We’re often accused of being BigLaw apologists (btw, stop emailing and start commenting if you have something to say!), but at least now we’ve got someone else to point to as being worse. Our buddies at AmLaw Daily.
In “Stanford Trial Drags Former Proskauer, Chadbourne Partner Back into Spotlight” they kiss up at least as badly as we do – and in this case, it’s worse, because even we are disgusted by Thomas Sjoblom’s role in the affair. How so?
Once the cochair of Proskauer Rose’s securities practice, Thomas Sjoblom saw his legal career hit a snag three years ago this month when former client R. Allen Stanford was charged with running a $7 billion Ponzi scheme.
Being indicted on obstruction charges accused of obstruction in a civil suit [Ed: we got it wrong the first time - he has never been indicted for that, he has only been investigated] is probably more than a “snag.”
A group of Mexican investors filed three class action suits last month against Sjoblom, Proskauer, and Chadbourne in Texas state court. The suits accuse Sjoblom and his former firms of aiding Stanford’s massive fraud by obstructing an SEC investigation into SFG and 140 other Stanford-affiliated companies around the world. (Click here for one of the three nearly-identical 94-page complaints, courtesy of Courthouse News.)
Last week, Sjoblom, Proskauer, and Chadbourne were also targeted in another suit filed by the Stanford estate’s court-appointed receiver, Ralph Janvey of Dallas-based Krage & Janvey. Janvey seeks $1.8 billion in damages from the three defendants, whom he claims turned a blind eye to Stanford’s alleged fraud and successfully stalled an SEC inquiry into the purported Ponzi scheme for years. (Click here for the 87-page complaint, also courtesy of Courthouse News.)
Also, more than a snag: getting sued a whole bunch of times, being forced out of your firm, and not even owning your own name as a domain.
Don’t get us wrong, though. No one loves Stoneridge Investment Partners v. Scientific Atlanta more than we do!
We think all the derivatives suits should continue to get thrown out – those are just zealous advocacy for a client and all that good stuff. Until it crosses the line, and, admittedly, Sjoblom may have come close. But Stoneridge is a broad shield…
What we don’t like is hanging clients out to dry. We think it’s shameful what he did to Laura Pendergest-Holt.
ALD also provides some of the other BigLaw involvement:
When Proskauer was hit with the initial Stanford-related class action in August 2009, and Chadbourne added as a defendant to the ultimately unsuccessful suit the following October, Sjoblom left Proskauer. (Davis Polk & Wardwell and Dallas-based Carrington, Coleman, Sloman & Blumenthal represented Proskauer in the litigation, while Chadbourne turned to Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison and Vinson & Elkins.)
Former Bryan Cave partner James Cole initially advised Sjoblom in the aftermath of SFG’s collapse. Cole was nominated in early 2010 to become deputy U.S. attorney general, installed in the job by President Obama as a recess appointment in December 2010 in the wake of tough questioning by a congressional committee, and eventually confirmed to the post by the Senate last June.
Sjoblom is now being represented in civil litigation by a team of lawyers led by McKenna Long & Aldridge partner Joshua Hochberg in Washington, D.C., and Fish & Richardson partner William Mateja in Dallas. Mateja, who is serving as Sjoblom’s local counsel, declined to comment about his client. Hochberg did not return a phone call.
What’s Fish & Richardson doing there anyway?
