Who knows what happened at the once 1,300-lawyer firm? Well, post-2008, the law firm was not doing as well as it would have liked. Revenue was not what it needed to be, particularly if the firm was to meet the revenue requirements under its loan covenants. So, the powers that were at the firm found a young collections employee to allegedly participate in a multiyear scheme to cook the books. The firm collapsed anyway. Three Dewey partners and the young man, who was not a lawyer at the time, were charged with multiple felony counts, some of which included grand larceny.
The three partners, after an arduous trial, had a jury deadlock. That left the young man standing alone to face his trial. He will not be going to trial because he entered into a deferred prosecution agreement this week — 350 hours of community service. The chairman/partner of the collapsed firm also has a five-year deferred prosecution agreement, but he cannot practice law during that time. The other two partners have rejected plea deals that would have required a guilty plea to at least one felony charge and jail time for one of them. Back to a jury trial for them.
The Barometer suspects that the young man may have offered some insights for the prosecutors on the new trial. He escapes all charges if he stays out of trouble for one year. The Barometer knows that there will be no trouble from this young man during his one year. His head was turned by powerful law partners who persuaded him to do some things that were just plain wrong. The jury is still out, as it were, on whether they were criminal. This young man, who did not have an accounting course to his name, should not have been dabbling in revenue adjustments. Regardless of what the law partners did or did not do, one thing is certain. They should be ashamed of roping him into the revenue inflation plans. The Barometer wishes this young man well following a big mistake that cost him headlines and a headline-filled postponement for his legal career.