Bressler Risk Blog

What happens to international law firms practicing in China on January 1, 2020? Can that even be a thing anymore? Will new appointees be “inserted” at firms? Will client outside counsel guidelines take note and evolve?

Read why many are concerned about new security rules taking effect: “China’s new cybersecurity rules ban foreign companies from using VPNs to phone home” —

• “The latest move is the long-threatened extension of Chinese spying powers over foreign companies, whose employees are to be prohibited from using working VPNs to communicate with their non-Chinese offices. These employees will now be left to use the same censored internet as Chinese citizens, and every trade secret and confidential communique they transmit to their home offices will be open to capture, inspection and use by Chinese authorities and the state industries they have long supported by funneling proprietary foreign corporate data to domestic competitors.”
• “The Chinese ‘Cybersecurity Law’ enables Chinese authorities to access any data on any server or personal computer, even those used by foreign firms.”
• “Moreover, a new Foreign Investment Law that takes effect in 2020 will eliminate any special dispensations currently enjoyed by foreign firms (for example, foreign firms are presently exempt from rules that allow the Chinese state to insert political appointees within the executive ranks of companies to monitor their operations — this will no longer be the case as of Jan 1).”
• “As Steve Dickinson points out on the China Law Blog, the ability of Chinese firms to spy on all communications between Chinese and offshore offices of US firms compromises US companies’ ability to comply with US laws restricting the export of “sensitive technologies” — the fact that the Chinese state can simply plunder these technologies from US companies’ servers means that whether or not the US companies turn their trade secrets over, they can still be presumed to be in the hands of the Chinese state and military and the Chinese companies that are closely aligned with them:
  • “Under the new Chinese system, trade secrets are not permitted. This means that U.S. and EU companies operating in China will now need to assume any “secret” they seek to maintain on a server or network in China will automatically become available to the Chinese government and then to all of their Chinese government controlled competitors in China, including the Chinese military. This includes phone calls, emails, WeChat messages and any other form of electronic communication. Since no company can reasonably assume its trade secrets will remain secret once transmitted into China over a Chinese controlled network, they are at great risk of having their trade secret protections outside China evaporating as well.”
  • “The U.S. or EU company may have an enforceable agreement with the Chinese recipient of its confidential information. So trade secrecy is protected with respect to that authorized recipient. But if the secret is easily available to the Chinese government, there is no real trade secret protection.”
  • “By giving the Chinese government and its cronies full access to its data, the U.S. or EU company may very well be deemed to have illegally exported technology to China and it could face millions of dollars in fines and even prison sentences for some of its officers and directors. There is an inherent conflict between foreign laws mandating a company not transfer its technology and China’s laws which effectively mandate that transfer.”

I always find something worthwhile in this article series published by Dentons partners Shari Klevens and Alanna Clair: “Consider the Risks When Acting as Replacement Counsel” —

• “Although the attorney’s representation may start in the middle of a lawsuit, it is still generally a new representation for the attorney’s law firm. Thus, while replacement counsel may feel the need to take urgent action, problems can arise where attorneys fail to follow their firm’s typical client intake procedures.”
• “However, law firms have client intake procedures for a reason. In some situations, there may be conflict issues that need to be resolved. The firm may have a standard required engagement letter to govern the scope of the representation as well as other issues. Even where the representation begins in a hurried manner, taking the time to follow the firm’s standard procedures for opening matters can help reduce the overall risk.”
• “One of the biggest risks for replacement counsel is that deadlines will get missed or forgotten in the transition. Accordingly, as one of the first tasks for replacement counsel, it is helpful to independently identify any deadlines that may need to be addressed. Replacement counsel may expect that the client or prior counsel will identify any imminent deadlines. However, the risk can be severe if the replacement counsel does not separately confirm whether there are any other deadlines or that the reported deadlines have been calculated correctly.”

“Weil, Ex-Client Clash Over Possible Conflicts in Insys Work” —

• “A former sales executive at Insys Therapeutics who is seeking a new trial after a racketeering conviction has cited new evidence that he said shows his ex-lawyers at Weil, Gotshal & Manges kept him in the dark about potential conflicts posed by its simultaneous bankruptcy work for Insys.”
• “‘Weil could not be loyal to both clients. Mr. Simon never provided his informed, written consent to this arrangement. Worse, when he asked his trial counsel, Weil partner Steven Tyrrell, what the Insys engagement would mean for him, Tyrrell responded, ‘nothing, really,’’ said Simon’s defense attorneys Daniel Marx and William Fick.”
• “But Weil denies that there was any conflict, said it took steps to avert the possibility of one and said Simon was fully informed about its work for Insys. Tyrrell said in an affidavit filed Sept. 16 that he told Simon about the pending bankruptcy representation in August 2018, and ‘Simon stated he understood my explanation, had no questions, and voiced no objection.'”
• “Tyrrell also said Weil implemented an ethical screen ‘to avoid any appearance of impropriety,’ according to a Weil memo filed in court. He said his firm circulated memos to the team working on Simon’s defense and on the Insys bankruptcy that instructed them not to have any discussions or share or access any files concerning each others’ matters.”

“Personal medical files discovered unshredded and dumped at landfill” —

• “Dozens of file boxes packed with private, confidential medical information were dumped at a Bay Area landfill, angering people whose names, addresses, medical history and prescription drug information was on display for anyone to see.”
• “That’s when she called 2 Investigates, which traced the files to a San Francisco law firm, Leach & McGreevy LLP and called the group for comment. Attorney Rick McGreevy said ‘nothing was being (improperly) disclosed’ and ‘most people don’t go digging around at the dump.'”
• “That comment didn’t sit well with UC Hastings legal ethics professor and attorney Richard Zitrin. ‘I just go ouch. It makes me flinch,” Zitrin said. “Somebody’s not stopping to think it through.'”
• “California law details that lawyers are required to protect the privacy of their clients and any state resident. Additionally, a California ethics opinion says an attorney should shred, erase or modify personal information to be sure it can’t be seen by others.”
• “The California State Bar said it is considering sending a warning letter to all member attorneys reminding them documents must be destroyed and not simply tossed in the garbage can.”

“Judge to Hear Motion to Toss Gordon Rees’ Defenses in Legal Malpractice Case” —

• “Attorneys for plaintiff Terry Hodges say Gordon Reese attorneys, including named partner Roger Mansukhani, changed their stories over whether they searched for relevant texts, emails or chats tied to claims the firm concealed a conflict of interest from Hodges when it represented him in the underlying litigation.”
• “The texts were sought to bolster Hodges’ claim that Gordon Rees—which represented him in a dispute with Netflix and fellow funnyman Chris Tucker—concealed that it was also representing Netflix, even after it learned it had a conflict.”
• “Gordon Rees’ lawyers responded that the issue is a red herring designed to ‘avoid a determination of the merits’ of the case and that the reason none of the texts from 2015 were found or searched for is because the lawyers in question either do not use texting for work or routinely delete any texts.”
• “Hodges’ filed the underlying lawsuit in 2015, claiming that Tucker owed him for years of writing and production tasks and had promised him co-producer credit for Netflix’s 2015 ‘Chris Tucker Live.’ Hodges’ complaint said the firm only disclosed the conflict after it had engineered Netflix’s dismissal from the suit and accepted thousands of dollars in fees before dumping Hodges.”

“Morgan Lewis Settles $30M Pa. Suit Over Alleged Conflict” —

• “Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP has inked a settlement to end a $30 million lawsuit accusing the firm of working against a client’s interests by helping to build a case against it on behalf of a Wisconsin-based hospital system.”
• “The deal ends claims by a Willis Towers Watson unit as it sought to recoup fees paid to Morgan Lewis before it learned that the firm was assisting counsel for Meriter Health System Inc. put together a suit against the the unit. The claims involved an allegedly flawed retirement plan designed by a Willis Towers Watson predecessor.”
• “Morgan Lewis has denied liability in the case brought against it by Towers Watson and argued that the company had signed an agreement when it retained the firm allowing Morgan Lewis to represent parties with adverse interests.”

“Sex cult leader Keith Raniere will not be sentenced until 2020: judge” —

• “Raniere, 58, wore his hair buzzed short and a pair of oversized tan jail scrubs on his small frame during the brief proceeding. He was brought into court in handcuffs for discussions relating to a potential conflict of interest involving one of his attorneys, Teny Geragos.”
• “At some point after Raniere’s conviction, Geragos applied for a job at the U.S. Attorney’s office in Brooklyn — the office that handled the NXIVM prosecutions. Raniere is required to waive the conflict if he wishes to proceed with Geragos on his defense team. Her father, Mark Geragos, is a Los Angeles-based celebrity attorney… The parties were told to file arguments and return to court on Oct. 31 for the conflict hearing to go forward.”

This article is truly worth reading in full. It goes into great detail, collecting examples and insight from several law firm GCs and risk leaders. I highly recommend it: “Terms of Engagement” —

• “With risk management increasingly fraught, avoiding client conflicts is key. Many law firms now have dedicated general counsel to review the terms of engagement letters, which include conflict provisions, and advise partners on negotiating waivers where appropriate.”
• “[Terry Burgoyne, general counsel at Osler Hoskin & Harcourt LLP] says they will sometimes ask for an “issue-conflict” guarantee. “They’ll sometimes say you have to notify them before you take a position on behalf of another client — in a totally unrelated case — that be might contrary to the way they’d like that issue to be resolved. On those we push back almost universally. ‘For one thing, you don’t know the issues they care about. And we have no way of searching for that, for issues we can’t identify later on.'”
• “…he says Osler walks away from ‘a not immaterial amount’ of work, between 5% and 10% of potential engagements, for conflicts reasons.”
• “Clients, too, are getting more and more sophisticated about conflicts and, from the law firm’s point of view, both in a good and bad way. [Says Kenneth Crofoot, general counsel of Goodmans LLP]: ‘I find clients are more understanding in many cases that waiving conflicts is appropriate and that firms have systems to put up walls and insulate information, which means everyone on a matter can get the counsel of their choice. On the bad side, a lot of client terms of engagement we’re seeing from large international corporations are pretty onerous.'”
• “When he talks about onerous, he’s talking about boilerplate that can be 40 pages long, ‘with conflicts expressed much more widely than under our law. They extend to every single entity that’s part of their empire; there can be 500 or more companies involved — which is a bit of a problem to put into your conflict system.'”
• “‘They provide that it can be a conflict for us to represent a party or take a stance in any proceeding that’s inconsistent with their business interests. When you consider that would cover all these 500 companies, how are we supposed to know what their current business interests would be in all those operations? We have no way of tracking that.'”
• “The model Norton Rose uses is not a GC, but five regional compliance offices with teams that oversee regional and global conflicts as well as other risk-management issues. In addition, the firm has a section that does nothing but look at the reputational risk of potential new clients.”

From the Legal Ethics and Malpractice group at Harris, Wiltshire & Grannis comes: “How Corporate Counsel Can Push Back on Outside Counsel Guidelines by Citing the Ethics Rules” —

• “In recent years, clients have begun to insist that their corporate counsel sign Outside Counsel Guidelines (“OCGs”) that restrict a lawyer from providing services to competitors of the client, even if the work is unrelated to the work being performed for the client and the lawyer has no confidential client information relevant to the work. Those OCGs have also begun to define the “client” as all subsidiaries, affiliates, or parent companies of the entity to which the lawyer’s services pertain. Both trends restrict a lawyer from representing a host of potential clients in the future. How can outside corporate counsel push back?”
• “The two trends cited above directly implicate ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct 5.6, 1.7 and 1.9.[1] By citing these Rules, and the restrictions they impose, corporate counsel may gain headway in negotiating more permissive OCGs.”
• “ABA Model Rule 5.6 (“Rule 5.6”) prohibits a lawyer from entering into any post-employment non-compete agreements with her law firm because they infringe on a client’s right to choose her lawyer and a lawyer’s professional autonomy… OCGs that prevent a lawyer from representing any client competitor—whether true adversity exists or not—do the very thing Rule 5.6 prohibits. While a traditional non-compete is imposed on the lawyer by her firm, OGCs are non-competes in disguise being imposed on the lawyer by her client. Importantly, both non-competes have the same effect: they limit a lawyer’s professional autonomy and limit the client’s ability to choose a lawyer.”
• “Similarly, OCGs that define the client to include all subsidiaries and affiliates of a company also implicate the Rules. ABA Model Rule 1.7, Comment 34 notes, ‘A lawyer who represents a corporation or other organization does not, by virtue of that representation, necessarily represent any constituent or affiliated organization, such as a parent or subsidiary… Thus, the lawyer for an organization is not barred from accepting representation adverse to an affiliate in an unrelated matter.’ Courts have held that the existence of an attorney-client relationship with one corporate affiliate does not create an attorney-client relationship with all corporate affiliates. “
• “Procedurally, consider implementing firm-wide rules that govern what terms your firm will accept in OCGs and having a designated management committee member negotiate all OCG terms. Having an established protocol for negotiating OCGs will reduce the need for the client relationship or billing partner to negotiate terms and potentially harm the relationship. In addition, make sure that a firm employee is keeping track of OCGs the firm agrees to in order to run additional as-needed conflict checks, e.g., agreeing to represent a company and its subsidiaries alters the firm’s conflict profile. That employee should also ensure compliance with Most Favored Nation (“MFN”) agreements with existing clients, because agreeing to certain terms in OCGs may require the firm to offer similar terms to current clients under existing MFNs.”

And, published last year by CNA, but just now crossing my desk, comes this article authored by two lawyers from the Professional Responsibility Group at Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz: “Fighting the Trojan Horse: Managing Outside Counsel Guidelines” —

• “If there is one thing keeping law firm general counsel awake at night, it is the myriad of outside counsel guidelines (OCGs) that may be floating around the firm… These OCGs differ from client to client, may be dozens or hundreds of pages in length and, as shown below, may incorporate requirements that the firm cannot meet.
• “Moreover, many firm lawyers treat the OCGs in a cavalier manner, neglecting either to read them or to send them to their firms general counsel. Even where the firm requires review and approval of OCGs as part of its client intake process, the firm may fail to keep track of the precise terms to which it has agreed with any specific client, or may fail to follow up to ensure that each OCG is followed.”
• “Moreover, the OCGs may contain terms or conditions that the law firm cannot satisfy, because those terms and conditions either exceed the firm’s resources or are inconsistent with ethical or other legal obligations.”
• “In this article, we will discuss five common issues that can arise with OCGs and what firms can do to address them”
• The article covers:
  • Expanded Conflicts Policies
  • Cyber Security Requirements
  • Billing Guidelines
  • Indemnity Provisions
  • Erecting the Dam: Controlling the Flow
• “OCGs can contain a number of risk management landmines for law firms. As outlined above, OCGs can significantly alter the power dynamic between the lawyer and client and may expose the firm to additional liability that may not be covered by the firms malpractice insurance. Law firms should, therefore, ensure that any OCGs are reviewed and approved in advance by the firm’s general counsel or management committee so that the firm can address any problematic provisions prior to the representation and also monitor what the firm has agreed to with a particular client. This strategy will help ensure a successful and constructive professional relationship.”

(Hat tip back to Karen Rubin for additional analysis, including a quote from Bill Frievogel, to further connect some of my best sources): “No DQ for company exec-turned-lawyer; “playbook” theory doesn’t play” —

• “The California court of appeals has denied a bid by an employment discrimination defendant to disqualify the plaintiff’s legal team. The name partner in the law firm representing the plaintiff was formerly the employer’s chief operating officer — but the court rejected the assertion that his firm should be disqualified merely based on his knowledge of the employer’s ‘playbook.'”
• “Based on Ritchie’s former role with the company, defendant O’Gara Coach moved to disqualify his firm, asserting that in his former role Ritchie was directly involved in policy-making, discussed strategy in pending employment claims with the company’s outside counsel, and was responsible for workplace policies when Wu’s claims arose.”
• “But under California law, said the appeals court, a law firm is not subject to disqualification merely because ‘one of its attorneys possesses information concerning an adversary’s general business practices or litigation philosophy acquired during the attorney’s previous relationship with the adversary.'”

“As ethics authority Bill Freivogel puts it at his always-useful Freivogel on Conflicts site, the issue in the playbook analysis is ‘when does a lawyer learn enough about the former client’s thought processes and procedures that the new representation may be deemed ‘substantially related’ to the former one,’ thus requiring disqualification under Model Rule 1.9(a) and its state counterparts.”

“Anesthesiology Company Wants Hospital Attys DQ’d” —

• “A Michigan-based anesthesia service has asked a federal court to disqualify attorneys representing a group of local hospitals in a dispute over an alleged violation of a noncompete clause, saying the law firm representing the hospitals advised the company on the business strategy at the heart of the suit.”
• “Anesthesia Associates of Ann Arbor, or A4, argued Friday that Honigman LLP advised the company in 2018 on whether a potential strategy for pursuing payment from third parties based on an implied contract would violate the terms of a noncompete agreement with Trinity Health Corporation.”
  “As a result, A4 argued, Honigman should not be allowed to represent Trinity in its suit over that same strategy, especially since the law firm worked for A4 for months before disclosing that it also represented Trinity.”
• “‘Honigman was engaged to and directly provided legal advice to A4 on the exact negotiation strategy that it now alleges is a material breach of A4’s agreements with Trinity, without first disclosing that the firm’s representation of A4 may be materially limited by its obligations to Trinity,’ the motion said.”
• “In a motion to disqualify filed Friday, however, A4 said that during the process of reevaluating its relationship with Aetna and Blue Cross, Honigman advised the company on a potential “implied in fact” contract strategy that would allow A4 to collect balances directly from third-party payors without having to bill patients. Honigman began advising on this strategy in May 2018, according to the motion. In August 2018, however, the law firm told A4 for the first time that it also represented Trinity. Afterward, A4 decided to part ways with Honigman, according to the motion.”

The story continues to unfold on the Dershowitz disqualification and defamation matter: “Dershowitz’ Lawyers Say Epstein Accuser’s Boies Schiller Lawyers Should Be Disqualified in Defamation Case” —

• “Attorneys for Alan Dershowitz argued Tuesday in a federal court hearing that Boies Schiller & Flexner lawyers representing a Jeffrey Epstein accuser should be disqualified from her defamation case against the retired Harvard law professor. The disqualification claim rested on communications Dershowitz had with a Boies Schiller partner in that firm’s Florida office in 2015.”
• “According to court filings, Boies Schiller partner Carlos Sires sent Dershowitz an unsolicited email to express his support following an appearance on the NBC ‘Today’ program, and, as the two continued to exchange emails, Sires said that he and his firm would be interested in joining Dershowitz’ legal team.”
• “It wasn’t until after Dershowitz forwarded Sires a memo allegedly outlining his litigation strategy that he learned Boies Schiller was representing Virginia Roberts Giuffre, the plaintiff who is suing him in the defamation case.”
• “Boies Schiller said it had implemented strict screening procedures to avoid conflicts and maintains that the document was never shared with any attorneys on Giuffre’s legal team.”
• “Giuffre, who has alleged in court papers that she was recruited as a minor into the deceased financier’s underage sex ring and then trafficked to Dershowitz and other powerful men, said in the suit that Dershowitz has falsely painted her as a ‘serial perjurer’ in an attempt to damage her reputation and credibility. Dershowitz, who represented Epstein when the late financier was the subject of a criminal investigation a decade ago, has adamantly denied all allegations of improper contact with Giuffre and says he had a First Amendment right to defend himself against her allegations.”

And, more recently: “Alan Dershowitz hopes surreptitiously recorded call will lift cloud of Epstein allegations” —

• “A New York federal judge has ordered an outside expert to analyze a tape recording that has the potential to disqualify David Boies’ law firm from representing a woman accusing Alan Dershowitz of sexual abuse, marking a new development in the ongoing fight between two of America’s top attorneys.”
  “Dershowitz, the Harvard law professor who represented Jeffrey Epstein, recorded a phone conversation between himself and Boies, the famed attorney whose clients have ranged from Al Gore in Bush v. Gore to Harvey Weinstein.”
• “Dershowitz, who transcribed the audio himself, says the recording captures Boies casting doubt on the claims of his firm’s client, Virginia Roberts Giuffre. Giuffre, a victim of Epstein, said she was directed by Epstein to have sex with Dershowitz. Dershowitz has repeatedly denied this claim, saying he never even met Giuffre.”
• “If it is determined that the recording was captured legally meaning that it was recorded in a state that allows the party to a phone call to record the opposite party without that person’s consent and if the recording says what Dershowitz purports it to, the Boies firm’s ability to represent Giuffre could be undermined. Boies would be a potential witness, perhaps disqualifying his firm from handling the case.”
• “It is quite uncommon, although not always illegal, for lawyers to record other lawyers without their consent, according to Stephen Gillers, an ethics professor at the NYU School of Law. (Gillers was speaking generally and not in relation to Boies, Dershowitz or the case at hand.)”
• “For calls in which the recorder is abiding by state law, the American Bar Association has taken the stance that it is not unethical for a lawyer to record calls with those who have not consented, as long as the lawyer does not falsely state or imply that the call is not being recorded, according to Gillers.”

A timely update from Karen Rubin, considering yesterday’s story about the judge disqualified for online “likes.” Today’s question is about the ‘friend click’ before the like: “ABA opinion on judges and recusal based on personal relationships leaves some open questions” —

• “Can we be Facebook friends? That’s one question left open by the ABA earlier this month in Formal Opinion 488, on the subject of judges’ personal relationships with lawyers as grounds for disqualification. While spotlighting judicial ethics duties in maintaining impartiality, the opinion fails to provide some needed guidance on social media relationships.”
• “In Opinion 488, the ABA Ethics Committee advises on situations that fall outside the bounds of Rule 2.11(A)(2); that is, where judges may have “social or close personal relationships with the lawyers or parties” but not as a spouse, domestic partner or other family member. The Committee identifies three categories of such relationships between judges and lawyers: acquaintanceships; friendships; and close personal relationships.”
• “‘Friendship’ implies a greater degree of affinity, according to the opinion. Friends may be casual (periodically meeting for a meal, staying in touch through calls or correspondence) or closer (routinely spending time together, vacationing together, sharing a mentor-protegee relationship developed while colleagues). Not all friendships require disqualification, but there may be situations ‘in which the judge’s friendship with a lawyer or party is so tight’ that there might be reasonable questions about the judge’s impartiality. It’s a matter of degree, the Committee advised.”
• “Opinions in Ohio and New York, for instance, suggest that a social media friendship with a lawyer is not a per se basis for judicial disqualification. Opinions in some other jurisdictions are more restrictive, and bar judges from being Facebook friends with lawyers who are currently appearing before them (California) or even may appear before them (Massachusetts). Late last year, the Florida Supreme Court ruled in a divided opinion that there is no basis to single out social media “friendships” between judges and lawyers for a per se rule of judicial disqualification.”
• “But earlier this year, a Wisconsin court of appeals rejected a per se rule while still holding in a child custody case that accepting a Facebook “friend” request from a party with a motion pending creates an appearance of impropriety and warrants judicial disqualification.”

The full article has links to various decisions and commentaries, and is worth a detailed read for those curious.

“Atty Slams Bid To Remove Judge From BP Oil Spill MDL” —

• “A Louisiana federal court should deny a Florida attorney’s motion for a judge to recuse himself from sprawling multidistrict litigation over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill as the alleged conflicts are minimal at best, irrelevant to present matters and have since been mitigated, a Louisiana lawyer has argued.”
• “U.S. District Judge Carl J. Barbier should not bow out from the litigation involving BP and the 2010 spill because he previously owned debt instruments for Halliburton and Transocean, as the judge divested himself of the assets back in June 2010, owning the assets didn’t amount to a conflict under legal precedent, and attorney Brian J. Donovan fails to establish that they have led to conflicts, according to Tuesday’s memorandum by Stephen Herman.”
• “‘Donovan [does not] point to any ‘extrajudicial’ sources to support his claims of alleged ‘deep-seated favoritism or antagonism’ that would supposedly make it impossible for the court to be fair and impartial in the Donovan cases,’ the brief reads. ‘There is absolutely no basis for recusal simply because, over the past nine years, the court has issued a handful of orders with which Donovan apparently disagrees.'”

“NY Judge Knocks Hedge Fund For Flimsy DQ Bid” —

• “A New York federal judge on Friday agreed to sanction hedge fund Weston Capital Advisors Inc. for an “objectively unreasonable” bid to get him to step away from overseeing a long-running fight over millions owed to an Indonesian bank. Calling the disqualification motion “another chapter” in the company’s history of defiance, U.S. District Judge Paul A. Crotty refused to recuse himself and granted a fee-and-costs sanction to Bank Mutiara.”
• “Weston Capital has also tried to “walk back” its argument that the court was biased due to the judge’s connection to the firm’s former law firm — Judge Crotty’s brother Robert is a litigation partner at Kelley Drye & Warren LLP — thus further undercutting its argument it had suffered from related bias from the bench. “Kelley Drye ceased representing Weston in this action over four years ago and the court disclosed its relationship with Kelley Drye over five years ago. Weston raised no objections,” Judge Crotty said. ‘Accordingly, since no objective person would reasonably question the court’s impartiality under these circumstances … there is no basis for disqualification.'”

“Opioid plaintiffs fight bid to disqualify U.S. judge before trial” —

• “Lawyers for cities and counties suing drug companies over the opioid epidemic on Monday objected to a bid by pharmaceutical distributors and pharmacies to disqualify the federal judge overseeing the cases, saying it had no basis and came too late.”
• “The companies had argued in Saturday’s motion that Polster, who has long pushed for a settlement that could ‘do something meaningful to abate this crisis,’ had made a series of public statements since 2018 that could cause a reasonable person to question his impartiality.”
• “In Monday’s brief, lawyers for the plaintiffs said the defendants had waived their ability to seek Polster’s recusal, noting they were relying on statements he made more than a year ago to belatedly seek his disqualification. ‘If these Defendants really thought recusal was necessary, they were required to raise the issue sooner – much sooner,’ the plaintiffs’ lawyers wrote.”

“Facebook ‘Like’ of Campaign Post Gets Judge Disqualified” —

• “A Kentucky judge was disqualified from a case involving the state’s governor and his re-election challenger over his ‘like’ of a Facebook post seen as a political endorsement.J udge Phillip Shepherd was removed from a case between Republican Gov. Matt Bevin and his Democratic opponent, state Attorney General Andy Beshear, for ‘liking’ a post discussing Beshear’s campaign.”
• “The Sept. 27 ruling from Kentucky Supreme Court Chief Justice John Minton Jr. found Shepherd should have disqualified himself because his impartiality ‘might reasonably be questioned.'”
• “‘The body of law addressing judges’ use of social media is still developing nationally. But recent opinions emphasize that ‘[t]he code of judicial conduct’s restrictions on judges’ off-bench activities apply equally on social media as in other contexts,’ Minton said in his order.”
  “Shepherd had defended his impartiality by pointing out his bipartisan social-media habits: he also ‘liked’ posts supportive of Bevin’s campaign and other Democratic and Republican candidates. But Minton said two “likes” don’t make a right. “In fact,” he wrote, ‘those ‘likes’ constitute additional violations of Rule 4.1(A)(3),’ the rule against judges publicly endorsing a candidate for any public office.”

Nice analysis from two lawyers from the Professional Liability Practice Group of Pullman & Comley: “The Dangers of Resolving Client Conflicts by ‘Dropping the Hot Potato’” —

• “A 2018 decision by the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts highlights a risk faced by law firms tempted by the prospect of business from a new client whose interests are, or may be, adverse to those of an existing firm client. Altova GMBH v. Syncro Soft SRL, 320 F.Supp. F.3d 314 (D. Mass. 2018).”
• “Faced with the opportunity to represent its existing client (Altova) in a new patent dispute against another client (Syncro), the firm was faced with an obvious conflict of interest. It attempted to solve its dilemma as follows: within a few weeks of being contacted by Altova for representation in the patent dispute, the firm wrote to Syncro terminating its relationship with Syncro. The firm described the reason for the termination as “potential conflicts in relation to other clients’ work that [the firm] would like to undertake and that those other clients would like [the firm] to undertake.” 320 F.Supp. 3d at 318. In its letter the Sunstein firm did not identify Altova as one of the “other clients” at issue, let alone ask for Syncro’s consent for the firm to represent Altova in the anticipated patent litigation against Syncro.”
• “The court slapped down the notion that such a gambit necessarily will convert the dropped client into a “former” client for purposes of conflicts analysis. When a client falls into the category of a “former” client, the law firm’s conflict of interest obligations are governed by the more lenient standards of Rule 1.9 of the Rules of Professional Conduct, rather than the more stringent conflict of interest requirements applicable to a “current” client under Rule 1.7. But given that the Sunstein firm dropped Syncro within mere weeks of being asked to represent Altova against Syncro, the court readily found that Syncro plainly was a “current client” at the time Altova first approached the firm about suing Syncro.”
• “While a law firm might be entitled to drop one client in favor of another unrelated client when the two clients become embroiled in a dispute that was “unpredictable,” the Sunstein firm had been performing ongoing work for Altova, including having previously sent Syncro a cease and desist letter relating to an alleged copyright infringement involving the same property at issue in the patent dispute. The court found in light of these facts, the 2017 patent “altercation was foreseeable.” Id. at 321.”
• “As a general rule, courts will not countenance a law firm’s attempt to avoid disqualification in a dispute between two current clients by the firm terminating its representation of the client it deems, for whatever reason, less desirable. The authors of Rule 1.7 command that “a lawyer must not accept a second client if the directly adverse conflict is known in advance and [therefore] must withdraw if the conflict is discovered after the concurrent representation has” begun. Hazard, Hodes & Jarvis, The Law of Lawyering §12.03 (4th ed. 2019).”

“Boeing Seeks DQ After Assistant Switches Sides In ADA Suit” —

• “Boeing has asked an Oregon federal court to disqualify a law firm handling a disability discrimination suit against the company, saying that it had hired a legal assistant who previously worked on the case while employed by Boeing’s attorneys at Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart PC.”
• “The Boeing Co. told the court on Friday that it had tried to ensure that The Law Offices of Daniel Snyder properly screened legal assistant Sarah Churchill off from the suit, but Snyder had resisted putting a screen in place and violated the screen just three weeks after agreeing to it.”
• “…Churchill worked on the case while employed as an assistant for Ogletree attorney James M. Barrett, who is still one of the attorneys of record for Boeing. During that time, Churchill sent or received almost 300 emails related to the case, including emails that contained legal advice on the company’s affirmative defenses, objections to depositions and other discovery, discussions of work product, and other issues, according to the motion. She left the firm in February, the motion said.”
• “The motion portrays Snyder as being resistant to formally agreeing to the screen, but he did agree to the requested screening procedures in June, according to the motion. Just three weeks later, however, he copied Churchill on an email about the case, the motion said.”