The Legal Current podcast emerges for the second time since its renewal with more unique insights into the Legal market. In the August 2013 edition of the Legal Current podcast, we cover:

• Legal Trends & Insights: The Peer Monitor Index (PMI) provides some hope in the second quarter as the law firm market improves
• Legal News: In a settlement over fracking operations, a unique situation arises when a family’s children are subjected to a confidentiality agreement
• News From Thomson Reuters: CLEAR helps Capital Stack engage in merchant funding, a new alternative for businesses that need capital
• On the Legal Blogs: Findlaw blogged live from the ABA Annual Meeting, covering Attorney General Eric Holder’s new drug sentencing policy.

If you have a suggestion for a future interview or episode theme, leave a comment on this blog post or send an email to contact@legalcurrent.com. You can also follow us on Twitter at @legalcurrent.

A new study found that drafting software tools for transactional attorneys can cut review time in half and catch more errors than manual proofreading. 

This podcast discusses what features are important to look for in automated drafting tools. 

Just in time for the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Annual Meeting in San
Francisco later this week, Sharon Sayles Belton, vice president of Community Affairs
at Thomson Reuters, chatted with this year’s ABA Tort Trial and Insurance Practice
Section (TIPS) Liberty Award recipient, Steven Shapiro. The award, sponsored by
Thomson Reuters, will be presented to Shapiro by Sayles Belton during the TIPS
Welcome, Pursuit of Justice and Liberty Achievement Awards Reception on Friday, Aug.
9 at the law offices of Sedgwick LLP.

As the legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union, Shapiro directs a large
staff of lawyers who deal with a broad range of issues, including free speech,
racial justice, religious freedom, due process rights, privacy rights, reproductive
and women’s right, immigrant’s rights, LGBT rights, voting freedoms and prisoner’s
rights. He has appeared as counsel or co-counsel on more than 200 ACLU briefs
submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court, and he is a leader in promoting diversity
within the legal profession. Shapiro is also an adjunct professor of constitutional
law at Columbia Law School and a frequent speaker and writer on civil liberties
issues.

The TIPS award was created in 2008 to honor lawyers and judges who demonstrate
leadership by actively promoted diversity in the legal profession.

To listen to the podcast interview with Sharon Sayles Belton and Steven Shapiro,
click the play button below. Also, watch for coverage of the Awards Reception and
other ABA Annual Meeting events later in the week on Legal Current.

The National Association of Women Lawyers recently concluded its annual meeting in New York.  Among the topics discussed at the meeting was skills, strategies and stumbling blocks for women lawyers in their career path.

Last year, NAWL released its National Survey on Retention and Promotion of Women in Law Firms and remarkably little has changed for women at senior and partner levels.

Angela C. Agrusa of Liner Grode Stein, who was one of the first women to graduate from UCLA’s Women Studies’ Department, talks about her personal experiences and ideas on women in the law.