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Illinois approved a ban on hand-held phones effective Jan. 1, which was already the law in many communities throughout the state including Chicago and Evanston. That law reportedly could hinder the state’s “mobile workforce,” as reported by Mike Riopell in the Daily Herald Business Ledger. Many companies already pay for and provide mobile communications devices for employees that regularly travel on the road for their job functions. With the new ban in place, it raises…

Pamela Sakowicz Menaker, Communications Partner at Clifford Law Offices, recently authored an article for the American Bar Association (ABA) entitled “Text Message Sender May Face Liability for Driver’s Accident” (Nov. 27, 2013). As a contributing editor for the ABA Litigation News, Menaker wrote about a recent New Jersey case which expanded the concept of duty for texters by identifying specific conditions under which the sender of the original message maybe held responsible along with the…

In the wake of NSA, Target data breaches, medical records compromised and other privacy invasions comes word that some health care companies are probing available information on patients in order to target them for telemarketing and direct mail pitches. The Wall Street Journal reported (“Data Mining to Recruit Sick People,” Dec. 17, 2013) that companies specializing in patient recruitment for clinical trials are now turning to pharmaceutical records, data brokers and social networks to identify…

In conjunction with the Hellenic Museum of Chicago, Bob Clifford participated in the retrying of the ancient case of Socrates. The event so popular that it demanded a venue change to a larger forum. The team of lawyers from the last trial was so well received that they have been invited back almost in their entirety for the second trial. Bringing light, not only to history and law, but also to deeper philosophical tenets that…

More than 210,000 patients die each year from preventable causes while in hospitals or under physicians’ care. This number actually indicates a larger issue of an “epidemic of patient harm”, according to a study by the Journal of Patient Safety. People go to hospitals when they are in dire need of medical care or have limited options, but patient trust may be wrongly placed in these institutions’ hands. Multiple causes began this trend of declining…

Children remind us of the innocence and joy of the holidays year-round, which is why it is so important for parents today to monitor the toys their children play with to keep the kids safe. Product recalls are down by almost 66% over the past five years, but it is stringent safety mandates, dangerous toys being seized upon their import and vigilant parents that are responsible for this laudable trend. Most toys are not meant…

January 17, 2014 The charge: matricide. That will be the focus of another ancient Greek mock trial as the “dream team” of lawyers takes on “The Trial of Orestes.” Robert A. Clifford, senior partner at Clifford Law Offices, with Dan Webb of Winston & Strawn will serve as counsel for the defense, defending the son of Agamemnon. Counsel for the prosecution is Patrick J. Fitzgerald of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, and Patrick M….

Clifford Law Offices is part of the legal team that filed a class action lawsuit a week ago against Target for its negligent mishandling of its customers’ credit and debit card information during the peak holiday shopping season. More than three weeks after Target discovered that the data had been mishandled, Target admitted that 40 million people had their credit card and encrypted debit card info stolen during the time between Black Friday and the…

January 13, 2014 The Seventh Annual Clifford Law Offices continuing legal education (CLE) program will be held Feb. 20. Bob Clifford will moderate the two-hour program entitled “The Ethics of Client Communication” that offers attorneys across the state free professional responsibility CLE credit. He will be joined on the panel by Illinois Appellate Court Justice Maureen Connors, James J. Grogan, Deputy Administrator and Chief Counsel of the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (ARDC) and…