Margaret Cassidy and her colleagues at The Candid Counsel are writing away – see Margaret’s article: Can Your Lawyer Hold Their Firepower? I’ve seen over the years that holding firepower (that is, doing nothing), is at times, the best course for a lawyer. But it’s hard to do nothing…
Margaret and The Candid Counsel crew put together many terrifying tales of just what it takes to frighten your friendly attorney. In no particular order Margaret’s classic tales of terror include: Writing emails to your lawyer joking about who in the company will look good in an orange jumpsuit. Conduct your own internal investigation without…
Most attorneys are familiar with the basics of the attorney-client privilege, the attorney work product doctrine and attorney ethics rules to maintain client confidentiality. Although these precepts are governed by the law of the jurisdiction, the general protections are similar regardless of the jurisdiction. The attorney-client privilege protects communications between a client and an attorney…
Agency inspector general offices investigate complaints from persons in the federal government ecosystem who complain about waste, fraud, abuse of authority; violations of law, regulations or policies; or danger to public health or safety; and, suffer some type of adverse employment action for doing so. Since the enormous Department of Defense (DoD) gets so…
The Federal Government wants employees of contractors and subcontract and independent contractors to disclose to the government instances of fraud, waste, abuse of authority; violations of law, regulations or policies; or substantial and specific danger to public health or safety. Once someone makes a disclosure of this nature, laws and regulations protect them so they…
Question: What do: Cuban cigars A gas line to a heated pool Dinners at a French restaurant A job with a prestigious bank A charitable contribution Have in common? Answer: Each was considered a bribe in a corruption and/or racketeering scheme to improperly influence a government official or government employee to use their position to…
Lawyers, particularly prosecutors, love to question people and then to cross-examine about inconsistent answers to the questions. This compulsion to ask questions is acute in prosecutors because their job is to get to the bottom of things. The counterweight to this is the defense instinct to rebuff questions by “lawyering-up”, asserting the Fifth Amendment or…