Federal Judge Orders Lawyer to Remove Dragon Watermark from Court Filings 66
A Michigan federal magistrate judge has banned a lawyer from using a cartoon dragon watermark on legal filings, calling the practice "juvenile and impertinent." Judge Ray Kent of the Western District of Michigan issued the order on April 28 after receiving a complaint featuring a purple, suit-wearing dragon on every page.
"Each page of plaintiff's complaint appears on an e-filing which is dominated by a large multi-colored cartoon dragon dressed in a suit," Kent wrote. "The Court is not a cartoon." The watermark belongs to Jacob A. Perrone of Dragon Lawyers, who told The New York Times he purchased the image online for $20 because "people like dragons."
Perrone said it plans to continue using the logo in his practice but will tone it down in future court submissions.
"Each page of plaintiff's complaint appears on an e-filing which is dominated by a large multi-colored cartoon dragon dressed in a suit," Kent wrote. "The Court is not a cartoon." The watermark belongs to Jacob A. Perrone of Dragon Lawyers, who told The New York Times he purchased the image online for $20 because "people like dragons."
Perrone said it plans to continue using the logo in his practice but will tone it down in future court submissions.
Slow news day I guess (Score:2)
Judge reprimands lawyer for acting like a 13 year old dork in court.
Judge is right. Dork is wrong, being a dork.
Did I miss anything?
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Judges are often wrong? Really? Citation needed.
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Re:Slow news day I guess (Score:4, Insightful)
We live in a world where the less than intelligent have been helped to thrive. Going back 30 years ago, the idea of there being one or two idiots in almost every village. Conspiracy nuts, the end of the world, this or that. Now, in every village, the people know who the idiot(s) are and so would ignore them. In the modern era with the Internet, you suddenly see how many villages there are. Weak minded politicians listen to the stupid people because there are just so many of them.
So, you get a stupid lawyer who doesn't understand that you don't try to be "cute" when you file legal paperwork. You are expected to be direct, submit documents in the format specified, and if you put your paperwork in in the wrong format, you will be told to fix the formatting issues before you re-submit. You can TRY to be cute when in court, but when it comes to the official paperwork, you don't try to play those games, because cute watermarks or logos or things like that just don't have a place.
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Shut up boomer.
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Clearly you've never spent any time with lawyers or the legal system. Targon is exactly right. There are rules to filing court documents, and this law firm is in the wrong.
And no, I'm not a boomer (yes, I know it's a general insult term.)
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I find that "Shut up, Boomer" says more about the speaker then the person they are referring to.
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>Citation needed.
every appellate court ever in the 700 years of the Common Law?
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Really? You understand the entire concept of having a tiered court system is based on the premise that judges are often wrong. Why would we have appeals if all the judges are out there batting 100?
So that is absolutely somebody's fursona (Score:3)
And that definitely makes this news for nerds.
Re:This is on /. (Score:5, Funny)
Because?
Because dragons, obviously. Nerds like dragons.
Re:This is on /. (Score:5, Funny)
Flambéd. With ketchup.
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Huh, I would have thought dragons preferred hot sauce myself.
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Some nerds also like law. Nerds come in different flavors, you know.
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Because?
Clickbait.
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Because?
More apropos to this site:
If I were the judge, I'd ban all those legal documents where they use a dozen unmatched closing parentheses as a box border on the front page.
To anyone who has ever written a computer program, it just screams out "syntax error".
those have been rare for years and years (Score:2, Interesting)
Yeah 20 years ago it pissed me off that people didn't know how to use their word processors properly but you have to understand that in my own actual career I still saw law partners dictate (i.e., they did not type their own documents) which is actually pretty impressive because you need to have a train of thought that runs non-stop and you can't forget the end of your thought by the time you get there. When people are billing a thousand dollars an hour (a figure which is no longer even atypical or impressi
Re: This is on /. (Score:5, Interesting)
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I guess that in this case, the lawyer's mistake was not doing his dragon logo with ASCII art using that same decrepit courier font.
Re: This is on /. (Score:2)
A Perfect Example (Score:2)
Mr. Perrone is a perfect example of the Arrested Development Generation:
"Oooo... this'll be AWESOME! Dragons, man. Yeah. that'll show 'em all how tough I am! Who cares if it hurts my client... it makes me look GREAT!"
Always a good idea to piss off the judge before he's even read one word of your adolescent plea.
I guess it helps the clerk: "Dragon watermark? Circular file..."
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The human spirit requires a chance to express itself, to add a touch of personality and maybe even some humor to the everyday. A quirky dragon logo that makes something more memorable
Poor judgement == bad lawyer (Score:4, Insightful)
A lawyer's job is to represent a client in an adversarial situation. They don't get to elevate their interests over their client's. And you don't win on your document formatting, but you certainly can lose on it, by violating rules. Perhaps judges should be open to more creativity and whimsy, but we don't live in that world, and more pertinently, the court case is not happening in that world.
Would you hire a lawyer who insisted on wearing a cosplay costumes court? Or presented arguments in iambic pentameter?
As the old saw goes, don't hire a skinny chef or a poor accountant. I'd add, don't hire an annoying attorney.
Re: Poor judgement == bad lawyer (Score:1)
If my lawyer can argue in iambic pentameter on the fly, yes, I want them. They're obviously a genius. And it's so much more classy than arguing in limericks.
It's not even a good dragon. (Score:2)
"Because people like dragons". No, no one's going to like this one. It looks like a Marvel mafia enforcer dressed in a suit, not a cute little Spyro everyone would love. Kids these days...
He's an AI lawyer, too. (Score:4, Insightful)
"Jacob A. Perrone is the lawyer behind Dragon Lawyers (phone number: [area code redacted] JAKELAW). His website, which also features the purple dragon and a bunch of busted links in the footer, says that the firm "integrates AI to lower the cost of legal services."
I think it would be fair to say that someone should review is legal bar homeworks and retrospectively check for plagiarisms.
Stolen from under the article (Score:5, Funny)
"I don't know what the big deal is. Lady Justice also has scales."
Meanwhile (Score:2)
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The only true open source dragon is the Mozilla one.
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I never saw him breathe fire. Yet he somehow defeated Kandalf.
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Yes, because that's exactly the same as a court brief.
Hint: different industries have different decorum. Would you put a huge ridiculous watermark like this on a resume or other professional communication where you were expected to be taken seriously? I would bet not, and this lawyer should know that too.
Just put it on your folder. (Score:2)
Just put the dragon on your folder, man. Or your Trapper Keeper. Do they still make Trapper Keepers? Maybe have it stitched into the leather on your briefcase. But don't put it on documents. WTF? Anybody that made it through legal school should know you don't cartoon up legal documents. Come on, man. Your making the rest of us dorks look bad because you're so terrible at being a dork.
Re: Just put it on your folder. (Score:2)
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https://www.mead.com/p/binders... [mead.com]
Fantastic. It's even in eighties colors.
tone it down? (Score:2)
Perrone said it plans to continue using the logo in his practice but will tone it down in future court submissions.
The judge banned the logo, so I'm pretty sure that means off.
Do you want a criminal lawyer? (Score:2)
No! You want a criminally insane lawyer!
Confused - what exactly is the judge's complain? (Score:2)
Is it:
- is it the color of the logo?
- is it the size of the logo?
- that the firm's logo is a dragon?
- is it that the firm's logo is on filings?
- or is it that with watermark of any kind it is harder to read (which I agree with)?
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It's the last one. The stupid asshat put it full page behind the text, not just small in the corner next to the law firms signature area.
I fit wasn't full page behind the text I doubt the judge would have even noticed, much less said anything. The jackass had to put it in the most obnoxious place he could though, which makes reading the text more difficult.
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More importantly, in their paper-loving world, it's getting either photocopied or scanned in pure B&W where that will just be a bunch of noise making the text unreadable.
Re: Confused - what exactly is the judge's complai (Score:2)
I did a quick search, it's a full page, bright purple anthro-dragon in a suit.
I say bright purple, but obviously it's a little washed out because it's a watermark, but it's neither discreet nor subtle.
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Yea I saw it too and it makes it hard to read. Just that dragons have little to do with it. Dinosaurs would be equally problematic. ;-)
Other likely images (Score:2)
Lawyer Is An Ass (Score:2)
Man+Dog unimpressed.
Furries (Score:2)
They are everywhere.
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I don't think this was meant to be an authentication device, like most watermarks are supposed to be.
This was branding, and the lawyer that did it is an idiot.
"The court is not a cartoon" (Score:2)
Vibers at Law (Score:1)
Outright obnoious (Score:2)
I was expecting a small watermark in the corner of the page, but it turns out the watermark is very opaque and fills the whole page background.
Wow. As if legal documents weren't already hard enough to read!