Thank god its over... [John]

Thank god this weekend has come to an end. It was one of the busiest weekends of my law school career and I definitely don't want to live though it again. It started off with the Inter-school trial competition where I was helping my friend as a witness for the defense. I received the part last minute since his other witness dropped out so I didn't have too much time to prepare. But Saturday went very well. From 8am to 5pm, we were in "court" where I was a witness for about 20 minutes in each trial. It was an amazing experience--my team did great! It really made me excited for Moot Court which is coming up very soon.

For the rest of the weekend, I was writing a Memorandum in Opposition to a Motion to Disqualify Counsel. This document was completely different then anything else I have written in law school. Instead of being objective like last semester's memorandums, it was purely persuasive. In college, I loved persuasive writing. But while writing this paper, it definitely was alot harder when all the case law was against my position. I kept wanting to put in cases both in opposition and support of my position (like in my previous papers). Finally, I got back in the groove and wrote what I think was a pretty convincing memorandum.

So basically I have been doing work since 3pm on Friday to 8pm on Sunday...never leaving my room except for the trial competition. I'm exhausted...time to go to bed :(

Second Memorandum Due!

So ever since I received my 1st memorandum back (as a mentioned a few blog posts ago) I have been working feverishly to improve the document so I could turn it in tomorrow as the second memorandum. After countless hours including omitted points, revising bluebook citations, and adding 6 new cases with new rules and principles, I have developed a paper I feel pretty confident in.

I am definitely getting the hang of writing a memorandum. It is an objective piece that is suppose to provide both sides of the argument concerning a potential clients case. It is read by a partner or associate in the law firm and they make a decision in regards to what to do with the case. The writing is completely different then anything I have done before so I'm really happy that I'm getting the hang of it pretty quickly. Our last memorandum is due later in the semester and it is an open memorandum where I will need to conduct WestLaw research for relevant cases that help support and oppose my conclusion.

But in the meantime, I have a Nexis Lexis research class, WestLaw research class and an ethics class to attend to in the next few days. Its going to be a long week, but will come out of it learning crucial tools for legal research.

Memorandum Writing [John]

Sorry about the late post. I have spent the entire afternoon writing my legal memorandum concerning the Massachusetts Identity Theft Statute. Other than being confused on how the structure of the outline is suppose to be (the teacher never really made it clear), I am definitely enjoying the legal writing. It's like writing a math proof back in high school where I have to go detail by detail to prove whether the fact pattern sufficiently satisfies the statute beyond a reasonable doubt.

I also got the Soapbox case this afternoon. Like the memo, I have to argue a specific side of a case...but this time I have to do it orally in front of a panel. I was assigned the respondent side and will be arguing for a Redskin linebacker who is accused of battery. The case is very interesting because its the incident occurred on the field during a game between a New England Patriots linebacker and a Redskin linebacker. More details to come later!