Latest legal news

While phone calls and personal visits are still banned, personal injury lawyers are to be allowed to use text messages as a way of reaching potential clients. | 12yrs

A scheme through which state agency WorkSafe Victoria pays bonuses to law firms which minimise compensation claims from workers is causing concern among the local legal community. | 12yrs

A Canadian-Arab lawyer has been cleared of possession of spice (synthetic cannabis) after a Dubai court accepted that procedures were carried out against him unlawfully. | 12yrs

2013 is being seen as the year in which Cade, Brazil's competition authority, seriously began flexing its muscles and showed the way it will operate in future. | 12yrs

A leading software company is predicting that the 'Big Law' sectors stands to see substantial growth, rather than the painful shrinkage foreseen in some quarters. | 12yrs

Israeli lawyer Michael Sfard has surprised many in his country by becoming one of the leading defenders of the rights of Palestinians in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. | 12yrs

Swiss banks have only four working days left in which to decide whether to give client information to the Department of Justice or to face prosecution. | 12yrs

A 63-year old lawyer was among a group of lawyers beaten by 'hired thugs' as the lawyers tried to protect and represent a local pastor. | 12yrs

Half of the 220 judges who sit in US immigration courts reach retirement age next year, a situation which could throw the backlogged tribunals into a state of greater confusion. | 12yrs

An increase in the number of law firms folding is predicted for early 2014 as 117 practices look set to start the year without professional indemnity cover. | 12yrs

UK law firm Morrish Solicitors has signed up to a new-style Alternative Business Structure (ABS) with the Transport Salaried Staffs' Association (TSSA). | 12yrs

Commercial courts - which are due to be merged in with the general court system - are generally regarded by foreign lawyers as being fairly well run and being free of political influence. | 12yrs

Edward DeSear has been jailed for 17 years after admitting to organising for a young boy to be taken from France to Belgium where the lawyer sexually molested him at a hotel. | 12yrs

Three US law firms - Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft, Milbank Tweed & Hadley and Morrison & Foerster - are among the international practices seeking to open or increase their litigation presence in Hong Kong. | 12yrs

Ranked as the 172nd least honest country on the 177-long Corruptions Perceptions Index, Libya clearly has major problems - but the lawyer appointed to fight corruption is seen as having a better chance than most would. | 12yrs

While public sector workers are likely to head home at midnight after their Christmas parties, lawyers are ordering the cab at 3am. | 12yrs

Legal and compliance groups in US banks are struggling to implement the Volcker rule, one of the main parts of the Dodd-Frank reform bill. | 12yrs

Washington-based Patton Boggs has pulled back from merger discussions with Locke Lord of Texas, according to sources who have talked to Reuters. | 12yrs

Australia is well placed to become an important player in the competitive world of arbitration, says Russell Thirgood of McCullough Robertson. | 12yrs