Another high profile lawyer-criminal-defendant represented by John Keker (who was the leader of Scruggs’s legal team) was plaintiff’s lawyer William Lerach. Keker negotiated a plea under which Lerach was sentenced to 24 months. The California blog Legal Pad sought Keker’s comment when Lerach got in trouble in prison for offering football tickets to a guard. Legal Pad speculates that there’s been a falling out between Keker and Lerach.
The alliance between the now-deposed king of class actions and the baron of the white collar bar is broken.
We’d been curious for months why San Francisco defense attorney John Keker wouldn’t return our calls when his client, plaintiff lawyer William Lerach, got in trouble for offering football tickets to a prison guard. Turns out the two legal titans parted ways. Among the reasons: Lerach was upset that he didn’t get into the Bureau of Prison’s residential substance abuse treatment program, according to two sources familiar with the situation. Lerach subsequently retained a San Diego white collar lawyer to represent him.
The substance abuse program is seen by some corporate convicts as a ticket to early release, according to a recent Forbes piece. Keker supplied four letters from Lerach’s doctors attesting to Lerach’s alcohol problem. Even so, the program wouldn’t have helped Lerach: according to Bureau of Prisons policy, an inmate must face at least 28 months to be eligible.
Keker steered Lerach through the lengthy federal investigation into kickbacks at Lerach’s former firm, Milberg Weiss. And Keker negotiated a deal that was widely seen as favorable for the plaintiff lawyer: Lerach pled guilty before getting indicted. He agreed to a maximum 24 months in prison. After some seething, Central District Judge John Walter approved the deal and sentenced Lerach to the two years, to be served in a minimum security prison camp. By way of comparison, Lerach’s cohort Melvin Weiss got 30 months after his indictment.
Just a few weeks after Lerach turned himself in at Lompoc, Keker filed a motion asking that the judge recommend him for the treatment program. Requests for a substance abuse recommendation are usually made at sentencing.
h/t Overlawyered.
Boy, Lerach sounds like one knucklehead for Keker to be glad to be shut of.
lotus, is it “be shut of” or “be shet of”? (short e, as in egg)
I never knew whether “be shet of” that I heard growing up was colloquial for “be shut of” or “be shed of.”
Nomiss: it’s “shed” … as in, “I’ll sure be glad to be shed of George Bush as president.”
Hmm. Now you’ve got me wondering. I’ve heard both “shut of” and “shed of.” Gotta look it up. Anyhoo, gonna be mighty fine to be sh__ of them as shat on us.
From BrainyQuote.com:
“Rid; clear; free; as, to get shut of a person.”
BUT
“Your search – “shed of” – did not match any documents.”
Keker is quite highly regarded, and one question is whether Lerach had unrealistic expectations of what he could achieve. Given his published writings, it seems possible Lerach feels that he deserves to be not only freed but acclaimed as the next marshal of the Rose Bowl Parade. In that case, he’s likely to get mad at any conceivable defense team for falling short.
I would say the bribing-with-tickets things suggests that Lerach has really not got the message, Walter.
Also: I saw Keker in court. He deserves to be highly regarded, at least on the strength of his performance in the motions hearings in the first Scruggs case. It was very clear from the beginning what his goals where in the hearing, and everything he did was about achieving those goals– which were about moving his client’s case to the best possible next position. The public relations game had gone a little bumpily before the hearings, but when lawyering counted in the hearings, I was really impressed.
One thing that crossed my mind reading about Lerach: There’s little question from having watched the drama of the Scruggs pleas that there were similar out-of-reality expectations by Scruggs, both father and son. They were offered really great deals and turned them down.
So are they similarly displeased, sitting in jail? Who will Dickie Scruggs hire in round 2, if/when it occurs?
I would say if it’s not Keker, that’s substantial evidence that they’ve had a falling-into-disenchantment similarly wrongheaded as the one Lerach had.