Hello All,

ELECTIONS TIME!!

Seriously, who doesn't want to work for free?

The deadline to submit your declaration for candidacy to  elections@cfpainc.org is August 5th!!

Voting will begin soon, so get those forms in!

"Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters." - Abraham Lincoln.

CHILDREN'S HOME SOCIETY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA

Pack Day:

CFPA is collecting school supplies for the Children's Home Society through August 7th! Thank you to all the members for your monetary and in-kind donations. We will be packing the collected supplies on Friday, August 8th from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the CHS office in Winter Park: 1485 South Semoran Blvd., Suite 1402, Winter Park, FL 32792.

Please email president@cfpainc.org if you would like to sign up to assist on pack day.

SELF DEFENSE

CFPA had sooo much fun with Sensei Joe Morejon and his team for our Self Defense Seminar. We appreciate the time they took to teach us some safety skills. If you were able to attend the event, please drop me a line and let me know your thoughts. Would you like us to try to do this again sometime? Inquiring minds want to know,  president@cfpainc.org. I know just the volunteer to assign to that particular project.

CLE

CP Review Course

Phillip A. Collard, MBA, CP, FRP            Mario A. Garcia, Esq.

Rissman, Barrett, Hurt & Donahue       Mario A. Garcia, P.A.

Brooke Bowman, Esq.                          Manuela Tomas-Austin, CP, FRP

Professor, Stetson College of Law                                          

Fermin Lopez, Esq.                             Vanessa L. Brice, Esq.

Colling Gilbert Wright & Carter            Colling Gilbert Wright & Carter

Anne Hughes, ACP, FRP

Co-creator of CFPA's CP Review Course

"I can no other answer make, but, thanks, and thanks." - William Shakespeare

Zipping Through E-Discovery

Thank you to Melissa Rogozinsky, of ESI roundtable for presenting Zipping Through E-Discovery. Do you have a CLE topic matter or suggestion for a speaker? We are all ears. Email  clechair@cfpainc.org  

BOLO (BE ON THE LOOKOUT)

Support the Troops

Scholarships

Are you a student member that could use some help with tuition and books? Are you an active and/or associate member and would like to continue your education by taking the Certified Paralegal Exam or Advanced Certified Paralegal Exam? CFPA will be rolling out the scholarship information in September, stay tuned for details.

Paralegal of the Year

Need we say more? Information coming your way soon ... Be sure you pass it on to THE BOSS.

SAVE THE DATE

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2015

CFPA'S 4TH QUARTER MEMBERSHIP MEETING, HOLIDAY SOCIAL AND CHARITY FUNDRAISER

Wise men say, "Forgiveness is divine, but never pay full price for late pizza."

 

   

UPL On The Internet

By: Keith E. Walker, CP, FRP, CFE

Whether on a legal website, electronic bulletin board, Craigslist, or in a chat room, non-lawyers are prohibited from giving legal advice on the Internet. Lawyers must take care as well when operating in this medium not to establish attorney-client relationship inadvertently and not to give legal advice. It is important in this context to keep in mind the distinction between legal information and legal advice. Providing general legal information, such as given in a self-help book or program, or in a newspaper column about the law, is encouraged. However, legal advice that is specific to a person's case not cannot be given by a person who is not licensed to practice law, including a lawyer who is licensed in one state but gives the advice to someone about a legal matter in another state.

Engaging in the unlicensed practice of law in Florida a crime. It is a third degree felony. For this reason, the State Attorney has the power to bring criminal charges against an individual for practicing law without a license. Also, the Florida Bar has the power to investigate and prosecute instances of unlicensed practice of law. Prosecution by the Florida Bar is civil in nature and the case is tried before the Florida Supreme Court.

Reprinted with permission of the NALA and Mary Merrell Bailey, Esq. The article originally appeared in the July/August 2014 issue of Facts & Findings, the bi-monthly journal for paralegals. The article is reprinted here in its entirety. For further information, contact NALA at www.nala.org or phone (918) 587-6828.

Catch up with tech or lose your career, judges warn lawyers ...

Federal judges are becoming much more sophisticated about technology-and they're growing increasingly impatient with attorneys who are failing to keep up.

Indeed, U.S. Magistrate Judge James C. Francis of New York's Southern District-one of a panel of four "cyberstar" federal judges who spoke on the future of law and technology at LegalTech New York 2014-was among the most concerned regarding lawyers who are clueless about the latest in technology.

Francis said he sees technological advances like e-discovery as so critical to the courtroom that he views attorneys who are unaware of its nuances as essentially engaging in a slow career suicide.

"E-discovery is pervasive. It's like understanding civil procedure," Francis said. "You're not going to be a civil litigator without understanding the rules of civil procedure. Similarly, you're no longer going to be able to conduct litigation of any complexity without understanding e-discovery."

The judges' panel was one of the most popular sessions of LTNY 2014, attracting more than 2,000 attendees. Other speakers included:

* U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin of the Southern District of New York.

* U.S. Magistrate Judge John M. Facciola of the District of Columbia.

* U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrew J. Peck of the Southern District of New York.

Facciola agreed wholeheartedly with Francis, adding that he finds it irritating to hear arguments from e-discovery-ignorant lawyers regarding the prohibitive cost of a specific type of discovery.

Too often, Facciola said, he is forced to endure the opening salvos of such arguments while already knowing the attorney has no idea what he or she is talking about, and already knowing that the e-discovery application in question is actually much more reasonably priced than the attorney is attempting to represent.

Facciola said some of the country's most competitive law firms already realize that technological ignorance is (and will continue to be) a mushrooming vulnerability in the courtroom. Not surprisingly, many of these firms are already taking steps to weed out their tech-ignorant from their tech-savvy.

Facciola put it bluntly: Why hire a lawyer who doesn't even have the technological competence to complete simple, everyday tasks like converting a Microsoft Word document into a PDF?

Added Francis: "The absence of technical knowledge is a distinct competitive disadvantage."

The judges also expressed concerns with lawyers who regularly leave behind unsecured laptops and similar computer devices in airports and other locations across the country. Those devices are often brimming with confidential data from perhaps dozens or even hundreds of clients.

Sadly, too many attorneys haven't logically concluded that they could be ethically liable for the loss of such data, and that they could be facing multiple lawsuits if the data falls into the wrong hands, according to Scheindlin.

The problem is especially troublesome given that attorneys, like the general populace, are using smartphones and tablets for both personal and business matters, Scheindlin said. That's a major change from a decade ago, when most attorneys used a desktop for work and only needed to secure a laptop outside of the office.

These days, with millions of smartphones and tablets being toted around, leaving behind the secrets to your Fortune 500 client's upcoming defense strategy tucked away in a sneaker while you take a dip in the ocean is an all-too-common nightmare scenario, Scheindlin said.

Meanwhile, Francis said he is getting much tougher on lawyers who come before his court requesting that subpoenaed and other evidence in electronic form be converted to basic TIFF images before it's handed over.

Attorneys have often easily won favorable rulings on such requests, based on their protests that releasing the original, interactive documents would reveal proprietary information.

But these days, Francis said, before granting such conversion requests he is now pressing attorneys to conclusively prove to him that releasing the documents in their original form would actually cause sensitive client data-that is irrelevant to the case-to be exposed.

The reason: Reducing interactive documents to TIFF images strips out the ancillary data and metadata e-discovery software needs to quickly scan through hundreds of thousands of documents, Francis said. Needlessly stripping out all those digital navigational aids is simply too much of a burden on the legal system, he said.

Facciola added a powerful warning: "Lawyers better get crackin'. There's an awful lot to know."

REPRINTED from the ABA Journal - This article originally appeared in the April 2014 issue of the ABA Journal with this headline: "Learn or Lose: Catch up with tech, judges tell lawyers."

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People have plans and strategies for everything: college savings, budgets; retirement, life insurance, etc.  Most people have no personal safety plan.  

What would I do if:
- I got car jacked on the way to work?
- an angry driver in road rage followed me to work?
- I were attacked in the elevator on my way home after late hours?
- there were an active shooter in the building?   

 Attendees and Instructors from the Self Defense Class held on 7/31/14 with Sensei Joe Morejon.