Is something fishy about yet another USA's departure?

[Rose Siding]

...(F)ormer US attorney in Los Angeles Debra Wong Yang, who says she departed the US attorney job of her own volition, and who until recently headed the office in charge of the investigation of former House appropriations committee chairman Jerry Lewis (R-Ca), reportedly got a $1.5 million offer to join the firm representing Lewis. Reports the American Lawyer:

Debra Wong Yang, 47, the Los Angeles U.S. attorney and a member of the president's corporate fraud task force, got north of $1.5 million to join Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher a few weeks later, according to two recruiters.

The reader who sent this along, an attorney, writes, "No law firm I know ever paid any lateral partner any money up front to join their firm - especially one coming from the public sector with no clients. As a Gibson, Dunn partner, she could earn that much money, but the industry rule is no money up front." Anyone else have any perspective on that? According to this report, Yang now "co-chair(s) Gibson Dunn’s National Crisis Management Practice Group along with Washington, D.C. partner Theodore B. Olson, a former U.S. solicitor general, and New York partner Randy Mastro, who served as New York’s deputy mayor of operations under Rudy Giuliani. She is also expected to play a central role in the Business Crimes and Investigations Practice Group, the firm said." Olson of course was the Bush administration's solicitor general. Yang's colleague at the LA US attorney's office, assistant US attorney Douglas Fuchs, has also reportedly joined her at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/005815.html

I share Ms Rozen's curiosity: "Anyone else have any perspective on that?" -Because on its face, that cool one point five mil looks a teeny bit like a potential bribe to a potential prosecutor laundered through the law firm of a potential defendant.

Background links are embedded in Laura's post.

[rubberducky]

1. K&R

[Divernan]

39. Supreme Court law clerks get $200,000 signing bonuses.

Just last week this Wall Street Journal article discussed "phat" signing bonuses for USSC clerks.
I believe that lawyers who clerk for federal district and appeals courts get about $15,000 signing bonuses. The new hires also get credit for the years spent clerking as if they had been with the law firm for that amount of time, in terms of their base salaries.

I have repeatedly pointed out in my posts on DU that any Bush appointee, or lower civil servant who takes the fall/voluntarily "resigns" and is then assigned blame/responsibility for a Bush admin. screwup, is bribed into so doing by private sector jobs with lobbying/law firms, at many times their govt. salaries AND with (I believe I used these words) fat signing bonuses.

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2007/03/12/that-phat-200000-supreme-court-law-clerk-bonus/

Posted by Peter Lattman
Corporate law firms pay Supreme Court law clerks $200,000 signing bonuses. That’s on top of a first-year’s starting salary of $145,000 to $160,000. “Which adds up to an awful lot of Pottery Barn sectional furniture for someone who is, on average, 26 years old and just two years out of school,” writes Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick in an essay that’s critical of the big bonuses thrown at these trophy hires.

Walter Dellinger, head of the appellate practice at O’Melveny, tells Lithwick that while not all of his best associates were Supreme Court clerks, “there’s a very strong overlap with extraordinary talent.” He adds: “One of the least appreciated things in the practice of law, is lawyering that rates even above truly excellent lawyering.” Sidley’s Carter Phillips confesses that he came up with the idea of law-clerk bonuses back in the 80s. “I’ll take the heat for creating this system,” he says. “But I was never the market leader for driving it up.”

Maybe there’s nothing wrong here, suggests Lithwick. After all, it’s a free market. And the bonuses could be used to pay off loans and then give lawyers the freedom to go into teaching or public service, she says.

But noting that a first-year associate who clerked on the Supreme Court will earn more than their former boss, “it’s hard to dispute the justices’ claim that the opportunity cost of staying on the bench has become almost impossible to ignore.” She quotes Justice Kennedy’s testimony before the Senate last month: “Something is wrong when a judge’s law clerk, just one or two years out of law school, has a salary greater than that of the judge or justice he or she served the year before.”

[Sydnie]

2. Holy shit

that has a stench to it that you can't cover with any air freshener known to man.

Sending this off to Keith right now.

[frogcycle]

4. don't forget:

money trumps peace

and patriotism
and honesty
and evidently every damned thing

[Sydnie]

9. I will NEVER forget it

http://www.cafepress.com/dts

[Blackhatjack]

3. Sounds like Ms. Yang needs a special subpoena to testify before Congress...

... and explain what was negotiated with her new law firm in arriving at a $1.5 million signing bonus up front for her future services.

[Raven]

5. A signing bonus???? I thought that was baseball.

I've been retired from law practice for 4 years now and I practiced in Boston which is a far cry from LA but, I never heard of or saw this. There is usually stiff competition for good, experienced laterals but not with signing bonuses. Doing that would upset the very delicate compensation balance at most large firms which are full of very large egos!

[napi21]

8. Raven, isn't that a conflict of interest for her to be working as a

prosecutor on a high profile case and aware of all the inside info they have on Lewis, only to quit and JOIN his defense????? I didn't think ethics would allow something like that?

[Raven]

13. Well, in many states there are laws

that provide a waiting period before a former public employee can be involved in a matter that he or she had involvement in while in the public sector. Sometimes, depending on the specific facts, a former public employee can never become involved. I don't know what rules CA has on this but it certainly does smell.

[Blackhatjack]

11. The joining of the target's firm is more impt than the amount of money paid

... there is an 'imaginary wall' between the new hire and the target's defense attorney, in that she cannot participate in his defense formally, but you know there could be a 'sharing of expertise' within the firm that roughly equates to telling the defense exactly what the US Attorney has dug us so far.

An ethical violation, but who is going to report her? Certainly not the firm that paid her $1.5 million to come on board.

[Sydnie]

14. Obstruction of justice for this attorney might be in order

but we know that the blivet** people would never bring those charges. Someone out there in CA will have to challenge her on the bar level maybe?

[Raven]

15. It's an imaginary wall alright! It's

called a "Chinese Wall" and it's a fiction.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

6. there's something wong and unseemly here - a bribe could not be any clearer

the idea of a sign up bonus for someone with no client base is unbelievable. That's crazy, immoral, and probably illegal.

[formercia]

7. The golden revolving door

I smell a rat.

Making problems go away, $1.5 Mil at a time.

[live love laugh]

10. So now they will buy them out instead of force them out. n/t

[Sydnie]

12. And, if they happen to have all the info from the other side

it's money well spent as far as they are concerned. She might never need to ever bring any client to that firm to have power in that firm, know what I mean?

[live love laugh]

16. Yes I do know what you mean. However, if the offers multiply, then

the offerors should become the target of obstruction of justice investigations.

[robinlynne]

27. multiply? one is plenty.

[KittyWampus]

17. What should we do with this information? Call Waxman's office?

[Raven]

24. Very good point!

Call or email the article.

[glitch]

18. Reeks. nt

[global1]

19. I Wonder How David Kelley & Boston Legal Will Treat This One.....nt

[Blackhatjack]

20. Let's see, would Jerry Lewis pay $1.5 mil to know what the US Atty had on him? hmmm....

Sounds like a bargain. He could skim that amount in one weekend from those who want to keep Jerry and the corruption train rolling in Congress.

[Frustratedlady]

21. PU! I wonder how many other "firings or resignations" have had compensation?

It will be interesting to see if the others come forward to ask where their checks are. After all, the Repug war chest was pretty rich, the last I heard.

This administration is so busy covering its ass, it is forgetting to pull the curtains. It only takes one instance to be uncovered to bring suspicion on other events. God knows we have plenty to choose from.

This administration's acts couldn't even be duplicated on stage...they are so bizarre.

[peacetalksforall]

22. I'm sure the right wing caretakers of the DeLay and Abramoff team criminals

crims would NOT want this publicly known. So, you know what to do. BLAST IT! Damage their Damage Control Forces. I can see it now - 'one or both of them' appearing on one or many of the corporate entertaining news shows defending themselves - PRECEDED by a team of Victoria Toensing like lawyers telling us that there is nothing unusual here.

[peacetalksforall]

23. And they will surely work into the dead of night trying to find a

parallel move by a Clinton person. Some US Atty that he assigned - doing the same thing.

[Rose Siding]

25. Grabbed this bit on Lewis from Novakula this morning-

The gop leadership put him in the position of steering their caucus on the Iraq bill-

Passive Republicans
Reform Republican House members, expecting rousing pep talks in preparation for debate on the supplemental appropriations bill funding the war in Iraq, were disappointed about how passive their leaders were at Tuesday's closed-door party conference.
Minority Leader John Boehner and Minority Whip Roy Blunt did not exert much energy in pressing for defeat of the money bill....

Surprisingly, a sterling call to action at the conference was issued by Rep. Jerry Lewis, ranking Republican member of the House Appropriations Committee. Normally known for deal-making with Democratic appropriators rather than partisan combat, Lewis called for Republicans to vote against the supplemental bill.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/novak/301289,CST-EDT-novak18.article

Looks to me like they're shoring up Lewis' partisan creds. Being of a suspicious nature, I'm wondering what their motives for that might be. Could Lewis still be in a legally precarious position, so insulation for him is sought? Or does his future look bright enough to elevate his profile amongst the ranks?

[loudsue]

37. Good question!

:freak: Methinks a (Waxman, Conyers, somebody?) investigating committee might want to find the answer to that.

:kick:

[seafan]

26. There was yet another resignation in Florida last Tuesday of a US Attorney.

Forgive me for going off topic, Rose Siding, but this thread is a good place for this information, since we are watching the whole US Attorney scandal very closely.

(Florida) US Attorney Paul Perez resigned this past week to go to Fidelity National Financial, Inc.


U.S. Attorney Perez resigns

By JIM SCHOETTLER, The Times-Union
Wednesday, March 14, 2007

U.S. Attorney Paul Perez, an Atlantic Beach lawyer who led federal prosecutions in Jacksonville and 34 other counties since 2002, resigned Tuesday to take a top job with Fidelity National Financial Inc.
Perez, 52, said his resignation had nothing to do with a series of firings of U.S. attorneys that has led to congressional investigations and criticism of the Bush administration. The president appoints the country's 93 U.S. attorneys, eight of whom have been fired in the past two years for reasons including alleged performance issues.

"I'm leaving on my own terms because I got a job offer I couldn't pass up," said Perez, whose resignation is effective March 30.
He sent letters to President Bush and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Tuesday about his intentions and said he had a cordial phone talk with Gonzales Tuesday afternoon.

Perez will become chief compliance officer for Fidelity, a 17,000-employee title insurance powerhouse headquartered in Jacksonville. His job includes ensuring the Fortune 500 company follows federal and state statutes.
Perez said the job pays "considerably more" than his current $143,000 annual salary and allows him to remain in the Jacksonville area with his wife and three children. Perez declined to give his new salary. He said he was first contacted by Fidelity in August.
Fidelity General Counsel Peter Sadowski said Perez's legal background and management abilities were among his many selling points. Perez oversees 100 prosecutors in Florida's Middle District, which stretches from Jacksonville to Naples.

.....

Perez said he will recommend that his second-in-command, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Klindt, become the interim U.S. attorney until the job can be filled permanently.

Perez inherited an office tainted by accusations of prosecutorial misconduct, allegations that were not repeated during his watch. The job wasn't without controversy, such as when Perez pushed for the prosecution of a University of South Florida professor accused of funneling money to Middle East terrorists. The professor, Sami Al-Airan, was acquitted of some charges but eventually entered into a plea bargain that led to a 57-month prison sentence.

Perez said he was most pleased with his office's progress in areas such as post-9/11 information sharing among law enforcement agencies and prosecutions in human trafficking and gun crimes.

.....

Very interesting timing with this one.

[annabanana]

28. great big honkin' k & r. . . .n/t

[HCE SuiGeneris]

29. Back up the dumpster trucks...

we gonna have us a convoy!

High ho, high ho, it's off to jail we go...

[il_lilac]

30. k&r

too much here to be a coincidence. Time to dig deeper into this story. Thanks!

[Straight Shooter]

31. UNETHICAL.

All caps because of the gravity of the situation. Probably illegal, too.

I hope Ms. Wong Yang enjoys her law license while she has it, because I think a whole big forkin' can of worms has just been opened.

[cascadiance]

32. Carol Lam's offer by Qualcomm might also be something to look at...

Brent Scowcroft sits on the board of Qualcomm (you know, Mr. AIPAC and Mr. ATC that's under investigation too!), and that nice offer she got was well timed to not allow her to come back to work under contract for the local Attorney's office here as some Dems asked to allow her to do to follow up on the investigations she was working on.

Perhaps we should look at the connections of other prosecutors too and where they wound up.

I don't think this necessarily speaks badly for the prosecutors themselves. In their shoes, you might also take a nice big paycheck if someone offered it to you in a timely fashion without knowing the true agenda was to permanently shove you aside from the U.S. Attorney position for someone more partisan than you. But it does sound pretty suspicious in both of these cases, and you have to wonder if it has been happening in others as well (or at least some of them received "offers" on their way out from suspicious outfits too).

[Luminous Animal]

33. Emailed TPM Muckraker...

They've taken the lead on this story from the beginning.

http://tpmmuckraker.com/

[jimshoes]

34. Great big K & R for you tireless

crusaders for truth out there. It's only a matter of time before the bad ship *co finally sinks.

[ooglymoogly]

35. And here once again T8d Ols0n 's caniving ugly head pops up.

The Forrest Gump of GOP black ops and a man I have despised from the moment I laid eyes on him coupled with the first time I watched his lips trying to give an honest look to his obvious duplicity. This blog was from 2002 but a subject never picked up by the msm in this country but was a topic discussed in print in other countries

http://www.vialls.com/lies911/lies.htm

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/5/2/10177/11404 k&r

[jamesinca]

36. I think Feinstein sits on the Judiciary committee

I may just have to send this to her. And call her office in San Francisco. And call her office in DC. And call of of her other offices in CA. And call John Conyers and call my favorite Senator from CA Barbara Boxer.

[DemReadingDU]

38. morning kick

[leveymg]

40. Signing bonuses for laterals not unheard-of, according to this:

This from The Vault, "Timing Your Escape": http://www.vault.com/nr/newsmain.jsp?nr_page=3&ch_id=242&article_id=27860379&cat_id=3198

Firms seek to attract the best lateral talent in key practice areas, and it is a simple matter of supply and demand. Where qualified applicants are abundant, or the need is not as dire, signing bonuses are generally not paid. A "hot" firm or one with a coveted opening (e.g. media or entertainment law) almost never offers a signing bonus. On the other hand, if a firm is having a particularly challenging time recruiting experienced and highly-credentialed mid-level candidates in a highly specialized area such as Patent, ERISA, Real Estate or M&A, a signing bonus may be offered. It will not be the equivalent of the year-end bonus the candidate is foregoing, but it will be keyed to seniority. A firm chasing a desirable candidate with competing offers may use a signing bonus to sweeten the deal. Junior associates rarely receive signing bonuses, unless a candidate has particularly stellar experience or credentials. Like a clerkship bonus, a signing bonus can be a proxy for a candidate who brings special luster or "resume value" to the firm. Because most firms use signing bonuses on a case-by-case basis, there are few who advertise their payment of signing bonuses. Needless to say, trying to identify firms who trumpet signing bonuses would be an ill-advised way for you to identify prospective employers!

________________________

[IWantAChange]

41. Would appear Rep Waxman may have to go to 24/7 Oversight schedule

it's no farther along than the 2nd-3rd inning and it looks like it could be a monster

[hang a left]

42. Just how many more took the bait??

How many more were forced to quietly resign and we haven't heard from

Just jaw-dropping.

[Marie26]

43. Payoff

Waxman needs to subpoena her.