Don’t miss the first session of the ISBA Business Institute on July 30 that shows you how to get the best return on your advertising investment, including television, radio, online, and billboards.

This program will teach you how to effectively use social media to promote your practice, when to use free advertising vs. what to pay for, how to use social gatherings to your advantage, how to network virtually, the value of association membership, and the practical ethical issues to consider.

The ISBA Business Institute is designed to help practitioners with all levels of experience. It will take place over the upcoming bar year and focus on what it takes to master the art of practicing law as a business.

The Illinois State Bar Association has announced the recipients of its annual awards. 

Each year, the ISBA presents awards to recognize individuals and law firms for their commitment and service to the profession, their communities, and the association. Award recipients are selected through a nomination process.

“Bamboozled. Hoodwinked. Defrauded. Those words send shivers up our spines, as we have all probably been taken for a ride once or twice in our lives,” writes Danya Shakfeh in her July 2021 Illinois Bar Journal article, “Justifiably Defrauded?” Shakfeh notes the legal definition and standard for demonstrating fraud makes it hard for plaintiffs to prove, or even plead, fraud. Illinois courts have made fraud an extremely subjective and fact-specific claim, she adds. This subjective standard is evidenced by the First District of the Illinois Appellate Court’s September 2020 decision in Metropolitan Capital Bank & Trust v. Feiner. Given the many ways a person can lie, the varying levels of information available, and the sophistication of plaintiffs, Shakfeh goes on to discuss how Illinois courts are presented with an array of decisions with no objective standard to determine whether a plaintiff justifiably or reasonably relied on a defendant’s representations.

WGN Radio has launched a new weekly radio program, “Let’s Get Legal,” which features ISBA members discussing legal topics and answering questions from callers.

“Let’s Get Legal,” hosted by Jon Hansen, will be broadcast throughout the state on WGN Radio 720 AM and WGNRadio.com from 3-5 p.m. on Saturdays. The first episode on July 10 will feature ISBA President and collaborative divorce and mediation practitioner Anna P. Krolikowska at 3 p.m., real estate attorney Kevin Camden at 3:30 p.m., property tax appeal attorney Fred Agustin at 4 p.m., and University of Illinois College of Law professor Robin Fretwell at 4:30 p.m. 

Join us on August 10 for this in-depth look at how to make technology work for you! Learn tools designed to make a lawyer’s life easier, strategies for learning how to use new technology, and the research regarding multitasking and how staying focused on one thing at a time can make lawyers far more efficient.

In their July 2021 Illinois Bar Journal column, The Resolution, Dr. Mary L. Milano and Kenya A. Jenkins-Wright, provide an update on the ISBA’s Steering Committee on Racial Inequality, which seeks to foster diversity, equity, and inclusion based on the ISBA’s equal justice resolution and to move collaboratively toward the resolution’s goals through a variety of means. To date, Milano and Jenkins-Wright note, the committee has undertaken public education in areas such as: claim rights in our property tax system; standards of nursing homes, particularly in minority areas; lending practices; and disciplinary practices in education that impact students of color disproportionately. The committee also spearheaded continuing legal education programming on addressing areas of unequal justice and practices resulting from bias, whether conscious or unconscious. “Our education for the public subcommittee continues to educate the public on how issues of diversity, bias, and equity affect all communities in various social, economic, and ethnic ways,” the authors say. “The future is beckoning. Lawyers need to be at the forefront of its framing and its becoming. It is all worth the risk and it all demands our commitment.”

The Illinois State Bar Association’s Lawyer Finder Service provides referrals to local lawyers Mondays through Fridays. The Service makes referrals in a number of areas of law. For the month of June 2021 there were more than 800 referrals given.

Here are the results for June 2021:

In this video by the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism, attorneys Mark C. Palmer, Aaron W. Brooks, and Josef R. Kurlinkus—who are all members of the ISBA’s Standing Committee on Legal Technology—discuss what happens when law firms get hacked, how they should respond (including if they should pay a ransom), and what steps firms can take to protect their data.

The ISBA offices will be closed for the holiday on Monday, July 5. They will reopen on Tuesday, July 6. During this time, members can expect the following:

• E-Clips will not be delivered on Monday, July 5.

All business and e-newsletter distribution will resume as usual on Tuesday, July 6. 

The Illinois Supreme Court today issued two new orders which will resume statutory time restrictions for speedy trials on October 1 and relax social distancing requirements in courthouses. Both orders are effective immediately.