New York State Bar Association Opinion 911 recently concluded:
"A New York lawyer may not practice law principally in New York as an employee of an out-of-state entity that has non-lawyer owners or managers."
Although a strict reading of New York Rule 5.4 (the same as elsewhere) may compel this conclusion, the result shows the lack of coherence in how we regulate lawyers today. My imaginary conversation between a law teacher and student is at the following URL which also links to the opinion and a forthcoming article on the subject:
http://www.newyorklawjournal.com/PubArticleNY.jsp?id=1202546914719