Summer internships have their unique rites of passage: nervous handshakes, PowerPoint mishaps, maybe a regrettable song at karaoke night. But the New York offices of Sidley Austin recently encountered a ritual of a more toothy variety, if multiple sources are to be believed—a summer associate who made a habit of biting her colleagues, and occasionally roaring at them in the halls. The story, first gnawed over in legal blog circles, quickly metastasized into a headline feast across NewsNation, the New York Post, and the Daily Mail.
Law & Order & Dental Records
Toothsome tales about the associate’s workplace antics have found surprising consensus among the reports. Citing the legal blog Above the Law, all three outlets confirm that on her very first day at the firm, the intern began biting colleagues—and, in a move rarely covered in any professional code of conduct, roaring at them as well. The biting reportedly continued for weeks, ending only with her departure. According to details compiled by NewsNation and the Daily Mail, the bite count varied by the source: some insiders told Above the Law and the Post that the total ran as high as ten, while others attempted to place the number closer to five, as an internal source clarified to the New York Post when rumors ballooned online.
One viral message, referenced by both the Daily Mail and the Post, described bite marks visible on a colleague’s arm, even sharing an image via social media. An anonymous “purported insider” cited by the Daily Mail claimed, “It was such a repeated thing that her officemate started wearing long-sleeve shirts to the office because she kept getting bit.” Notably, the Daily Mail adds that this all happened over multiple incidents, not a one-time lapse, and that the “Biglaw Biter” even included a human resources staffer among her targets.
While this would suggest an office environment bordering on Lord of the Flies, the outlets stress that the behavior wasn’t described as hostile. As NewsNation notes, employees at the firm framed it as “offbeat” or “faux-quirky,” not aggressive. The New York Post, ever succinct, reports that “‘Nibble’ is probably too tame a word,” citing photos of post-bite bruises as evidence. The Post also colors the intern’s style as “a faux-quirky manic pixie dream girl crossed with the Donner party vibe”—a characterization that manages to reference both Zooey Deschanel and 19th-century cannibalism in one unwieldy bite.
Office Culture: When “Quirky” Gets Teeth
If you’re wondering how one could bite a coworker (or several) without immediate repercussions, you’re not alone. The New York Post, paraphrasing Above the Law and highlighting chatter on Reddit, suggests the “Biglaw Biter’s” otherwise personable demeanor delayed any formal complaints. The reluctance to report, said one user claiming to work with her, likely stemmed from a desire not to “ruin” her life for what some saw as a bizarre—if spectacularly ill-judged—mistake.
Meanwhile, the Daily Mail notes that office rumor mills didn’t stop at the biting. An insider message circulating on X, and referenced in their reporting, accused the intern of a secondary faux pas: allegedly ordering a $2,000 bottle of wine at a firm dinner with partners and associates. According to the same report, this became a footnote in her termination meeting, grouped in as another sign of “poor judgment.” The Mail, always eager for an offbeat detail, throws in that she regularly said “rawr” and described herself as a “horse girl,” which—while odd—still seems less memorable than a mouth-shaped bruise.
It’s worth pausing here to consider that while source counts of bite victims differ—ten, five, or something in between—the buffer of mythologizing has started to surround the saga, a point an insider speaking to the New York Post was quick to flag: “People are outright making things up at this point”—an inevitable stage in any Internet-era office legend.
Chomping Conclusions
So, what have we learned from the curious case of the Sidley Austin summer? Even the most storied institutions are susceptible to the kinds of oddities that HR manuals couldn’t possibly anticipate. Biting, roaring, avant-garde beverage choices: it’s an office etiquette train that went off the rails somewhere between whimsy and “should we call someone about this?”
Perhaps the real head-scratcher isn’t the biting itself, or even why it wasn’t immediately shut down, but how many bites it took before someone finally penciled in a meeting. Is there a tacit law-firm strike rule—three bites, then an email? Does roaring signal intent or remorse? How does a place so attuned to precedent and decorum end up tiptoeing around such, well, unusual behavior?
At the end of the day, the facts—sifted and nibbled by NewsNation, the New York Post, and the Daily Mail—paint a picture of a moment when “quirky” got literal teeth, and an office full of legal professionals found themselves pondering whether to roll up their sleeves or don a full suit of armor. Maybe law is stranger than fiction after all. Or maybe this is just a reminder that sometimes, the only thing more difficult than passing the bar is surviving summer associate season with your limbs—and your dignity—intact.
