Jonathan D. Glater reports that the former Milberg Weiss will pay $75 million over five years; the government will release a statement saying no current attorneys committed wrongdoing. (“Firm to Settle Class-Action Case for $75 Million”, NY Times, Jun. 17; also W$J). The W$J says the firm will admit that it committed wrongdoing in the past, but will not actually plead guilty–i.e., the same sort of deferred prosecution agreement that the NY Times recently condemned in the context of business. (To be clear: I’m not objecting to a deferred prosecution agreement here. Felony convictions for entities are usually effectively death sentences, and that is pointless if the guilty parties have actually left the building.)
Rebutting Bill Lerach in Portfolio
The editors at Conde Nast Portfolio were kind enough to invite me to contribute a rebuttal, which is now online, to William Lerach’s egregious apologia pro crookery sua. The allotted space permits me to address briefly only a couple of Lerach’s worst howlers, in particular his bald assertions that his concealed kickbacks did no harm to class members or to competing lawyers. (It’s true that named class representatives do a very poor job at their intended mission of standing in for other class members’ interests, but secretly aligning their incentives with the size of fee awards, rather than the value of the settlement to the class, is a corruption meant to keep them from ever living up to their theoretical watchdog role.)
For a more extended look at what’s wrong with Lerach’s article, let me recommend Joseph Nocera’s excellent column a week ago in the Times:
In the article, Mr. Lerach expresses zero remorse, positions his crimes as having hurt no one while serving a greater good and makes the absurd claim that he was railroaded by his political opponents.
It is a brazen, shameful piece of work — and it must infuriate the prosecutors who made the plea agreement with him, and the judge who accepted it, especially since Mr. Lerach wrote his own remorseful letter to the judge ahead of his sentencing. It also ought to infuriate anyone who cares about the law. Plenty of criminals head to prison still believing they’re above the law, but Mr. Lerach takes the cake.
Ted Frank has some further thoughts on that point. And note (from Nocera) that Lerach’s “everyone did it” swipes at his colleagues — which many, including we, have read as grounds for an investigation — are by no means passing without contradiction from colleagues:
Mr. Lerach’s statement has infuriated other plaintiffs’ lawyers. “It would just be unthinkable” to give kickbacks to lead plaintiffs, said Max Berger, of the firm Bernstein, Litowitz, Berger & Grossman. Added Sean Coffey, another Bernstein, Litowitz partner: “It is bad enough that this confessed criminal cheated for years to get an unfair advantage over his rival firms. But for this guy, on his way to prison, to say that everyone does it is just beyond the pale.”
(cross-posted from Point of Law; & welcome San Diego Union-Tribune blog readers).
P.S.: For another example of just how slippery Lerach’s careful phrasings can be, check this Roger Parloff post from an earlier point in the scandal. And Stephanie Mencimer, whose writings are nearly always criticized in this space, deserves due credit for seeing through Lerach’s “liberal folk-hero status” to the “pretty sleazy” realities beneath in this February article.
Latest on Kozinski and Cyrus Sanai
As Patterico reports, Cyrus Sanai is shopping around a CD that he claims consists of downloaded material from Judge Alex Kozinski’s web site server.
The case against “Civil Gideon”
Here are my prepared remarks for the June 14 panel at the ACS convention. My actual remarks differed from this somewhat, as I extemporized a bit and, by my watch, I didn’t get my full ten minutes before the moderator cut me off:
June 16 roundup
- Educator acquitted on charges of roughness toward special ed student sues Teacher Smackdown website over anonymous comments criticizing her [NW Arkansas Morning News, Citizen Media Law Project, House of Eratosthenes]
- Lorain County, Ohio judge who struck down state’s death penalty has Che Guevara poster in his office, though Guevara wasn’t exactly an opponent of killing [USA Today]
- Privatization of U.S. Senate food service is a parable for wider issues [Tabarrok]
- Low-end strategies for acquiring criminal-law clients include trolling the attorney visiting area at the federal lockup, paying the hot dog guy in front of the courthouse [Greenfield]
- A Canadian Senator on why his country’s medical malpractice law works better than you-know-whose [Val Jones MD leads to audio]
- U.K.: convicted rapist sexually assaults and murders teenage girl after housing authority is told evicting him would breach his human rights [Telegraph]
- No word of legal action (yet, at least) in Salina, Kansas car crash that driver blames on “brain freeze” from Sonic restaurant frozen drink [AP/K.C. Star]
- In Michigan, some mysterious entity is trying to drop an electoral anvil on two of our favorite jurists [PoL]
Haywood Rosales v. Home Depot: a “glued to his seat” encore
It appears an ill-natured prankster spread adhesive on the toilet seat of a Home Depot in Florissant, Mo., in suburban St. Louis. The hapless patron who was next to sit down claims in his suit that the earlier, similar incident in Colorado (which we covered here and here) should have put Home Depot on notice that “a strong possibility that instances of copycat behavior would occur”. With that awareness in hand, the retail chain could have — what? sent in an employee to check for seat-gluing after each time a customer used the facility? (The Smoking Gun, Jun. 13).
Added to the favorites column
Added to the favorites sidebar on the right: our contemporaneous coverage of the case of the finger in the Wendy’s chili. Any other favorites you’d like to see there?
Judge Zilly’s sanctions order against Cyrus Sanai; Kozinski recuses himself
The furor over the Kozinski web site pseudo-scandal over what Wonkette calls “the sort of naughtiness you’d find in the dirty birthday cards section at Spencer Gifts” has caused Judge Alex Kozinski to recuse himself from the obscenity trial, resulting in a mistrial. Kozinski is known for his ethical rectitude, which is perhaps why he did so, but one wishes that he didn’t permit the appalling LA Times coverage to create a perception of a perception of a bias, much less agree that that provides grounds for recusal. But with some implausibly calling for his resignation, discretion is perhaps the better part of valor. Still, as Jesse Walker notes, “There has been no shortage of free-speech trials in which the presiding judges had a moral objection to essentially innocuous material. I don’t see any reason why such a case shouldn’t be heard by a jurist with a history of tolerance.” And one wishes that the conservatives calling for Kozinski’s resignation would use that powder for Ninth Circuit judges who act ultra vires rather than for the jokes judges share in their own time.
Paul Krugman and tainted tomatoes
The Times columnist’s rants on the supposed collapse in food safety (which he keeps blaming on, of all people, Milton Friedman) appear to be not well borne out by the actual numbers (Alex Tabarrok, Jun. 13).
New Steve Chapman blog
My favorite syndicated columnist, based at the Chicago Tribune, started blogging last month, and has been commenting on such subjects as the Vioxx verdicts, the (possible) end of the Second Amendment debate, and imagined vs. real spending on schools.