we ended up with nothing at all.Government is just fine at getting the arrest and prosecution programs together...

Blog post of funny traffic stops

Posted on December 31, 2008
The linked blog post shows some funny traffic stops. They're not all funny. #1 is pretty hilarious. Other good ones are #20, 17, 15, 14, and 11. The rest are so-so.

Consequences of Aggressive DUI Enforcement

Posted on December 28, 2008
So, you think aggressive DUI enforcement is a great thing, huh? I got this message from a friend the other day. I edited it a bit.I was driving on I-80 in New Jersey. I missed my exit and had pulled onto the shoulder to read the map when a State Trooper parked behind me...

Can't Afford a Lawyer?

Posted on December 24, 2008
It's a common phrase heard in the legal community. I can't afford a lawyer. The statement is usually followed by a request for free advice or pro bono representation. I did a quick search on Google for "can't afford a lawyer" - there are 63,900 results...

DWI: To Blow or Not to Blow

Posted on December 23, 2008
One thing comes up a lot in DWI seminars. A client calls you late at night. They've been arrested and the cop wants them to blow into the "Breathalyzer". In most of NY the device is actually a Datamaster, but question is the same. And to be clear, I'm talking about the breath test in the station...

Pringle Hearing and the DWI Prompt Suspension

Posted on December 18, 2008
In handling our a href="http://www.redlichlaw.com/dwi/"DWI/a cases, the "prompt suspension law" has been bothering me, along with a number of other issues. I first wrote about this a couple years ago as part of a post about a href="http://albany-lawyer...

Speed Cameras in New York State: Coming Soon?

Posted on December 17, 2008
New York State is hungry for money. Speed cameras are coming. The full text of the proposed new law is at the bottom. Here are some details:br /br /a. A new statute would be created, � 1181-a of the Vehicle and Traffic Law. This law holds vehicle iowners/i liable for speeding - even if they're not driving the car...

Plaxico Burress - Are Hunting and Target Shooting Illegal in New York State?

Posted on December 09, 2008
Update: Thanks to George P. Conway for the comment. Penal Law �265.20 sets forth a list of exceptions. I'm not sure these exceptions clearly apply to loaded firearms. That would seem to be the natural conclusion, but it's not completely clear.----------At the bottom of this post is an image of the first page of the felony complaint in the Plaxico Burress gun case...

Profile: The Master

Posted on December 09, 2008
Here's another Albany lawyer profile. Keep in mind these are generally semi-fictional.The Master is one of the top criminal defense attorneys in the Albany area. All the judges, cops and criminal lawyers know his name, but not everyone recognizes him on sight...

Florida Speeding Tickets

Posted on December 07, 2008
Just added a page to the Redlich Law Firm website about Florida speeding tickets There seems to be a lot of tickets written there, so much so that I saw a TV show (or internet version of a TV show) about one of the traffic courts there.Interesting thing for us concerns how we handle NY tickets for Florida drivers...

DWI Defense Perspectives

Posted on December 06, 2008
I had the honor of speaking at a DWI seminar this past week. There were some excellent speakers, and a few of us presented a sharp contrast on how to handle DWI cases.My topic was low BAC cases. I talked about some things lawyers can do when the defendant's blood-alcohol content is low...

More Verizon and Debt Collection

Posted on December 02, 2008
I've written in the past about Verizon and their debt collection practices. They're back again.I got a call this morning about an old disputed cell phone bill. The caller said she was from NES. I'm thinking this is Nintendo calling trying to sell me a Wii, but no...

Keith Olbermann on Gay Marriage

Posted on December 01, 2008
I've always wondered why discrimination against gays isn't inherently gender discrimination. It's okay for Jim to marry Mary, but not to marry John. Isn't that discrimination against John because of his gender?But below is an argument for gay marriage by Keith Olbermann...

Profile: The Glory Hound

Posted on November 21, 2008
The following is another in my occasional Profiles in the Albany NY legal community. Keep in mind these are generally semi-fictional.The Glory Hound is well known to most attorneys in the area. He is a vigorous promoter of both himself and a cause or two...

Dewey Cheatham & Howe

Posted on November 17, 2008
Just came across this cool website - a play on the most famous fictional law firm, Dewey Cheatham & Howe. This is clearly the product of a demented mind. :-)

Craig Watkins: A Great Prosecutor

Posted on November 15, 2008
Solid article in the Wall Street Journal today about a prosecutor in Dallas. Craig Watkins was elected DA there in 2006. He's made a name for himself by thoroughly reviewing dubious convictions and using DNA evidence for that purpose.He actually created a unit within his office, the "Conviction Integrity Unit," to review cases...

Costa Rica: Some Thoughts

Posted on November 14, 2008
Over the past few days I posted the details (and some photos) of our trip to Costa Rica. Now's the time for some reflection.First, for those who want to read the posts in chronological order:Day 0Day 1Day 2Day 3My first thought is that Costa Rica lived up to its billing...

Costa Rica Day 3: Better Driving and More Xandari

Posted on November 12, 2008
On the morning of Day 3 we enjoyed one final breakfast at Gaia. Another nice meal, including fresh local fruit. I thought the croissant french toast was better the day before, but it was still good.Before breakfast we checked out Gaia's nature trail. We only got a little way in and decided it was too challenging...

Costa Rica Day 2: Manuel Antonio and the Americana Fea

Posted on November 09, 2008
After a good night of sleep, we had a nice breakfast at Gaia's restaurant. This resort really pampers the guests. Lots of staff available at all times to help with whatever you need or want. The restaurant has a fantastic view of the ocean and many miles of coastline...

Costa Rica: Ugly Driving and Beautiful Xandari

Posted on November 08, 2008
I've been thinking about Costa Rica for years. Driving my wife crazy. Well, I was goofing around with my Northwest Airlines frequent flyer miles on their website and (with spousal approval) booked a short trip to Costa Rica. And now we're here.We arrived after a fairly long flight - a bit longer because the plane had to fly around Hurricane Paloma...

Costa Rica Day 1: Poas Volcano, Uglier Driving and Gorgeous Gaia

Posted on November 08, 2008
On our first full day in Costa Rica (for Day Zero, see Costa Rica: Ugly Driving) we woke up a little late. The previous day was a long one, and we both had trouble sleeping.When we did get up, we had a pleasant breakfast at our resort, Xandari Alajuela...

TruPhone for iPhone

Posted on October 27, 2008
I read about an "app" for the iPhone called TruPhone. It allows you to make calls over the internet when you have a WiFi connection. We have a weak cell signal at our house. I downloaded TruPhone to my iPhone and tried it out using our home WiFi. The call was crystal-clear - far better than what I'm used to at home on the cell...

Van Nuys Traffic Court and Britney Spears

Posted on October 22, 2008
Apparently Britney Spears had her day in Court recently. 10 of 12 jurors felt she was not guilty of driving with a suspended license, so she's neither guilty nor "not guilty." As best we can tell, the case was heard in Van Nuys Traffic Court.

Why hire a traffic lawyer?

Posted on October 13, 2008
If you want a good reason to hire a traffic lawyer, watch this show of people going to traffic court by themselves. It's called Speeders Fight Back and it's on TruTV.The site also has a list of future episodes.The show is set in what looks like Plantation Traffic Court, part of the Broward County Court system.

Criminal Defense Lawyer Thoughts

Posted on October 08, 2008
It's a sad reality that hard economic times are not bad for criminal defense lawyers. Desperate people are more likely to commit crimes. Cash-strapped governments at all levels increase traffic enforcement and fines. All of this leads to a greater demand for our services.

Lawyer Thoughts

Posted on October 08, 2008
Having one of those pensive moments.- Sometimes being a lawyer feels like walking through a minefield. We have a map of all the mines, but the map is in the form of 10,000 large books. You can't carry them all with you, and it's kinda hard to remember everything...

Are police tougher on out-of-state drivers?

Posted on October 04, 2008
Just read an interesting statistical analysis about speeding tickets by Professors Michael Makowsky and Thomas Stratmann. They both appear to be economics professors at George Mason University.They analyzed a database of Massachusetts speeding tickets...

Criminal Defense: Some of our clients are criminals

Posted on October 04, 2008
A few years ago I did a post about representing innocent clients in criminal defense cases.The other day I spoke to the Pre-Law Association at U Albany. One of the stories I told them (which I'll go into another day) involved the most criminal client I've ever represented...

The Secret to Writing a Lawyer Blog

Posted on September 28, 2008
Someone on a social networking site asked a question about writing a lawyer blog, and about writing posts that will generate traffic versus posts that will appeal to a niche. I think I have the secret, and it's not really a secret.To paraphrase Crash Davis from Bull Durham: Don't think meat...

Traffic Court - New Heights!

Posted on September 11, 2008
Our traffic court site continues to grow. The latest news is that we broke 200,000 page views in the last 31 days. Monday was the biggest day in the site's history, with over 4600 visits and over 4300 "unique" visitors. Tuesday was over 4200 visits, making it the strongest regular Tuesday ever (excluding Tuesdays after a 3-day weekend), and the 4th biggest day in site history, just a nick behind July 7th (an abnormal Tuesday)...

Albany DWI Seminar

Posted on September 10, 2008
You know the world's in trouble when I'm speaking at a seminar. There will be a Lorman CLE on DWI in Albany on December 4th. I will talk about handling low BAC cases. Should be interesting.

Vote for Steven Vasquez

Posted on September 07, 2008
The congressional primary is Tuesday - voting is from 12 noon to 9 pm. Please make sure you get out and vote.And Republicans -- vote for Steven Vasquez. There are three big reasons why you should:1. Steven supports small government, and he really means it...

10 Great Things About Albany

Posted on August 31, 2008
People supposedly like top 10 lists, so here goes, in no particular order ...10. Albany is a fairly short drive to several cool places. New York City is a bit more than 2 hours. Boston is 3 hours. Four hours to Montreal, and a bit more than that to Niagara Falls...

Insanity in the Computer Age

Posted on August 29, 2008
There's a semi-famous quote about the definition of insanity: "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." It's most often attributed to Albert Einstein, but I haven't found a reliable source for that. I've certainly heard the quote before...

Albany Lawn Care and Snow Plowing

Posted on August 26, 2008
My buddy Mark Malone started up a business, Malone and Sons, doing lawn care and snow plowing. They've been mowing our lawn in Guilderland and do a consistently solid job. It's been a tough year with all the rain, but they find a way.We normally don't need plowing, as we have a snow blower...

Website Economics

Posted on August 26, 2008
The web has certainly changed my world. Our websites, including our law firm site and our traffic court site, are the main drivers for our business.There are a bunch of websites out there that seem more successful, yet apparently struggle. I just got an e-mail from one where I'm a "member...

Frustrated Lawyers

Posted on August 14, 2008
I've been a little grumpy lately. Usually I'm happy, dopey, and a bit sneezy. Never bashful. But lately, grumpy. I think I'm frustrated with being a lawyer and with running an office.I shouldn't feel that way. Life is good and so is business. Things are a lot tougher for a lot of other lawyers, and for a lot of other people...

El Dorado Superior Court

Posted on August 11, 2008
As our traffic court website continues to grow, we're nearly done with California. We just finished adding El Dorado Superior Court. The county includes a few courts, including South Lake Tahoe Superior Court. I've been to South Lake Tahoe. There's some gambling resorts on the Nevada side of the border, but the thing I remember most is the Heavenly Valley ski resort...

Albany Websites

Posted on August 10, 2008
As someone who is seen by Albany media as a prospective advertiser, I sometimes get interesting information.Back in May I attended an event in Colonie where one local media outlet (you can guess who) was bragging about its website. The sheet they handed out on this provided some numbers for April traffic; I'm adding current Alexa rank:Media Company Unique Visitors Alexa RankTimes Union218,50015,715News-9114,600114,024WTEN94,300194,915WNYT91,400176,980Not included in the list, cbs6albany...

2008 Honda Accord

Posted on August 09, 2008
I've been shopping cars for a while now, and finally made a decision. I've been looking at $50K cars like the Audi A6 and the Infiniti M35x. And I've been all over the map, thinking about an Acura MDX and even the upcoming 2009 Porsche 911 Carrera 4. At $80K, the Porsche was getting a little silly...

Local and Unique

Posted on August 07, 2008
There's something unique in the works at SpinJ Corporation. We're working on a new website. It's top secret. So secret that if I told you what it was, I'd have to ... well ... not kill you ... maybe tickle you until you promise not to say anything. That's all I can really do...

Milestones on the web

Posted on August 03, 2008
Our websites hit some new milestones. First, The Redlich Law Firm site had over 10,000 visits in July. We came close to that in both January and March, but this is the first time we went over. It wasn't that long ago we had only 6000 visits a month, so this is good for business...

Tax Benefits of Leasing a Car - IRS Depreciation Limits

Posted on August 02, 2008
I've been thinking about leasing a car (see my previous post about leasing certified pre-owned cars). My accountant told me to lease. But I like buying. I know there's a tax benefit to leasing, but I don't really understand it.If I was smart I would have asked my accountant to explain it to me...

Albany Criminal Lawyer

Posted on July 24, 2008
We've had a burst of clients needing a criminal lawyer in Albany. The unusual part of the spike is cases in the federal court here, related to border problems. So far it's a great example of how foolish our government policies are.We spend billions of dollars of taxpayer money trying to keep drugs, foreigners, and - believe it or not - money from entering our country...

Speeding tickets and GPS

Posted on July 22, 2008
Just saw a great story on using GPS (global positioning system) to fight a speeding ticket. Check it out on the Press Democrat.

Tuolumne County Superior Court - Interesting Grand Jury Report

Posted on July 22, 2008
Apparently the Tuolumne County Grand Jury (in Sonora, California) covers a lot more ground than the grand jury here in Albany or in most other places. I was adding an entry for the courts in Tuolumne County when I came across this.They investigate public agencies and seem to find a high degree of professionalism everywhere...

A different take on traffic court

Posted on July 20, 2008
Check out this story about traffic court in England. So different from what we see here.

Albany Lawyer in the News

Posted on July 11, 2008
Nice story today about one of our cases: Capital News Nine.

Real Estate in Albany

Posted on July 04, 2008
We are now handling real estate closings in Albany and the surrounding area. David Cooper, our senior associate, has done a lot of work to prepare for handling these transactions, and we've handled a couple so far. First victim was my mother, so David made sure to get it right...

Lawyers Marketing on the Web: Controversy

Posted on July 03, 2008
I've posted in the past about some dubious lawyer marketing. Most recently I posted about an upstate lawyer with a DWI business model for sale.Another aspect of this kind of marketing is a variety of lawyer websites, along the lines of superfreakingawesomelawyers...

Los Angeles Traffic Court story

Posted on June 25, 2008
Just a quick one - the following is a great story about handling a speeding ticket in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles traffic court does not come off well. Great photos, good story, etc.

Certified Pre-Owned and Leasing

Posted on June 25, 2008
I'm getting ready to replace my car. I've had it for 6 years and nearly 110K miles. The backseat is getting too small - something about how the special car seats for kids force their legs forward at an angle - yet another reason why Americans want larger cars...

Google Analytics, Dublin and Digiweb

Posted on June 23, 2008
I've noticed through Google Analytics, for some time now, that my sites get unusually heavy traffic from what appears to be one user in Dublin, Ireland. Nearly all visitors from Dublin are using Linux with the Mozilla browser with Digiweb as the network location...

New speeding ticket pages

Posted on June 21, 2008
We added some new speeding ticket information pages to the Redlich Law Firm website for other states today.First we added a page about Pennsylvania speeding tickets. My associate has been pushing me to add such content.We also added a page for Connecticut speeding tickets...

The Testiliar and Barney Fife

Posted on June 13, 2008
As our firm progresses I've been spending less time in court. Our associates have been doing most of the traffic court appearances, while I spend more time managing the firm. But once in a while I still get out there. I'm still the main lawyer for hearings and trials...

Judicial salaries

Posted on June 12, 2008
I saw this comment on the Times Union Capitol Confidential blog: "Students graduating from law school this year (who have not even passed the bar exam) are making more then these judges who have worked hard through out their career to be voted or appointed to these positions...

Traffic Court Hits 75K

Posted on June 12, 2008
Our traffic court website reached a new level the other day, with over 75,000 visits and over 65,000 unique visitors in 31 days. There were nearly 170,000 pageviews as well.We've been adding courts in a few states. Our California traffic courts page now covers 23 counties, and the Los Angeles traffic courts page has become one of the busiest pages on the site...

Prosecutors: Some Things Never Change

Posted on June 06, 2008
I've blogged a lot in the past about prosecutors in the Albany area. I had a new experience about a half-hour ago that I feel compelled to relate.In one local county the District Attorney's office has undergone a lot of changes in the past year or so...

The Jeff Gaul Chronicles

Posted on June 03, 2008
Read my latest post about Jeff Gaul. Only if you're interested in crazy Albany politics stuff.

Film Festival for Albany Indie Team

Posted on June 02, 2008
My buddies the Masuccis have a short film that is playing in some festivals. I'm one of two Executive Producers of the film. You can see it at the box[ur]shorts Film Festival website.Short description: In the twilight of his life, Ned reflects on his past, his remaining years, and discovers how his role in life has changed...

Albany Ron Paul Meetup

Posted on June 01, 2008
As one sees with any movement, there can be different factions. In the Albany Ron Paul movement, there are two different "Meetup" groups. One is run by a guy who seems a bit off. Well, okay, to a lot of people outside the movement, we all look crazy. But this guy looks crazy to most of us inside...

Smelly Returns

Posted on May 31, 2008
Almost a year ago I wrote a blog post about a DWI lawyer I referred to as Smelly. This was not a reference to any odor, but rather a play on his name. I've never even met the guy, and have only talked - briefly - with one lawyer who has worked with him...

New York Traffic Courts: The Surcharge Tax Increase

Posted on May 19, 2008
Change is brewing in the surcharges for various offenses in the NY traffic courts and criminal courts. I've posted a portion of the schedule below that's most relevant to what we do, in the usual traffic ticket and DWI cases, will discuss these massive tax increases further below...

Albany DWI and DA Soares' New Policy

Posted on May 17, 2008
Kudos to the Times Union for breaking an important legal news story. The Albany District Attorney's office has adopted a new policy regarding plea bargains in drunk driving cases.For starters, a big chunk of the policy depends on the accused person's blood alcohol content, or BAC...

David Soares and Citizen Action

Posted on May 13, 2008
I just got an e-mail for a David Soares fundraiser, and I just have to debunk the propaganda. Here are some of the claims, and my comments:In his first term in office, David has fulfilled his campaign promises by:Shutting down crack houses through our Safe Homes, Safe Streets Program to improve the quality of life in our neighborhoodsI don't remember a campaign promise to shut down crack houses...

Rensselaer Train Station

Posted on April 30, 2008
Several years ago a new train station was built for Amtrak in Rensselaer. I don't remember all the details, but it cost a huge amount of money. $55 million sticks in my head, but maybe that was before the cost overruns.I'm sitting now in the station waiting for a train...

What do lawyers do? Diversifying the revenue stream

Posted on April 25, 2008
An interesting issue has come up in our office recently. How much should a small law firm like ours do to diversify our revenue stream? Other businesses have this kind of issue, but in some ways this is special to lawyers.Our law firm in Albany has a strong main practice handling traffic cases in upstate New York...

Vermont Traffic Courts

Posted on April 25, 2008
I got motivated and entered all the traffic courts in Vermont in the past week or so. Not too many of them. Vermont has fourteen counties. Each county has two courts -- District Court and Superior Court. As one might think, District Court handles lesser offenses while Superior Court handles the more serious ones...

More Traffic Court News

Posted on April 22, 2008
Our Traffic Court website has shot up in the world a bit. According to Alexa, the site is now among the top 350,000 websites in the world. That's a big jump, but not really because of an increase in the importance of our site.Alexa changed the way it measures websites...

San Diego Criminal Court - The Marine Widow Case

Posted on April 19, 2008
We finished the San Diego Superior Courts, and I came across a great story in the process. It's apparently called the Marine Widow case, and that link is to a story about it. Heard in San Diego Criminal Court.Short version: Marine dies. Wife responds by getting a boob job with the life insurance money, joining wet t-shirt contests, and shagging other soldiers...

Los Angeles Traffic Courts

Posted on April 14, 2008
We made some progress on our directory project, adding all the superior courts in Los Angeles County. Superior Court in California seems to handle just about everything, from simple traffic tickets up to murder cases and civil cases too.A couple of the more "happening" traffic courts there include Beverly Hills Superior Court and Malibu Superior Court, which have had quite a few celebrity cases...

Lawyer websites and font size

Posted on April 10, 2008
I just visited a website for another law firm in the Albany area. The font size was extremely small. Below is an image showing it next to our website, and you can see that our fonts are significantly larger. If you go to the effort to create a website, you should go further and make sure it is user friendly and readable...

Albany Public Relations

Posted on April 03, 2008
My buddy Mark Grimm is also my fellow town board member. Mark really led the campaign and I think his skills in public relations really helped. He has a website for his business: Albany Public Relations. A couple years ago when we sued the Rensselaer DA, Mark set up our press conference and it went very well...

Schenectady DWI

Posted on April 02, 2008
We handle DWI in the Schenectady area. It seems like most of the cases we see occur in the towns, like Rotterdam, Duanesburg and Glenville. Of course there are some in the City of Schenectady as well. We certainly see more DWI and DWAI cases in Albany County...

Facebook gay ads

Posted on April 01, 2008
I've read about how social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace help direct advertising to the right audiences. So I'm a little worried that Facebook keeps showing me this ad.Am I gay and I just didn't know it? Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course...

Gmail April Fools Joke Got Me

Posted on April 01, 2008
So there I am peacefully using my Gmail when I notice a link at the top for a new feature -- Gmail custom time. Check out Google's Gmail April Fools Joke.I actually fell for it for a couple minutes. Started composing a message to see how it worked, but the feature was missing...

Traffic Court continues to grow

Posted on March 30, 2008
This past week our traffic court website hit a new high. Monday had over 3200 visits and Tuesday was just short of that. Both days had more than 3000 unique visitors (different people using the site - some people visit twice in one day). The site is now seeing consistently more than 60,000 visits a month, with roughly 55,000 unique visitors...

Saratoga vs. Albany on Google

Posted on March 30, 2008
I just created a new page on the firm website about DWI in Saratoga. This got me interested in how often the term "Saratoga" is searched on Google. Below is an image from Google Trends, showing the relative search volume, as compared to Albany. Albany gets consistently more searches...

AdWords and AdSense Customer Support: Are Dark Clouds Moving in Over Google

Posted on March 27, 2008
I've written in the past about problems with AdWords customer support, and now I'm having problems with AdSense combined with AdWords.For those who don't know, AdWords is a service Google offers where users can put ads up on the internet. The most prominent way you see these ads is when you do a search on Google...

Trial Lawyers and the Feeling of Victory

Posted on March 26, 2008
The life of a trial lawyer has its peaks and valleys. I just heard the blessed words "Not Guilty" from a jury, and that is one of the peaks. Sort of.I wrote some time ago about representing the innocent client. Since that time I have found myself with more and more of my criminal defense clients who I believe are innocent...

Rhode Island Traffic Courts

Posted on March 22, 2008
We have completed the traffic courts in Rhode Island section of our traffic court directory site. Well, we think so anyway. At first we missed some municipal courts, but we added them recently and are pretty sure we got them all.So far the busiest page in Rhode Island is the Rhode Island Traffic Court page...

Why Toyota Is Annoying

Posted on March 20, 2008
I've been thinking about getting a new car. My current car, a 2002 Audi A4 is getting too small. There's not enough legroom in the rear for my daughter, due to the booster seat. This is another reason government regulation pushes people into larger vehicles, but I digress...

Spitzer and Prostitution Policy

Posted on March 12, 2008
I have often been critical on my other blog about overzealous prosecutors. Most prosecutors are reasonable, but there are a few that seem to take a "holier than thou" attitude. This is the biggest reason why some are happy to see Eliot Spitzer's fall...

Truck Accident cases in Albany NY

Posted on March 08, 2008
Someone suggested we add a truck accident page to our website, so I did that today. Accident cases involving tractor-trailers are typically higher-value cases, due to higher insurance coverage and the severity of the injuries. Fortunately they are also rare...

Traffic Court News

Posted on March 03, 2008
Our traffic court directory is doing well. The Alexa "rank" is approaching #600,000 (i.e. the 600,000th busiest site on the web). By comparison our law firm site is ranked over 2,000,000. Alexa is not perfect, but it's in the ballpark. Within the US the site is now within the top 100,000 websites...

Too Many Lawyers? Or Too Many Laws?

Posted on February 11, 2008
I saw someone complaining about "too many lawyers" today and I started ranting. You see, the problem is not too many lawyers. It's too many laws. The more laws you make, the more demand you create for lawyers.Great example is the new Aggravated DWI law -- the higher offense for BAC over 0...

Eli Manning to David Tyree and the Immaculate Reception

Posted on February 04, 2008
I was born with a congenital defect - I'm a Giants fan. I'm pretty sure it came on the Y chromosome. Despite years of general apathy about sports, I somehow still get excited about the Giants. I've gotten over the Knicks, the Mets, my college teams, etc...

Critical thinking starts young

Posted on January 12, 2008
Our 6-year-old surprised me last night. My wife and I were talking in the front seat about allegations that a particular presidential candidate doesn't like Jews. Our daughter asked why so-and-so doesn't like Jews. Seeking to avoid that kind of issue with her (at least while driving a car and not really able to discuss it), I said that we were just joking...

Scrooged

Posted on December 23, 2007
A friend of mine sent me this, and I thought it was pretty funny. It didn't take much time either.See Warren Redlich Scrooged.And make sure your sound is on.

A bad iPhone experience with Apple and AT-and-T

Posted on December 18, 2007
See the picture below to start getting a sense of my frustration with Apple, AT&T, and my new iPhone.That screen is not in any of the iPhone commercials I saw. No one at the Apple store told me that I needed "an AT&T pre-approved credit check code" before I'd be able to use my iPhone...

Interesting Albany trivia

Posted on December 09, 2007
Did you know that Albany, in 1870, was the 20th largest city in the United States?Check out this table from the US Census Bureau. Albany's status dropped quickly, and by 1910 it was the 50th largest city, even though Albany's population had grown substantially in that time...

Guilderland - Appointments in January

Posted on December 08, 2007
At our first Town Board meeting as new councilmen on January 3rd, MarkGrimm and I will be asked to vote on many appointments for variousTown positions. In keeping with our campaign pledge to open upgovernment, we wish to publicly solicit applications for those positions...

Albany Sheriff Cracks Down on Gambling and Marijuana

Posted on December 04, 2007
The Albany Sheriff is really cracking down on the bad guys these days. The Times Union had a couple of articles on November 29th about his team nailing a gambling ring, and another about them bungling a marijuana operation.In the gambling story, the Sheriff successfully protected the public from four dopes who were engaged in a gambling conspiracy...

Plea to the Charge

Posted on November 22, 2007
As lawyers handling traffic and criminal cases, we will generally talk to the prosecutor and see what kind of deal they're willing to do. In most cases we get some offer for our client to plead guilty to a reduced charge. Simple examples include reducing a moderate speed to a parking ticket, a high speed to a lower speed, a misdemeanor to a violation, or a felony to a misdemeanor...

Martial Arts in Albany

Posted on November 15, 2007
Here's a great personal story about Tai Chi and Kung Fu. The author is a fellow student at the Capital District Tai Chi & Kung Fu Association.I was a student there years ago, but stopped around the time our first daughter was born. I'm back now, and my daughter is also doing Tae Kwon Do at the same place in the Pil-Sung Martial Arts program...

Traffic Court - 50K Visits

Posted on November 08, 2007
We hit a new milestone for our Traffic Court website. From October 8 to November 7, there were 51,000 visits. First time we broke the 50K mark.October 8 was actually a relatively slow day, so tomorrow we will probably hit two other milestones -- 45K unique visitors (some people visit more than once) and 120,000 pageviews...

Times Union, Privacy Policy, and the Electronics Communications Privacy Act

Posted on November 03, 2007
UPDATE (11/4/2007): The Times Union exacerbated its violations of the ECPA and their own privacy policy with a further article by Casey Seiler about Sock Puppets.-----------In a recent article the Times Union "outed" some blog commenters. I've been wondering if they can be sued for this, as it appears to violate both their own privacy policy and the Electronics Communications Privacy Act (18 US Code 2702) (ECPA)...

Guilderland - Final Days

Posted on October 31, 2007
Less than one week to go until the election -- Guilderland voters will decide who should be on their town board.Mark Grimm and I are running on a message of ending the secrecy and insider privileges. Mike Ricard and Dave Bosworth are running on, well ...

Ron Paul on Leno

Posted on October 31, 2007
Ron Paul appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno just now. I'm sure it will be available on YouTube or other sources any minute.He really hit it out of the park. He stayed on his message, and he spoke without sounding like canned soundbites. With his fundraising success and all that's going right for him, as he puts it, there really is a risk he might win...

Speeding tickets: One opinion

Posted on October 22, 2007
Saw this article online about whether it's worth it to fight a speeding ticket:MSN Money article on speeding ticketsNot sure I agree completely, and also not sure that all the comments apply in New York State. Still, a cautionary tale for those who get a ticket.

Guilderland: Personal attacks in politics

Posted on October 08, 2007
Here they go again. The Mike Ricard and Dave Bosworth team have attacked me personally, along with my running mate Mark Grimm. The latest salvo is in the August 4 edition of the Altamont Enterprise. These are letters to the editor, and do not appear in the online edition...

Troubles for new attorneys

Posted on October 08, 2007
I saw another great article in the Wall Street Journal, though it's a couple weeks old now. The law market as a whole has been relatively flat compared to overall growth in the economy. Meanwhile the number of law graduates, and thus, new lawyers, has increased quite a bit...

Follow up on unsolicited attorney mailings

Posted on October 08, 2007
In late July I did a post describing a letter that was mailed to a client of mine. This is known as an unsolicited attorney mailing. I think, but am not sure, that the powers that be in our profession decided there is nothing wrong with such a mailing...

Guilderland NY Update

Posted on October 07, 2007
Our Guilderland NY campaign for Town Board rolls onward. I updated the campaign website with more information and a better layout for the home page. There is a new page detailing Mike Ricard's illegal variance, and another page on Dave Bosworth and his unethical abuse of his nonprofit...

Traffic Court Landmark - 100K pageviews in 30 days

Posted on October 05, 2007
Our traffic court directory website hit a new landmark. As the image below (from Google Analytics) shows*, there were over 100,000 pageviews in the last 30 days. Two other landmarks are getting more than 45,000 visits, and over 40,000 unique visitors...

Traffic Court booming

Posted on September 23, 2007
Our traffic court website is booming. Starting roughly September 4th, visits to the site jumped. There were over 30,000 unique visitors in the last 30 days, with over 75,000 pageviews. If recent numbers continue, we will approach 40,000 unique visitors per month and 100,000 pageviews...

Baseball diversion: Fewest Pitches in a complete game

Posted on September 23, 2007
I was watching a baseball game the other day and the announcers were talking about pitch count -- how many pitches the pitcher had thrown so far. This prompted two questions in my head:1. What is the fewest number of pitches thrown by a pitcher in a complete game?My friend David found the answer to that one: 58, by Red Barrett in 1944 for the Boston Braves...

Mike Ricard and the assessment process

Posted on September 20, 2007
A quick update on our Guilderland NY town board campaign efforts:I've been researching incumbent Town Board member Michael Ricard, his assessment, and other issues.I created a page about Mike Ricard's Assessment showing what I found. It includes satellite images of his property from Google Maps, and photos of his house...

NY Election Law: Update

Posted on September 18, 2007
I write with a legal update in the ongoing saga of Ricard v. Redlich. The appellate court ruled against us. We lost. And yet, I'm still on the ballot.For those who were unaware, New York Election Law is confusing. I have heard that 50% of all election law cases in the US take place in our fair state...

A good debtor-creditor experience

Posted on August 30, 2007
I've complained in the past about some annoying experiences with debt collection, particularly the Yellow Pages companies. I was starting to have what seemed like a similar experience, but then things changed.In 2004 I agreed to do a free trial of a listing on lawyers -dot- com...

Virginia Traffic Court and DMV fees

Posted on August 29, 2007
About a month ago I mentioned Virginia's new speeding ticket fees. I saw a more complete breakdown of them and wanted to just give a quick update on that. These are fees imposed by the Virginia DMV, on top of the fines that come from the traffic courts in Virginia...