Best Law School for Criminal Law??? Forum

[270910]

I wonder if there really is such a thing as a "prestigious white-collar firm"?

http://www.wc.com/

Clients include such (accused) criminals as former United States President Bill Clinton and Senator Ted Stevens. Notable alums include Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan.

[vamedic03]

Interesting comment. I wonder if there really is such a thing as a "prestigious white-collar firm"? Big, and even medium sized commercial firms don't usually do criminal defense. They usually farm out their clients' kids' brushes with the law. There are a couple of reasons for this; you really don't want your commerical bankster clients waltzing through a waiting room filled with gold-chained cocaine dealers and pimps. Bad for business. Second, if you aren't doing criminal defense regularly, you probably aren't competent to handle anything beyond a non-DUI traffic citation. If your corporate clients find themselves facing really serious stuff like environmental crimes or anti-trust accusations, you shouldn't handle that, either, because there's a good chance you will be charged as well or at least be subpoena'd to testify. You need some distance. Even if you aren't implicated, there will be conflicts of interest all over the landscape between the corporate officers themselves and with the corporation...that sort of thing.

Out here, the federal PD and AUSA hire without much regard to one's law school. Again, though, class rank matters a lot. Top third minimum. I have no idea, of course, how it is elsewhere in the country.

Um... what the heck are you talking about?

1) There are a lot of major white collar practices - Williams & Connolly focuses heavily on this, and many other firms have large practices in that area - Skadden, Covington, Debevoise, WilmerHale

2) There are a lot of major Anti-Trust practices out there - Arnold & Porter, Cleary, etc. etc.

3) Exactly how are you going to be subpoena'd as a company's attorney to testify? You think the client is just going to waive privilege?

[BeautifulSW]

Well, if you say so. But attorney/client privilege is an interesting beast. You might discover that the client isn't who you, or he/she/it thinks it is.

[BeautifulSW]

Hm. Yes, you ARE right. I stand corrected and suitably embarrased. But how DO they do this, I wonder? What do they do when there's a clear conflict between the corporation, say, and the CEO that hired them?

[clintonius]

Hm. Yes, you ARE right. I stand corrected and suitably embarrased. But how DO they do this, I wonder? What do they do when there's a clear conflict between the corporation, say, and the CEO that hired them?

Isn't that kind of the point, though? If you're hired by the CEO, you defend the CEO. I guess I don't see the difficulty (honestly not trying to be snarky -- if there's an issue I am missing I'd like to learn, because I find the topic interesting).

Now, if you mean that it might be difficult for the firm to maintain a relationship with that corporation after defending the CEO against an action brought by the corporation, I suppose that's valid. I'm under the impression that it's not super unusual for that to happen, but that's just a vague impression and not based on anything solid. If it is indeed a problem, I'd guess that it's a bigger problem for the larger, full-service firms than for a place like W&C.

[BeautifulSW]

Well...the problem as I see it is that the corporation's interests could easily be adverse to the interests of the CEO.

[vamedic03]

Well, if you say so. But attorney/client privilege is an interesting beast. You might discover that the client isn't who you, or he/she/it thinks it is.

I can guarantee you that the law firm is more than well aware of who its client is. This is part of the basics of evidence/privilege.

[vamedic03]

Well...the problem as I see it is that the corporation's interests could easily be adverse to the interests of the CEO.

You're way over simplifying the way that big law works. Many companies hire multiple firms for different matters and boards will hire separate firms to advise them when necessary.

Many large law firms have white collar practices. Certain practices are where you go when you get into deep shit. These practices makes lots of money for firms. They are able to handle their conflict issues - which may mean that they don't represent a given company on certain matters.

However, there are thriving anti-trust and white collar/government investigation practices in most of the top law firms.