The top legal affairs news stories from this morning and the weekend
Freshfields culls partners after pay shake-up [Financial Times] (£)
I’ve never seen a judge so angry as in Prince Harry v the Mail [The Times] (£)
50 Cent asked judge to bail dealer for European tour [BBC News]
‘This was a righteous case. A holy war’: the lawyer who took on Meta and Google – and won [The Guardian]
Judge faces death threats over ‘cow vigilantes’ [The Telegraph] (£)
Bill for Hillsborough Law set to be approved by MPs [BBC News]
‘I was like, “Oh my god, I can be taken seriously”’: the women inspired to become lawyers by Legally Blonde [The Guardian]
Uganda judges push back against lawyers’ bid to scrap ‘colonial titles’ [BBC News]
The Iranian lawyer with model looks who runs rings around pro-Palestinians [The Telegraph] (£)
“Who determines when an AI is ‘accurate’, particularly given its propensity to hallucinate? [Legal Cheek comments]
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Clients are greatly to blame for expensive lawyers. Much of the law is text book. Thus work can be carried out by experienced and competent solicitors in the regions. My experience as a client is that big firms charging ludicrous rates have work done by people at the bottom. It was said that no one got the sack for instructing IBM. This kind of approach guarantees these so called major legal firms work. Clients should look carefully at their panels, who is doing what and final bills. Can huge number of partners be justified? Look at the size of boards and salaries in other industries. My view simply is that the customer should apply the same critical
Eyes to legal services as they do elsewhere in the business.