Revised bar bill awaits action Amendment would reduce dues to $358 by NANCY McCARTHY Staff Writer 覧覧覧覧 As time runs out for the nearly broke State Bar, it appeared last month that no urgency legislation would be enacted to head off massive layoffs and keep the attorney discipline system operating. By the Memorial Day weekend, Assemblyman Robert Hertzberg, D-Sherman Oaks, had received no signal from Gov. Pete Wilson that he is satisfied with the bar's efforts to meet his concerns expressed in last October's veto message. CONTINUED ...

A manacled Dana Ewell is led from the courtroom during the recent triple-murder trial in Fresno. Former public board member's son convicted in killing of family by KATHLEEN O. BEITIKS Staff Writer 覧覧覧覧 Portrayed as a rich boy consumed by greed, 27-year-old Dana Ewell was convicted last month of murdering his father Dale, sister Tiffany and mother Glee, a former public member of the State Bar Board of Governors. Six years after the 1992 Easter Sunday slayings in the Ewell family Fresno home, a jury took 10 days to convict Ewell and his college buddy, Joel Radovcich, 27, of first-degree murder with special circumstances. The conviction could bring a life term in prison or the death penalty. CONTINUED ...

For employees, the crisis is real by KATHLEEN O. BEITIKS and NANCY McCARTHY Staff Writers 覧覧覧覧 At 51, and with eight years of experience at the State Bar, Bobbie Young did not think she would have to look for a new job. But her position as an accounting clerk has been eliminated, the victim of Gov. Wilson's veto of the bar's fee bill and subsequent legislative bickering. Young is just one of the 500 State Bar employees who received a potential layoff notice at the end of April. Unless emergency legislation is enacted, most of those employees will be packing up and leaving their offices on June 26. CONTINUED ...

REGULARS FROM THE PRESIDENT – Avoiding a bigger problem ahead NEWS Bar exam results available on web Bar chief Steve Nissen honored by Public Counsel LEGAL TECH – Are your applications ready for 2000? LAW PRACTICE – Learning to choose the right mediator MCLE MCLE Self-Study – Stress and you MCLE Self-Assessment Test MCLE Calendar NEW PRODUCTS – From court forms to the Y2K OPINION Lessons of the dues debacle Raising the bar A vehicle for advancing ideas Californians poorly served by the stalemate In defense of JNE . . .    . . . Shield the process from political influences    . . . Bastard born, but now a valuable ally Letters to the editor TRIALS DIGEST YOU NEED TO KNOW