Story here. When the commodity brokerage Refco crashed, the bankruptcy trustee suggested that Refco's lawyers, at Mayer Brown, might be civilly liable for Refco's participation in questionable transactions. A large investor in Refco has now sued Mayer Brown for $245 million, alleging fraud and RICO violations. The firm has hired the redoubtable John Villa of Williams & Connolly. Villa quite capably defended Vinson & Elkins in at least two post-Enron-crash suits: the claim by the company itself and the class action suit. Remarkably, the American Lawyer Media article suggests that Weil, Gotshal & Manges is representing the investor. Normally, we don't see large firms taking on that kind of work.
I haven't had a chance to read the complaint yet. Do any of you readers know where it can be found? While there has been much broad policy discussion of whether the corporate lawyer should be the client's "gatekeeper," as a practical matter the issue is driven by the legal analysis by which corporate firms are, or are not, held liable after the client goes belly-up. That analysis turns on a number of technical arguments that I won't be able to discuss until I see how the complaint frames the issues.