About Erik Lundegaard
Erik Lundegaard has been a senior editor at Super Lawyers since 2005 and its editor in chief since 2013—during which time the magazine has won close to 100 journalism awards around the country. His freelance writing has been published by The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Slate, Salon, MSNBC.com, The Christian Science Monitor, The Seattle Times and The Believer, among others. He has a B.A. in English from the University of Minnesota, studied Mandarin Chinese in Taipei, Taiwan, and lives in Seattle, Washington, where he is a long-suffering Seattle Mariners fan. In his spare time, he is working on a book about the movies of James Cagney.
Articles written by Erik Lundegaard
Right Way for Right-of-Way
Eminent domain attorney and Expo Line advocate Bradford B. Kuhn on why the easiest way from Point A to Point B isn’t necessarily a straight lineQ: You’re the chair of Nossaman’s eminent domain practice. Who do you tend to represent in your cases? A: A significant chunk is public agencies: LA Metro, San Diego Association of Governments, San Bernardino. I primarily do the right-of-way acquisition component. If you’re building a huge corridor for a new rail line, or a freeway that’s widening, it’s a lot of work to actually acquire the properties for the project. Q: Are you ever involved in choosing where to put these …
Mind the Gap
Why W. Lewis Garrison Jr. has been accused of turning Alabama into ‘tort hell’There’s an accountability gap in federal drug law, and W. Lewis Garrison Jr. is trying to close it—at least in Alabama. The gap exists, in essence, because of the often-competing desires to make drugs both safe and affordable. In 1962 under the Kefauver-Harris Drug Amendments, drug companies, including generics, were required to prove the efficacy and safety of their products to the FDA. (That’s the safety aspect.) Twenty-two years later, the Hatch-Waxman Amendments allowed generic …
Playing With the Interplay
Nancy Crow on the giant puzzle of tax law and the special joy of the Windsor decisionQ: So how much money does a person need to make in order to hire a tax lawyer? A: It really depends upon what you need a tax lawyer for. Recently in my practice, I have been focusing a lot on estate and trust issues. In that area, the estate tax exemption was $60,000 when I started practicing law and it’s now $5.43 million. But I do a great deal of planning transactions for people who have a lot less money than $5.4 million, I can assure you. Sometimes people contact me as a tax lawyer …
When a Cemetery is Not a Cemetery
And other tales from Oliver Maner’s Patrick T. O’ConnorQ: I’m hearing a lot of background noise right now. Where are you? A: Well, I’ve got a schizophrenic situation here. I went to Auburn undergrad and University of Georgia law school, and I’m driving to Athens to see those two schools play in football. Q: You’ll be rooting for Auburn? A: Yes indeed. Q: So would I be starting on the wrong foot if I mentioned that, as football nicknames go, you can’t get much better than “Crimson Tide”? A: Oh yes you can. It’s funny: …
The Man in the Gray Hat
The formerly controversial Gene Iredale embraces nuance and theftQ: Let’s start off with a couple of quotes on your website. One is from The San Diego Union-Tribune: “Just the mention of Eugene Iredale’s name in courthouse circles touches off controversy.” A: That’s from a very old article. I’m afraid I’m not as controversial as I used to be. Q: What was it in reference to? A: I handled a lot of criminal cases that were significant cases in the federal court, and the nature of the cases would be such that there would be immediate …
The Golbert Report
Traveling the world and buying Chagalls with international tax attorney Albert S. GolbertQ: So it’s Golbert, yes? Silent T? A: Yes. There’s a funny story about that, actually. When I grew up in Colorado, nobody pronounced my name with a French accent. But after I did my master’s in tax law and international law at the University of Michigan, I had the opportunity to pursue my doctoral studies in Geneva, which is a French-speaking canton. So I lived there, practiced there and of course nobody in that office called me anything but Golbert [silent T]. But when I came back to the …
Trial Dog
In an age of settlements, clients with must-try cases are relying on experienced lawyers like J. Ric GassQ: [Via phone] Where are you right now? A: Northern Wisconsin, looking at Lake Kawaguesaga. Best time of the year. The tourists are leaving and we still have a month and a half of good weather and golf. Q: I take it you like both? A: Golf is one of my three favorite hobbies, which are in this order: golf, golf and golf. I live in two places. Six months of the year up here, six months in Nashville. Q: You helped set up your firm, Gass Weber Mullins, in Milwaukee in 2004, but how …
The Defining Civil Rights Issue of This Century
David Boies, Ted Olson, and the federal constitutional right to same-sex marriageBush v. Gore may have divided the country but it brought together the two attorneys arguing it: David Boies of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, and Theodore B. Olson of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. In its aftermath, the two men became friends, sharing summer bike trips with their wives and an interest in wine. And in 2009, they famously teamed up in the Proposition 8 case, winning back the right for same-sex couples to marry in California. Super Lawyers magazine sat down with the two attorneys …
Debt and Taxes
Tax and estate planning attorney Deborah Weber talks eggshell audits, offers in compromise, and why she doesn’t represent tax protestersQ: As a tax attorney, what do you do for your clients? Obviously not their taxes. A: We represent taxpayers who have tax problems both with the IRS and New York state. Let’s say something bad happened to you six years ago: Somebody died, and then you got depressed and stopped filing. A lot of times, people don’t realize that you can pick up the next year and then file late the prior one. So one year turns into six years. So if you come to me and say, “I haven’t filed in six …
Keep It Simple, Stupid
That’s what Steve W. Berman has always done, in class action lawsuits against Jack in the Box, Big Tobacco, Toyota, the NCAA …Ask most lawyers a question and 10 minutes later you’ll have to ask another. Ask Steve W. Berman of Hagens Berman a question and 10 seconds later you have to ask another. Conversation with him is less a leisurely round of golf than a rapid-fire game of pingpong. How many cases is he involved in right now? “Probably 40,” he says. Which was the last case he took to verdict? “Average Wholesale Price. It was three years ago.” Why class action? “[My old firm] got involved in the WPPSS …
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