Lawyer David Boies has made a career going after corporate abuses of power (see, e.g., his service as a special counsel for the Justice Department's suit against Microsoft and his role in the Tyco litigation). Tom Kirkendall has the scoop on some apparent questionable conflicts of interest on Boies' part. The Law Blog also has some additional details.
Securities lawyer Mel Lifshitz is under investigation for, essentially, owning his own plaintiff:
Since 2003, a charitable trust funded and administered by Lifshitz's family has donated money to various causes, most of them orthodox Jewish organizations. Another recipient of the charity's money, however, has been a limited partnership that was a plaintiff in more than a dozen class-action lawsuits filed by Lifshitz's firm over the past four years, a review of documents shows. ... Moreover, in five filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Lifshitz is listed as a "beneficial owner" of the Colbart Birnet partnership -- a circumstance Lifshitz says is plain wrong and attributes to "human error."
If true, Lifshitz would seem to have discovered that you don't need to chase ambulances if you own the ambulance company.
