The administrators of Lehman Brothers' assets in Europe said Monday that they may seek a direct agreement with hedge funds and other creditors to return money tied up since the collapse of the parent company as an alternative to a court-sanctioned settlement.

PricewaterhouseCoopers — which controls some $8.9 billion in assets from Lehman Brothers International (Europe) since the parent company went bankrupt on Sept. 15, 2008 — has proposed a contractual agreement with creditors following an adverse ruling by the High Court in London. The court ruled in July that it had no power to grant the administrators' request to set a "bar date" or deadline for creditors to file claims.

PricewaterhouseCoopers is appealing the court ruling, with a hearing expected on Oct. 26, but meanwhile it has disclosed a timetable for the alternate settlement.

The administrators sought a bar date because they had not received responses from all clients of Lehman Brothers, they could not depend on the accuracy of Lehmans' record and had not received all the information requested from custodians, depositories and affiliates of Lehman Brothers International (Europe).

There were 13 law firm mergers during the third quarter of this year, up from seven deals recorded during the second quarter, according to a new report from Altman Weil Inc.

Most of the quarter's mergers were tiny acquisitions, reflecting "the continuing caution of law firms in response to the recent economic turmoil," said Bill Brennan, principal of Altman Weil.

The meatiest deal reported was Boston-based Bingham McCutchen’s acquisition of McKee Nelson, a 120-lawyer firm with offices in Washington and New York. The merge formed a 1,100-lawyer firm called Bingham McCutchen LLP.

Also during the quarter, Washington-based Howrey LLP acquired Day Casebeer Madrid and Batchelder, a Silicon Valley intellectual property boutique.

While those two deals involved large firms, eight of the quarter’s 13 deals were all small regional combinations. Brennan explains that law firms are not looking to assume the risks inherent with big mergers right now and are instead scooping up small firms or groups of lateral partners with portable business.

There were 25 law firm mergers and acquisitions reported in the first quarter of 2009.

A court-appointed examiner investigating Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.'s bankruptcy has been exploring whether the Federal Reserve improperly cut in front of other creditors owed money in the $613 billion bankruptcy case, records show.

Billing records filed with the court show the examiner is investigating an issue that has angered many of Lehman's creditors: how the Federal Reserve and the New York Fed -- which lent Lehman $46 billion in cash and securities before its bankruptcy filing last September -- were paid promptly and in full, while tens of billions of dollars in other debts were left to be sorted out in court. It remains unclear when and how much Lehman creditors will be repaid.

The examiner, Anton Valukas, chairman of law firm Jenner & Block LLP and a former U.S. attorney, said, "I am under a court order not to discuss what we are doing or how we are doing it."

Fed loans were crucial to propping up Lehman during its final days, and were part of an extraordinary government attempt to stabilize Lehman in the chaotic weeks of mid-September 2008. The government ultimately quashed a rescue of Lehman, which filed for bankruptcy protection. But its earlier steps now are open to scrutiny in bankruptcy court.

Details on the examiner's work remain scant, and it is possible no actions will be brought. Should the examiner determine that the Fed got preferential treatment, bankruptcy administrators could pursue court claims to recover assets for Lehman's creditors from the Fed, on the theory those assets should have remained with Lehman when it filed for bankruptcy last September.

Attorney Gloria Allred, perhaps best know as a zealous advocate for women and women’s rights – and who unbeknownst to many represented Mackenzie Phillips in her divorce and was on Michael Jackson’s enemies list – spoke to Chris Yandek of the CYInterview.com about Roman Polanski saying, “He had the opportunity to live a good life, to be successful in his professional life, but to escape and avoid and the justice system – and now his time has run out. He needs to return and to face justice. And those who are supporting him may have different motives.”

Allred went on to question whether or not Hollywood big shots would support other child predators like Polanski, “I wonder if those who signed a petition in support of Roman Polanski intend to sign other petitions in favor of other sexual predators or is it just a rich and famous sexual predator who may have chosen to support.” She went on to add, “Roman Polanski can direct a movie, but he can’t direct the judicial system. He can produce a movie and he can’t produce necessarily the result he wants in the judicial system because that’s beyond his direction and control.”

She wants people to understand that Roman Polanski is not the victim, “He needs to serve his time. I think there is a lot of defense spin going on out there and allegations against a judge who’s deceased and can’t defend himself. I think there are those that are trying to make Roman Polanski the victim. He’s not the victim. There is a victim in the criminal case and that was a 13 year old, then 13 year old and the other victims are the people of the State of California whose law was violated.”

Chris Yandek is the editor of CYInterview, an outlet that features high profile interviews from Hollywood, sports, and news makers. His interviews are featured by numerous mainstream broadcast, print, and online outlets.

http://www.cyinterview.com

Lawyers representing South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford in an ethics investigation are asking the state Supreme Court to keep the report out of the hands of a Legislature expected to consider impeaching him.

Sanford has been under pressure to quit since revealing he disappeared for a week from the state in the summer to visit his mistress in Argentina.

His lawyer said Wednesday that he wants the court to force the State Ethics Commission to keep its investigation secret until after it decides whether Sanford broke laws by using state planes for personal and political purposes.

In August, Sanford said the commission could release its complaint against him.

Sanford contends the commission wants to give lawmakers an early report on the probe. Ethics Director Herb Hayden says that will not happen.

A Florida appeals court has upheld a lower court ruling that the NCAA must release documents on Florida State's appeal of an academic cheating penalty.

The 1st District Court of Appeal upheld a circuit court decision Thursday. The Associated Press and other media groups had sued, saying the NCAA's desire to keep the process private violated Florida open records laws.

The documents focus on Florida State's appeal of the NCAA's intention to strip coaches and athletes of wins in 10 sports.

That includes football coach Bobby Bowden, who stands to lose 14 victories. It would dim his chances of again becoming major college football's winningest coach. Bowden has 384 victories — two behind Penn State's Joe Paterno.

Red Hat has filed a friend of the court brief with the U.S. Supreme Court asking it to uphold a lower court's ruling that software isn't patentable. Red Hat is not a direct party but took a position against software patents in the case of Bernard Bilski and Rand Warsaw versus David Kappos, Undersecretary of Commerce and director of the U.S. Patent Office. The case is now before the Supreme Court. Rob Tiller, an assistant general counsel at Red Hat, filed the brief in what he said was a rare chance to attack the patent issue head-on.

"Our patent system is supposed to foster innovation, but for open source and software in general, it does the opposite," said Tiller today in a statement announcing the amicus brief.

"Software patents form a minefield that slows and discourages software innovation. The Bilski case presents a great opportunity for the Supreme Court to rectify this problem," he said.

Tiller argued that a federal Circuit Court ignored Supreme Court guidance when it decided in 1994 that someone who could show that software was "useful" and produced "a concrete and tangible result" could patent the software. Before that, the Supreme Court and lower courts had held that abstractions couldn't be patented and that a patent needed to cover an abstraction incorporated into a particular machine, or be a process that "transforms a particular article into a different state or thing," Tiller wrote.

The Supreme Court should rule in favor of Bilski and Warsaw and allow only patents that cover tangible machines and processes, the amicus brief says.