“Glass Lewis Opposes Samsung Life, Fire & Marine Board Nominees Over Conflict Concerns” —

• “Global proxy advisory firm Glass Lewis has come out against the appointment of outside directors at Samsung Life Insurance and Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance. The firm cited potential conflicts of interest, noting that the nominees’ law firms have provided legal services to the companies.”
• “According to financial industry sources on March 13, Glass Lewis recommended against the reappointment of Lim Chae-min as an outside director and audit committee member at Samsung Life Insurance in its proxy report for institutional investors. The firm also recommended voting against the new appointment of Kim Jae-shin as an outside director at Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance.”
• “Glass Lewis raised concerns that law firm Lee & Ko, where Lim serves as an advisor, provided legal services to Samsung Group in 2024-2025. The firm warned this could create conflicts between board decisions and personal interests, and could influence the company’s selection of legal services.”
• “‘Given that the current board does not have a sufficient proportion of outside directors, we find it difficult to support a candidate with such ties,’ Glass Lewis said.”
• “The proxy advisor opposed Kim’s nomination at Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance for similar reasons. Kim currently serves as an advisor at Kim & Chang, a law firm that has provided legal services to the company. Glass Lewis added that the board has not secured enough independent directors to provide adequate oversight in protecting shareholder interests.”

“Waivable Conflict from Counsel’s Firm’s Prior Representation of a Victim Bank and Permissible PSR Disclosure to Treatment Providers on Supervised Release” —

• “In United States v. Wells (2d Cir. Mar. 9, 2026) (summary order), defendant-appellant Laurell Wells appealed from a judgment of conviction in the Southern District of New York (Rakoff, J.) following a guilty plea to conspiracy to commit wire and bank fraud (18 U.S.C. § 1349), bank fraud and aiding and abetting (18 U.S.C. §§ 1344, 2), and aggravated identity theft (18 U.S.C. §§ 1028(a)(1), 1028A(b), 2). The district court imposed an aggregate 132-month term of imprisonment and five years of supervised release.”
• “Wells raised two principal issues on appeal:”
  • “Whether the district court erred in denying defense counsel’s motion to withdraw based on an asserted conflict arising from counsel’s firm’s prior representation of Chase Bank, an institutional victim of the charged fraud scheme.”
  • “Whether the district court erred by authorizing disclosure of Wells’s Presentence Report (PSR) and mental-health evaluations to his cognitive behavioral therapy provider as part of supervised release.”
• “The Second Circuit affirmed on both issues. Although the decision is a nonprecedential summary order, it is a useful synthesis of the Circuit’s conflict-waiver framework and its supervision-condition jurisprudence regarding treatment-related disclosures.”
• “The court held that: (1) counsel’s firm’s prior representation of Chase created, at most, a waivable potential conflict, not an ‘actual’ or ‘unwaivable’ conflict; (2) the district court satisfied its duty to inquire and properly conducted a Curcio waiver process, and Wells knowingly and intelligently waived conflict-free representation; and (3) the supervised release authorization allowing the Probation Office to provide the therapist with the PSR and mental-health evaluations was within the court’s broad discretion and was reasonably related to treatment needs under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), without imposing a greater deprivation of liberty than necessary.”
• “The conflict inquiry: the court’s threshold duty: The panel first evaluates whether the district court satisfied its obligation to identify and classify the potential conflict. Applying Lussier and Kliti, it emphasizes that the trial court may rely on counsel’s representations and must determine whether the conflict is actual, potential, or nonexistent. The record showed: (i) counsel disclosed the issue pretrial; (ii) the court required written submissions; (iii) counsel explained why the conflict was ‘background,’ likely not strategically salient, and waivable; and (iv) the court held a hearing to address waiver. That sequence satisfied the inquiry obligation.”
• “Classification: why this was ‘waivable potential,’ not ‘unwaivable’: Wells argued that prior firm representation of Chase (a victim bank) created an ‘actual and unwaivable’ conflict. The panel rejected that framing. Relying on Perez (unwaivable conflicts are rare) and decisions treating prior representation of witnesses/codefendants as generally waivable (Perez, Leslie, Basciano), the court reasoned that:”
  • “Chase was an institutional victim rather than a current client whose interests were being actively advanced in related litigation.”
  • “The firm obtained a conflicts waiver from Chase, which purported to free counsel to cross-examine Chase witnesses without limitation.”
  • “Even when prior representation might affect cross-examination decisions, Second Circuit doctrine treats that as a candidate for disclosure and waiver, not automatic disqualification.”
• “The net doctrinal move is to locate the case within the ordinary Curcio-waiver universe rather than the exceptional ‘no rational defendant’ category that mandates disqualification under Lussier.”
• “Validity of Wells’s waiver: knowing, voluntary, intelligent: The panel upholds the waiver as adequate under Curcio and Arrington. It highlights multiple safeguards:
  • “Wells received notice of the conflict in advance and discussed it in court.”
  • “The district court explained the risk (e.g., less vigorous cross-examination of Chase employees because of the firm relationship).”
  • “The court repeatedly offered to appoint independent counsel to advise Wells, which he declined.”
  • “When Wells later sought to replace counsel, his stated reasons centered on tactical disagreement, not renewed conflict concerns.”
  • “The district court revisited and clarified the conflict on the first day of trial, including eliciting the government’s preview of the Chase witness testimony.”
• “The panel also rejects Wells’s claim that he was coerced into waiver by the prospect of proceeding pro se. It treats the ‘counsel vs. pro se’ choice as arising only after Wells’s tactical dispute, and it invokes Rosemond and Rivernider to explain that strategic friction does not entitle a defendant to new counsel, especially when substitution would disrupt trial.”

David Kluft asks: “Can lawyers who voted for Biden effectively communicate with a client who voted for Trump?” —

• “Two NY plaintiffs sued a law firm for malpractice, alleging that the firm negligently advised them on whether to take a settlement. The plaintiffs proffered a corporate law professor as an expert on ‘legal ethics and the practice of law,’ even though ‘virtually none of his experience involve[d] legal ethics, either generally or specifically.'”
• “The Court noted that the Professor’s opinion was unreliable, including because he misinterpreted an ABA opinion and ‘depart[ed] from the factual record.’ The Professor also came up with a strange speculative method for determining malpractice, musing that because the firm was dominated by Biden supporters (which was not actually true), they were incapable of fulfilling their Rule 1.4 duties to communicate with their Trump supporting clients.”
• “The Court held that the Professor ‘failed to show that researching an individual’s political donations to learn if an attorney has a different political ideology than their client is an accepted or newly innovative method used by legal ethics experts to support a malpractice claim.’ Testimony excluded.”
• Decision: here.