Kimmel and Silverman may be on the outs, but Kimmel & Silverman are still together.

Confused?

Apparently, some clients of lemon-law firm Kimmel & Silverman PC, whose endeavors (and troubles) in Maryland we’ve written about several times, were, too. According to a press release put out by the firm and picked up as a news item by the ABA Journal, people saw headlines about “Kimmel and Silverman” splitting up and thought they referred to the lemon lawyers.

In reality, the headline was about (obnoxious) comedians Jimmy Kimmel and Sarah Silverman, who have ended their relationship and presumably will move on to annoy new romantic partners.

The law firm’s press release quotes partner Craig Kimmel as saying, “I was quite shocked when the headline popped up on cnn.com. I thought my relationship with Bob was going well. There were no warning signs. Then I found out about Matt Damon, and turned to my good buddy Ben Affleck for advice.”

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer

Washington Monthly has a great piece about four Baltimore men in federal court on murder and drug charges. These four men, who are black, are using a tactic that has been called “the flesh-and-blood defense,” usually associated with white supremacist anti-government folks.

From the story:

Judge Davis ordered the three defendants to be removed from the court, and turned to Gardner, who had, until then, remained quiet. But Gardner, too, intoned the same strange speech. “I am Shawn Earl Gardner, live man, flesh and blood,” he proclaimed. Every time the judge referred to him as “the defendant” or “Mr. Gardner,” Gardner automatically interrupted: “My name is Shawn Earl Gardner, sir.”

Davis tried to explain to Gardner that his behavior was putting his chances of acquittal or leniency at risk. “Don’t throw your life away,” Davis pleaded. But Gardner wouldn’t stop. Judge Davis concluded the hearing, determined to find out what was going on.

It’s a pretty lengthy piece but definitely worth a read for all you law wonks.

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer

On June 30, a truck pulled up to the Maryland State Bar Association headquarters and delivered boxes of its newly updated public service brochure, “Foreclosure Proceedings in Maryland.” On July 1, the MSBA started handing them out. By July 15 — just two weeks later — it had gone through more than 1,000 of the 20,000 it had printed up.

And that doesn’t even include hits on the Web version, said MSBA spokeswoman Janet S. Eveleth, who called the response “unprecedented.”

The total includes about 800 brochures given out on request from the MSBA’s office and more than 200 passed out to lawyers attending last week’s MICPEL foreclosure course in Baltimore, Eveleth said.

MICPEL will repeat the “Nuts and Bolts” class this month and next in Rockville and Salisbury, with video replays scheduled for September and November. Scholarships are available for lawyers who volunteer with the Foreclosure Prevention Pro Bono Project.

The printed brochure doesn’t mention the pro bono project — “We didn’t want to do anything that might limit its shelf life,” Eveleth said — but the online version includes the state’s HOPE hotline, 877-462-7555.

BARBARA GRZINCIC, Managing Editor/Law

The attorney-rating site Avvo.com now includes Maryland lawyers, a development I wrote about in today’s paper. I spent yesterday reporting the story, which included a fair bit of noodling around on the site. Here are a few things I noticed:

Peter Angelos, with a rating of 6.7 out of 10, is a merely “good” lawyer. Fellow toxic tort giant Peter T. Nicholl doesn’t even get a number rating.

Warren Brown? Margaret Mead? Billy Murphy? Gerry Martin? Ken Ravenell? These crimlaw big shots are rated “no concern,” meaning Avvo doesn’t have enough info on them to put together a numerical rating.

To be fair, at this point, less than 11 percent of the more than 32,000 Maryland lawyers listed on the site have been given a number rating.

Another observation: it looks like Avvo may be listing some big-firm types who do predominantly defense-side product liability litigation as “defective/dangerous products” lawyers, which to me would imply that they do plaintiff-side work.

All right, you’ve finished reading this blog post. Now go check your own rating. I know you’re going to do it, if you haven’t already.

CARYN TAMBER, Legal Affairs Writer