By Louise K.Y. Ing

In years past, it was a common practice of Hawai`i court reporters to initiate the inquiry to a deponent or deponent’s lawyer about reviewing and signing her deposition transcript.  Not anymore.  Since early 2012, Hawaii court reporters have stopped that practice, leaving it to the party conducting the deposition to inform the witness of the opportunity to review and sign the transcript.  If the deposing lawyer does not ask the witness, then the witness or his lawyer should make the “ask”, preferably at the start of the deposition before the matter is forgotten in the “heat of battle” or end-of-deposition exhaustion.

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By Ellen Godbey Carson and Shellie K. Park-Hoapili

“If you have the feeling that something is wrong, don’t be afraid to speak up.”

- Fred T. Korematsu

February 19 marks the 70^th anniversary of Executive Order 9066, which tragically resulted in the exile and imprisonment of over 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry (“AJAs”) from the West Coast during World War II.  In 1983, three teams of young attorneys (including former Alston Hunt Floyd & Ing Of Counsel Leigh-Ann Miyasato on the Korematsu team) filed writs of coram nobis (error upon the court) to overturn the wrongful convictions of Fred Korematsu and others who violated the exile and imprisonment orders (Korematsu v. United States, 584 F. Supp. 1406 (N.D. Cal. 1984; Hirabayashi v. United States, 828 F.2d 591 (9th Cir. 1987), Yasui v. United States, 772 F.2d 1496 (9th Cir. 1985).  These attorneys believed in a larger social purpose and were not afraid to speak up.  The result – an unprecedented landmark victory!  Never before in American legal history had a comparable effort been mounted to overturn convictions in cases that had been finally decided by the United States Supreme Court.

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By Brandon Segal

Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor created a buzz in the Honolulu legal community as the 2012 star of the William S. Richardson School of Law’s Jurist-in-Residence Program.  Justice Sotomayor packed in presentations to public school students at Farrington High School, University of Hawai`i law students and faculty, Hawaii State Bar Association members and Hawaii Women Lawyers/Hawaii Women’s Legal Foundation members.  At a breakfast hosted by HWL/HWLF, Justice Sotomayor offered valuable practice pointers for U.S. Supreme Court advocates – pointers that are useful for any advocate:

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